Syn free slow cooked kofta curry

I love my slow cooker!  I’ve always been a huge slow cooking fan, partly because it saves me a lot of faffing about and always makes perfect meals but since I’ve been on this diet I’ve found it’s possibly the single best kitchen aid for adding flavor to diet food.  

Anyone on a diet knows that removing fat removes at least part of the flavor from a meal and the only real way to replace that is with a well-seasoned, flavor infused dish.  Indian food uses a myriad of spices which naturally lends itself especially well, in my opinion, to slow cooking.    

With that in mind I’ve tried a couple of different curries recently and this weekend did a kofta curry taste off.  I have a divided pot for my slow cooker and in one side did beef (using 5% mince) and in the other I made lamb koftas.  I don’t use lamb mince from the supermarket as it’s too high in fat, instead I went to the butcher who very kindly deboned and removed the visible fat from a couple of lamb joints then minced the lot for me.  I had enough to make the koftas and more in the freezer to make a shepherd’s pie later in the month – bonus!

To go with the meatballs I did plain rice and also sautéed some onions to make an onion and saffron rice as a completely syn free meal.  Clearly I could add veggies and oher speed food but apart from the onion in the lamb koftas I didn’t have any as, well to be honest I’m a little bored of fruit and veg and had the day off!

Syn free lamb kofta curry with rice

The results was that both were absolutely delicious however the lamb slightly more so, but that may have been because I’ve not had lamb for ages and it is one of my all-time favourites.  

The recipe for the koftas is here but you may want to look at the pulled chicken tikka masala in the slow cooker, I thought it was delicious too and my friends at fat class who made it agree that it’s well worth a go!

Kathy xx

Chocolate Nutella Brownie Bites

These were not my idea, one of the lovely ladies in my SW class posted the recipe and by the end of the day several of us had made them as they really can’t be any more tasty or easier.  I did mine a little before group and took them for a post weigh-in treat while they were still warm. 

Chocolate brownie bites

Let me just say this picture doesn't do them justice, they were much nicer looking than they seem here although a couple were a bit wonky! 

They’re 2 syns each for a small cookie but they taste absolutely delicious.  These would be great to make when surprise visitors pop by as it’s only four ingredients and 6 minutes in the oven…doesn’t get much better than that!!!

I only had a couple left after class but I put them in an airtight container and they were still really good the next day.  At breakfast (ooopsie).

If you want to give them a try the recipe is here

Enjoy!

Kathy xx

When the cravings hit!

The longer I’m on my diet, 9 months now and counting, the more I find I’m missing the oddest things.  Recently it’s been chocolate and the other day it was flapjack.  It’s a case of either having a little bit of what I want or a lot more of a ‘diet’ version and as I like my food (a lot!!) I’ve been creating new recipes to have more of the fake foods.

Chocolate has been straightforward.  I’ve been making my chocolate jelly sweets every few days in different flavours but at the moment the chocolate mint version are by far the best, they’re chocolate-y and refreshing so really good after dinner.  I had a couple of After Eights the other day after a curry (ok, so I’m not always managing to stay on it!) and of course they’re better but these are only 2 syns for the whole lot vs 2 syns per chocolate so to me it's totally worth it.  The taste is there, it’s the crunch that’s missing….I could cover them in a little chocolate but that kinda defeats the object!

Choc mint jellies

For my flapjack craving I made Cherry Bakewell Oaty Muffins.  They’re good but they’re not a flapjack.  I made them quite deep, had I done the same ingredients as a thinner cake I think it would’ve been more flapjack like but they are still really good and quite filling.  Two is a HEB and whilst I’m not swapping my Weetabix muffins for them yet I think they’re a nice alternative.

Oaty Cherry Bakewell Muffins

I’m continuing with the diet swaps as I’ve lowered my target again, this time it’s 6 ½ stone and I’m only a pound off.  The weight loss has slowed down but as it’s been the holiday and party season I’m encouraged that I haven’t gained at all, a couple of maintains and a couple of small losses see me at 90 pounds lost in 41 weeks and now it’s time to focus and get that final pound, shiny sticker and certificate…

Kathy xx

Slow cooked syn free shredded chicken tikka masala

I’ve lowered my target and have a couple more pounds to lose in order to get to my new, 6 ½ stone weight loss goal.  One of the things I wanted to do to help was look at old food diaries and see what contributed to the bigger weight loss weeks (I always keep a food diary and at the end of the week record the weight loss/gain that week’s menu saw).

One of the things I noticed was that I seem to lose more weight when I mix up my food, a good balance of meat/fish/chicken and a couple of veggie days if possible.  Seems to keep my body on it’s toes and stops me getting bored too!

So this weekend I decided to try something different with chicken, I have a lot of mince meals in the freezer and fancied a change.  I batch cook to make my life easy in the week and I decided to play with the SW recipe and see what I came up with.  I have a pot in my slow cooker that divides the whole thing in half so I also tried the chicken fajita. 

Pulled chicken fajita (left) and tikka masala (right) in the slow cooker

Both are shredded recipes and I have to say that the chicken tikka was delicious, really tender and tasty.  The chicken fajita one not so much, it was ok but not even close to as good as the curry.  Also, there’s not onions or peppers in the recipe, it’s just chicken and I’ve subsequently found out that it’s just as good cold, it’s going to make a great salad option and even something I can take and pick at when we have picnics in the summer.

Pulled chicken tikka masala - syn free

The slow cooker pulled chicken tikka masala recipe is here.  It might need marinating but trust me, it’s worth the effort and planning!

Kathy xx