Big Health Kick Food Diary: What I Ate In A Week

So, like a huge number of you out there, we are on a huge health kick at the moment.

A few people have been asking about what we are eating and for some ideas over on instagram (I’ve been posting a lot of things on my insta stories of the things I’m cooking etc) so I thought I’d do a What I Ate In A Week post.

Now a little disclaimer: I am not a nutritionist, I am just following some of the things that have worked for me in the past – if you need nutritionist-approved diet advice, please do source this properly and healthily. For me, it works – for others, I don’t know. Do what is healthy, that’s what is most important!

I know that for me to stick to any plan I need to eat sweet things, and I also can’t do completely cutting out rice & pasta, but I can cut them down. I need to feel full, and I know I will lose all motivation if I don’t prep in advance and eat things that don’t feel like “diet food” – these are just things I’ve learnt about myself over the years.

Also, in addition to these meals, I drink copious amounts of tea (with skimmed milk). I don’t count tea in my meal plans – it makes me happy and I’m not about to limit it – it’d make me very grumpy indeed!

I use MyFitnessPal as a way of tracking my intake which I find very easy, particularly when cooking up meals from scratch. Do let me know what works for you! 🙂

Monday

I was off on Monday so I spent the day doing day to day admin, a bit of laundry, a bit of shopping, and went to the gym.

• Breakfast – Poached Eggs on Smoked Ham (Four Slices of Ham and Two Eggs) – 282 calories
• Lunch – Fresh Tuna Steak with cucumber sticks, sliced red pepper & dollop of houmas. Sliced Melon & a handful of Grapes. Can of Diet Coke (yes, I know it’s not great for me but it’s yummy!) – 347 calories
• Dinner – Mor Chicken Sausage Rice Stir Fry – Wholegrain rice with red peppers, courgette and 5 Mor Chicken Sausages chopped into chunks and mixed in. 430 Calories (picture above)
• Something Sweet – 1/2 tub Halo Top Sea Salt Caramel (YUM) – 160 calories

Total: 1,219 calories

Tuesday

Tuesday was also a day off for me, which I had set aside as a bit of a “blog day” to reply to emails, write some posts and generally do a bit of blog admin. I also made my big chunky knit blanket which you might have seen on instagram and managed to get to the gym for a bit in the afternoon.

• Breakfast – Poached Eggs on Smoked Ham (Four Slices of Ham and Two Eggs) – 282 calories
• Lunch – Covent Garden Tomato Soup with two toasted pikelets – 270 calories
• Dinner – Beef Meatballs with Tomato Sauce and Wholegrain Rice – 542 calories
• Something Sweet – Bowl of strawberries – 55 calories

Total: 1,149 calories

Wednesday

I had a long day shift in the hospital on Wednesday so left the house at 6.30am and didn’t get back until 9pm – grab-and-go breakfast and a tupperware microwavable lunch were necessities! I don’t get a lot of time to stop during my shift so I don’t get the chance to get hungry really, despite it being a 12.5 hour shift!

• Breakfast – Two Omelette Muffins (recipe post to follow – these are a perfect grab-and-go breakfast!) and Two toasted pikelets – 225 calories
• Lunch – Thai Prawn Fishcake with Reduced Sugar Baked Beans (1 Snap Pot) – 328 calories
• Snack – Melba Toast & an Apple – 162 calories
• Dinner – Ginger, Lime & Chilli Chicken Breast with Roasted Veg and Mashed Potato – 391 calories

Total: 1,106 calories

Thursday

On Thursday I had a night shift, so I woke up at normal time Thursday morning (about 6.30/7.00am ish), had a normal breakfast first thing and a small lunch and then went back to sleep mid-afternoon for a few hours, before having another breakfast pre-shift and then dinner at about 3am in my break on shift – hence the weird order of meals for this day!

• Breakfast 1 – Poached Eggs on Smoked Ham (Four Slices of Ham and Two Eggs) – 282 calories
• Lunch – Handful Baby Plum Tomatoes, 2 toasted pikelets, 15g nutella – 202 calories
• Breakfast 2 – Bowl of Crunchy Nut with Skimmed Milk – 178 calories
• Snack – Heinz Cuppa Soup and Melba Toast – 133 calories
• Dinner – Thai Prawn Fishcake with Reduced Sugar Baked Beans (1 Snap Pot) – 328 calories

Total: 1,123 calories

Friday

After my night shift I was understandably asleep on Friday morning – apart from having to answer the door in my PJs to the DFS delivery guys collecting our new bed (which we were sending back after a huge drama – long story!)

I eventually woke up about 12.30pm and so had some brunch then. We drove up to Shropshire for the weekend on Friday afternoon, and decided on an impromptu date night that evening – dinner and drinks at a lovely restaurant, The White Hart at Ironbridge, down by the river. 🙂

With any healthy eating plan, I know that I need to treat myself occasionally, so this dinner was completely off-plan, exactly what I wanted, I ordered – and it was amazing!
As I had three courses including a very scrummy salted caramel fondant and a few g&ts, I just put 2,500 calories in for it all on MyFitnessPal – I imagine that might be a huge overestimation but I’d rather guess it as too many than too few!

• Brunch – 125g Low Fat Natural Yogurt with half a tin of peaches (in juice) and a handful of bran flakes – 266 calories
• Dinner – Starter – Crispy Lamb Belly with Onion Bhaji, Curry sauce, Yogurt & Coriander. Main – Sea Bream with Gnocchi, Fennel & Crabmeat salad. Pudding – Salted Caramel Fondant with Banana Fondant, Vanilla Ice Cream & Pecan Crunch – estimated 2,500 calories (probably less)

Total: 2,766 calories (and worth every single one!)

Saturday

On Saturday we were still up in Shropshire and M had a Golf Lesson late morning, so we had a bit of a lie in (I even had a cup of tea brought to me in bed – yep, he’s a keeper!)
We watched a bit of the winter olympics and then after M’s haircut we headed back home to Hertfordshire.

• Breakfast – 45g Crunchy Nut with Skimmed Milk – 178 calories
• Lunch – Mexican Chicken Breast, Red Pepper & Lettuce in a Wholemeal wrap – 380 calories
• Dinner – (we were back late so something quick and simple was needed!) Pasta with Tomato Sauce and Tuna, sprinkled with 20g Cheese – 480 calories

Total: 1,038 calories

Sunday

On Sunday morning we had a lovely lie in, watched some more of the winter olympics, and then headed into our local village for a coffee and some lunch, then spent the afternoon having a bit of a clean and tidy in the flat. M went away with work for the week on Monday so Sunday night was a chilled one together and an early night. 🙂

• Breakfast – Two Toasted Pikelets with Nutella – 185 calories
• Lunch – Fish Finger Bap (wholemeal bap and fresh homemade fish fingers from the deli we went to) – estimated at about 520 calories
• Dinner – Healthy Homemade Cottage Pie – 407 calories

Total: 1,112 calories

This week I ate well, didn’t feel hungry, treated myself, and managed to stick to eating healthily even when working erratic hours – and I managed to shift 1.2lbs too!

Do let me know in the comments if you like posts like this and I’ll do more ‘Healthy Eating’ posts and recipes etc on here…it actually helps me stay driven to do it too!