{WIAW & RECIPE} Vegetable Pancake

Hi guys, it's been a while since I've done a WIAW post as I've been instagramming my food instead. Follow me on Instagram @missyungquainth =)  The weather in the UK has been up and down, mostly freezing cold and now I'm feeling poorly. I've got a cold and a cough; my nose is totally blocked and runny. I can't believe I'm ill before going away. I'm going Hong Kong for two weeks next Monday and I hope I'll be better by then. I need my taste bud to be working properly as I'll be pigging out everyday and night!

Today's WIAW post won't just be about what I had during week but will also feature a recipe for vegetable pancakes. =)  This week has been an indulgent week for me, I've been eating a lot on Wednesday and Thursday night and I broke my vegetarian diet. lol. But only for two days.

On Wednesday, I went out with my brother for dinner at Cha Cha Moon. I bought a Groupon deal pay £20 for £40 worth of food. We ordered three noodles main courses and one starter.

The first one is Fujian style udon, it has fishcakes, prawns, squid, belly pork and choi sum. 

This is seafood ho fun made in a black bean sauce; scallop, prawn, squid, red and green pepper. They put a bit too much dark soy sauce making it too dark. 

This was our starter, marinated sticky chicken. This was really good. I had two small bits as I didn't want to have too much meat.

The lobster was tiny and it cost us £25. Not impressed with the price, the taste and quality. The noodles tasted a bit like soap, they probably didn't rinse the noodles after cooking it the first time. The lobster was a bit over cooked making the texture very rough.  

After the dinner, we wanted dessert and so we walked to Häagen-Dazs for waffles. On our way we actually stopped at Cinnamon buns and got 2 mini buns for £1. A starter to our dessert lol. At Häagen-Dazs, we shared a Belgian waffle with raspberry and chocolate ice-cream. 

Thursday night was a date night with my boyfriend. We did a lot of walking. We walked from Liverpool street to Brick Lane and found a chocolate shop, they sold different flavours of homemade chocolate truffles and hot chocolate made with REAL chocolate and NOT powder. You can actually taste the cocoa. I bought a cinnamon hot chocolate.

Then we went to a bagel shop and bought some freshly baked bagel with smoked salmon and cream cheese and a block of almond cake. We ate this when we got home. We then walked from Brick Lane to Haggerston to my boyfriend's old work place, Ribeira, and we got free food! Lol. The chef made us both a salami sandwich, it was delicious! The bruschetta bread was crispy on the outside and soft on the inside, just perfect. We also ordered a smoothie like cocktail, was so refreshing.

This was just a snack before dinner. We then walked back to Kingsland Road for some Vietnamese, I ordered a bowl of pho with king prawns and my boyfriend ordered beef with ginger and spring onions and rice. Sorry didn't take a picture.

Sunday was my pancake day. If you're regular reader of mine you will know I love to experiment with my pancakes. On Sunday I decided to make some savory pancakes for lunch. The original recipe is from Shape Magazine but I adjusted a couple of things.

Ingredients (the following measurements are an estimate, I just went by my preference);
-1 cup of thinly sliced/shredded cabbage
-1 cup of carrots peeled like ribbons with a peeler
-1 cup or kale thinly sliced/shredded
-1/2 cup of spring onions shredded
-1/2 cup of diced mushrooms
-1/2 cup of all purpose flour
-3-4 eggs
-salt, pepper and other spices to season.

Method:
1. Cut up all the vegetables and then toss them together in a large bowl

2. Add the flour and toss well until all vegetables are coated

3. Beat the eggs and add to the vegetables and mix well. Add the spices to season.

4. Add a drop or two of oil into a non-stick pan and heat the pan. Once the pan is hot, turn the heat down to medium- low. Add about 2 spoonfuls of the mixture and use spatula to flatten it out like a pancake.

6. Cook each side for about 3-4 minutes or when its golden brown.

I served it with cottage cheese and it was a bad choice, I tasted better with ketchup. But if you seasoned it well you shouldn't need any sauce to go with it.

Thanks for reading!

WIAW- Birthday Carbs

Hi guys! Its time for What I Ate Wednesday. The sky is so dark this morning, miserable weather. I'm here drinking my green smoothie while writing this.

If you've read my last few posts you would know that I've put myself on a Lean Challenge; intense workout 5x a weeks and no white carbs. The challenge ended more or less on my birthday which was on Friday.

I went out for a birthday lunch with my family at my favourite Il Mascalzone, an Italian restaurant in Edgware. They are my favourite because their food are delicious and also their dishes are different, you won't find similar dishes at Bella Italia, Ask or other franchise Italian restaurants. I love their black ink quid spaghetti and the al dente texture.  See the photo below; black ink squid spaghetti with lobster, homemade Italian sausage and mushroom risotto, some vegetable pasta dish (I forgot the name of it), and the dome is meant to be some sort of pizza. Inside the dome are some rocket, tomatoes and mozzarella cheese. This wasn't that special but the bread nice and crispy.

Last night, went out for a belated birthday dinner with my best friend, I had Italian again. Yes, I love Italian. We went to a newly open local Italian restaurant, called Nonna's Kitchen. Sorry, I don't think it's Italian, I think it's Sicilian. I had tagliatelle with prawns and zuchinnie. It was yummy, the portion was just right. We didn't have starters as we wanted to have space for desserts- team sweet tooth!

We chose  a variety of 6 mini cakes, my favourite one is the ricotta cheese (the tube thing in the middle right), and the hazelnut cream puff (bottom right).

We also ordered a slice of pistachio cake with cream. This was a bit too rich for me.

And...yes there's more and it was just the two of us lol. We also ordered a slice of pistachio ice cream sponge cake. I had a great night eating! 

I made some mussels in tomato white wine sauce on Monday night. My parents and my brothers loves the way I make it lol. I realised that sprinkling parsley on the top of  any dish makes it look very professional. 

I got to show off one of the breakfasts I had this week. Do you like the way I decorated it? This mung beans, red beans and quinoa porridge, topped with blueberries and figs. Very nutritious and high in protein. 

There's more birthday dinners coming up with other friends, so more carbs on its way. October is a fatty month for me =p . 

Thanks for reading! 

Do you like Italian? Which restaurant do you usually go to? Are you a sweet tooth?

WIAW-Warm Oat Pudding

Hi people. I haven't written a WIAW post in a while mainly because I tend to only take photos of  my breakfast and forget about the other meals. But here are they anyways. : D

The weather in the UK is up and down, one day its cold and one day its hot. Typical English weather. To suit this cold weather, I've had less of cold breakfasts and have been making lovely warm oat pudding almost every morning. I haven't had enough of it yet, I'm sure I will by the end of the week. I'm not sure why I call it pudding when really its just porridge. Maybe because it reminds me of rice pudding. lol.

Tuesday Breakfast

I have so much time for breakfast that I make sure the presentation is top notch lol. Below is oat pudding made with chocolate soya milk, topped with figs, almond nuts, pomegranate, sunflower seeds and banana.

I topped it with some much fruits that that the pudding is totally covered, below is a closer view. 

Monday Breakfast

I love the crunchy texture pomegranate's seeds has and the sunflower seeds makes it extra crunchy. The rest (below) are made with almond milk. 

Sunday Breakfast

Do you like the colour contrast? Red and navy blue. lol. Goji berries and blueberries.

Saturday Breakfast

This is one is topped with blackberries, sunflower seeds and chia seeds.

I usually make my porridge by boiling the milk and oat together, stirring occasionally until creamy and sometimes I will add an egg to it for extra protein. This takes me less than 10 minutes. But this oat pudding is cooked slightly differently and takes longer, about 15-20 minutes.

The recipe is derived from Chocolate Covered Katie's Blog

What you need:

• 3 cups milk of choice (720g)
• 1 cup steel-cut oats (160g)
• 1/2 tsp plus 1/8 tsp salt (I think oatmeal tastes much better with a little salt, but you can use less if you normally make–and enjoy–oatmeal without salt.)
• 1 1/2 tsp cinnamon (level)
• 1/2 to 1 cup raisins (70-140g)
• 1 tsp pure vanilla extract (4g) ( I didn't use this)
• sweetener and toppings of choice

Method: 

If you have a slow cooker: Lightly grease the bottom of the crock pot, then add first 5 ingredients and stir. Cook on low for 3 1/2 hours. Turn off heat, then add the vanilla, sweetener of choice, and any other toppings or mix-ins you wish. (If you don’t have a crock pot, bring the milk to a boil and then add the next four ingredients. Lower to a simmer, and simmer 20-25 minutes or until thick.  Then stir in the vanilla, sweetener, and other toppings of choice.) You can store leftovers in the fridge – it’s a good idea to add a little extra liquid (milk or water) when reheating. 

Simmering 

What do you have for breakfast when its cold? How do you make your oatmeal? Please share your recipe :)

WIAW- dissertation taken over my food and workout

Hi my lovely people!
There isn't much for What Ate This Wednesday this week as my dissertation has taken over. That doesn't mean I haven't been eating healthy and having my daily smoothies but it does mean I have slowed down on my workout.  I only worked out briefly on Saturday morning with my friend. I was supposed to train her but I was just out of energy. However, I've been doing 5 minutes worth of leg raises before bed every night. I could see instant results!

No matter how busy I am, I will always make time for my breakfast and smoothies. Lol. Breakfast is the meal that I put the most effort on. Don't understand how some people can go without breakfast. I love my smoothies so much that I just don't feel complete if I don't have it in a day.

My smoothies have a been slightly different this week. I mentioned in my previous post that I bought some aloe vera juice from Holland & Barratt, well I've been adding them to my smoothies. But I can't really taste the juice, actually I don't even know how it tastes, lol. Maybe I should have a taste on its own first.

First its my Sunday smoothie, a detoxing one. Carrots, ginger, lemon, aloe vera juice, baobab powder and manuka honey. I'm really glad that I put some manuka honey to it because I put too much ginger and it was so spicy! The honey helped...a bit. I just downed this one.

On Monday I made a mango shake with hemp milk. Didn't add aloe vera juice though. I haven't had hemp milk in a while, I did miss the taste. The shake had one mango, cup of hemp milk, baobab powder, manuka honey and lemon juice.

Tuesday, I made a mucky looking smoothie. I used some home grown green apples (golden delicious), a cup of blueberries, aloe vera juice, lemon juice and water. The colour of this smoothie was quite interesting, to me it was anyways. When I first turned the blender on, the mixture was pink. When I blended it for another 10 seconds it was purple. When I poured it out it was brownish purplish. I didn't drink it straight away, I rinsed the blender then it was brownish redish, I think its to do with the apples turning brown. I realised that our home grown apple turn brown really quick when cut open compared to the ones you get in supermarket, when I say quick I mean in seconds. I think its because our ones are organic and the supermarket ones might have some preservative or something.

This morning I didn't have any idea what kind of smoothie to make as there wasn't much in the kitchen. So I just grabbed whatever I can see.

Banana, carrots, blueberries, gojiberries, plum, milled seeds, aloe Vera juice and water. No need to put any kind if sweetener as banana is sweet anyway. This actually tasted quite good.

What kind of smoothies have you been making this week? What's the weirdest combination you've made and gone wrong? 

WIAW: Gluten Free Diet

Hiya

It's time for What I Ate Wednesday. The UK weather has been going downhill, rainy and getting pretty cold in the evenings. :(

My boyfriend and I have decided to go on a gluten and wheat free diet. Well, not a strict one but try to avoid as much gluten and wheat as possible. This is because he reckons he is allergic to wheat and possibly gluten since every time he eats something that is made with wheat he will get bad stomach pains. He hasn't been to doctors to get it diagnosed though. And why am I going on it? Well, I can't to be honest. I'm Chinese and soya sauce is one of our main seasoning ingredients and it contains gluten lol. I'm not going on it to try to lose weight or whatever because it doesn't help you lose weight according to nutritionists. Gluten free products tend to have more fat than products with gluten. I just want to feel less bloated, gassy (sorry for saying this lol) and sluggish after eating certain food. I will just swap certain ingredient like pasta and oat to gluten free to help increase energy. Pizza Hut is doing a gluten-free base and I always get quite ....(not very feminine to be talking about it lol) after eating pizza so maybe that's something I could change lol. 

What is Gluten?

Gluten is a protein found in wheat, barley, rye which means most pasta and bread contains gluten. It gives bread that spongy texture, makes pizza dough stretchy and is used to thicken sauce and soups. Some people who has celiac disease cannot eat gluten, if they do they will get stomach cramps, diarrhea and bloating. But some may not have this disease but just may be sensitive to gluten.

The thing is with gluten free products or anything that is free from tend to be a lot more expensive. Why? It's so unfair. Why do people with certain allergy or celiac disease have to pay extra to get food? 

Anyways, going on a gluten free diet isn't too hard for us since vegetables and fruits are gluten free and we have a lot of that anyways. I bought some gluten free oat, gluten free pasta and and gluten free plain white flour the other day.

On Monday, I made a gluten free meal, Cauliflower and cheese pasta. Using Tesco's free from pasta, Dove's plain white flour and Tesco's free from almond milk. And obviously other vegetables.

Not brown enough I know. I made the white sauce with some onions and threw in some mushrooms.
The sauce was really good in fact, I think this is the best I've made so far lol. I did change the milk half way, I used Koko's coconut milk so the sauce was a bit sweet. The pasta just taste like regular pasta.

Yesterday, I made salmon and prawn spaghetti for dinner. I subscribed to Simply Cook recently which I will blog about later, they had a recipe for this and provided the seasonings so I tried it out. It wasn't bad at all but using creme fraiche as a sauce was quite sickening- the recipe said use creme fraiche.

Are you allergic to gluten or wheat?  What gluten free dishes do you make? 

What I Ate Wednesday- My first WIAW

Hello lovelies! As a fitness fanatic and healthy foodie, I read a lot of other fitness and health blogs. I realised that most of them blog about 'What I Ate Wednesday' (WIAW). I did a bit of research on what it is and who started it. WIAW was started by Pea & Crayon for her reflect on her eating habit and for other bloggers to see what each other are eating. So you blog about the meals that you had any day of the week. I love the idea however and I have got many healthy food ideas from other bloggers.

So Imma start my first WIAW.

Sunday breakfast started off with some wheat bran served with coconut yoghurt, a chopped banana, gojiberries, baobab powder and agave nectar. I've recently started adding whole gojiberries into my breakfast. My mum used to steam some gojiberries for me and my brother to have with our dinner because they are good for your eye sight. Then she moved on to brewing it with some chrysanthemum which is also good for your sight. In fact, goji berry is a commonly used ingredient by Chinese, they add it a lot to soups. Btw, the kind of soup I'm talking about isn't the chicken sweetcorn kind of ones you order from Chinese restaurant. Proper Chinese soup are very watery and are made from various plants (fruits, vegetable, nuts and fungus) and sometimes meat for a sweeter taste. 

I spent Sunday afternoon with my boyfriend and I made him a quick but nutritious lunch. It was semi- healthy, the unhealthy part was the stuff Yorkshire pudding and the white rice. You know Yorkshire pudding is quite oily and white rice is refined carbs so no good. I stuffed the Yorkshire pudding with some minced beef that was stir fried with some mushroom, tomatoes and onions. Then topped it with some cheese and popped it in the oven about 20 minutes. I cooked the white rice with some quinoa and a bit coconut cream (For a bit of Carribean flava lol). The yellow mushy thing is mashed sweet potatoes, Charlotte potatoes, cauliflower and sweet corn. I added some coconut milk to make it more creamy. And to complete the meal, I made a green smoothie with 2 kiwis, 1 honey dew melon, handful of spinach, 1 apple and 1 banana. 

Didn't take photo of my dinner as it was not interesting. So moving on to Monday. I decided to go to gym earlier well a bit earlier than usual, I went at 9am. Ok, I know that's not early for some of you and I know some of you probably work out at 6am. lol. Since I'm going earlier I didn't want to have a big breakfast so I made a pre-workout oatmeal; oat, hemp protein powder, baobab powder, strawberries, maca powder, 1 tbsp peanut butter and skimmed milk. Plenty of protein and a great energy booster. 

I worked my upper body only because its time of the month and I'm a bit funny with doing core workout....just the thought of it..never mind lol. I did a lot of triceps and bicep workout and did higher reps. My arms aren't flabby but they are not toned enough.They still move a bit when I wave lol. I want to get them proper toned and defined. I did about 20 power cleans too, a good whole body workout. I also did some squats and lunges but made it harder by holding a bar behind my shoulders. 

I'm telling you, that pre-workout drink lasted me long. I wasn't hungry after 1.5 hour workout but I still made a small lunch. I made another smoothie with 1 apple, 2 tomatoes, and 1 beetroot. Doesn't sound too pleasant but it was nice.  

Swedish wholemeal cracker with light cream cheese and smoked salmon, 2 fried eggs in yellow pepper rings. 

A couple of hours later I snack on some Chinese dessert, sweet soup made with a mixture of beans and grains. My dad made it, it helps calm his hayfever apparently. 

I started Tuesday morning with a "green" smoothie. It was supposed to be a green smoothie but it turned out pink lol. I put a banana, a cup of strawberries and about 8 leaves of Romaine lettuce. 

For a proper breakfast meal I had granola served with coconut yoghurt and Greek yoghurt, goji berries, baobab powder, mixed milled seeds and peanut butter.

Today (Wednesday morning), I went gym "early" and worked only on my lower body. Lots of squats and lunges and worked on various weight machines for legs, glutes and hip. I finished the workout with a 1 minute plank, I'm getting better at it lol.

Usually people blog about a day for WIAW but I ended up doing 3 days lol. But there's no rules, and I want to share most of my food, its fun! ^.^

What did you eat? How was your week?