Slow Cooker Oatmeal

May 16, 2014

Okay so I just want to start off by apologizing in advance as the photo’s are not the prettiest But seriously, how pretty can oatmeal really be? Hehe, I tried my best but just be assured that this slow cooker oatmeal TASTES amazing!

So what is this week’s edition of Friday Fare? … Slow cooker oatmeal!

Slow Cooker Oatmeal

My boyfriend bought me a slow cooker a few weeks back and I am literally obsessed with it. It has made meal prep and meals in general so much easier. I mean seriously, all you do is add your ingredients (plus chopping stuff if you need too, which can take a while actually as slow Alice found out) into the slow cooker, set it to low or high, and then leave it for several hours. And voila! Delicious food in mass quantities, mmmmm.

Told you the photo’s wouldn’t be fantastic 🙁 SO delicious though

I discovered the idea of slow cooker oatmeal while just searching the web trying to look for alternatives to overnight oats. I really like overnight oats but it’s cold .. and I really like a warm and comforting breakfast. Slow cooker oatmeal presented a lovely way to have a warm and delicious breakfast with minimal effort involved! I like my oatmeal really creamy and rich so I used unsweetened almond and coconut milk as my liquid, but feel free to substitute half for water if you want a less rich oatmeal.

This meal is full of protein and complex carbohydrates and is extremely filling and should keep you feeling full for a good three to four hours.

Slow Cooker Oatmeal

Alice Williams

Creamy slow cooker oatmeal; all the taste with none of the effort.

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Servings 2

Ingredients

1/2 cup dry steel cut oats
2 and 1/2 cups unsweetened almond milk or sub for any milk you like
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp vanilla extract

Instructions

1. Put all ingredients into your slow cooker
2. Set slow cooker to 'LOW' setting and let the oats cook for 4 hours
3. Eat! You can add anything to these oats (after they are cooked though, I added fruit into the slow cooker and each time it turned out nasty). Some idea's are fresh fruit, honey, natural peanut butter, unsweetened cocoa powder, nuts .. the world is your oyster!

I hope you enjoyed this edition of Friday Fare. Now there is no excuse to not eat breakfast since you can make it ahead of time and then just leave them in the slow cooker with the setting set to ‘WARM’ 🙂

Honestly yours,
Alice

Fitness, Sunday Summary

Sunday Summary – Kayla Itsines Week 11

May 11, 2014

Kayla Itsines Week 11

I literally spent Tuesday through Saturday with the stiffest and most sore legs I have EVER HAD!!! For those who follow me on my bikini body guide journey, you will know that I have now completed week 11 of Kayla Itsine’s bikini body guide .. yay! On Tuesday, I did my leg workout and although I have done it once before in week 9, I truly pushed myself to the max this time. Hence the stiff legs for almost the entire week! It was pretty ridiculous, every night I would go to bed thinking ‘okay, so tomorrow they won’t be sore anymore’ and then wake up with equally sore legs -__-

I love the workouts for week 11 though. They are so intense and really make you realise just how strong you are. I have to say, the ab workout for this week has been my absolute favorite of the entire guide. It hits every part of my abs and makes them feel oh so tight and toned afterwards.

The arm workout is great too, although I have much more of a love/hate relationship with it. I did approximately 157 push up variations when I did my arm workout for this week, so hopefully that gives you some indication as to how ridiculous it is. But hey, at least now I can do that many push ups!! I normally do my workouts in the group exercise room at the gym, but for some reason an unannounced class was being held in there when I arrived on Friday, so I had to do it in front of all the cardio machines. A little embarrassing to say the least but I did look pretty bad ass doing all those push up variations, so it didn’t really matter in the end.

In other news, I was doing SO WELL on my #HFsugarfreemay until this weekend. It was my boyfriend’s graduation and so I wanted to bake him some yummy treats which inevitably ended up with me tasting these yummy treats too .. oops. Regardless, I think trying to stick to sugar free as much as feasibly possible as it is really quite helpful. It made me stop putting honey in my tea, stevia/brown sugar in my coffee and just made me think more about whether I really wanted that dark chocolate or not 😉 I am all about balance so having sugar/sweets/ice-cream or whatever once in a while is alright as long as you are being mindful about your choices and not completely gorging on whatever your indulgence is. With that in mind, I will leave you with a photo of my boyfriend and I at his graduation, haha.

So all in all, it was a great week and I am so excited (but kind of sad) to be finishing Kayla Itsines bikini body guide next week. Be excited for that next week and also for a really, REAAALLLYYY exciting post on Tuesday. Trust me, you will not want to miss it!

Honestly yours,
Alice

Friday Fare

Soba Noodle Salad Rolls with Peanut Sauce

May 9, 2014

So once again, I was extremely busy this week plus kept forgetting to take photo’s of possible Friday Fare options (le sigh). So instead of disappointing you all and not posting a recipe, I decided to share a soba noodle salad rolls with peanut sauce recipe created by one of my favorite healthy food bloggers, Nutritionist in the Kitch!

Some of you may know that I am a huge fan of Christal, from Nutritionist in the Kitch, and regularly make her recipes and find inspiration from her. I thought her soba noodle salad rolls with peanut sauce recipe looked incredible and I wanted to share it with you all. I actually bought some fresh spring rolls the other day, so I will be experimenting with my own fresh roll creations.

Without further ado, here is the recipe and some of Christal’s photo’s of this yummy looking dish 🙂

Ingredients

Rolls:
10 sheets rice paper
6.5 oz soba noodles
1 carrot, peeled and julienned
1 bell pepper, julienned
2 green onions, cut into strips
small bunch cilantro
small bunch lettuce
1 tbsp low sodium soy sauce
1 tsp sesame oil
Peanut Sauce:
¼ cup creamy peanut butter
½ lime, juice
1 teaspoon sesame oil
1 teaspoon rice vinegar
1 tablespoon soy sauce
1 tablespoon pure honey
1 clove garlic, minced
1 tablespoon fresh ginger (optional)
¼ cup water (add more if you prefer a thinner consistency)

Instructions

For Rolls: In a large pot, heat 4 cups of water to boil and cook noodles according to package instructions. Run cooked noodles under cold water and drain. Mix in 1 tbsp soy sauce and 1 tsp sesame oil with noodles. Set noodles aside.
Fill a shallow dish with warm water. Place one sheet of rice paper in dish until it is submerged, soak for 1 minute or so until it becomes soft, carefully set on a clean surface, such as a cutting board, and make sure the sheet does not bend or fold.
Place about 2-3 tbsp of cooked soba noodles in the middle of the rice paper sheet, top with a few slices of carrot, pepper, onion, a few sprigs of cilantro, and a couple leafs of lettuce.
Fold the top of the rice paper sheet over the filling, then fold in each side, then roll until the opposite end has closed the roll, put on a plate and repeat the process until you have ten salad rolls! (Learning this process may take a little patience, but after the first couple rolls you will get the hang of it! )
For Sauce: Combine all ingredients in a food processor, or mix together by hand.
Serve with cold rolls, enjoy!

Prep time

15 mins

Cook time
5 mins

Total time
20 mins

Serves 5

Nutritional Information

Serving size: 2 Rolls & 2 Tbsp Peanut Sauce Calories: 323 kcal Fat: 8.7g Saturated fat: 1.6g Unsaturated fat: 6.5g Trans fat: 0 Carbohydrates: 56.7g Sugar: 6.2gFiber: 3.6g Protein: 9.5g

Mmmmm, cannot wait to make these and fresh rolls in general. You can pick up rice paper at any Asian supermarket, and they are usually pretty inexpensive … perfect for a student budget, woo hoo! Actually most things at Asian supermarkets are much cheaper in general, so you should definitely give them a visit the next time you need groceries. I picked up some sesame chili oil for only $3 or something like that. Normally sesame oil is something ridiculous like $5 … no thank youuuu!

Have any of you ever tried fresh rolls before? I first had them about a year ago at a Vietnamese restaurant in San Leandro and have never looked back!

Honestly yours,
Alice