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nutritious

Friday Fare, Health

Easy Shrimp Tacos

April 11, 2014

Easy Shrimp Tacos

This week’s Friday Fare is dedicated to my friend, Tenny, who requested an easy shrimp tacos recipe for the upcoming Cinco de Mayo!

shrimp tacos

I thought this was a great idea because a) I wanted to make taco’s anyway and b) Now you can all make these taco’s for your cinco de mayo parties, or to just eat and enjoy. This taco has my own Alice twist on it. Instead of cabbage, I have included spinach because then you don’t have to spend ages shredding cabbage. Plus, spinach is extremely healthy for you and very, very tasty. I decided to use guacamole to spread onto the taco (like butter on bread) AND also as a topping. The main ingredient in guacamole is avocado, which is a source of healthy fats and has quite a range of vitamins and minerals. Healthy fats are a necessity to aid your body’s absorption of vitamins and minerals too, by the way.

Your carbohydrate source comes from the corn tortilla’s, and your protein comes from the shrimp! I am a mega fan of shrimp (as those of you on Instagram know) because they are low in calories but quite dense in protein. For example, 4 ounces of shrimp is only 80 calories and has 18 grams of protein!

For all you students out there, I recommend buying frozen shrimp in bulk because it is much cheaper and it is really easy to thaw – you just put it in hot water for a few minutes and it is ready to cook.

Shrimp Tacos

Alice Williams
Celebrate Cinco de Mayo with these tasty and healthy shrimp tacos!

Ingredients
  

Ingredients

  • For the taco's
  • 2 corn tortilla's I used blue corn tortilla's from Mi Abuelita Bontia Naturals
  • 1 cup fresh spinach
  • 4 oz shrimp or 8 jumbo shrimp
  • Juice of half a lime
  • 1-2 teaspoons cumin
  • 1-2 teaspoons garlic salt or 1 clove of crushed garlic and 1-2 teaspoons of high quality salt
  • For the Guacamole
  • 1 ripe avocado
  • 2 crushed cloves of garlic
  • Juice of 1/2 a lime
  • 3-4 cilantro leaves
  • Optional - 1/2 diced jalapeno

Instructions
 

  • 1. Prep the guacamole first. Trust me, you will devour the taco's and forget all about the guacamole if you have not made it first! To do that, mash all of the ingredients listed above for the guacamole in a small bowl and set aside.
  • 2. Now get a large frying pan and put over a high heat. Wait 30 seconds to 1 minute until the pan is quite hot and then put the taco on it. Cook each side of the taco for 30 seconds to 1 minute - until they are lightly browned.
  • 3. Once both taco's are cooked, you can spread your guacamole onto them. I used about half of the guacamole I made to spread onto the taco's. Then add a layer of spinach onto your taco's, will require about 4 spinach leaves, depending on how big they are. Set aside for now,
  • 4. Saute the shrimp in a frying pan, using either coconut oil or olive oil. I used a spray olive oil to minimize the calories and fat since I am getting a substantial amount of healthy fats from the avocado already. Sprinkle the cumin and garlic salt over the shrimp, and then drizzle the lime juice over the shrimp. Please adjust the amount you add to your taste.
  • 5. Once the shrimp has cooked (does not take long, maybe 5-8 minutes?) place them evenly onto your taco's, and place another layer of spinach on top of them. Add some more guacamole if you want, and some salsa if you have made or have some as well.
  • 6. Place a few cilantro leaves on the top of the taco's (if you want), drizzle some more lime juice on them and then fold, and enjoy!
Shrimp Tacos

Shrimp Tacos

 

Shrimp Tacos with guacamole

I hope you have all enjoyed this week’s edition of Friday Fare! I love this recipe because it is quite a light dish, yet very satisfying, tasty and healthy all at the same time 🙂 I prefer to use corn tortilla’s because flour tortilla’s tend to have a lot more ingredients in them whereas corn tortilla’s are much simpler. Annoyingly though, flour tortilla’s do have more protein and fiber but corn tortilla’s have less calories. And for those who are intolerant to wheat and gluten, corn tortilla’s are the obvious winner here. I think corn tortilla’s are tastier too hehe, but that is just my personal opinion!

As always, if you recreate these, please please use the hashtag #fridayfare and tag me in your post so that I can see them! And if you like the posts, why not subscribe .. 🙂

Honestly yours,
Alice

Fitness, Health, Sunday Summary

Sunday Summary: Kayla Itsines Week 3

March 16, 2014
sugar free and refined free muffins

Hello everyone!

This was an INSANE week for me! I had a research proposal and a presentation all due this past week, so I was working like a maniac to make sure I got everything finished and to some sort of a high standard. I don’t know how I managed to get everything done, but when it hit 10PM on Thursday night (yes, my classes end at 10PM), I breathed a sigh of relief because my weekend had finally started …

In addition to all this work, I had a really great consultation with Body Type Nutrition coach and fitness model, Stephen Box. He has been my secret nutrition weapon these past few months and has been helping me with losing the last bit of fat and has taught me a lot about nutrition along the way. Since I am NOT a certified nutritionist, I can always use some help and I do not think any of you should shy away from getting help from qualified sources. Anyway, I was feeling a little demotivated and he really helped set me back on track. So thank you so much for that, Stephen! Staying inspired and motivated is a key part of staying a healthy and fit individual and certainly not something that should be overlooked.

This weekend saw me making some very sound nutritional choices as my boyfriend and I went to visit his grandparents and aunt who are sugar-free and gluten-free, because his aunt has candida (which I actually want to do a whole post on at some point, because candida overgrowth is actually a huge problem). Ergo, this weekend was full of delicious meals and desserts which were guilt free! For those of you who follow me on Instagram you will have seen the photo’s I posted of all the yummy food and the beautiful scenery I enjoyed.

Kayla Itsines Week 3

Luckily for you all, I have been given permission to share some of these recipes so look out for them as I release them over the next few weeks. Here is a little teaser of one of the recipe’s I plan to share with you all …. 🙂

sugar free and refined free muffins

 

Doesn’t that look so good and fluffy?!

Kayla Itsines Week 3

So that’s it from me! Ohh, I guess I should state that I have officially finished week 3 of Kayla Itsine’s Bikini Body Guide, and will now be going into week 4. This week KILLED ME. So .. many … jump lunges … my god.

Hope you all had a wonderful week! Let me know what you got up too in the comments below 🙂

Honestly yours,
Alice

Friday Fare, Health

Friday Fare – Healthified ice-cream with toffee sauce

March 7, 2014

Woooow, it’s Friday already?? Umm, the weeks pass by too fast for me. And I have a lot of work due next week for uni, so that’s not necessarily a good thing lol.

Anyway, I thought I would show you all how to make a healthier and clean version of everyone’s favorite dessert: ice-cream! And since I loooove toffee, I thought I would show you how to make a healthy version of that, to drizzle on top of the ice-cream.

Healthified ice-cream with toffee sauce

Healthified ice-cream with toffee sauce

I was inspired to do this, because a) I freaking love ice cream, and b) I am in LOVE with banoffee pie. Read bananas and toffee in a pie. Together. Heaven in a pie. And because this ice cream is made out of bananas, I thought it would be delicious to pair it with a healthy and raw toffee sauce 🙂

This recipe was also inspired by recipes featured on Blogilates and The Detoxinista 🙂

And note, before you can do ANYTHING, make sure your bananas are ripe and sweet and then slice it up and freeze the banana slices overnight. This is a crucial first step, as the frozen banana slices is what gives you a deliciously sweet and creamy texture to the ‘ice-cream.’

Also PLEASE USE NATURAL PEANUT BUTTER and not just any old peanut butter 🙂

Alright, banana slices all frozen? Excellent, let us move on.

 

Healthified Ice-Cream with Toffee Sauce

Alice Williams
Healthy 'ice-cream' that literally tastes and has the exact same texture as ice-cream!

Ingredients
  

  • For the Ice Cream
  • 2 bananas sliced and frozen
  • 1 tbsp Peanut Butter
  • For the Toffee Sauce
  • 12 pitted medjool dates
  • 3 tbsp milk
  • 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Instructions
 

  • To make the ice cream
  • 1. Throw your banana slices (or you can gently guide them) into your blender, and whizz it until the consistency becomes smooth and creamy. This will be done very quickly if you have a Vitamix or Ninja blender and unfortunately will take longer with a less high powered one. I found that a food processor actually worked very well in getting a very ice-cream like texture, but perhaps that has more to do with the fact that my housemates food processor is perfect ..
  • 2. Then add your peanut butter to the mixture. Blend for another 30 seconds – 1 minute.
  • To make the toffee sauce
  • 1. Make sure you soften the dates by soaking them in hot water for a few minutes (3-5 is fine) first.
  • 2. Once the dates are soft, add the dates in first and blend them for a bit until adding in your milk and vanilla extract.
  • 3. Blend until your desired consistency (I wanted to leave mine a bit gritty and thick) and then either add to the ice-cream, on top or by swirling it in orrrrr just eat it. Hehe, it is really good.

Notes

Adapted from Blogilates and the Detoxinista
Healthified ice-cream with toffee sauce

Healthified ice-cream with toffee sauce

I hope you like this recipe as much as I do!! I normally like to add some unsweetened cocoa powder to my ice-cream mix, or I stir in some unsweetened coconut flakes and dark chocolate chips. Experiment, the possibilities are endless!

If you make this delicious dessert and post it on Instagram, Facebook, or any form of social media, please tag me and hashtag it with #fridayfare and #honestlyfitness so I can find you 🙂 My name on all social media outlets is just ‘Honestly Fitness’.

Love you all so much, and I hope you have a wonderful weekend. And remember to indulge once in a while! I had a ridiculously decadent little dessert last night and plan to go out for Indian food with my good friends tomorrow night. Although health and fitness is important, it is all about balance. Don’t deprive yourself, and don’t go too crazy 🙂

Honestly yours,
Alice