Foodie Friday On A Saturday - What I Ate In May

As I said on my weight loss update on Monday, May was a bit of a disaster when it came to eating healthily. I ate the odd healthy thing but a lot of the things I've ate were naughty in the extreme :). A lot of this naughtiness was to to do with my birthday so that seems as good a place as any to start my review :)

Birthday Cake :) - my mum made my traditional birthday gluten free carrot cake, I love this cake and this years was especially yummy, especially with extra cream cheese frosting :)

Something else which I made especially for my birthday was my Spicy Mexican Cornbread (see the recipe here). I've been craving this for months so as I was having a treat day I went for it and made it extra cheesy.

As well as home baking I also went out for a few meals with friends and family. You can read about my meal with my bestie at the South Causey Inn here but I also went to Chiquitos with Mummy Lou. We're both partial to a bit of Tex Mex so we took advantage of the Lunch menu. My ever the carnivore momma went for a hefty cheese burger and I went for this..

It's a newish item o the menu and it's well worth having. It's the Halloumi Salad which is basically "skewered halloumi cheese, onions and peppers, grilled and served over a citrus dressed salad with cranberry & mint salsa" It was gorgeous grilled veg, salty squeaky grilled halloumi and the salsa - wow I could write poems, well I couldn't but you know what I mean, it was sweet, savoury, tangy, sticky amazingness -Chiquitos if your listening jar this stuff!.

As I said my mum had a burger, she's going through a meat phase at the moment, to give her, her due she eats lots of veggie food at home - I cook at least 4 nights a week and I don't do meat! Sometimes though she does cook it for herself, and lately she's had a burger thing going on, so I joined in and made myself a veggie burger to be proud of. A veggie burger in a gluten free bun, stuff with lettuce, raw onion, tomato ketchup, low fat salad cream and blue cheese - nom!

It's no real surprise that I gained weight in May, I probably ate more cheese than I probably had in the previous 4 months put together - first up a nice veggie lasagne.

I made a veggie, baked bean chilli, and layered it with gluten free lasagne sheets, chargrilled aubergines and creamy cheese sauce.

I also made nachos with my homemade salsa..

which is healthy in it's own right, but I don't think a mountain of tortilla chips, mozzarella and Red Leicester really help the calorie and fat content. In fairness the bag of tortilla chips had been lying unloved in the cupboard since January - how's that for willpower.

Speaking of cheese, in May I also experimented with something new - Genius Gluten Free Puff Pastry - Yes it's fattening but I have missed puff pastry so much. It's not exactly the same and I did find it a little less flaky but my yummy cheese straws speak for themselves.

When I was first diagnosed with gluten and wheat intolerance, there wasn't a lot of gluten free food on the market but now you can get gluten free friendly food from pretty much everywhere, including QVC.

QVC sell fudge making kits from a brand called Calico Cottage, as well as those kits they also sell some baking mixes, including one called Chocolate Fudge Pie. It's a gluten free almost brownie like cake, squidgy sweet and very, very yummy!

From sweet to savoury in the blink of an eye, and something that was a bit of an experiment - stuffed mushrooms! My mum got some huge mushrooms from Aldi and it was such a shame to just chop them up, so I decided to stuff them. I removed the stalks, chopped them up and added them to a pan with a crushed clove of garlic, a tiny bit of chopped onion, and a spray or two of fry light. I cooked them off till they were soft, then I mixed them with a little bit of Stilton, some gluten free breadcrumbs, and a bit of cream cheese. I then put the stuffing back into the mushrooms, put a bit more cheese on the top and then put them in the oven for about 20 minutes till the mushrooms were soft. I then served them with some yogurt, mint and garlic sauce.

Yogurt, mint and garlic sauce is a bit of an obsession for me at the minute, and I served some more with some curry loaf and some new potatoes. I didn't have any chickpea dahl to make it though so I made my own spicy bean mix. I cooked some garlic, onion and chilli in fry light before adding a tin of baked beans and some curry powder. I was really happy with how it turned out and I'll definitely make this version again x

I also served some with a nice fresh salad, with some olives and some coleslaw.

So that was my month, what are my plans for June? Well I'm hoping for a few more healthy options, and so far so good, I've started the month well but we'll see how I get on. Next weeks Foodie Friday post in a recipe for something erm not that healthy but we all need treats in life :). Happy Eating and I'll see you soon xx