We need to talk about Kevin

Kevin came to stay on Monday.  He had been abandoned by his mother during Sunday night and by Monday morning he was suffering with hypothermia.  He is about 6 weeks old, but is only half the size he should be.  His mum is a cull-ewe, which means she has reached the end of her breeding life and should not have been having any more lambs.  No one told her, hence Kevin arrived.

 

He urgently needed warming up, so I tucked him up in the kitchen with a hot water bottle and covered him with a rug.  He had a runny nose and eyes and you could hear him rattle with each breath. 

A six-week old lamb should be bonny and plump, but Kevin was scrawny and had a nipped in tummy. He needed feeding up, but after six weeks with his mum, was very reluctant to take to a bottle.

I persevered over Monday and was up early to make sure I had time to feed him before work on Tuesday morning. Jamie and I popped home at different times during the day to check on him, and try to tempt him to have more milk. We were worried that if he didn't get his appetite back, he wouldn't make it.



We put him in the garden, where he gravitated straight over to Dave II, thinking he was joining his flock.

 

He was happy grazing for a bit but still very reluctant to have a bottle of milk.  In desperation, Jamie gave him some hay.  Kevin spent the rest of the day happily chomping away. 

When we came down on Wednesday morning, Kevin had eaten nearly all his bedding and was wandering about the kitchen looking for something else to eat!  He even downed about half a pint of milk. 

 

Having made such an amazing recovery, he was definitely well enough to go back to the farm.



I think he looks rather like Shaun the Sheep!

NB: Apologies for the poor photos, most were taken without the flash as I didn't want to startle him.
Although he looks rather sweet he was a very stinky lamb.

 

Swimming the Channel

As part of my master plan to become more healthy, I have taken up swimming again.  My dad taught me to swim many, many, many years ago and every Friday evening our family would go for a swim at Hatfield Pool and afterwards we'd get fish & chips. 

I am swimming twice a week and have seen a huge improvement in fitness and stamina already.



After just six weeks, I am able to swim half a mile, in half an hour.  I have found this website where you can read tips to help improve your technique and log the number of lengths completed.  To date I have crossed 22% of the channel!
 

 

I will do everything in my power to avoid bingo-wings and no, I am not having fish & chips afterwards.

5:2 Vegetable Soup

As promised, here is my recipe for Vegetable Soup, 5:2 style:

2oz celery - 2 calories
6oz carrots - 54 calories
5oz onion - 30 calories
8oz courgette - 40 calories
garlic - I don't think a clove or two registers on the calorie scale?


 

I usually bung the whole lot through my food processor which only takes seconds to chop, although it makes for more washing up, but I feel this is the lesser of the two evils.

I put the chopped veg in a large saucepan and add:

390g carton chopped tomatoes - 72 calories
lots of basil - 0 calories
 

 

I add enough water to make up to about 3 pints, which is roughly 2 refills of the tomato carton.
When the vegetables are well cooked, I blitz with my stick-blender.  Half goes in the freezer for my second fast day and the other half goes in a flask to keep my going during the day.
 

 

I tried various combinations before I settled on this recipe.  There was no loss in flavour by not sweating the veg in a little oil first, and opting to use water rather than stock knocked out a few more calories.  This final version is quite satisfying and not too thin or watery.  If you try it, do let me know how you get on.

Eat, Fast & Live Longer

Every magazine or newspaper I pick up is banging on about 'Eat, Fast & Live Longer'.

Well, I'm about to join them!

I haven't seen the Horizon programme that was presented by Michael Mosley in which he followed the 5:2 diet but I have heard about the health benefits associated with this way of eating.  Apparently if you deprive your body of calories it stops producing a growth hormone call IGF1.  We in the West have access to far too much food and as a result we don't stop producing this hormone.  This means that we are constantly producing new cells.  This is fine when we are young and still growing, but once we are adults it is beneficial to put our energies into repairing cells rather than just create new ones.  It is thought that following this way of eating will lessen your chances of suffering from heart disease, diabetes, cancer and may also help prevent the onset of Alzheimer's. 
And, if you should need another reason to give it a go, it also aids weight loss.

The idea is that on two, non-consecutive days you drastically restrict your calorie intake to 500 for women and 600 for men.  The other five days, you eat as you would usually do.



I started to follow this way of eating about half way through November and in five weeks, I lost 5lbs.  I decided to put it on hold over Christmas as I knew fasting wasn't for me over the festive period!  Since we've gone back to school, I have resumed and have lost the 2lbs I put back on over Christmas, plus an extra 1lb.  It works out that I am losing about 1lb a week.

But the real bonus, is that I feel really well.   In a perverse way, I look forward to my 'fasting' days.  I have a sense of achievement for every day that I stick within my calorie allowance and I know that every single thing I eat on those days is considered and healthy. 
 

 

This is a typical lunch on a fast day.  Just a great big bowl of salad, packed with flavour, looks beautiful and not an ounce of fat within sight.  On fast days, I certainly manage to hit my 5-a-day, reduce my caffeine intake and I don't feel overly hungry during the day.  The biggest challenge for me is to restrict my tea and coffee, as I can't drink them without milk and having milk does cut into my calorie allowance.

This salad comes in at 80 calories.

I will be sharing some of my tried and tested 5:2  recipes and tips over the next few weeks, which you may want to try even if you aren't adopting the diet.

If anyone has experience of this lifestyle, I would love to hear about it.


 

Salt & Pepper Squid

This is so easy and so delicious - if you like squid! 



You need:
Squid
Cornflour
Sea Salt
Freshly Ground Pepper
Oil for frying.



Slice the squid into rings. I bought mine frozen in Waitrose, and would imagine most supermarkets stock it, or a Fishmonger, if you are lucky enough to have one near you.

 

Mix about a tablespoon of cornflour with plenty of salt and pepper - you need plenty of seasoning, so don't stint on the salt and pepper

Heat about 1cm of oil in a frying pan and fry the squid in batches, for about one minute.  Drain on kitchen paper.

 

I made spicy potato wedges to go with.  Leave the skins on the potatoes and cut into wedges, roll in olive oil and Hot Smoked Paprika.  Again, use more than you would think as it loses some of it's intensity during cooking.

Serve with salad and a good squeeze of lemon.