Saturday 26 January 2019

Egg Curry. No need for rice just salad on the side.

Ingredients

12 boiled eggs cut in half
1/2 teaspoon chilli paste
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
1/4 teaspoon garam masala
1 teaspoon dried coriander leaves
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons of macadamia nut oil
1 medium onion diced finely
4 medium tomatoes diced finely
1cm grated root ginger
150 mls sour cream
ground pepper

1. Heat oil in a pan and over medium heat sauté diced onion and tomato until they are soft.
2. Add chilli paste, cumin, garam masala, coriander, salt and ginger to the tomato and onion mix and allow to simmer for 5 minutes.
3. Remove from the heat and allow the sauce to cool for 5 minutes.
4. Put half of the mixture into a blender and puree. Add the puree back to the sauce remaining in the pan and mix through.
5. Stir in the sour cream and gently increase the heat and bring back to a very gentle simmer.
6. Arrange eggs in the sauce and allow the eggs a minute to warm through.

Serving suggestion
You could serve with traditional curry but it is not a very liquid sauce so I generally serve with salad.

Egg Curry - An absolute family favourite.       2019 (c) Daisy Hedge



Monday 21 January 2019

In 2018 I started intermittent fasting. Why?

As part of my awakening I have been doing intermittent fasting. I actually started about 3 years ago when Michael Mosley was promoting his 5 and 2 diet. I started to look into the research and gave it a try. It was hard but I felt better and my arthritis seemed to improve. But with a busy work schedule and family it was hard to maintain.

At the beginning of 2018 I starting doing 16:8 during the week and eating 3 meals with the family on the weekend and then that evolved into 20:4 during the week and finally OMAD (one meal a day).
I found online links to Dr Jason Fung's books, bought them and was particularly taken with the Obesity Code. As a science student and teacher it made so much sense and I angry that I had been lead astray all these years. I knew the science but never made the connections with weight gain and loss. I slowly started to lose weight with out much effort.

My husband read the book The Complete Guide to Fasting by Dr Jason Fung and did a 12 day water fast and then did Keto and hight protein  shakes for the remainder of the month. He lost 25 kgs. I realised that if he could survive fasting I certainly could and then I began experimenting with 24hr, 48 hr and eventually 5 day fasts. As you can see from the graph from about August you can see I lost about 15kgs. At Christmas I put it back on and I have just completed a 3 day fast to try and pull in the weight I gained over Christmas. This now a way of life and will continue to be probably till the day I die.

What lead me to this? I was always the chunky girl at school despite being active. I road my bike everywhere, swam nearly everyday, walked everywhere. I put on a lot of weight (got up to about 120kg) when I moved to a regional area when I first began teaching, probably due to stress and not really eating right. I then moved from a regional city to a small country town. There was no junk food - it was and hour away. Fast food was steak and veg at the pub. I walked everywhere, swam whenever the pool was open, did ballroom dancing, took up squash, road my bike on country roads for kilometres. I lost some weight at my smallest I was 85kgs. I then came back to city and my now husband and I had a very nice DINK (double income, no kids) lifestyle. We went out, ate at restaurants, got home delivery and our waist measurements grew and grew. We were happy, healthy and fat. But both of us had always been happy, healthy and fat since childhood. I think I went to about 115kgs.

When we decided to finally get married I was about 105kgs. We had been doing Atkins and had seen some improvement but carbs called us all the time. I was pregnant with our son when my husband was diagnosed with Coeliac Disease. He stopped the Aktins diet and decided to have feed of Weetbix and was in the toilet for a week - this was the starting point of all our issues really. Trying to find substitutes for wheat products lead us to carbs that were even worse in quality and more highly refined. I was diagnosed with Gestational Diabetes (borderline- had I have been in the US or UK the reading would not have considered high enough but in Australia the diagnosis parameters are lower and I was 0.01 over the cut off).  Whenever we ate gluten free bread, biscuits or pizza my glucose would go way out of control.

My Gyn/Obs sent me to a dietitian who supposedly was trained in prenatal diet and diabetes. She recommended grainy breads and low fat and told me to eat every 3 hours during the day. I tried what she said even though I didn't like her advice, she was the expert after all. My blood glucose was consistently high and I was eating when I wasn't even hungry. I began to put on more weight than the Gyn/Obs wanted. If you are obese and pregnant they usually want you to not put on weight - minimal weight gain. I abandoned her advice and ate only when I was hungry and stopped eating any gluten free products. As a result my blood sugars remained stable until about 1 month before I was due and I was having large fasting readings in the morning and the Gyn/Obs put me on a low dose of Metformin. After I had my son, the nasty placenta was gone and I no longer was diabetic and he didn't have any sugar issues. But did my weigh sky rocket in the next few months.

                                                           A little over 1 month old.

My son would not latch and I was eating all these different foods to improve my milk supply (which was minimal). The only part of me growing was my waist rather than my ability to make milk. I got up to 125kg. It was then recommended I join the WENDY program at the hospital. They were researching insulin resistance in post gestational diabetic women and guess what, I was insulin resistant. They got me doing a walking program (10 000 steps) and assigned me a dietitian. The walking was great and it largely improved my insulin resistance before any dietary modifications were made. The dietitian was great, she was 'normal' size rather than the anaemic specimen who told me to eat continually. She told me to reduce plate sizes, portion control and to enjoy food just don't eat crap food.

She said, 'if there is a morning tea at work - have something. Enjoy a piece of cake that someone has taken the care and time to make. You don't need to eat the Tim Tam or store bought donuts, be selective. Don't eat because someone wants you to finish the plate so they can take it home. They can throw to item in the bin or put it on another plate.' 

I have tried to live by the those words. I soon became pregnant with our daughter and had no gestation diabetes and actually lost weight during the pregnancy by not putting any on. I still ate normally but just not for two! But two weeks after my daughter was born I was having milk issues as I did with my son but I was also in unbearable pain - it turned out the pregnancy had induced Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA). I was no longer breast feeding because I was immediately put on steroids and pain relief and my weight fluctuated between 95-100 over the year after.

                                                                     2 weeks old

Twelve months later I went back to work with RA and two small children and the weigh slowly crept on again. Exhausted, stressed, sick with RA and eating for survival not health - lots of takeaway and convenience foods my weight eventually got up to 122kgs in January 2018 - time to make changes.

My mother died of Diabetes (type 2) related issues when she was 60. My father died of cancer when he was 72 but when he was 70 he was diagnosed with Diabetes. My maternal grandmother had Diabetes. My sisters both had Gestational Diabetes and one now is Pre Diabetic  and the other is Diabetic. My husbands father has had Diabetes since his early fifties- late forties and was nearly on insulin. I am not becoming them without a fight - fasting is my way to avoid Diabetes.


Monday 14 January 2019

My mid life awakening.

Six months ago I took leave from my job - 18 months. I took leave largely to have a go at starting a new business venture but to also have a break and do something different. Some friends and colleagues have jokingly called it my mid life crisis but I am calling it my mid life awakening.

I have been a teacher for 22 years. It wasn't what I always wanted to be. In fact it was the furthest from my initial career choice. I wanted to be a medical scientist but I stuffed around at university a little too much and did a teaching degree after my science degree so I could get work. I am a good teacher and despite it not being my first choice of job when I was younger I have strived to be the best teacher that I could. I have won awards, done a Masters in Education, become a head of department. So why do I not want to do it anymore?

Teaching doesn't excite me. Science excites me and passing the knowledge on excites me but that is not teaching anymore. The bureaucracy, constant changing curriculum, increasing pressure from parents and administrators to work miracles, the increasing long hours (because governments have failed to acknowledge the extra responsibilities dumped on teachers) and how those long hours prevent me participating in a normal life with my family are all the reason it doesn't excite me anymore. Before you say, 'teachers get so many holidays etc. etc.', at the request of my accountant I documented the hours I did at home marking, researching and planning. I was regularly working a 60-70 hour week during the term.

Lets do the calculation. A normal job with a 38 hrs week and 4 weeks holiday equals 1824 hrs a year.
A teacher works minimum 40 school weeks and each school week 60 hours, this equates to 2400 hrs a year. This also comes with enormous stress as administrators put pressure on for pass rate percentages to improve and marking to get turned around and moderated asap, parents and students contact you 24/7 via email or school message boards and the public passes judgement as to how they could do so much better if they were you. Finally you go - enough is enough, I want to be like other jobs where I don't bring my work home and I can have a holiday, go to the dentist or doctor when I feel like it. It is great to attend my own children's school functions rather than have to miss out because I am attending the function of the school I work for.

What has my mid life awakening shown me. In six months my health has improved - I am off rheumatoid arthritis (RA) meds because my stress levels have decreased. My children's health and well being has improved because they are not being dropped at before and after school care and their mother is focussed on them and not other peoples children. We have saved money because the kids are not at before and after school care, I don't need a cleaner and because my hours are not consuming the household we eat home cooked meals rather than takeaway or home delivery. I am not a single parent family, I do have a husband but he works full time too and when both are working full-time plus additional work related pressures 'shit doesn't get done!'

I feel like my creative brain has regenerated. The artistic endeavours I pursued 20 years ago have a chance to thrive again. I now have veggie garden. School doesn't consume my thinking all the time. My business is starting to increase and as hard as a business is to start and run it is still not has consuming as teaching.

When I told people I was taking time off to start a business etc. I got mixed reactions. There were colleagues who felt like me and were congratulatory at my braveness to try and break away and then there were those who were scared for me (or for themselves).

'What if it doesn't work?'  I don't care. I would rather have tried than have forever lamented of what could have been.
'What about your super?' I have 20+ more working years. I am not staying in an job that is not good for my health and mental well being because of an imaginary super payout that may/may not happen in 20 more years.

So, I have chosen to start documenting the adventures of mid life awakening. Mainly for my own benefit but it my thoughts helps someone else then my ramblings have been worth it.


Monday 24 September 2018

OMAD Shitaki Mushroom Omelette and Homemade Kimchi

Shitaki Mushroom Omelette and Homemade Kimchi

Shitaki Mushroom Omelette and Homemade Kimchi                                                                       2018(c)Thedaisyhedge
Now....if my calculations are correct this meal should be around the 800cal range. With makes it ideal for OMAD and weight loss for reducing sugar, even Keto.

My approximate calculations have it at

Cal 800
Fat 60g
Protein 35g
Carbs 25g
Fibre 5g

Serving : 1

Ingredients

100g shitaki mushrooms
1 spring onion
2 cloves garlic
1 Tbsp butter
1/2 tsp soy sauce
1 tsp sesame seeds
4 eggs
1 Tbsp mayonnaise (for on the side)
salt and pepper to taste


1 cup of kimchi - I used my own homemade kimchi but you could easily use pre packed. I own a small fermenter so I make my own yogurt and kimchi.

Method

1. Chop up mushrooms, garlic and onion and using half of the butter sauté in a pan until onion is translucent and mushrooms are soft and then add soy sauce.
2. Remove mushroom mixture from heat and put the the side while you prepare eggs.
3. Melt remaining butter, allow to cool.
4. Chop up second garlic clove.
5. Crack 4 eggs into a bowl and whisk.
6. Add melted butter and whisk.
7. Add garlic and whisk.
8. Add salt and pepper to taste.
9. In a lightly oiled or non stick pan pour in egg mixture. Heat the egg mixture on low until you see the egg starting to firm.
10. Place the mushroom mixture on top of the omelette and begin to fold the edges over.
11. Place filled omelette onto the plate. Garnish with sesame seeds.

serve with 1 cup of kimchi and 1Tbsp mayonnaise





Thursday 31 March 2016

Crackling unlike anything I have made before - fantastic!

I remember as a child waiting for the crackling on a pork roast. My father would fight with the stove to get just the right crackle and as great a cook as he was it was always a little charred. We ate it enthusiastically anyway. It has been my quest to get the ideal crackle. When I say quest I don't mean I have sacrificed the rest of my life to gain the ultimate crackle but every time I do a pork roast it becomes the only thing I focus on.

I have tried salting, drying and cooking high and cooking low. I have consulted google and read comments by Jamie, Heston and whoever else will offer an opinion. 

This is how I did it.
1. I bought the roast a day a go and resisted the urge to freeze it. I left it in the fridge in the vacuum pack.
2. Morning of roast dinner. Removed meat from plastic, cut extra lines in skin (butchers never seem to do enough) rubbed salt into skin and then I put a salt crust on the skin about 1/2 cm thick.
3. I placed the roast on a tray in the fridge uncovered so it would dry out for about 2-3 hours.
4. About 3 hours before serving time I turned on the oven to 250C to heat up and brushed the salt off the roast into the sink. Using a wet paper towel I removed the remaining salt and then patted the skin till it was dry to touch.
5. My roast was a 2.1kg rolled pork roast so cooking times may vary for other cuts. By this stage the oven had reached 250C. I turned it down to 140 C, put the roast in the centre of the oven and forgot about it for 2 hours.
6. At the 2 hour mark I put the potatoes and pumpkin in (cut in size to about 1/2 an apple). A little over an hour later (approximately 3 hrs since it went into the oven) I removed the roast and the veg from the oven. I turned the oven up to 200C and put only the roast back in and cooked it a further 10-15 minutes.
7. I removed the roast and put the veg back in for 10-15 minutes at 200C while the meat rested and I made gravy and cooked some peas.

This is what it looks like at the end. Evenly cooked and every bit was crunchy. It was like finely made honeycomb - a very smooth finish with tiny bubbles of crunch. 
The beautiful crackle (c) The Daisy Hedge 2016
My son told me it was the most fantastic crackling he had ever eaten (he is 6) and my daughter who is 3, after saying she hated crackling became a convert and couldn't get enough on her plate.
Close up of the beautiful crackle (c) The Daisy Hedge 2016
As a mentioned we had potatoes, pumpkin, peas and gravy to accompany our pork and crackling but I also indulged in a some red wine. Because of my arthritis medication I can only indulge occasionally. This was moment of celebration, I had to toast to the crackling! I collect wines in our travels and this one I bought in Port Macquarie Easter 2015. It was lovely. I now wish I had bought more!

Sangiovese Shiraz 2013 from Cassegrain Winery, Port Macquarie (c) The Daisy Hedge 2016


Wednesday 23 December 2015

Chocolate Macadamia Brownies ( Originally Posted From Camille's Pantry 14/9/10)

Chocolate Macadamia Brownies

(c) 2010
Ingredients and Equipment
1/4 cup macadamia nut oil
250g dark chocolate buttons
1 cup caster sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla essence
2 eggs, beaten
1/4 cup besan flour
1/4 cup potato flour
1/4 cup yellow maize corn flour
1/4 cup white maize corn flour
1/2 cup chopped macadamia nuts
1 muffin tray with paper liners (12 muffin tray)
Procedure
1. Preheat Oven 180 C and put paper liners into muffin tray.
2. In a medium heatproof bowl over a saucepan of simmering water heat macadamia oil and chocolate buttons. Stir slowly to ensure chocolate and oil blend well. Becareful not to let water get into the mix as chocolate will “seize,” or turn into a grainy, clumpy mess in the bowl.
3. When chocolate and oil are blended slowly add sugar. Mix well after each addition. Sugar may not melt, it just needs to be mixed into the chocolate and oil.
4. Remove bowl from heat. Add vanilla, eggs and nuts, mixing after each addition.
5. Flour will need to be sifted together and slowly added, again, mixing well after each addition.
6. Spoon mixture into the paper muffin cases. You will only need to fill the cases half way as the batter will rise. Cover remaining batter and place to the side to use for next batch. Do not put the remaining batter into the fridge as the sugar and chocolate will solidify and you will not be able to spoon the batter into the muffin cases easily.
7. Put tray into oven for 20-25 minutes or until the brownies are firm.
8. Allow the brownies to cool for 5 minutes in the tray and then remove the brownies carefully. If they are still warm they will bend in the paper cases and be misshaped. Cool at room temp.
9. Reline the tray and spoon batter for next batch.