Homemade manual wood splitter

Sadly we are not yet in the position to need wood for winter, but when we have our passively heated house with a wood burning stove I have EVERY intention of rigging up one of these...







A perfect example of human ingenuity making a labour intensive job a bit easier. I'm pretty sure this is a brilliant example of some basic physics principles - fulcrums (fulcra?) and levers and moments and things.

Just brilliant.

Adventures in fermentation: Making cider vinegar, ginger beer, and kefir

Now then, while I am happily pootling away at the Forgotten Household Crafts project, I am very bad at sticking to only one thing at once. When I get inspired, it tends to take many forms - I blame my creative brain *shakes fist*

So,  alongside my reading of Mrs. Beeton and digging through various crafty books I had an urge to try going no-poo again and try making my own bathroom cleaning spray. Then I ran out of kimchi, realised it's Christmas next week, and went shopping at my favourite shop in the world where I found some kefir. Inspiration set in.

The magic word: live. My interpretation: breedable!

I realised that going no-poo meant I was very shortly going to run out of cider vinegar, so resolved to try making my own. I made some more kimchi, and while chopping up cabbages wondered if I could ferment ginger into ginger beer to have at Christmas (answer = yes). As for the kefir, I'd read about it, but never tried it - let alone made it.

Having detailed the process of making cider vinegar and ginger beer I  realised these are blog posts in themselves (more soon!), so for now, some teaser pictures...

Cider in the making...

Spontaneous fermentation of ginger smush... ginger beer here I come!

As for the kefir... well, that's currently just a jar containing some milk and a spoonful of kefir on my kitchen sideboard. We'll have to see if it turns into anything...

Mrs. Beeton's Book of Household Management

Dear reader, I have a Christmas present for you...

You can download a copy of Mrs. Beeton's Book of Household Management on Kindle for the handsome price of £0.00 - that's right, it's FREE! (just click the link to go straight there)

So whether or not you have a Kindle, you can have a look at an electronic copy of her masterpiece (all 591 pages of it - including a recipe for toast) without having to spend any of your pennies.

This does not mean I will not be 'borrowing' my mum's copy when I go there at Christmas, but at least this way I have a more robust copy that I won't worry about spilling things on.

Happy reading!

Forgotten Crafts Project #1: Preparing food

Today I read a very pertinent review of John Seymour's other book (The Forgotten Arts and Crafts), which read:

I really thought this book would be about

1) The forgotten crafts
2) How to learn to do them

What I got was a lot of reminiscing and stories about how things were better before mean 'ol World War I came along and industrialized England.

Beginning to read the chapters of this book, I see this person has a real point.

The first chapter on food preparation is divided into 6 sections:

* savoury puddings
* desserts
* chopping, pounding and pulping
* beating
* cake mixes
* pastry making

Some of these I think are good fodder for investigating 'forgotten household crafts', and some of them less so. The section on cake mixes seems to basically cover how as a boy he preferred eating the cake batter to the actual finished product.

And that's about it.

So I might not be addressing that one in quite so much detail.

He does however talk a lot about puddings (both sweet and savoury) and they seem like things I should be investigating. We've all heard of Yorkshire puddings - but what about Essex or Suffolk puddings? Summer pudding is fairly well known - but what about Cambridge pudding?

But of course there are no recipes.

So I will have to broaden my net to investigate other sources of such knowledge, as Mr. Seymour is not hugely forthcoming on the issue. I do have a few tricks up my sleeve, not least of which involving pinching my mum's copy of "Mrs. Beeton's Household Management" when I visit at Christmas (mwahahaa), but I suspect a trip to the library is in order.

Does anyone have any recommendations for useful books...? Please let me know!

Forgotten Crafts Project: Introduction

"I'm only a housewife, I'm afraid"

So opens the Forgotten Household Crafts book. Immediately I am realising I have completely misjudged the project, and that my views - beaten into be by society and the media over the years, are completely in opposition to those of Mr. Seymour.

As far as he is concerned there is no nobler profession - unless you are a farmer - and it angers him that the role of 'housewife' is so maligned. As I begin to read the book, I realise he is right, and I wonder where the idea that running a house is neither a) challenging nor b) time consuming comes from.

Ugh.

Since completing my PhD I have effectively been a housewife, while I've tried to work out what my next steps are to be. Even with modern conveniences I find that keeping our home clean, tidy and organised takes up most of my time, and I've had to earmark my mornings for writing if I don't want to spend my entire life doing 'house work'.

While both Jon and I were working full time I think we began to realise that our lifestyle wasn't compatible with us both being in full-time work. If we wanted to keep chickens, make all our food from scratch, preserve food that's in season, run an allotment, mend clothes and furniture rather than replacing it, make people gifts AND have a clean, tidy and organised house, we either needed to be super-human or make some life changes.

And despite our range in superhero pyjamas, we were not developing anything approaching superpowers.

There was one section that really stuck out to me in the introduction. It refers to our attitude to work:

"I was talking to an old lady [...] and she gave me an account of a week's work when she was a child: washing on Monday, selling eggs and butter at the market on Tuesday, baking on Wednesday, and so on. "Wasn't it all a lot of work?" I asked her. "Yes," she said "but nobody had ever told us there was anything wrong with work.

"And what do people do with all the time they "save" by not having to look after their homes properly? Do they spend all that time improving themselves or their environment? They do not, for life without the firm base of a good home is unsatisfactory and unpleasing. So such people seize on any cheap thrill that comes along to allay the boredom. They besot themselves with the telly"

Speaking for myself, this pretty much sums up my life when I was working full time! My home was cluttered and unloved which made me stressed, and I didn't have the energy to do any of the things I wanted to do. I'd buy books and DVDs to allay my frustration, and spend my evenings watching television because I was so exhausted. I had a list of health problems as long as my arm - including PCOS, depression, IBS, anaemia, and I reckon I was about 6 months from a diagnosis of CFS. And all because society tells me I'm nothing without a 'career'? Hmm.

But this has all become a bit serious. I merely mean to indicate that perhaps Mr. Seymour has a point and we need to reclaim the word 'housewife' (or indeed 'househusband'). It does not mean a boring but perfectly dressed 1950s Stepford wife acquiescing to her husband's every whim while he lounges around reading the paper, which I will confess is what the word conjures up to me.

Ugh. I didn't do 5 years of postgraduate study to label myself with those prejudices.

I'm not going to try and redefine the word now, but I am realising that there's more to this project than simply learning to make butter. I suspect there's some sociology and feminism to delve into as well.

Jolly good, Mr. Seymour! You've thrown down the gauntlet, and I accept.

Onward!

How to make Christmas puddings... in a slow cooker!

I love my slow cooker.

On my list of favourite things in the world, it's right up there with my husband and the Pope (maybe 'things' sounds wrong...).

So when it came to making this year's Christmas puds it crossed my mind that a slow cooker would actually be a rather splendid way of steaming the puddings. I haven't actually done an energy comparison (though I will...) but it strikes me that when boiling a pan of water for about 6 hours, the slow cooker is going to come out on top.

Unlike our Christmas cake, I don't have a family recipe for Xmas puds. But unlike our Christmas cake, a pudding needs to be somewhat less precise in measurements. Rarely do I have everything I need, even if I've done shopping 'specially, so this is just as well.

Surveying some of the big cheeses in the culinary world I did of course create a spreadsheet of quantities of ingredients used, so that I could compare, and find an average. The quantities are for a 1.2 L pudding, serving 6-8 people.

As you can see, for all and every, they're very similar, and don't vary much from the quintessential Victorian Householder, Mrs. Beeton.

The type of fat used varies - be it butter, oil or suet. The quantity and type of booze also varies quite a lot (blimey, Nigella!) varying from stout to brandy to a rather tame sub with milk by Jamie Oliver. But the principle is the same: 100 g each of breadcrumbs, flour, fat and sugar; 500 g dried fruit (whatever you fancy: I used raisins, sultanas, apricots, dates and figs); about 150 ml stout/liquid; 2 eggs; as much spice as you like, and a grated apple. Nuts seemed very optional.

I then divvied this up into one big and 6 tiddly pudding basins (the large one actually just being a leftover container from a past pud...), put about an inch of water in the bottom of my slow cooker, and switched it on low for about 6 hours. Better safe than sorry - and I figure it's practically impossible to over-steam a pudding over this time frame!

Raw pud mixture in my teeny basins

Et voila - no worrying about the pan boiling dry, very little effort (compared to the cake), and a pudding that tastes infinitely better than those shop-bought stodge-fests.

I seriously recommend trying to make your own (if, of course you like Christmas pudding!), I couldn't believe the difference the first time I made my own. It was AWESOME!

Cooked puds - and cakes!

Forgotten Crafts Project #59: Festivals and decorations - a short history of Christmas traditions

A brief miscellany of Christmas traditions...
It seems we have a lot to thank the Victorians for when it comes to the way in which we currently celebrate Christmas. Gift giving, crackers, cards ... are all Victorian inventions. Ironically, all these traditions were well and truly established by the time John Seymour were a lad, I think it's just that we've taken them all a bit overboard in recent years. The good old beeb has a really good page on Christmas traditions which I have stolen much of this info from.

N.B. I've tried to reference my sources, as I truly believe in accountability for sweeping statements made by anyone on t'interwebs. These sources are all web-based, and while my undergrad tutor would cry: "but any old idiot can put stuff on the internet!" (he's right - look at me go!), this is not my area of expertise, so, in lieu of proper academic referencing I have used what I consider reliable sources. If however you ARE an expert in Christmas traditions history then PLEASE get in touch, I would love to pick your brain!

Christmas trees
It seems adorning one's home with greenery at this time of year is a veeeery longstanding tradition. And why wouldn't you want to get some of the limited verdant plant life from around you, and bring it into your home to remind you that while it *may* be cold, and dark, and depressing, and you have very little to do right now, life is in fact still going on outside?

But it was of course the Victorians who formalised this use of plant life in the home, borrowing from what appears to be a Germanic tradition (hmmm, where would Queen Victoria have got Germanic influences...?) - and it's hardly surprising that whole trees were readily available in such a densely forested part of the world!

According to the BBC's guide to a Victorian Christmas [1]:

In 1881 Cassell's Family Magazine gave strict directions to the lady of the house: "To bring about a general feeling of enjoyment, much depends on the surroundings… It is worth while to bestow some little trouble on the decoration of the rooms".

Good old lifestyle magazines, making us want what we don't actually need, since the 1800s ;)

Christmas Cards
In 1843 Sir Henry Cole (apparently aka Old King Cole, who I believe was a merry old soul indeed) commissioned the artist John Calcott Horsley to design a card that could send to his acquaintances. Sceptics will also note that Henry Cole was instrumental in the establishment of the penny post three years previously, and I have certainly heard it said that Christmas cards were introduced as a means of encouraging people to use this new service. Not a bad idea really, however cynical you're feeling! While originally retailed at a shilling each, they were a luxury item well out of the reach of the working classes [2], but the idea caught on, and by 1880 11.5 million cards were sent [1].

The very first Christmas card, designed by John Calcott Horsley. Credit: V&A museum.

Turkey For Christmas lunch
This one baffles me. Why you would have turkey for Christmas lunch instead of goose or beef (or indeed just chicken) is beyond me - we are altogether not turkey fans! It's a weird one, as according to the British Poultry Council (I like to think of a group of chickens and turkeys siting around a table), up until the 1950s turkeys were a luxury food. In 1930 it took a week’s wage to buy a turkey. Now it takes 1.7 hours [3].

Other interesting news from the turkey council: Turkeys are believed to have first been brought to Britain in 1526 by Yorkshireman William Strickland - he acquired six birds from American Indian traders on his travels and sold them for tuppence each in Bristol. Also, Israel is the world's largest consumer of turkey.

Gift Giving
While gift giving had long been a tradition at winter celebrations, the gifts exchanged seemed to be very small - foodstuffs and handmade trinkets. It was Queen Victoria who began the trend for sharing larger items, and for their being exchanged on Christmas day as opposed to New Year's day [1, 4].

Christmas Crackers
The invention of the Christmas cracker is attributed to one Thomas Smith, a confectioner who, following a visit to Paris came up with the idea of selling bon bons (sugared almonds) in twists of decorative paper in England in the mid 1800s. Over the years these became more and more elaborate, incorporating mottos, small gifts and, of course, a chemical strip which emitted a loud CRACK when pulled [1, 5].

So there you have it, a brief overview of some of the peculiarities of the English Christmas. By all accounts much of what we now consider "Christmas Traditions" in this country were consolidated by one Mr Charles Dickens in A Christmas Carol. I'm not sure I really have a problem with this - there are worse things to hold to as traditions than a Christmas goose, reflection on your past, present and future, and general generosity.

Plus, plastic tat didn't exist in Dicken's day, and I'm all for more of THAT.



References:

[1] http://www.bbc.co.uk/victorianchristmas/history.shtml 

[2] http://www.royalmailgroup.com/sending-traditional-christmas-cards-still-more-popular-e-cards-reveals-royal-mail-research 

[3] http://www.britishturkey.co.uk/facts-and-figures/turkey-history-and-other-facts.html

[4] http://www.livescience.com/25779-christmas-traditions-history-paganism.html

[5] http://resources.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/customs/xmas/crackers.html

Forgotten Crafts Project #59: Festivals and decorations

When I came up with the idea for this project, my intention had of course been to work my way through the list in a numerical and orderly fashion. However, when typing up the contents list, I realised that the last installment is festivals and decorations, and, it being the beginning of December I would be foolish to wait on this one! For one thing, festivals happen throughout the year, and it makes sense to do them as and when, and for another I'm making Christmas decorations, cakes and puddings at the moment, so...

I get the impression that like so many things, Mr. Seymour is none too impressed with the modern developments around the "present-day orgy of rampant consumerism" that we call Christmas. His words, not mine. As a child his decorations did not go up until Christmas eve, after he and his brother had been read 'twas the night before Christmas' and gone to bed - awakening on Christmas Day to a house bedecked with holly and a Christmas tree adorned with real candles.

Whether Christian or not, I do feel the magic of Christmas gets lost in consumerism. The celebration of the turning of the cycle of the year is ancient; as John Seymour mentions, living at a high latitude the shortening days and increasing cold must have felt to our ancestors like the end of the world was nigh. When the days began to get longer it must have been a relief, and a cause for enormous celebration! And what better way to celebrate than by getting ourselves into debt feasting and singing and sharing stories?

For us this year, it'll be a bit lean, so we'll probably have a Good-Life-style branch in a pot adorned with a variety of coloured lights and mismatched decorations, a ton of greenery festooned around the house, and enough tinsel and paper chains to make it look like a fairy vomited in our living room. No shortage of festivities, but we'll forgo the £30 on a tree, thank you very much - there's no rule that says we have to have one!

Coming up...
* How to make a festive wreath
* How to make Christmas pudding in a slow cooker
* A short history of some Christmas traditions (including crackers, cards and trees!)

Forgotten Crafts contents list

So, what will this project involve, I hear you say.

I'm very glad you asked...

Kitchen Crafts
1. Preparing Food
2. Open-hearth cooking
3. Cooking at a range
4. Baking
5. Storing food
6. Salting and pickling
7. Drying and smoking
8. Bottling and canning
9. Preserves
10. Confectionery
11. Chilling food
12. Cleaning and maintenance
13. Washing up
14. Providing water
15. Tea making
16. Coffee making
17. Ale and beer making
18. Herbs and spices
19. Keeping livestock
20. Keeping bees

Dairy Crafts
21. Milk and milk treatments
22. Making and using cream
23. Butter making
24. Cheese making
25. Making ice cream

Laundry Crafts
26. Drawing water
27. Making lye and soap
28. Washing linen
29. Drying linen
30. Pressing linen
31. Dyeing

Around the home
32. Gathering and making fuels
33. Heating
34. Beds and bedrooms
35. Home doctoring
36. Bathing and the Jakes
37. Dining and entertaining
38. Candle and oil lighting
39. Gas and electric lighting
40. Cleaning
41. Chimney sweeping
42. Waste disposal
43. Controlling pests and vermin

Textile Crafts
44. Spinning
45. Weaving
46. Mat and Rug making
47. Lace making
48. Crochet
49. Tatting and macrame
50. Knitting
51. Making and repairing clothes
52. Quilting and patchwork
53. Smocking
54. Embroidery

Decorative Crafts
55. Painting and papering
56. Stenciling
57. Furniture and furnishings
58. Ornamenting the home
59. Festivals and decorations

Forgotten Crafts Project

During my rehabilitation from THE THESIS I spent a day tarting up our bedside cabinets and watching films. One such of these was Julie and Julia. If you haven't watched it, it's the true story of Julie Powell who decides to cook her way through Julia Child's "Mastering the Art of French Cooking" and blog about it. It stars Meryl Streep and Amy Adams (reason enough to watch it, imho) and is fab.

Reaching the end of the film I thought "wouldn't it be great if I could find a book to do that with? If only I was committed enough to actually follow recipes when I cook..."

*sigh*

My eyes roved our bookshelves, across the multitude of cookery, gardening and nature books, and settled upon our copies of John Seymour's "Forgotten Household Crafts" and "The Forgotten Arts and Crafts". The latter caught my eye, as being a bit of a tom boy anything with the words "household" in makes me groan inwardly... ugh, 'household', BORING!!
 

  

But there's a hitch, I thought: arts and crafts take time to learn. There's a reason that back in the day young men would take up an apprenticeship, then progress to being journeymen, then masters, and finally artisans.

And you don't become an artisan in a week.

And there is absolutely no point me attempting to make a barrel. There just isn't. I simply don't have the time to commit to becoming good enough to make it worthwhile. That said, if I got offered the opportunity to have a go I would totally be up for it (Any coopers out there? There must be - they need barrels for the vital process of MAKING WHISKY).

So while that would be an interesting project, it would be a life-long one, and not the stuff of regular blog posts. I promise I will update you if I decide to try and learn how to make a besom, dye cloth or shoe a horse though. Interesting stuff.

So it looked like it would have to be the BORING household crafts book. Ha ha.

However, when I looked through the contents of Forgotten Household Crafts, far from exhaustive  instructions about how to clean skirting boards and sweep a floor, it basically listed all my favourite things... knitting, preserving food, making beer - and a host of things I don't know how to do: making butter and soap, smoking food, spinning yarn (and only 12 pages on cleaning in the whole book!!).

So, dear reader, if you wish to join me, I will undertake to go through this book, try out each of the 'forgotten' household crafts, and report back to you on each of them. See here for a full listing of the crafts.

If you want to get hold of a copy, it is currently retailing for ONE ENGLISH PENNY on Amazon (plus £2.80 P&P, of course). Apprarantly if these crafts were 'forgotten' in 1987, they're completely forgotten now.

Oh, and in case you were wondering, the bedside cabinets now look like this:

Not bad, eh? (before they were just plain wood)

I'm back, baby!

It's taken two months since submission, but I *think* I might be a human bean again - huzzah! :D

Having spent the past week with a delightful spell of tonsillitis, I feel I have now emerged from my bedridden, sweaty chrysalis a new and shiny person.

Profound stuff.

This has been in no small part owing to the triple treatment (no, not for TB, dry rot or H. pylori) of Harry Potter book 5, the writings of the wonderful Lucy AitkenRead, aka Lulastic, and Star Trek Voyager series 7. Obviously there was also a lot of paracetamol, honey-lemon-and-ginger and sleep involved for the physical symptoms, but sometimes I find the right ingredients can work magic effects on your psychology, too.

The combination of thinking about 15 year old me and my aspirations, feeling re-inspired about living ethically, and making a re-commitment to being a little more 'Starfleet'* in the way I order my days have motivated me to get my butt in order and sort this wee blog out, because I luff it, and it is a neglected baby atm.

SO, I have some plans (some nefarious, most normal) to get this moving again now that I am FREE of PhD responsibilities. Oh the relief... OH the RELIEF!

So I bring to you a new project...

Read on, Macduff!





* Yes, I am an enormous geek. Get over it.

See you on the other side!

#whole30 #day12

Breakfast: stir fried veg, smoked mackerel, kimchi.

 Lunch: 'coleslaw' made with grated carrot, shredded cabbage, radish, spring onions, olives and capers; avocado, prawns fried in coconut oil and garlic, and a baked sweet potato. DELICIOUS. (thank you hubs)

Dinner: roasted parsnips and squash with pan fried liver and pork belly, leeks and whatever veg we had left. £30-worth of veg hasn't lasted very long!

#whole30 #day11

 Breakfast: smoked mackerel, cucumber, kimchi, for two. With green tea :-)

Lunch: stir fry with mackerel and TONS of sesame oil.

Dinner: Thai red curry with fish. Amazeballs.

#whole30 #day10

Breakfast: stir-fried veg, mackerel and kimchi

Lunch: stir fried veg with sweet potato and tahini. The tahini was amazing, so nice to have something different.

Dinner: Stir-fried veg and beef mince with kimchi.

#whole30 #day9

Breakfast: smoked mackerel, cucumber, kimchi, a few cashews

Lunch: salad - broccoli, courgette, radish, cucumber, trout,  sweet potato, olive oil.

Dinner: Stir fried veg and pan fried trout. Jon did the veg with  fish sauce, and it was oddly delicious!

#whole30 #day8

Another late breakfast, cooked by my husband: scrambled egg and fried mackerel with stir fried veg and kimchi.

 Dinner: THE SPICIEST STEW IN THE WORLD. Cooked again by my husband. Carrots, sweetcorn, white fish, courgette, a few raisins and a whole lotta 'tagine spice'.

#whole30 #day7

Grandad's birthday!

Breakfast: spinach and courgette omelette with some smoked mackerel

 Lunch: Baked sweet potato with fried liver, cabbage and broccoli (with olive oil and balsamic vinegar)

Afternoon tea! Gluten-free and diabetic (i.e. low sugar). It was delicious, and I didn't feel even remotely sad I couldn't have what everyone else was having. Indeed, everyone else got food envy ;)

What everyone else had. Delicious, but not as good as mine!

#whole30 #day6

 Now, day 6 was a Saturday, so I of course massively slept in and ended up having a sort of brunch instead of breakfast and lunch.

Brunch: brown rice, mackerel, poached egg, cucumber, kimchi.

Dinner chez little bro: spinach, green beans, courgette and STEAK! Delicious.

#whole30 #day5

Breakfast: rice, kimchi, smoked mackerel. As per usual. Forgot to take a picture as I was being questioned by a Chinese person on my voluntary use of chopsticks, and weirdly Asian breakfast choices. My Englishness swelled, and I was deeply embarrassed by my unusual behaviour. Somehow 'because I like it' didn't seem sufficient :-P

Lunch: bento box with the usual suspects - rice, radishes, beansprouts, cucumber, chicken, kimchi, olive oil

Dinner: POACHED EGGS! (exciting, no?), the last of the meat off the chicken carcass, broccoli, cuzcumber, courgette, sweet potato.

Interestingly, today I have not eaten peppers, and I have not swelled up like a balloon. Before I started this I suspected nightshades were an intolerance I had, so from here on in no aubergines, tomatoes, or peppers.

*sad face* that's 3 of my favourite veggies :-(

I'm off to visit the littlest moo tomorrow, and have hung onto the carcass of the chicken to make stock. Little does he know that's what we'll be doing...

#day4 Struggling.

I wrote this last night when I was feeling distinctly low about the whole Whole30 thing. I thought about not posting it, as it's pretty personal and a bit ranty - but you know what, this is how I was feeling, and I don't want to censor that. This 30-day challenge is a voyage into uncharted territory, and I want to chart it as it happens - the downs as well as the ups.

So...

It’s #day4 and I’m having a tough time. I’m mostly putting this down to spending last night and some of this morning writing a short article that has been swiftly rejected by it's target publication – there’s nothing like a bit of rejection to put me in a low mood.

It’s times like this I get very critical of my abilities. One rejection can feel like a ton of bricks has been dumped on your confidence. I’m 30, and have no income, no house, no kids. My health is hugely unreliable, and I’m currently infertile. I’m highly specialised in something very few people are actually interested in – either inside or outside of academia. I’m not sure I even see science as a good use of the planet’s resources sometimes. I want to be self-employed, but don’t have any presently useful skills, and sometimes have so little self-confidence I just don’t see how I could do it anyway. I’m bored with food, and am not yet convinced this #whole30 thing is worth it. I’m constantly hungry, I’m still bloated, my skin is awful, my hair looks thin, my glands are up, and last night I’m pretty sure I felt the tingle of a cold sore. I’m distinctly grumpy.

What I really want right now is to go eat a pack of American-style chocolate cookies, which thankfully I don’t have the motivation to go buy. I know I’d regret it afterwards, but I do at least know I’d enjoy eating them. I guess that’s the problem with food addictions: food doesn’t criticise, doesn’t question. It just makes you feel better, albeit for a short while, when you're feeling rubbish. That’s why you get addicted.

Ugh.

#whole30 #day4

Breakfast: smoked mackerel, rice, kimchi

Lunch: bento box with sweet potato, radishes, pepper, chicken and kimchi - and olive oil.

Dinner: broccoli, courgette, pepper, chicken, sweet potato and kimchi.

Getting bored of the same food day in, day out...

#day3 Dilemma.

This Sunday it is my grandad’s 88th birthday. In respect for his accumulated years we are, as a family, going to a posh hotel for afternoon tea.

This will not be #whole30 friendly.

So do I just not go?

Of course not - it’s his 88th birthday! But explaining no sugar, no grains, no dairy to my grandad will only leave him confused, and upset that I’m being ‘different’.

So, I called them earlier today and asked what they could do for me, which was a gluten-free, diabetic (i.e. reduced sugar) afternoon tea. I was pretty impressed they could do that much, and decided it would do.

I know “off roading” isn’t allowed during the #Whole30, and if this were with friends I probably could have negotiated it; but I’m pretty sure sitting with a cup of black tea and not eating anything while everyone else tucked in would just have led to me alienating my grandad on a special day, which I’m just not down with. Life will present me with these challenges, and like with so many other things, I guess the best we can do, is the best we can do.

Should I have moved my Whole30 to another time? Possibly - but then my brother wouldn’t be able to join me until August, and I really wanted to get started.

I think maybe I’ll treat this as a trial, and do another one later. After all, the goal is to make me feel better - and I’m pretty sure it’ll do that :)

#whole30 #day3

Breakfast: smoked mackerel, kimchi, brown rice, green tea when I got to work.

Went to bed at about 9.30 pm last night, up at 6 am and feeling great. At my desk by 7.20 :)

Lunch: bento box with rice, chicken, peppers, kimchi, radish and some sesame oil. Oh, and a naartjie.

Afternoon snack: banana, cashews, redbush tea. It's the Dragonfly Vanilla redbush and is DELICIOUS. Loving the institutional teapot and cup/saucer.

Dinner: courgette and broccoli smooshed up with 2 eggs, chicken and sweet potato.

#whole30 #day2

Breakfast: smoked mackerel and kimchi.

Brought a sweet potato for lunch and was going to buy some chicken and salad to go with it.

Forgot my wallet = sad-looking sweet potato for lunch, which I had to eat with a teaspoon as someone nicked all the forks in the staff room :( Doh!

On the up-side I finished nice and early (having started nice and early) and went food shopping.

Dinner: chicken, broccoli, pepper, rice, a few cashews and some olive oil.

Hungry day, but feeling ok.

Letter to myself

Dear Bee,

Why are you doing this Whole 30 diet? Why make things so difficult for yourself? Why cut out so many foods that you enjoy, at a time when it’s possible you’ll be craving them the most? Why be hungry? Why be awkward when you go to people’s houses for dinner?

I think it’s important that these things are down in black and white, as there will be times (perhaps very soon) when the motive behind this is eclipsed by short-term desires and cravings.

Once you were slim, and full of energy. Your skin was bad and confidence low, but you could eat whatever you liked and not put on weight. People called you ‘skinny’ and possibly not in a complimentary way. The backs of your arms weren’t chubby because you were constantly on the move, and didn’t crave sugar all the time.

To be fair I think it all started in that final year of uni, living with Anna. That’s when you learned to eat an entire bar of Dairy Milk, or half a cake in a single sitting. I guess 21 isn’t the age you want to be learning bad habits.

But you held it all together until after uni, and the chain of events precipitated by dad’s leaving led to your slow but steady weight gain. During the NVQ everything was fine as you were outdoors all the time, but come teacher training and Dave, it all went a bit wrong. The weight crept on, the health problems that had been building bore fruit. You were overweight, tired, anaemic, depressed.

The body you have now is testament to a bad time in your life, the lowest time, and it’s time to shift it, and move on.

This diet is not primarily about weight loss, or even looking good, although you know deep down you want to be that slim girl again.

It’s about feeling good.

Having energy.

Beating the sugar cravings that lead to your PCOS.

Making the best chance of beating cancer, diabetes and Alzheimer’s in the future.

Having clear skin.

Keeping your figure after having kids.

Being able to have kids.

Getting rid of cellulite.

Being the fit, healthy person you’ve never had the confidence to believe you can be.

Because life starts NOW – not when the PhD is done, not when you get your first paycheck doing a new job. You can be successful doing something you love, and you can be that person who gets up at 6 am, goes for a run, then gets down to work running her own business. It can all begin now.

Right now, your weight is stuck at 11 st 7 lb. That is a whole lot less than at Christmas. But you can shift that stone to get back to 10 ½ st – where you were when life still made sense. A weight your body stuck at for ages. A size you were happy with. When you had energy and far fewer body issues.

Why wait? In a month you could be a new person. Just give it the 30 days, then you can make up your mind where to go next.

Stick at it. You can do it.

Bee x x

#whole30 #day1

So, as my lovely brother has agreed to accompany me on this adventure, we have to start today so he can go to a beer festival at the end... (I know, right?) (love you lil bro ;) )

The problem is that I'm going to be working away from home for a week at Rothamsted, and staying up at 'the manor' - the old manor house which presumably once housed the chap who founded Rothamsted (I's look it up if my brain weren't already full) where visiting students now get housed.

The only problem with this is that my sole means of cooking for myself this week will be a suite of microwaves - goodbye rice cooker, goodbye toasted nuts and seeds, goodbye flavour in general.

For this reason I have decided to allow rice in my diet - at least for this first week. It forms a staple of my diet generally, and I'm fairly sure I'm ok with it. There are only so many sweet potatoes I can eat.

Of course, being busy, I didn't manage to get pictures of my food today, so-

Breakfast - banana, black tea, brazil nuts

Lunch - leftover Japanese food from meal out yesterday in London (they did me a doggy bag :D) : rice, salmon, lettucey salad stuff

Dinner - sweet potato, chicken, veggies

#Whole30

So, despite numerous interventions into my diet I still get sick, often. I can't help but wondering if I'm doing it all wrong...

So my ickle brother and I have decided to do a Whole30 for, well, 30 days, to see if it'll help my poorly digestive system. Bless his soul for giving me moral support in this.

I'll be blogging every day to record my thoughts and progress...

Today's motto

Whether or not Aristotle actually said it (I'm fairly sure it was Mary Poppins, myself) they are wise words:

Latest project

So, I just made this for my friend who has recently welcomed a small person into the world.

The pattern is courtesy of Subversive Cross Stitch (www.subversivecrossstitch.com). I wouldn't advise a visit if you're easily offended by curse words, though. The whole site is about slightly 'alternative' embroidery...

Cardboard art and floods

Working on sequencing my genetic data as I am, I have been spending more time online than normal this week. And it just so happens that today is a good day for interesting internetting.

Find #1: Cardboard collective
This makes my attempts at costumes look rather passe. I particularly like the Luna moth costume, but check the rest of the site out, too. This lady has made upcycling cardboard into an art form!

Find #2: 21 Pictures of Politicians in Wellies Staring at Floods
I particularly like that the fashion advisers have not let any of them wear Hunter wellies, in case they look posh or something. Much inappropriate laughter was had in a very quiet office.

Find #3:  Global warming is about hotter, drier weather... not flooding
I got this through my ABSW feed this morning, and I'm not sure whether to laugh or cry. I think for my health it had better be the former. It is the worst piece of journalism I think I've ever read.

How to make stress your friend

I don't often make such sweeping statements, but watching this video by Kelly McGonigal and TED might just save your life.

She talks about how it is the belief in the negative effects of stress that affect your health, not the stress itself.

In other words: if you believe stress is bad, it will negatively affect your health.

Mental, huh?

I love science.

The link again? Oh go on then...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RcGyVTAoXEU

No poo #3

Yeah, I know right! Third time's a charm though - isn't it?

I haven't had much luck with cutting out shampoo. I read the blogs of these amazing women who haven't washed their hair for years and have beautiful hair, and I cry inwardly. WHY DOESN'T IT WORK FOR ME? Why doesn't my hair co-operate?

So, in light of yet another story of a lady who hasn't used shampoo for 3 years, I'm giving this one last try. This time with scarves. 

That's right. I'm just really hoping that by having something pretty on my head, rather than a mop of slightly greasy hair, I will be able to stick it out for longer. As previously stated, I may be a little bit of a hippy, but I do care about my appearance.

So, this time – out with the bicarb and lemon juice approach, out with things that make a complete mess of my shower (I'm looking at you, lentils) – in with… wait for it, WATER!

Yup. 

For a week now I have been showering for 5 minutes every morning (rather than 15 every three days) and just not using any shampoo. I give my hair a good rub-over to make sure it's well rinsed, and when I'm out it goes up in a bun, then gets wrapped up in a scarf.

So far, it's a horrible greasy mess. It looks ok if I ruffle it up, and has more volume than my hair has ever had, but to the touch it's horrid. If this keeps up I'm canning the experiment.

So far the major up-side has been the discovery of Andrea Grinberg's website. As an Orthodox Jew she covers her hair for other reasons, but has turned it into an art form. A scraggly kerchief over the head? No-siree. 

I am in awe, and blatantly copying some of her ideas. I have had more compliments in a week over the head scarves than I have in a year for my hair. At this rate I might just wear them all the time, and keep up the no-poo until either my hair gets nice, or I run out of scarf-related inspiration.

Please do check out her blog, it's SO inspiring!

Love, Bee x