Mini crustless quiches

A month into Harcombe and I am 10lb lighter. To celebrate I made some international mini crustless quiches. I’ve been tinkering with crustless quiche for a while and have discovered that the secret is a silicon deep muffin tin. What comes out looks a little muffin-y but is totally delish.

Crustless quiches

Ingredients

Makes 6

1 pack of Scottish smoked salmon flakes
1 welsh leek, sliced
3 eggs
Generous splash of whole milk
Spoonful of Italian marscapone
One slice of French Brie, cut up into small squares.

Fry leeks and then stir in salmon flakes
Beat 3 eggs with milk and marscapone (cream / creme fraiche / whatever dairy goodness you have to add some luxurious healthy fats) – warning marscapone just breaks into little white lumps and looks gross at this stage! Season.
Put leeks and salmon into a deep hole muffin tray (6)
Pour egg mix over and then sprinkle Brie on top.
Bake at 200 degrees for 19 minutes

Vary the ingredients, I made a lovely onion, tomato and goats cheese set last week.

Bon Appetite!

Manic Easter Monday

Unfortunately local schools aren’t great around here. They aren’t terrible but far from great. My oldest (Ben) is in Year 1 and his teachers job share (not fab for very young children) and seem total opposites. Blonde teacher told me one evening he was falling further and further behind because of his reading, trouble writing and lack of concentration. “Im very concerned”….”not able to access the curriculum”… This was a bolt from the blue! I said I wanted value-added data for the class (anonymised) and Ben as an individual I also said I wanted him to be assessed for dyslexia.

Next day brunette teacher called me to say it’s nothing to worry about, he’s doing fine etc..

I don’t believe in pushing kids too hard at such a young age but despite their different opinions I didn’t feel he’d learned much in Y1 so my Mum kindly paid for him to have extra tuition at explore learning and as long as Ben enjoys going there I’m happy as he is developing his concentration and writing skills. Only problem is that it’s on the far side of Bedford. So after brekkie I drove Ben to explore learning and pottered around Sainsburys getting stuff for the evening meal, I then picked Ben up and headed to the nearest Beefeater to meet hubby and the little monster.

Lunch over and too cold to walk around the lake we headed home and hubby cooked an amazing dinner of Chicken Mole (recipe on the good food website). It was bloody hot but so moreish. It had a little peanut butter in but I figured it was fairly little and ate it with no rice, just a little sour cream to balance the heat. Our Easter break was over, it had been the coldest Easter I can remember with snow but we’d still had fun (and thank God we hadn’t booked a break away to the coast this year!).

Breakfast: Brie omelette, salad
Lunch: Salmon, corn on the cob, hollandaise sauce, cooked veg
Dinner: spicy chicken mole, soured cream.

Day 4 of Harcombe diet eating out and taking away!

I had a bad start to Thursday, when I was in the shower a huge black spot appeared in my vision, it disappeared after a few minutes but was pretty odd. Worried that this could be the start of a migraine I decided not to drive (my migraines leave me with a blind spot, poor co-ordination and slurred/ jumbled speech, like being drunk with none of the fun and a killer hangover). I cooked my usual omelette with tomatoes for brekkie but didn’t feel hungry and managed about 1/2, in fact I was quite queasy and spent much of the morning quietly groaning in my office.

I’d arranged a few weeks ago to have lunch with a friend and approached Nandos apprehensively. A Mediterranean chicken salad (no feta) and corn on the cob (with butter!) later and I felt MUCH better. I didn’t even resent not being allowed a diet coke. Feeling better I powered through the afternoon and must have walked three miles going to the far side of Clapham Road to meet Ben’s tutors, back to the train station and then walking home.

In the evening we treated ourselves and the boys to a curry. As Ben had played his favourite trick of keeping us all awake from 5:30 neither adult wanted to leave the house so we ordered a takeaway. Now I know onion bhaji has a little gram flour to bind it but I decided that I could turn a blind eye to that and had a very enjoyable evening.

Breakfast: bacon omelette and tinned tomato
Lunch: Nandos Mediterranean salad (no feta), corn on the cob and butter
Dinner: Chicken Methi and 2 onion bhajis

Day 2 of phase 1 of Harcombe – sweet chilli sauce panic

I woke up from one of the deepest and most undisturbed sleeps ever at the ungodly hour of 5:30 while my son asked where the toilet paper was! I was nearly ready to sleep again when he came in to tell me his leg hurt and then again 15 minutes later to ask if it was time to get up.

The day had not got off to the best start and was exacerbated by youngest son feeling poorly and wetting the bed. Knowing that I had a long day ahead and no chocolate or caffeine to prop myself up with I was not in my happy place. I felt like I might be getting the lurgy off little son and stomped into the kitchen threatening to take the treat out of my early-bird’s lunchbox.

Despite everything I managed to get through the morning meeting without crying, falling asleep or forgetting my name (all of which I thought were likely given my un-caffeinated state). I got back to my office and thought about lunch without great enthusiasm while getting ready for the afternoon’s briefing and Board meeting, I even handled a crisis in another department and handled umpteen calls while surreptitiously typing and clicking print!

The evening session started at 3 and finished at 7:30 when we went straight into a farewell dinner for a retiring Board member. Before going on the diet I’d chosen the veggie option as I like meat in moderation rather than the perfectly cooked but too big and too rich versions offered at the venue. I don’t think I did too bad given that the day ended with a formal dinner and plenty of wine on offer

Breakfast: bacon omelette, salad and beetroot
Lunch: salmon with salad and beetroot (can’t get enough of these)
Dinner….

Cauliflower Beignets and an apple sauce – yum I skipped the sauce and felt virtuous until and I realised beignets had flour (whoops). By the time the fish course came my heart was pounding and scalp was twitching.
Chickpea and basil croquettes with salad and sweet chilli sauce. I ate the salad and left both of the croquettes. Some chilli sauce may have fallen onto the salad.
Artichokes in a hazelnut velouté on mash. I ate the artichokes but didn’t go chasing extra sauce, left the mash and picked at veggies on the side.
Pudding – politely declined an amazing looking trio of chocolate desserts.
Cheese, coffee and petit fours – politely declined while I glugged more water.

No wine, no coffee, no tea and no diet coke.

I got home at 11, straight to bed but feeling proud of myself for avoiding the temptations of biscuits and sweets during the meeting, olive studded bread and butter, croquettes, hazelnut velouté, mash, cheese, crackers, grapes, tea, wine and chocolate puddings.

Day 1 of phase 1 of Harcombe hell.

In desperation I’ve turned to a far out diet, the Harcombe diet. When you read the book it seems to makes sense but anything that takes me away from diet coke seems extreme to me!

I decided to start on a Monday as I didn’t want the long Easter weekend to be overshadowed by me sobbing while the rest of the family scoffed hot cross buns and Easter eggs and as my week would quieten down after Tuesday evening. Sadly I decided pretty much on the spur of the moment and hadn’t exactly stocked my kitchen up in advance.

Breakfast – 2 egg omelette with rocket, spinach and watercress.
Snack: tub of M&S olives (super yum)
Lunch – M&S side salad and tub of prawns.
Tea: 2 egg ham omelette, rocket, spinach, watercress and beetroot
Supper: two pieces of salmon in a warmed up easiyo mayo that had for wrong!

After Brownies I decided to make my own mayo using some natural live yoghurt which the easiyo site claimed was easy. It wasn’t easy and didn’t thicken so I decided to warm it up and serve as a freaky warm hollandaise with my salmon, bizarrely it was quite nice.

Exhausted by a day with no hot cross buns or diet Pepsi, running around at work, running around after the kids and then supervising brownies making chocolate nests I couldn’t stay up and was in bed by 9.