Masterchef to Slimming World - Spicy Beef Koftas

 Another dark morning this morning has finally helped me make the decision that I need to change my shift at work. Starting work at 6am is finally breaking me so I'm going to start a phased move to 7am and see how I go. I'm sure the extra hour in bed will do me the world of good too. Not only was it dark, but the house was freezing, although outside it was warm and foggy.

I stayed on plan again today, am doing really well this week and am hopeful of a promising result on Saturday. We are going to weigh in before we go on holiday...I know - dedication, it's the last week of our 12 week countdown and we don't want to squander it.

Breakfast
The ATM was working today so I managed to get some cash and had some bacon (free), beans (free) and tomatoes (speed) with the last bit of tortilla (2 syns due to chorizo).

Lunch
Was eaten in 2 stages in between 2 meetings and was the fruit salad (speed) and quark (free) I didn't eat yesterday.

On my way home I had to pick Lauren up from holiday club. Love that everyone is so positive about her, she looks after the younger children. Last time she had drawn them all wolf pictures and they'd coloured them in and were taking them home and she has taught them all a wolf game. A little buy William gave her a big hug before she went, so sweet.

At home we were both starving so we had an Opal apple, really sweet and crip, I think they are what used to be called Golden Delicious Blush (speed) and a bag of crisps, I had Chipsticks (4 syns).

Dinner
Back to the first episode of Celebrity Masterchef last week, the girls at the Temper restaurant made  beef tacos and then in a later episode John Torode set a challenge of making beef koftas. This set my mind whirring formulating a dish and I've been writing notes for a couple of days. Tonight I got my chef head on, I meant business, I got my hair in a bobble and set to work, prep first cooking after.

Beef Koftas (2 sysn for oil, mayonnaise and sriracha)
I took a 500g pack of 5% minced beef and mixed in an egg.
I made Lauren 3 herby koftas with oregano, garlic salt and seasoning.
For ours I added garlic salt, seasoning, cumin, hot chilli powder, harissa spice and chopped red chilli and fresh coriander. Gave it all a good mix and split it into 8 quenelle shaped koftas. Sprayed with fry light and set aside on a silicone sheet on a baking tray. Later baked them at 180C for about 20 - 25 minutes. Aesthetically they would be better if you fried them in a pan, as the juices look odd when you bake them and they don't get that nice browness.
To serve them, I quartered a Fitzgerald's seeded wrap, coated with Chipotle Mayo (just some light mayonnaise mixed with chipotle seasoning), then topped with 45g feta cheese (healthy A) which I'd sprayed with 7 sprays olive oil (1/2 syn) and marinated in lime juice with coriander and chopped red chilli. The kofta sat on top and I dressed it with some sriracha sauce. Sweet chilli would work equally well.


Carrot Puree (free) - i blended boiled carrots and stirred in cumin, a teaspoon of quark, a little chilli powder, seasoning and some lemon juice. You just need to adjust the various spices to your own taste. This would also be good with fennel seeds too or some toasted cumin seeds as a garnish.

Garlic mushrooms (free) - I put mushrooms in an oven tray and sprayed with fry light, dusted with garlic granules and seasoned and baked at 180C for 15 minutes.

Vegetable rice (free) - I place a few florets of cauliflower and a few florets of broccoli in a food processor and whizzed til it resembled couscous. Seasoned with chilli, turmeric and garlic powder then fried for a couple of minutes in a shallow pan with some fry light.

I also did some crispy discs of potato in the Actifry, but you could do them in the oven, just par boil and spray with fry light, they will take about 30 minutes at 180C.

Slimming World Summary of the Day

Healthy A - feta cheese
Healthy B - Fitzgerald's wrap
Snacks - chicken (free), Nature Valley bar (4 syns), Chipsticks (4 syns), Hi Fi bar (3 syns)
Types of fruit and vegetable: 10
Drinks: Water, pepsi ginger and coffee
Syns: 15 (tortilla 2 syns, dinner 2 syns, snacks 11 syns)