Fewer Cakes and More Fruit and Veg

I started Weight Watchers On-line on Thursday.  Attempts to lose weight by myself recently have failed miserably, and Weight Watchers seemed like a good idea.  I joined about ten years ago and lost over two stone - I liked the structure and the discipline and found the points system worked really well for me.

Over the years the weight crept back on - actually most of it piled back on dramatically when I started a new job - and I've been up and down ever since.  I managed to lose a stone last year and was really happy with the way it made me look and feel.

Unfortunately the winter and miserable summer so far led to serious over-eating, and at the moment I'm about two stone heavier than I want to be.  This is my "before" photo!

So, this blog will be featuring fewer cakes and more salads and low-fat meals for the foreseeable future (but will never become a cake-free zone, don't worry!). 

Weight Watchers has changed a bit since I last did it, but I've been impressed with it so far.  For those of you who aren't familiar with it, every food has a points value, and you have a certain number of points to eat per day.  You can earn extra points through exercise.  You could, if you wished, eat only very small amounts of high-calorie and high-fat food, or spend your time eating wierdly processed food which has had unimaginable things done to it in a factory to take the fat out, but the fact that you get hungry leads you to eat large quantities of "low-pointed" foods (it does me anyway).  You can eat unlimited fruit and veg (except potatoes), and things like wholewheat bread, potatoes, brown rice, eggs and low-fat creme fraiche are all low-pointed and labelled as "healthy and filling foods".  It's going to do wonders for my attempts to keep off the processed food - I've eaten so much fruit and veg since Thursday that I think I'm going to turn into something that photosynthesises.  We went shopping yesterday and I went mad in the fruit section - I love summer fruit and would, I reckon, about five times out of ten, chose a delicious succulent plate of melon, pineapple and strawberries over a plate of cake.  I bought apples, melons, raspberries, blueberries, peaches and delicious dark-red cherries (and amazingly our food bill was even a little lower than usual).  I have to say, also, that the on-line tracking is also perfect for someone who is, it's fair to say, somewhat addicted to fiddling around on the computer.  We shall see how I stick to it!

I made a gorgeous salad for my lunch.  Butternut squash roasted in olive oil, goat's cheese, walnuts, raw spinach leaves and peashoots.  Beautiful, tasty and healthy.

That was followed by creme fraiche, blueberries and raspberries.

Dinner tonight - and on several other occasions seeing as I've made enough for a small army is curry.  Onions, yellow peppers, courgettes, sweet potato, chicken, chick peas and green beans from the garden in a tomato-based sauce (made with bought curry paste).  It's cooking as I speak and I shall be enjoying it with basmati rice very soon.  It's so pretty - I love eating dishes that have lots of different colours in them!