5 Day Plan part II

The first 5 days went really well and I’m proud to say I managed an evening in the pub without alcohol – though the coke light got a bit dull – I'll have to think up some more interesting soft drinks for tomorrow. Re-assessing the fridge on Sunday I could see there was still plenty of fresh vegetables and fruit, plus a few items in the freezer that I could utilize for suppers so no need to go shopping, except for a few items such as chicken and bananas. So my total spend for the 10 days brings be to about 1750 THB (35GBP/ $58) and even better I had left over portions which I popped in the freezer for later use.

The Bean Croquette recipe I had, from a vegan cookbook by Robin Robertson, called for the use of a potato, but not wanting to use the starchy carb I swapped that out for cooked aubergine adding enough to get the right consistency, I also baked rather than shallow fried. The Yellow pepper coulis was tasty and my cauliflower mash was pretty good – but nicer with a parsnip in it.

My favourite, and perhaps the most “fattening” meal was the Sunday night curry. When I was in Sri Lanka few years ago I took a couple of cooking lessons with the chefs at the Mudhouses where we were staying. They use a lot of freshly made coconut milk in their curries, which adds to the fat content of any dish, so I tried to use sparingly and added water to thin it out a bit. 

By using pumpkin – which has a its own creamy texture – you still get a good consistency. Its also saturated fat so not the healthiest choice but given that it was only 250ml and that covered at least 2 servings, plus the rest of the day was uber healthy, I think I’m safe, but don’t forget things you might think are “healthy” choices may not be so!

The next 5 day menu plan:-

	Breakfast	Snack	Dinner
Day 1	Porridge with cooked apple & orange juice	Banana, Kiwi fruit	Grilled lemon marinated chicken with Mediterranean roasted veg salad & pumpkin seeds
Day 2	Beetroot, Pineapple & banana blend	Humous, carrot sticks, Kiwi fruit	Thai style vegetable soup
Day 3	Banana, mango & blackberry smoothie	Tabouleh, apple	Lentil stuffed peppers & red cabbage salad
Day 4	2 egg muffins, chopped fresh tomatoes with basil, saute’d spinach	Apple, pineapple	Mushroom risotto & red cabbage salad
Day 5	Muesli, banana & orange juice	Kiwi, carrot sticks	Baked aubergines with tomatoes and basil