Protein&spinach muffins

Recently I've ordered few products from bulkpowders.co.uk
 

psyllium husk&spinach powder, proteins plus coconut oil from bulkpowders

I still look for my healthy food supplier and checking English companies out. Bulkpowders was one of them, recommended by my friend. Despite the name, they don't have only products for those who are on bulk ;) 


They don't have fancy packing, just simple, minimalistic ones. Together with no big adds. But the variety of products is really big. I got few protein powders from them (simple whey and mixed), gainer for my beloved, psyllium husk, hmb and spinach powder from them. For now whey protein chocolate orange is my unquestionable favourite, especially with my mornings oats. 

my recent baking

Having some day off I decided to use ordered spinach powder. I used it for muffins and they came really tasty.

For 8 muffins you will need:
* 1 scoop of vanilla protein
* 2 tbsp of sesame/quinoa/regular flour
* 0.5 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder 
* 0.5 tbsp spinach powder
* 1 egg
* 1dl of almond/regular milk
* sweetener (Sukrin or other)

Mix all dry ingredietns first, then add egg and milk for dough, watery consistency. Mix together and put into muffins forms. Bake for 30 minutes in 200 degrees.

ready to eat muffin with glaze and dried raspberries on top

Glaze:
* 2 tbsp of Philadelphia Light (or other soft cheese)
* powdered sweetener (Sukrin Melis)
* dried raspberries on top 

Enjoy gluten free, sugar free, protein&spinach muffins! :)

isn't that true? ;)

Norwegian method

As you are visiting my blog often, you might notice that I add 'Norwegian method' section in the right side of my blog. I wanted to mark this type of training specific, since I am convinced that this is the secret for lean body.
 

What is a Norwegian method?

Norwegian method is a system of training which is a result of my own experience with training and dieting. 

 My history: I have trained for 6 years (with 1 year break in between), check all the diets and forms of activity. I become fit, but not as fit as I wanted. I acted without any reasonable plan, just doing things spontaneously. I was always eating healthy, but I didn't control my portions. And the results weren't satisfying for me.

After almost 2 years in Norway I reversed my knowledge about training methods, eating and perceiving my own body. I've lost my insecurity and started to train for my real pleasure and healthy body, not only to get a lower number one the scale. 

That is how I came out with Norwegian method - all of my hitherto knowledge packed in a own watchword. 

Trainings:

To burn fat, you not only have to exercise. You have to do it wise. 

My training is composed by two types of activities - cardio (exercises which rises your hart rate by running, jumping, cross training, going on aerobic classes etc.) and strength training  (where you lift weights/using machines at the gym and working directly with your muscles growth).

* Lifting weights/gym training

First component of Norwegian method is strength training. The one when you worked directly with your muscles - you are building them and strengthen them. 

 

Why build something if you actually want to loose weight? Because those muscles tissues will burn calories for you once you stop training and only by adding muscles you can really re-shape your body (have a round butt, tight arms and flat belly).


There are different methods of doing gym training - one where your working on each body part at one session (circuit training, good for beginners) and split trainings, where on one session you work on two or three muscles groups (like back and biceps on one day and chest and triceps on the other). Type of gym training are always matched with person's fitness level.

My sample 3 split is:
* back/biceps/abs
* chest/triceps/shoulders
* legs/calve

 


* Cardio activities


By running on treadmill, you doing a great thing for your hart, but not necessarily loosing fat. Long lasting, aggressive cardio training releasess lots of stress horomon for your body - cortisol. It will stop you fatburn progress. What is more, your burning calories stops exactly at the moment you stop your activity. And thirdly, it takes lots of time to run 10km.
By going on aerobic classes, you will increase your activity and fitness level, but unless you're not pushing yourself harder, your body will adapt to this kind of activity.

benefits of High Intensive Interval Training

That is why I prefer High Intensity Interval Training. It is short (no longer than 30 minutes) and increases you after workout burn of calories (what means that your body works looong way after you stopped training).
It consist of warm up and high and low intervals where you're going on your 80-95% heart rate max and then rest on low intervals. I am fan of 1minute x 1minute intervals, but there are many versions of it. 
You can do HIIT training on treadmill, outdoors, by doing exercises like burpees, walking lunges etc. There are countless possibilities.

variation in training is a key to success

Of course doing other form of activities which weren't mentioned here are good - unless you're moving and burning calories, but my point was to pick 2 which have the best fat burn effect and are the quickest to perform. 
With smart training you don't have to spent hours at the gym, believe me.

Recommended training: 3 weights sessions and 2 cardio sessions

Diet:

I actually don't like the word 'dieting' since for me it is a lifestyle, type of eating which I am doing on a daily basic. The more you know about food and it benefits, the more flexible you can be in your diet. 

The rule is simple: in order to lose weight, you have to create a deficit. You have to consume a little less then your body needs. By word 'a little' I mean deficit of 200-300 calories, not more. We don't want to put our bodies into starvation mode when it stopped fatlose due to protection priorities, we also don't want to slower metabolism, in fact - conversely, we want to build fat burning machine.
We have to know how much calories we can cosume on a daily basic and later on plan our meals.

I am a fan of often, small s(I eat round 6 of them), but recent studies shows that it really doesn't matter if you eat 3,4 or 6 meals. Daily macros intake is crucial here. So, for them who prefer bigger meals, there is still a hope ;)

There are 3 types of nutrients you can consume:

* Carbohydrates, which gives your body energy. 
There are 2 types of carbs: slow and fast. Slow carbs gives you energy gradually, fast will do it quciker, btu for a shorther period of time. 
Types of slow carbs: brown rice, whole meal pasta, spelt tortillas, sweet potatoes, yams, grains, quinoa, vegetables
Types of quick carbs: rice cakes, white rice, cuscus, fruits

When? I do believe that it is wise to eat your carbs mostly for breakfast, before and after workouts.

* Protein, which builds your muscles 
I belive that protein rich diet is crucial for strong and lean body. Protein gives your body blocks for recomposing your body.
Good protein sources: lean poultry, lean pork meat, fishes, dairy, seafood, protein powders
I recommend having a source of protein in each meal.

* Fats, which helps your body to digest and increases absorption of vitamins and micro nutritients from other foods
We need some fats in our diet, but let's do it wisely. 
Good fat sources: omega 3 pills, fatty fishes (like salmon), avocado, coconut milk, sesame oil
 There is no specific time when you should consume fats but it is better not in pre/after workout time since body will be too abosrbed dealing with your activity and needs quicker forms of refuel than fats

Sample meal plan (portions of these food has to be estimated for each person individually, same as meals)

sample breakfast oats

* breakfast: oats/oat bran with yoghurt/protein powder and 2 omega 3 pills
* snack: low fat greek yoghurt with carrots/other vegetables
* lunch: lean meat with vegetables (about 0,5 kg of broccoli/cauliflower/spinach or other low kcal veggies) with tea spoon of sesame oil
* pre workout: carrots/rice cakes/fruit, BCAA, coffeine
* directly after workout: protein shake with rice cakes or BCAA and rice cakes after HIIT workouts
* after workout meal/dinner (eat within an hour after training): lean meat/fish with baked sweet potato and vegetables
* supper/snack: cottage cheese with berries/vegetables and almonds

one of my favourite food combo: chicken in coconut milk with broccoli

NO for: processed food, sodas, sweets, juices (it is better to eat your fruits than to drink them, unless you have a choice)
YES for: organic and eco food, coffee and tea (sweetened with stevia/truvia), light sodas from time to time

As you see, it is quite lots of food in a typical meal plan. Remember that we are cutting only 200, 300 calories from normal daily intake.


The reason of that there is plenty of food is not to starve your body, but trick it a little - cut a little carbs from lunch, spare some calories, but not let your body to feel it due to big quantities of vegetables. 
You will refill yourself before training and just right after it to restore glycogen in muscles. Other thing is that with gym trainign you will need your food in order to perform your training!
You need your food in order to see results in the gym and in your body! 

Free day/meal:
It is good to have a free day/free meal from time to time. It help you phisically and mentally. 
Free meal is a signal for your body that everything is ok and it doesn't have to go into starvation mode. It helps you with your cravings too. But be carefull, free meal/day can also be trigger to give up your effords and go back on bad track.
If you already started to diet, take only 1 free meal each 7th day of Norwegian method diet.
If you are satisfy with your results and feel comfortable with your dieting, take a free day, but still try to keep it clean (if you ate 1700 daily, make a free day with 2300 calories for example).
After free day you will gain water, but it should be gone within 2 days.

 

Those two components: training and diet are the core of Norwegian Method. 
There is also third: supplements.

Supplements:

You might use additional supplements, but they are not necessary. They are made to help you to achieve your goals faster.

* omega 3 - crucial for all your body health, read more here

* protein powder - great protein replacement in your diet when you don't have time to prepare 'real food', choose whey protein with little carbs in it which will be quick absorbed after weight workouts; I use my protein powder also as a replacement for dairy products with breakfast oats

* BCAA - amino acids, each good protein powder contain them; they are protecting your muscles again destroying during exercising, has far more less kcal than protein shake and only the essence of what you need most (read more about BCAAs here)

* caffeine - helps you with your hard trainings, with additional energy and focus

You can also consider taking: green tea, cla, l-glutamine, magnesium, multi vitamin

Summing up, Norwegian method is based on: 

At least 3 intensive gym workouts, 2 high insensitivity interval trainings and protein rich diet with additional supplements. 
I did not discover America, it is obvious. 
I have just collected all the effective tips&tricks in one place, one method. Method which works on me :)


 


For more info, detailed training and eating plans, please contact me: nordicfitnesss@gmail.com

I would like to read your opinion about Norwegian Method. 
Please use a comment field for that :)


 

Sunday's pizza time!

home made pizza with paprika, minced meat and fresh spinach and rucola with mozarella cheese on top

Oh yes, I did that!

Normal pizza, on a normal wheat dough, with normal cheese and ingredients. It's all about moderation and healthy mind.

If you want to check my previous, healthier pizza versions click here and here.

Preparation is the key

In rushy days try to plan your meals ahead. It is the thin I am currently working on. It will be easier to grab a lunch box and heat it than prepare each meal before you want to eat it. And you are sure that you won't eat any shitty just only because you were extremely hungry and there was nothing else to consume.

All the preparation is also time sparing - you cook rice/past/meat/veggies once and only divide them into portions. 

That is what I prepared yesterday: chicken/cooked salmon/baked salmon with spinach with rice/buckwheat and lots of veggies. There is also low carb homemade crispy bread for snacking.

From last week I try to incorporate this lunch box system for me and my beloved. Out kitchen looks like body-builders kitchen ;) hehe. 

Last week lunchboxes: chicken is soy souse with whole grain pasta and vegetables

 I basically use the same source of food for both me and my men, but with different proportions: more carbs and protein sources for him; for me less carbs, more veggies instead.

Another lunchboxes from last week: chicken curry with rice and veggies

Lunchboxes are life savers when you dropping home for only an hour (like I did now) and you already have you healthy meal prepared :)

Have a nice Monday! 

Party food: spinach rolls

spinach rolls

If you are looking for some party snack, which are easy to prepare, looks great and taste no worse, you came to right place!

Spinach rolls are really easy to prepare. You will need:

* french dough/butter dough (in poland there is a low fat version, which I actually recommend, but here in Norway, we have only regular type)
* spinach
* 1 egg and a spoon of natural yoghurt or Philadelphia cheese

start with preparing spinach that it can cool down before rolling them into dough

First, start with spinach - defroze it, put it to a pot and boil it. Add 1 egg, lots of garlic and salt. At the end add a big spoon of yoghurt to have more creamy consistence. Put the pot from the heat and let spinach cool down.

Take half defrost french dough. It has to be a half-frozen that you can form it easy, when it is defrosted it gets really messy, believe me.

knife has to be sharp to not destroy the beauttiful pattern of dough

Put a spinach on a dough and roll it. Then take a really sharp knife and chop it into piecies like in the pictures below.

rolls ready to bake

Put rolls on an oven pan, you can covered them with egg (but it is not necessary) to get gold coating.
Bake rolls in the oven for 30 minutes in 220 degrees. 

can be served both - warm or chilled

And.. enjoy a great party! :)

Btw. this is not a diet snack, keep that in mind, french dough is very rich in calories from fat. But from time to time you can spoil yourself with treat like that, don't you? :)

Pizza time!

Meat pizza on yeast dough covered in fresh spinach and ruccola

Another fast-food in healthier edition. I prepared pizza, this time with lots of meat and on yeast dough. 

For dough I used ready mix from Protein Fabrikken. 
This one is made mainly from almond flour, white eggs and whey protein. It contains only 4g carbs per portion of ready pizza, is full in protein and fiber (healthier option for sure, but still not tasting as good as regular pizza dough, to be honest). 

champignons seasoned with oregano, basil, salt and garlic pepper

I prepared champignons first, rich seasoning them with oregano and basil. I only put them on pan and warm till they put juices.

this minced meat has approximately 8% of fat

Minced chicken meat was next for preparing. I used the same seasoning which I used with champignons.

paprika - one of my favourites ingredients in the kitchen

I chopped also red paprika.

I made dough from adding dry yeast, 0,5dl of walnut oil and 2,5 dl of warm water to flour mix

After preparing dough and leaving it for 30 minutes to grow (mine didn't grow much - I am poor with yeast stuff).

I used pizza souse from can with chopped tomatoes in it.

pizza ready for baking

I put all ingredients on dough and put it to the oven for 30 minutes in 200 degrees.

I like adding cheese only for the end of baking process - only to melt it

After 20 minutes I took pizza from the oven and add cheese on top. I use a mix of regular and parmesan cheese. Then I putted pizza for the next 10 minutes to the oven.

I decorate pizza with fresh chopped ruccola and spinach.

Spinach pancakes

I am presenting another idea of using spinach for those who are not actually a spinach fan (for example me;)).

spinach fluffy pancakes

I always try to use spinach as a ingredient, it brings me some volume and vitamins til dishes, but you don't exactly fell it - and that is all the secret! ;) 
Today I am presenting spinach pancakes, previous recipes was about spinach meatballs and tarta

For 10 small pancakes you will need:

I am using whole grain flour, you can replace it with rice/soya/almond flour

* 5 tablespoons of whole grain flour

This chopped frozen spinach is very easy to use - only thing you have to do is to defrost it

* a bowl of defrosted spinach 
* 1 egg
* pinch of salt
* 1 teaspoon of baking powder

* half a cup of water

It might not look tasty, but in the en it will be ;)

Mix ingredients all together and heat the pan with some frying oil on it.

You can form normal sized pancakes, but then it is better to omit using baking powder (it makes dough more fluffy)

Form small pancakes in the pan and fry them about 2-3 minutes on each side.

And that is it! Wonderwing how to serve this kind of pancakes? I put a filet chicken breast on it and covered it with other pancakes that in result I had a pancake-sandwich :)

Tenderloin for dinner

Tenderloin in garlic and herbs with rice and broccoli

Tenderloin is probably my favourite part of (pork) meat. Nothing can beat veal tenderloin, but pork is also good - and more affordable! ;)

Seasoning and putting meat to fridge will give it perfect aroma and juicy

To have a juicy and aromatic meat it is good to seasoned it (lot's of fresh garlic recommended!) before, add a drop of oil and put it to the fridge. The longer time meat will spend in fridge, the better (you can leave it even for all night).

Meat won't need any additional oil once you used few drops while seasoning

When rice and vegetables were almost ready, I putted chopped tenderloin on a frying pan and fry for about 10 minutes (5 minutes on each side).

I added chopped red paprika to rice as well as some spinach and ruccola leaves - there is never to much veggies and greens ;)

I served tenderloin on spinach and ruccola leafs with rice (with paprika) and blanched broccoli.

I am big parmesan fan :)

Before serving I also use some parmesan cheese for decoration.