Homemade is usually always better (expect wine, homemade wine is usually awful!).

I have wanted to make my own yogurt for a while now and now that I am doing it I have no idea why I waited so long.  It's easy and super tasty.

HOMEMADE YOGHURT

WHAT YOU NEED

• 400ml milk (I used 2% milk)
• 20g dried skimmed milk powder
• 2 heaped tbsp live, plain yoghurt (I used a 2% yogurt)
• thermomoeter
• wide necked thermos flask, pre-warmed with boiling water

WHAT YOU DO
Pour the milk into a saucepan and whisk in the milk powder.

• Skimmed Milk Latte- 20kcal

At lunch time I usually have a green juice or a salad.  Today was a juice day.  This juice was 1/4 of a cucumber, 1 tsp ginger, 1 cup of spinach and half a lime.

• Fast Day Green Juice- 30kcal

• Fast Day Soup- 23kcal

 I save most of the 500 calories for my evening meal.  This flavour packed prawn noodle salad was the perfect end to this Fast Day.

FAST DAY PRAWN NOODLE SALAD

SALAD

• 100g cooked prawns
• 1 red pepper
• 10g spring onion, thinly sliced
• 1/2 cup chopped red cabbage
• 50g rice noodles, soaked in water
• 10 sugar snap peas
• 1/2 carrot, peeled and thinly sliced

I drank lots of water all day and three cups of tea with 10ml skimmed milk in each one (12kcal in total). In the evening I drank a slimline tonic water with lots of ice and a slice of lime.

So for this Fast Day I ate 497 calories.


I am not a diet or nutrition expert. Anyone who wishes to try this diet plan needs to first check out all of the details right here. All of my calorie values are plucked from either the packet or the internet. All recipes and images are my own.

I, like many others, have been on many diets and I have been quite successful on some of them. The one I achieved the most with, also had the negative effect of making me see food simply as a point value and nothing more. The idea of eating a jar of pickled onions was appealing because it was 0 points!! I don't want to be that person ever again. Don't get me wrong; I love pickled onions but a meal they are not!

Recently I have been feeling very blah. Months of winter padding and big jumpers have left me feeling a little like a marshmallow. Time to make some changes.


HOW DOES A FOOD LOVER GO ON A DIET?
You love food, you’re a little bit of a food nerd; you think about food from the moment you wake up till the moment your head hits the pillow? You dream about food, waking up in the morning hungry for what you devoured in your sleep. Know the feeling? The idea of counting calories all day every day is just painful. I don’t want to care about how many calories that lovely piece of crispy skinned belly pork has in it. I want to add that extra splash of olive oil. I want to drink the wine without remorse. I want to butter it without shame! I don’t want the guilt. I am so over the guilt. I want my cake and I want to eat it!

So the Fast Diet is my choice. Never heard of the Fast Diet? Here is a little info;

If we were to distill the Fast Diet into a single sound-bite, it would all come down to 5:2. That’s five days of normal eating, with little thought to calorie control and a slice of pie for pudding if that’s what you want. Then, on the other two days, you reduce your calorie intake to 500 calories for women and 600 calories for men.

Since you are only fasting for two days of your choice each week, and eating normally on the other five days, there is always something new and tasty on the near horizon. In short, it’s easy to comply with a regime that only asks you to restrict your calorie intake occasionally. It recalibrates the diet equation, and stacks the odds in your favour.

Bear in mind that the programme is designed as a well-signposted path towards a longer, healthier life; weight loss is simply a happy adjunct to all of that.

CHECK OUT THE WEBSITE FOR MORE DETAILS

Valentine's Day is coming.  Did you know already?  Have you been bombarded with hearts, glitter and overpriced roses yet?