The Great Food Blogger Cookie Swap - Orange & Polenta Cookies

I didn't need to read past the first line... 

The Great Food Blogger Cookie Swap brings together food bloggers from around the world in celebration of all things scrumptious.

I'm in! 

I signed up without reading any further, and then figured out the rest of the process of the Great Food Blogger Cookie Swap along the way. 

I received my "match" email letting me know which three bloggers I have been allocated to send a dozen cookies each to. The only hitch was there was only one other gluten-free blogger out there that signed up for the swap. So, Emma and I were matched with each other. I then got a really sweet email from Emma wondering if it would be totally weird if rather than posting our gluten free cookies to each, if we should maybe meet up 

So Emma and I met for lunch in Marylebone and exchanged cookies. I don't know whether it is the mutual antipodeanness that made it such an easy and fun lunch, but this Kiwi blogger is a seriously good baker! She made me a batch of Melting Moments (how VERY AustraZealand right?!) and they were so incredibly soft and buttery that you would never know that there was any flour in them at all, let alone whether it was GF flour. 

They were heavenly, seriously good!! Do yourself a favour and pop over to her blog Adventures of a London Kiwi to snag the recipe. She filled mine with three different fillings...Pumpkin Spice, Lemon and Jam, all of which were incredible, but I was a sucker for the lemon!

I wasn't sure what to bake for my dozen because the rules stipulate that you can't share anything that you have already blogged about. Hmm... my trouble is that whenever I stumble upon something yummy, I blog it right away! So, I had to find a new recipe to try out. I had a think about what my favourite cakes and cookies are and one of my new found favourites are the financiers and so set out to make some cookies with polenta in them. 

I found this recipe on Baking in Frangrais and absolutely loved it, and only tweaked it a little. I've made this batch multiple times and think it is sensational. 

I think they are the perfect cookie to have with a hot cup of tea or cold glass of milk! 

Ingredients

3oz polenta (75g)

1oz rice flour (25g)

1oz almond meal (25g)
1/4 tsp baking powder

¼tsp bicarbonate of soda

3oz icing sugar (75g)

2oz butter, cubed (50g)

1 beaten egg yolk

Grated rind of 1 orange

Flaked almonds

Method:

Preheat oven to 180°C/350F. Line two baking sheets with baking parchment.

1. Put the polenta, rice flour, ground almonds, bicarb, icing sugar and butter into a food processor and blitz until you have fine breadcrumbs.  

2. Add the egg yolk and orange rind and process again until a ball of firm dough is formed.

3. Wrap the dough in cling film and chill in the fridge for 30 minutes.

4.  Dust a work surface with rice flour and turn the dough out onto it.  Roll the dough out thinly and cut into circles about 4cm diameter.

5. Put the biscuits on the baking sheets, allowing a little room for spreading.  Sprinkle each one with flaked almonds.

6. Bake for about 8 minutes until golden.  Leave to cool on the baking sheets for a few minutes, dust with icing sugar and then remove carefully and cool completely on a wire rack.

The biscuits are crisp and crunchy and fresh and nutty. 

I love my little helper in the kitchen! She is never far away when I'm baking!!

And because everyone loves a good before and after shot... Here's the packaged cookies ready to give to Emma, and she sent me a photo of what happened when her co-workers found the cookies!!

I loved being part of this cookie swap. It felt good to contribute to the Cookies for Kids' Cancer and I always love baking for a happy reason. I really enjoyed getting to meet another expat foodie blogger in London (particularly one who is gluten intolerant too!) and am now looking forward to reading everyone's submissions on their blog!

Psst!! If you are looking for a little more meg-made, I'd LOVE for you to follow along!

Half Birthday Honey Sponge cake (GF)

This post is dedicated to Madeleine's two Grandfathers. 

To my Dad, Pop, who shared with me a love for half birthdays, which I am now carrying on to my children in the hopes they will embrace the indulgence with me too. 

And to Pete's Dad, Granddad, who has been trying to force honey on this child since the day she was born. It is now officially safe to give Maddie some honey, so as promised, she had honey in her cake today! 

Today Madeleine turned 18months old, one and a half!! Happy Half Birthday darling girl! 

It is incredible to think this world didn't know this sweet little girl only 18 months ago, and yet I can't believe how long I feel like I have known her for, and can't believe it's only been 1.5 years. 

I wanted to make a fairly simple sponge cake today and to appease her Granddad, I added some honey in, so that hopefully he can see we don't deprive her!! 

I followed this recipe from Gluten Free on a Shoestring, but omitted the corn starch and lemon, and added two tablespoons of honey instead. 

It was a lighter cake than I have made so far gluten free, however still wasn't the light and airy sponges that I used to love!! I think next time I would beat the egg white together with the yolks, and then add the dry ingredients later, I feel like that would produce a fluffier batter. But it smells delicious and Husband says it is so (I'm fasting today so this cruel and unusual punishment afternoon of baking really should earn me double weight loss this week!!). 

Happy Half Birthday Maddie, what an overwhelmingly joyful 18 months it has been.

Please forever stay this sweet and loving.

Mum xx


Psst!! If you are looking for a little more meg-made, I'd LOVE for you to follow along!

Fast Diet - Week 8 - #LoseDayTuesday

Starting week eight of the 5:2 Fast Diet!! To find out more about it, read my original post here.

My scales are broken.

Well they must be because they haven't moved in TWO WEEKS!!!! Last week wasn't surprising at all, I replaced all the water in my body with eggnog, but this week I was kind of expecting to see the numbers go somewhere (with crossed fingers that the destination was down!!).

This past week I was a little more mindful about what I was consuming, largely because I could barely walk, let alone run up and down stairs for 30 minutes to burn off something yummy. A few years back I fractured my sesamoid bone in my foot and every now and then it flares up and simple things like walking (and even sleeping) are disturbed and very painful. So I guess I did less incidental exercise during the week, but on the weekend I swam some laps at the pool and did my regular reformer pilates.

I ate fairly well on my non-fast days however if I knew I was going to indulge (Maze Grill Thursday night for Husbands birthday and a delectable seafood night on Saturday) then I would eat way less during the day. I am really trying to strike a balance so that I can still enjoy the things that make me happy. This is why this diet works for me. I've never been good at depriving myself all the time for 3 months or so to try and lose weight, it is just so against the grain that I could never stick to it. There's nothing wrong with enjoying good food, and this diet allows me to still do that, I just enjoy a lot less of it now!!

I don't have a week of temptation ahead of me so I fully expect to see some changes on the scales next week! That is unless an old theory of mine proves true....that all I need to do is LOOK at donuts and I put on weight!! (I'm in the process of tidying up my Pinterest boards so have spent a lot of time looking at incredible gluten free food I want to try out over the Christmas period!).

One thing I have mastered is not eating until much later in the day now! My first taste of food is now about 3pm, although one of my fast days I just didn't eat all day until 8pm. My husband wants to know what happened to his wife, the one who had to eat within 30 minutes of waking up!! It helps me so much though, because as soon as my belly gets a whiff of food, it wants more...

So onto the meals from a fast day...

Lunch - Spicy tomatoes eggs (Shakshuka)

I saw this one in the Fast Diet Recipe Book and it looked so tasty, but the name was not so... Shakshouka! This is why I renamed them spicy tomatoed eggs! 

This recipe is in the Leisurely Breakfast section of the recipe book, but I'm definitely not hardcore enough to consume cayenne pepper for breakfast, so I made this dish as a late lunch. I don't have a small pan that I could make a one serve in, so just made the double, and my husband was creative with his potion later on (mixing through pasta of course). 

Recipe Post HERE

Dinner - stuffed chicken breasts (skewered Italian)

My good friend Holly first introduced me to stuffing chicken breasts a few years ago and now it is one of my favourite ways to enjoy chicken! This recipe is a slightly healthier version to what I usually make though, but it is still delicious and thanks to the fresh tomato it doesn't dry out even though it isn't wrapped in prosciutto.

Skewered Italian (from Fast Diet Recipe Book)

Flatten a chicken breast and top it with 1 chopped large tomato, a few basil leaves and 2 tsps freshly grated parmesan. Season, roll up and secure with skewers. Bake for 15 minutes or under a grill or until the chicken is cooked through.

The recipe calls for this to be eaten with either tender stem broccoli or dry-griddles courgette strips, and so I went with the courgette. I'm not sure if the calorie count included the courgettes or not, but if not, its only an additional 20 calories, so its not a big deal!

Drinks

Creme Caramel herbal tea x 2 (4 calories) and not nearly enough water. I think because I wasn't as active I wasn't actually thirsty, but I think it may be contributing to why things aren't moving, my body feels like it has to retain the water since I'm not giving it any. It's funny isn't it, that in giving your body more water, it retains less. Odd but true. 

Total calories for the day = 442

Exercise

Reformer Pilates and swimming laps at the pool. When my foot issue made walking difficult I decided that I should try swimming some laps instead. So on Saturday we went to the pool. I haven't swam actual laps since I was pregnant so it was fun to be back in the water. I love swimming, it feels very natural to me, and even though I haven't swam in two years, I kept up with the fellas in the "medium" lane, so that's not too bad! Distance swam - 1km. It felt great to be exercising without hurting my foot, hip, back or sciatic nerve (oi, I really need a new body, this one is faulty!!). 

Weight loss?

Total loss to date = 2.7kgs (5.95lbs)

I feel more okay about it this week (partly because of everyone's encouraging comments/tweets/emails last week, thank you!!!) but was still hoping for a bit of a loss. But I feel like I'm getting into the groove of still allowing myself treats, but then adjusting my other intakes so that it doesn't tip the scales for the day! 

Goals for the coming week

A new section this week, but I think I want to really articulate what I've learnt from the previous week to focus on in the coming week. For this week they are:

• More water more water more water
• Swimming goals - 1.2km
• Midweek exercise - just an at home pilates/resistance workout
• Alcohol free 4 nights not just 3

Have you recently started the Fast Diet?? Are you enjoying it? Having much success? I love hearing how other people are finding it, it seems to be working for pretty much everyone who tries. I follow some really great people on Instagram and Twitter, some of their progress photos are amazing!!! 

I hope you have a great week!! 

Psst!! If you are looking for a little more meg-made, I'd LOVE for you to follow along!

Photo Phriday #32

THE most wonderful time of the year!

December in London is charming. It restores my faith in this sometimes grimy and gloomy city. For one whole month (well lets be real, the lights turn on in October!) there is magic in the air and romance in the cold. We rug up in our warm woolies and I for one feel the sparkle of the fairy lights above. 

I have always loved Christmas, even when it was too hot in Brisbane to do anything but lounge around the pool and sleep, I always loved decorating the house and making Christmasy food, even if it wasn't cold and like you read about it in every Santa story. 

Last year we spent the Holidays in Charlotte, NC and New York City. Maddie was 6 months old and we had such a wonderful time celebrating a real American Christmas, complete with grits and the Rockerfeller Tree!

This year though we are spending Christmas in London, with my brother and his family coming to spend it with us. I am so excited. It will be the first Christmas I have spent with my niece and nephews, and this year Madeleine has so much more of a clue about what's going on, I can't wait to see her little face on Christmas day!

On the 1st of December every year is tree decorating and egg-nog day. So we did our decorations and had our good friends over for rum balls and eggnog! (you may have read, I cannot control myself when it comes to eggnog....)

You may have seen our beautiful Bruce (the Spruce) on the journey home...

And now we have proudly lost half of our living room to house this beauty for the next month! 

This year the theme is gold with splashes of soft pink. Randolph the advent calendar reindeer was once upon a time bright red, so he got a little makeover!

And he got a little buddy this year. But little buddy got gold'ed AND glittered!

We needed something for the top of our tree, and according to my husband, it had to be a star. I'm not sure that he has very many Christmas traditions to bring to the overly decorated table, so i'm more than okay with a star atop our tree!! So long as it was gold and glittered!!

 I made this wreath last year and was happy that it still fitted the theme this year because I just think its so cute. How funny does our tree look?! It's like half the living room!!

I made some tissue paper pom poms to hand with the bunting...

I found a really sweet bell-heart ornament (and got an extra one as a gift), but they were red! Could you believe it, red, at Christmas time! Well anyway, I'm sure you can guess what happened to ours!

And our brown paper packages have all been tied up with strings and posted all around the world!

Did I mention that I LOVE Christmas?! It is just the most wonderful time of the year. 

But today, is my husbands birthday, so Christmas is on hold today to celebrate him! Tonight we are off for a date night out, with our first London babysitter watching Maddie. But today we've been busy preparing to celebrate when he gets home. I better write my card now, tough act to follow!

Happy Birthday Husband, and Happy December to all and to all a good night!

Fast Diet - Week 7 - #LoseDayTuesday

Starting week seven of the 5:2 Fast Diet!! To find out more about it, read my original post here.

Boy oh boy am I making the Fasting Days work hard at the moment!! Its as though I'm challenging this diet, to see just how much I can indulge on non-fast days and see if I can still lose weight. The answer - NOPE! I am not entirely surprised to see no weight loss this week, it hasn't been the best week. I have tried and tried to resort to my list of non-food cuddles and on fasting days I have been successful, but on feast days, I've feasted. And I regret it. Last week I was feeling confident and proud of myself. This week I feel doughy and self-conscious.

As I see it, there are two possible scenarios for the reason the scales didn't move this week. Scenario one is that I have gained some muscle this week, which is possible given that my Reformer Pilates class was heaps easier this week and I wasn't hurting for 4 days after!! Scenario two is that I drank my body weight in eggnog and started to resemble the rum balls that I inhaled all day Sunday. Me thinks it is scenario two! Shame.

So, where to go from here. Onwards. And downwards (on the scales only, will be trying for a more positive and happy week this week....no more food cuddles!). I think I need to remember that I am actually trying to lose weight, so a litre of eggnog is perhaps not the way to do that!! I think this week's result are the kick in the butt I need to reset and work harder this week. 

Lunch - Chorizo & Butterbean Soup

Yes, same soup as last week. I can't help it, I love it! I've had another fast-day of soup for lunch and soup for dinner, but figure those aren't the posts I should write about. But, I wanted to put this one back in the mix to encourage everyone, EVERYONE to try it, it really is so delicious. 

This fab recipe from Lavender & Lovage. 

Snack - Cinnamon cottage cheese

I am losing a little bit of creativity I think! I am just going for the same old same old at the moment. I want to spend some time reading through recipes and come up with a few new snack ideas for next week!!

I had some cottage cheese, sprinkled with some cinnamon on top! 

Dinner - Baked Cod with Balsamic Peppers & Sweet Potato Mash

A few weeks back we went to our friends downstairs for dinner and every time we eat with them I am inspired to try new foods. They are gluten intolerant, eat really well, and are darn good cooks. We had the most incredible dinner of baked cod, saffron & currant rice, with another side that I can't even remember but it was soooo good. Anyway, my point is that I've wanted to try baking and grilling my fish the same way to see if I could recreate it, and so that's what I did for my Fast Day dinner.

To cook the peppers, I used one squirt of oil spray (1 calorie) and let the finely cut peppers soften up for about ten minutes in the pan. I then added 1 teaspoon of balsamic vinegar and 1/4 teaspoon of brown sugar. I possibly didn't need the sugar, because they ended up tasting quite sweet, but they were delicious!

The mash sweet potato really is just that. I boiled the sweet potatoes and when I was mashing them, through in a tablespoon of cottage cheese and one teaspoon of paprika. I wouldn't necessarily do the cottage cheese next time, it didn't add anything to the taste and therefore was a bit of a waste of calories.

And for the fish, all you need to do is bake the fillets for about 8 minutes (depending on their size of course) and then finish them off under the grill for two minutes to crisp up the top. The fish just flaked away but had a great crunch on top.

Drinks

Gosh I was so incredibly dull this week!!! Same same, water and Creme Caramel herbal tea. (2 calories). 

Total calories for the day = 488

Exercise

Reformer Pilates and unfortunately that's about it. I had a few physical ailments this week, which made walking quite difficult, so unfortunately I didn't do as much planned or incidental exercise as I should have. 

This week my goal is to work out smarter, and so rather than trying to push through the pain, come up with ways of exercising that don't use my feet/hips/back in such painful ways. I hope to get to the pool to do some laps this weekend and I have a new Spotify soundtrack so no excuses for not doing a resistance workout in my living room!! 

Weight loss?

Total loss to date = 2.7kgs (5.95lbs)

Boo.

I hope you have a wonderful week. Here's to a more balanced and happy week!!

CYBER SALE

For the rest of Cyber Monday everything on my Etsy store will be 25% off!!

So if you are looking for a Christmas gift/decoration and want a great discount, head on over to to meg-made before the night is out!