Overnighting oats

Like there is not enough photos of other people's food going around, I bring you photos of my overnight oats!

I have seen recipes for overnight oats floating around for ages, but never really tried it. I usually cook my oats like porridge on the stove top, it gets a bit stodgy. On my trip to Glenelg a few months back, I thought I'd try it as I was staying in a motel with no cooking facilities (it did have a microwave). Easy breakfast. It was great.

I much prefer this way, when I remember to put it in the fridge the night before. No fancy mason jars, just a plastic storage container with a lid. It all softens overnight, not stodgy at all. The fruit plumps up and the seeds and nuts soften up. All the flavours mix together nicely.

I don't like it cold, so I take it from the fridge and warm it up a bit in the microwave.

I add a little bit of black molasses and mix it through. It's super high in iron and magnesium. 

I am not one to measure what goes in, just chuck in whatever I have. This is what I used this time:

• Rolled oats
• dried apricots, cut up
• dried figs, cut up
• pumpkin seeds
• slivered almonds
• LSA mix
• water to just cover ingredients

It's become one of my go to breakfasts, when I don't feel like poached eggs on toast! Poached eggs on toast is my fave.

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My morning rituals

I don't know about you, but I most definitely have a morning ritual.

On school days, it starts by turning my phone alarm off, which I leave on the kitchen bench. It means I have to actually get OUT of bed and walk to the kitchen, where my routine starts. This is intermingled with packing bags for school and feeding animals. If I am lucky the kids aren't awake yet and I can do most of that in peace.

A lot of the morning tasks are ritual, like opening the curtains, putting the kettle on and usually, going to the loo.

Whatever order I do things in, there are three things that I do (for myself) religiously every morning.

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Drink hot water and lemon juice.

This is the first thing I do in the morning. Every morning. It's habit.

Drinking warm lemon water is supposed to aid digestion, be good for the immune system and liver. Lord knows my liver could do with all the help it can get!

What I do know is, it keeps me regular! Which must be good for my colon too (a little extra information you probably didn't want to know). Lemon juice contains Vitamins C and B6. With my history of depression and anxiety, the B6 is important. 

I squeeze half a lemon's worth of juice into a mug, then fill with hot water from the tap. It's at this time that I take my multi vitamins too.


Make a herbal tea

I have never been much of a coffee drinker, and when I was, I felt sluggish and weighed down. It just doesn't agree with me I don't think. That's not to say that I never have coffee. I was bought one the other day, by someone who didn't know my tendency for tea, so I drunk it anyway. Every now and then is OK with me, it's just not one of my habitual drinks.

I do however drink a lot of herbal tea!

Straight after I've had my lemon drink, I make a cuppa tea. Sometimes it's drunk while perusing Facebook, or making lunches for school, or watching the morning news. It depends how much time I have on my hands or whether the kids are up yet.


Eat breakfast

I always make and eat breakfast. My staple breakfast is porridge, with added goodness like pumpkin seeds, LSA, coconut and sesame seeds. Sometimes some dried or fresh fruit.

I always seem to fit it in before school drop off, even if it's a quick piece of toast or some fruit and yogurt. Porridge seems to keep me going until lunch time though, without dipping into the pantry. It's the space between lunch and dinner I have trouble with, and all the sweet crap I have in the pantry.

How does this differ or similiarise with your morning? 
Are you a coffee or tea person?
What is your weakness, when it comes to the mid afternoon slump?

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Everyday #fmy52weeksofmemories

I am falling behind here.

Everyday I struggle to find that balance between having enough down time and staying up way too late. Do I catch up with stuff or sit on my rear watching telly. Masterchef and Gogglebox wins every time. Even those are interrupted by out of bed children who 'NEED' me.

Trying to fit all the things I need to do into a certain number of hours in a day. It doesn't feel like I ever stop.

Mostly I feel I am not achieving anything, yet the opposite is true.

I write lists almost everyday to keep on top of what I want to get done. I manage to methodically cross things of the list and am actually achieving. The list usually goes in the bin and more things get added to the next list, or stacked in my brains memory stores. Stores which don't work all that well.

If I kept every day's lists and looked back over them at the end of the week, I could be quite proud at what I have managed to get done. I am seriously considering doing this.

There are things that I do every single day, that I don't write on the list, because they are automatic. I have been known to write these on the list, just for the satisfaction of crossing them off.

Drink a hot lemon drink
First thing in the morning, before I do anything, I make a drink of hot water and lemon (or lime) juice. If I don't use fresh lemons, I have a bottle of juice in the fridge.

I can't remember when I started doing this, but it's become a habit. Even when we were camping I took my bottle of lemon juice.

Feed the dog and chooks
This is one of those things I will write on the list and cross it off, just for the recognition. I am the animal feeder, hear me roar......
The dog barely raises an eyelid from his kennel as I feed him in the morning. The three chooks come running with gusto as I toss the contents of the chook bucket into the run. I get 2 eggs as my reward. One of the chooks is getting a little long in the tooth and hasn't given me an egg for ages. Maybe chicken soup will be on the list soon.

Eat breakfast
Without fail I make myself breakfast, and eat it. OK, so I forgot one day last week, I did eat something after the school run when I got home like a good little chicken.

More often than not it's porridge. Today it's left over chunky soup I made yesterday.

I have managed to get our routine down pat in the mornings that I have time to sit down to breaky. In between packing school bags and having a shower.

Washing
This is something else I have no trouble putting on the list just because, and crossing off. I am a hard working washer woman. Whether it be dishes or the washing pile of hardly worn clothes and wet towels. I cross that shit off my list bane of my existence of my list.

The bathroom, dunny and floors however are usually neglected. I should hang my head in shame. The trick is not to breathe in or look too hard at the wrong time.

Cook!
I don't mind cooking.  I actually enjoy it. I cook something everyday, so that's probably a good thing.

What really shits me off is when the kids wont eat it. I try.

Seedy Porridge

Did I mention I was on a bit of a health kick? Well having a good crack anyway.

I've been using loads more fresh produce and less of the processed, unrecognisable as food, stuff.

Breakfast most mornings is fruit, yoghurt, or porridge. Occasionally I will cook an egg, but mostly I don't have the time. Porridge is quick.

This is how I've been having it, with lots of seeds and honey to sweeten it up.

You could add sultanas, or fresh fruit on top like strawberries or banana.

The food combining way of eating, that I'm currently doing, doesn't allow fruit to be eaten together with other foods. I eat fruit before a meal and not during or after. It goes on the principle that fruit digests quicker than other food, so should be eaten separately.

Also proteins and carbs aren't mixed together as a rule, so I use water to make the porridge. By all means use milk if you want to. Just cook the porridge according to the direction on the oats packet.

Don't ask me how it works. Sometimes it sounds like mumbo-jumbo, all I know is I feel better and I lost a bit of weight. Can't argue with that.

Porridge with seeds and honey

1/3 cup of quick oats
1 cup water

Bring to the boil, then simmer for 2 minutes. 

Take the porridge off the heat and stir through -

1 tablespoon of pepitas(pumpkin seeds)
1 teaspoon sunflowers seeds
1/2 teaspoon sesame seeds
1 Tablespoon of LSA(a ground mixture of linseeds, sunflower seeds and almond)

Drizzle with some honey. Sit and eat.

What do you usually eat for breakfast?

Do you like porridge? How do you have yours?

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