Happy New Year!  I am a huge fan of Christmas, but my Christmases tend to be punctuated with mountains of melted Camembert, gallons of mulled wine and countless sambuca shots. All good fun, but not exactly Slimming World friendly and I always wake up on 2nd January feeling like I’ve been hit by a bus from overdoing it for weeks. 

At this point, January is a welcome distraction, a chance to wipe the slate clean and set out those resolutions. Which I always struggle to stick to, but each year I like to contemplate what my goals would be…. If I was ever motivated enough to keep it up. 

That’s why my Instagram name (handle?) is beyondjanuary, as each year all my good intentions float beautifully out of the window after the initial month. I’m bursting at the seams (both figuratively and literally) to make this year a success. 

So in that vein, I thought I’d kick off this year with PLANNING, the key to staying on plan (yes yes, the clue is in the name). I’ve written previously about doing Slimming World with a heavy focus on eating clean, i.e. avoiding many of the “low fat” “fat free” items that Amelia Freear has coined as “packets and promises”. 

Winter essentials: 

• Thermos flask 
• Slow cooker 
• Ability to say no 

To make things really simple, I’ve been buying the following: 

• Entire orchards of fruit 
• Pre prepped veggies 
• Casserole meats
• Chicken breasts and lean mince 
• Iceland Slimming World products – admittedly these don’t fall under #cleaneating, but they are so useful – and feel like comfort food! 

A typical day currently looks like this: 

Brekkie: Starbucks skinny cappuccino (4.5 syns), fruit salad 

Lunch: Soup, ryvita (healthy extra B), marmite 

Snacks: Crudités, fruit 

Dinner: Chicken skewers and salad / slow cooked beef casserole / chilli and veg

Eton mess with coconut meringue (3 syns per meringue) 

Determined to keep this up – and enjoying a Dry January is definitely helping!

Until next time….

Lx