With no particular plans today, I decided on a  chilled Saturday focusing on things I enjoy. So come spend a Saturday with me!

Firstly I have to greet my little ginger bear Hunter, he’s always so happy to see Luke and I. He’s a little ray of sunshine and I love it when he wakes up, but I especially love it when he wants cuddles. I have all the time in the world for that. I mean look at that face! He’s too cute!!

So first things first it’s a quick tidy of the kitchen, and dishwasher unload. Anyone else’s husband lay in bed just listening to you do the dishwasher, then come downstairs and try and help when it’s almost done? Or is that just my husband? 

After a quick kitchen tidy and dishwasher unload, it was time for breakfast. And breakfast as standard is porridge, because I am addicted to oats! Monday to Friday I have plain oats but at the weekend I like to go “crazy” and have flavoured oats, always prepared of course with no added sugar almond milk and some frozen berries. Add a cup of tea for me and coffee for Luke both with oat milk and that is one of my favourite breakfasts, satisfying and filling. 

Morning shower done (I love a long hot morning shower) It was time to put my face on, and by face I actually mean my beauty skin care products and not makeup. Since I am now very much in the mindset of very minimal make up where possible, (although ALWAYS lashes and lips) unless of course I am heading on out then we go full on.

My favourite skincare products (at the moment, because no doubt that will change) are The inkey list products. I especially love their retinol and SPF cream. I wear SPF every single day, it’s the biggest must have essential. Admittedly I haven’t always worn SPF, but I now have a sun spot on my face which has been there for a while, but I decided to get it checked out in February 2023 on the advice of my eyebrow tech. Thankfully the doctor confirmed that it was just a sun spot which was a result of both not wearing SPF and the use of sun beds. I have now ditched the sun beds and SPF is part of my daily routine. I finish off my minimal weekend makeup with the wonderskin lip gloss (absolutely obsessed) And then a quick spray of rituals perfume.

As I said earlier, we had no particular plans today, but when you have a super energetic (sometimes) 5 year old dog and the weather is bright and sunny, it was definitely time to head out on a long walk.

Obviously my hair goes up into the standard dog mum bun, knitted headband on (so I don’t get earache) and to complete the must have look I add my muddy dog waking coat and some very very muddy wellies!! oh and let’s not forget some all essential sun glasses – just because! And why not add into that mix a cheesy grin? I mean a normal smile would have been just as efficient.

We spent just over an hour on our walk over the discovery centre, unfortunately Hunter has to stay on a lead, because he has zero recall when needed! Although when we are in training class, typically his recall is spot on! However he still has a good time running around and loves meeting other dogs.

With our walk over it was time to go grab a drink, we settled on a Costa now I am a Starbucks girl, but Costa was on our route home so it made sense to stop and get a coffee frappe with coconut milk. If I’m ordering my go to Starbucks it’s coffee Frappuccino with soya. Oh and I take my own cup everywhere!! Becasue reuse and try and help the planet right? These cups are available from Serene Sage on Etsy (sorry UK delivery only) but go check them out, I love and am pretty obsessed with all of the designs

Walk done, coffee purchased it was time to head home, Hunter was tried and hungry (more so tired) Luke was hungry and I had some video editing to do for my YouTube channel which you can check out here. I made Luke a small healthy lunch with a side of miso soup and small piece of homemade banana oat bread (which I’d love to share the recipe for, but I kind of just make it up as I go along!) I settled for a miso soup as I wasn’t overly hungry and even passed on the banana oat bread (which I confirm was DELICIOUS, because I tried a lot when I was making it!)

Spending a few hours editing my Maldives travel vlogs, and I was definitely having holiday blues! I spend a lot of my free time researching travel destinations and watching travel programmes. I am pretty obsessed when it comes to travel! I also enjoy editing my travel vlogs because it’s a chance to reminisce about my amazing time and all that we got up to.

After spending a few hours editing, time was getting in and I had dinner to prepare. So I am not the best cook, but I love being in the kitchen following recipes and making edible food, because Luke actually does enjoy my cooking – so maybe I’m not that bad after all!!

The post My Saturday appeared first on Lifestyle Lisa.

With my honeymoon just weeks away (5 and a bit but who’s counting) I am desperately trying to find healthy recipes that I can stock up on for when snackcident’s happen. Because hey I’m only human after all and the odd snackcident does unfortunately occur!

So today I thought I’d share a short, easy and let’s say semi healthy recipe for PB & J oat muffins or as I call them for short “muff cups”

Before I start can we just take a moment to appreciate oats! I mean they are so versatile and I nearly always include oats in my baking! I literally just love oats!

Okay appreciation post over, it’s time for that recipe! And just to clarify this is not my recipe, this is a Instagram gem by healthyeatgram, I’ve just tweaked it in places!

Okay, here we go

Ingredients

3 banana’s

1/2 cup of peanut butter

4tbs of jam (jelly) of choice, I used grape jelly as it’s my favourite!

1/2 cup of oat milk (or milk of choice)

1/2 cup of maple syrup

2 cups of rolled oats

2 cups of musli

2 cups of granola

2tsp of baking powder

1tsp of cinnamon

Method

In a large mixing bowl mash bananas until smooth(ish) then add in all the other ingredients and mix together well! Obviously a taste test as you go is obligatory of course, so you can decide if it needs a little more of any of the above ingredients!

Once all ingredients are mixed well together distribute the mixture evenly into muffin cups.

Preheat the over to 140 degrees and bake for 25 minutes.

Let them cool (unless you are like Luke and can’t wait) and absolutely enjoy (with a cup of tea!)

They may not look worthy of a bake off Paul Hollywood hand shake, but let me tell you they taste amazing!!

The post Healthy(ish) PB & J Oat Muffins appeared first on Lifestyle Lisa.

It just so happens that I love pesto, and would usually buy shop bought, except 2022 is my year for trying to make more food from scratch! Which means it’s goodbye to the store bought jar and hello fresh homemade!

This is quite literally the easiest recipe ever!!! And as you all know by now, I like to keep things easy with very little hassle!!

Recipe

1 30g packet of basil (you only need the leaves)

64g grated Parmesan cheese

1/2 cup of olive oil

43g pine nuts (can be substituted for walnuts- I use a mixture of both)

3 cloves garlic

Salt & pepper to taste

Method

Throw everything into your food mixer and mix until everything is blended and you have something that resembles pesto!! Taste and add more seasoning if required. Garnish with pine nuts and serve!!

HOW simple is this, to be honest I won’t buy store bought again, as this is far tastier in my opinion.

It’s so quick to do, I think it literally took me 15 minutes! It’s a huge hit in my household, and with summer fast approaching this is perfect to rustle up for a picnic, or bbq, or just to enjoy sitting outside with some fresh crusty bread and a chilled glass of Prosecco!!

The post Hey Pesto! appeared first on Lifestyle Lisa.

YES I’m back with another food related post, because I love food, love experimenting and love sharing recipes that I find on Instagram and Pinterest!

This is actually quite an exciting food post because this is my OWN RECIPE! It was trial and error on an overcast Thursday afternoon and one that actually worked and turned out really rather well, so of course I’m sharing the easy recipe with you in the hope that maybe you’ll make them and enjoy them as much as I do!!

So firstly before I share, this is a simple, no fuss recipe, and it’s also pretty healthy too, winner all round!!

The ingredients list – 40g coconut flour, 40g oats, 60g of peanut butter or nut butter of your choice, 1 banana (I only had 1 left so next time I may use 2), 50g of coco powder (I was going to use cocoa powder but wanted something sweeter but still healthy so I actually used 50g of options hot chocolate powder) 2tsp agave nectar, 1 level tsp baking powder.

Method – Add the flour, oats and baking soda into a bowl and mix together. Blend together the banana, peanut butter, agave and chocolate powder until a smooth consistency forms, then add in the remaining mixture and mix until you have a doughy consistency. Then simply mould into little round bites place in the oven on 170 degrees for 15 minutes.

The end is result is pretty satisfyingly tasty! Its kind of like a mini chocolate muffin with a hint of banana!! It’s a healthy treat and perfect for those evening cravings with a cup of coffee!!

Let me know if you try this recipe and like it, or if you have something I could try next time, leave me a comment below.

The post Chocolate Oat Bites appeared first on Lifestyle Lisa.

Back in the kitchen on a rainy, miserable and chilly Sunday afternoon I thought I would try making my very own burrito bowl! Knowing that I already had a few burrito bowl recipes saved on my Pinterest board, I decided to give one of them a try! Because I’m working with the ingredients that I’ve got at home, I adapted a little and took a few ideas from different burrito bowl recipes.

Here’s what I put into my Healthy Sweet Potato Burrito Bowl

Roasted Sweet potato cut into chunks seasoned with, garlic powder, paprika & cayenne pepper, sweetcorn, shredded lettuce, red onion, cilantro lime rice, pico de gallo, chopped olives, black beans (which I couldn’t get hold of so substituted for the 3 bean salad from Tesco supermarket), cheese and a spicy dressing to finish.

1) How to make pico de gallo – Okay this is a favourite of mine, and they serve it with pretty much everything in America which is fine by me because it’s so delicious. Because we don’t have it here in the UK, I thought I would try making it myself! It’s really easy, and the end result was mouth watering tasty. – Start by chopping half an onion into small chunks the smaller the chunks the better, next chop jalapeños (I used jalapeños from a jar) into small pieces, add the onion and jalapeños to a medium sized mixing bowl. Next add lime juice and salt to the bowl and let everything marinade for a good 5/10 minutes. While that’s doing it’s thing chop around 10 small tomato’s (or 6 if they’re large) along with some fresh finely chopped cilantro (which here in the U.K is better known as coriander!) add the tomato’s and cilantro to the marinade and mix all together, leave for a further 15 minutes to let the juices really soak in before serving and enjoying!!

2) How to make Cilantro lime rice – This was a complete “wing it” recipe but it actually worked! Firstly obviously cook a batch of rice, once its all cooked and drained I let it cool for around 15 minutes before putting it in a frying pan (don’t add any oil) I then made up a quick marinade of lime juice, garlic and chopped cilantro (coriander) I didn’t measure anything as I was “winging it” so my advice is taste as you go along and decided how you like it. Once my marinade was done to perfection I added it to the frying pan with my rice and fried on a medium heat, the aim is to make sure that all the juice is absorbed by the rice. Once the liquid has gone the rice is done!

3) Homemade dressing – I actually did pretty much follow a Pinterest recipe for this, but tweaked it in places. You will need 64g of Tahini, 55g of water, 1-2tsp of hot sauce (I used Tabasco) 2tsp of garlic powder, juice from 1/2 lime or lemon (I used lemon) salt to taste. I put all the ingredients in a bowl and mixed until I had a consistency that wasn’t like hummus, but more runny like a dressing should be. I tasted it as I went along and added more garlic and I added a bit more water when it started to get too thick. I also added a bit of paprika and cayenne pepper to add some colour, and a bit more flavour as I find Tahini can be quite bitter so I like to disguise the taste.

Making the burrito bowl is the fun part! It doesn’t matter how it looks, as long as all your ingredients are in there! The end result is an explosion of different tastes that complement each other so well!

I’m going to experiment with different options, I have some Quorn chunks, some Oumph! A few bits from the vivera range including meatless chicken, and for Luke who likes his meat I have turkey, so lots to play around with and see what I can come up with!!

It’s funny that I used to HATE being in the kitchen, but I’ve almost found a new love for it, I’ll take that as a positive from lockdown!

The post Healthy Burrito Bowls appeared first on Lifestyle Lisa.

I decided (because I’m in the mood for experimenting) that I was going to attempt making my own hummus! OF COURSE I turned to Pinterest for an easy healthy recipe that would have me whipping up a delicious homemade hummus in no time at all!

I found one pretty quickly that I had already saved to my food & drink board on my own Pinterest account which you can follow by clicking the link on my home page.

I hadn’t actually planned to make hummus it was a last minute decision, therefore I had to do a bit of improvisation on the ingredients!

For this delicious homemade hummus you will need the following (Note this is not my recipe)

• 43g of good-quality tahini
• 2–4 tablespoons cold water, or more if needed
• 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
• Sea salt to taste
• 2 medium cloves garlic, peeled and smashed (I didn’t have cloves so used instead lazy garlic)
• juice of 1 lemon (2–3 tablespoons) (I used instead the lemon juice in a bottle)
• 1 can of chickpeas rinsed and drained
• optional toppings: extra drizzle of olive oil, chopped fresh parsley, sprinkle of ground sumac or paprika, toasted pine nuts (I didn’t add any of this, but will next time when I am better prepared)

Next up was to throw it altogether and blitz away in my blender. Seriously now looking to invest in a food processor! The blender worked okay but as with most things unless it’s a smoothie it doesn’t blend everything into a really smooth consistency, therefore this was a chunky hummus!

The end product okay may not look visually pleasing BUT it tasted really good! It did need to be blended a bit more which is something that I will aim for next time. But overall taste was good! Luke also really liked it (and he’s the honest one!) It was so quick and easy to make that I doubt I’ll be rushing to buy shop bought ones anytime soon!!

I served my hummus this evening on top of my seafood salad bowl!

The post Homemade Hummus appeared first on Lifestyle Lisa.

As you know whatever I do needs to be relatively straight forward and healthy(ish) And Pinterest has loads (literally loads) of amazing and unique recipe ideas that are simple enough for me to do.

I actually found another Cookie Dough recipe which doesn’t use chickpeas, but instead uses oats as the base ingredients which is great because I love anything oat based! Having mentioned previously that I was keen to try different versions of the chickpea cookie dough I decided that I would give this recipe a go and see how it turned out.

I pretty much followed the recipe although changed it ever so slightly to accommodate the ingredients that I had – well when in lockdown use what you have!

To make the cookie dough you will need

128g of oats, 128g of cashew nuts (I actually used 64g of cashews and 64g of cashew nut butter) 7 dates, 1tbsp of almond milk (I used 2tbsp) 1 tsp of vanilla essence,

Into my food blender it went (I don’t have a mixer) – and I mixed it until it was like dough! I then once again evened it out into 2 ramekin dishes and for fun garnished it with mini jazzes and sprinkles and served with pumpkin spice belvitas!

It tasted delicious! I can’t decided which recipe I prefer, although Luke’s preference would be the one without chickpeas but he has said he likes both!

I have to say I am LOVING these cookie dough recipe’s! I can’t wait to find more! Thank goodness for Pinterest in times like this!! Let me know if you’ve tried out this recipe or if you have any other easy ideas I can try out.

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