Irresistable Ice Cream Week

Hot, muggy weather, like we've been experiencing over the past few days can be the bane of the weight watcher. Especially if you're trying to exercise! Personally this kind of weather puts me off eating and all I want to do is knock back some ice cold pints of sweet, sweet beer, well that or else eat a bucket of ice cream.  Unfortunately luxury ice cream is pure evil when it comes to calories and fat content....What I wouldn't have given for a tub of fairly nuts or cookie dough Ben and Jerrys this afternoon....droooooooooooooool!!!

But I knew the guilt I would feel afterwards would far outweigh the pleasure. Per 100ml  of Ben and Jerrys there is roughly 15g of fat. A scoop is roughly 100g so if you go for 3 scoops, which, lets face it, is the most popular size, we're talking 45g of fat and it's not even a main meal as much as I wish it could be. We're also talking 270 calories per scoop so in that little  three scoop tub at the cinema there lurks a whopping 810 calories. So a 500ml tub that you would buy in the supermaarket would contain over 1300 calories and 75g of fat. Ouch! But there are a number of alternatives as always and I do have a pretty great low fat ice cream recipe but I will post that later in the week. This blog post is about quick fix solutions to stop your ice cream craving.

First of all, let me get one thing straight...I'm not talkin 'bout none of that frozen yoghurt muck! That's not ice cream and it never will be....I'm talkin 'bout real, creamy, not an ice crystal in sight, ice cream.  Obviously the non luxury brand ice creams are going to be lower in calories...Plain vanilla averages at 100 calories per 100ml and 4.5g of fat.  That's what we would all normally have at home in our freezers, but we can do better than that... Carte D'or have brought out a Light Vanilla Ice Cream and I swear it tastes identical to their normal vanilla ice cream, which is very good indeed. Made with vanilla pods, it's a little pricier than the own brand ice creams available in supermarkets and the likes of HB or Walls but it tastes so much better. Tesco do a lighter choice vanilletta, but they give the game away by not calling it ice cream...it's a "frozen dessert" and it tastes completely gack! So don't be tempted to try it!!

There are only 70 calories per 2 scoops and 3g of fat in the Carte D'or light Vanilla, so I usually have 3 scoops and a topping of some sort, which more often than not is half a snack sized crunchy bashed to crumbs and sprinkled over the top. You'd be surprised how far it goes and it's like having a honeycomb and chocolate ice cream. This also works well with Maltesers or an Oreo. Basically anything chocolatey and crumbley! Nom. Nom Nom!!! Just watch how much you use to keep your calorie count down. I'll also be posting a great low fat/low cal summer fruit sundae recipe during this week that will leave you feeling completely spoilt on only 180 calories!!!

Of course, we're not always at home when the urge for an ice cream hits, but even when you're out and about you don't have to resist if you know your ice cream badies from your ice cream goodies. Generally I stick with ice creams that are made from skimmed milk and sorbet. So if you like them go with a Tangle Twister for only 76cals, an Orange Solero for only 77cals, or a Funny Foot for 83 cals. If you just want an ice lolly then those seriously tasty Fruit Pastille ones are only 58 cals and if you're feeling really saintly but fancy something creamy there are always the old childhood reliable Mini Milks at a mere 31 cals but they are very small! Nothing stopping you having two when they're that low though!

The average chocolatey ice cream lolly isn't terrible in calories and fat if you were having one as a dessert rather than just a snack.  It would be a good choice, in fact... but I'm all about maximising taste for as few calories as possible and you can have a way more indulgent dessert for around the same calorie count with much lower fat.  So if you're watching your weight don't sweat it when it comes to ice cream. Don't bother with the frozen dessert crap, it tastes pants. Avoid the luxury brands unless it's a super rare treat and you're willing to work off all those calories. There is a low calorie/fat option for every circumstance. Think I'll go have a Solero right now!
 

Muffin Top Maiming Muffins

Cupcakes and Muffins are a big deal at the moment. Everyone is going nuts for them, myself included, but they are super high in calories and fat. The average blueberry muffin available in coffee shops the world over averages at 380 calories and 19 grams of fat! Yep you read that right...19 grams of fat! They also seem to contain very few blueberries and the few that they do contain have been soaked in sugar no doubt. 

I found a recipe for blueberry muffins on the BBC Good Food website and adapted it to make it low calorie and low fat without losing any of the taste. I guarantee that if you like blueberry muffins you will love this recipe.  

Nutritional Information per muffin:
Calories: 196
Fat: 4.8g (0.5g saturated fat)
Carbs: 36g
Fibre:2g
Sugar:16g
Salt: 0.43g
WW Propoints: 7


Ingredients:

5 tbsp Flora Cuisine (45% less saturated fat than Olive Oil, 1.2g less fat and 24 fewer calories)
340g self raising flour (or else 225g SR flour and 115g Wholemeal flour)
2 tsp baking powder
Zest 1/2 lemon and 1 tsp of juice
85g  fruit sugar (brown caster sugar if you can't get fruit sugar. Fruit sugar is sweeter so you use less of it)
50g light muscovado sugar
2 tbsp of powdered sweetener (optional)
1 small very ripe banana (the blacker the better)
1 egg
300ml butter milk (keep a little extra aside to add at the end to ensure super moist muffins)
2 drops of vanilla essence
125-150g fresh blueberries
(If you like them a bit sweeter try adding 2 tbsp of powdered sweetener)

1. Heat oven to 200C/180C fan/gas 6. Use a 12-hole muffin tin and line with paper cases. Mix (both) flours with the baking powder and lemon zest. Reserve 1 tbsp fruit sugar, then stir the rest into the flour with the Muscovado and optional sweetener.
2. Mash the banana well then stir in the buttermilk and oil. In another bowl beat the egg till it's fluffy but still liquid (I usually give it a good three minutes with a hand whisk) then combine with the rest of the wet mixture. Using a large metal spoon, very lightly stir into the flour mix, just to combine. Over-mixing will make the muffins tough. Toss in the blueberries and give just a few turns of the spoon to carefully stir them in without crushing. At this point I normally add a little extra buttermilk mixed with the vanilla essence to losen the mixture. Adding more liquid at this stage will ensure a moist muffin.
3. Spoon the mixture into the tin - each hole should be very full. Bake for 15-20 mins until risen and golden. (I would definitely check them after 15 minutes.)
4. Mix the reserved caster sugar with the lemon juice. When the muffins are done, remove from the oven, then brush with the sugar and lemon mixture while they are still hot. Gently loosen the edges of each muffin then leave in the tin for 15 mins to cool a little as they're very delicate while hot. Remove to a wire rack. Best eaten the day of making, but will keep for up to 3 days.

 This recipe is massively adaptable. Try it with 85g of strawberries instead of banannas and add some strawberry essence instead of vanilla. Make sure to drain the excess liquid from the strawberries after mashing them but retain the liquid and mix with the sugar  for the finishing glaze. blueberries do go well with strawberries but mix it up a bit with cranberries. You could also use apple or any fruit combination you wish so long as you get the constistancy and weight of the fruit the same as the mashed bananna.

Give it a go and let me know how you get on.

One final thought: Blueberries can be expensive. I buy mine in Lidl as they are much cheaper than anywhere else but I have  planted my own blueberry bushes in pots that shall keep me in an abundance of blueberries  in the coming months for free!