A love affair...

It's confession time here at Throw Out The Map. Well, technically that was yesterday but I missed that boat by a solid 24 hours. So, here I am with a confession for you, on a Thursday non the less. Get ready it's a biggy.

I am in love.

I am in love and he doesn't love me back.

In fact I'm in love and he barely even stays for breakfast.

I'm in love and I don't care who knows it.

I am in love with Mr. Overnight-Oats.

Seriously, I don't know how I lived without him. I'm aware that this may be yet another party I'm late to join, but now that I'm here there's no way I'm leaving. I mean, come on, it makes breakfasts almost as easy as not bothering at all.. but ya' know.. you're still bothering. In fact I'm so in love I'm going to make you a pros and cons list. Just in case you're doubting their awesomeness.

Pros

A super healthy breakfast waiting for you every morning.

All the different flavours you can get your hands on - I'm talking, oreo, strawberry, chocolate, banana, even spinach if that's your thing.

Extra time in bed. That's always a good thing right?

In a jar - eat on the go. Not in a jar - eat at home - unless you made it on the floor then maybe don't eat that.

You feel super organised when your breakfast is just waiting for you. Or like your suddenly living in a hotel.

Cons

There are no cons - are you crazy?!

Okay well maybe there are a couple, like, it's not actually made my the oat elves. Even though it's just waiting for you every morning you still need to put a little effort in the night before. But, lets be real, 10 minutes before you go to bed is more than worth the extra 15 in bed the next morning!


So how do you make your very own sneaky oat-so lovely overnight oats? It literally couldn't be easier.

Chocolate, Strawberry and Almond Overnight Oats.

You'll need:

Half a jar of rolled oats.
Half a jar of milk/soya milk/almond milk whichever you prefer.
Spoonful of cocoa powder.
Pinch of sugar.
Half a banana.
Hand full of strawberries.
Hand full of almonds.

As you've probably gathered from previous posts I'm not a massive fan of measurements and tend to cook by proportion so obviously you can change the amounts around as much as you want.

First things first you want to fill your jar around half full with rolled oats, and add the sliced half banana.

Next, pour around half a jar of milk over your oats and banana so they are just about covered. Then sprinkle in the pinch of sugar and spoon of cocoa powder before closing the lid and giving it a good shake.

That's all the preparation done. Pop that jar in the fridge and head off to bed.

When you're up and about and ready for breakfast it's even easier.

Grab your jar out of the fridge and top with sliced strawberries and some almonds.

Now go enjoy. If you're feeling creative mix it up and add cookies, different nuts, fruit, seeds anything. The world of oats really is your oyster. But if you find some showstopping combinations please pop back and let me know. I'm always looking for new ways to spice up my morning oats.

warm corn and quorn salad

A weekend of eating cold sandwiches, raw carrots, and oat breakfast biscuits will leave you feeling distinctly hungry for good food. In my case that was anything warm, anything fresh and definitely something that involved a little bit of time in the kitchen.

I settled on a grilled corn and quorn salad with honey and mustard dressing, as that filled the fresh category. The corn and quorn “chicken” pieces keep it warm. I spent an hour dancing around the kitchen with the sister whipping this one up, a great chance to have a catch up while getting some delicious food.

You won’t need an hour to make this though – we were just being slow and enjoy the kitchen time.

First things first go grab your ingredients.

For the salad:

Baby leaves – spinach, lambs’ lettuce, red lettuce, red chard, and rocket

Small sweet peppers

Baby corn

Sugar snap peas

Quorn chicken pieces (obviously you can use regular chicken)

Chilli kidney beans

For the dressing:

Wholegrain mustard

Honey

Olive oil

Cider vinegar

Salt

Pepper

Sugar

First, start by making the dressing. Fill a small jar about a quarter full with the olive oil and vinegar. Add a spoonful of wholegrain mustard and the same of honey. Season with salt, pepper and add a pinch of sugar to help everything combine. Stick the lid on the jar and give it a good shake to mix.

For the salad, begin with the quorn. Heat some oil in a frying pan and add the quorn chicken pieces fry them lightly for around ten minutes. Next add half the jar of chilli kidney beans to the frying pan and leave to warm through.

Place the baby quorn and sugar snap peas under the grill on a low heat so as to just warm them through.

Next, chop the peppers into small pieces and we are ready to plate up.

Into a bowl add the baby leaves, followed by the quorn pieces with chilli beans. Next top with the peppers, grilled corn and sugar snap peas. Drizzle your dressing over the top and you are ready to go.

It’s simple and easy, but filling and just warming enough for a light lunch or summer meal. We couldn’t stop exclaiming about how healthy we were feeling the whole time we were eating – although that could be down to our normal diet of pizza and fajitas. I can see this easily becoming a go to meal when I’m in a rush for something nice and quick to eat this summer.

Have you got a go to summer meal? 

Simple Spinach Soup and a Slice of Crazy

Oh Monday why are you always popping up and kicking Sunday out of the party, he's a chilled guy you should let him hang out with us more. Thanks to you yesterday was a loooong day filled with far too much work and not enough fun. Even though the sun was shining and I got to walk skip merrily into work eating fruit salad, and some of my work involved making beautiful flower baubles in the sunshine. I still somehow ended up spending 12 hours in an office building dragging very heavy boxes from room to room, all on that one fruit salad, and a slice of microwave pizza. Not what I usually call fun if i'm honest.

Now I complain a lot, but I do really love my job and sometimes 12 hours moving boxes and gluing petals and decorating tents just comes with the job. I'm also really lucky to be very good friends with all of my colleagues. That said when spending almost half a day in work I've managed to find some pretty sweet ways to entertain myself. A few of the bizarre games I found myself playing yesterday were:

Secret dance party - A classic when decorating the inside of a tent. Zip the door shut, pop your iPod on loud and dance until someone comes to investigate where the musics coming from. At this point you have two choices, awkwardly switch your music off and apologize for the noise, or invite them to dance and decorate with you. Job done twice as fast.

Hide and Seek - A slightly less productive game I like to play, especially when people don't know they're looking for you. But also a great way to find some peace and quiet to send some emails. A highlight of this game is the look on peoples face when you emerge from your hiding place. Beautiful.

Building a box fort - Okay so this one was less intentional. I was looking for a box in the corner of the room, it might have been at the bottom of the pile. Before I knew it I may have found the box I wanted and also have found myself fenced in behind the boxes.

Well there you have it, a slightly bizarre list of ways to have fun at work. I should probably also add that I played most of these games with my boss, as we were all starting to feel the stress of far too long away from the sunshine. In most other circumstances you probably shouldn't hide from people, build forts or dance to drastically loud steps songs.

Anyway I may have gotten a little distracted. Even though my day was horrifically long and I ate far to little, I still managed to have a delicious and healthy tea. This soup is one of my favorites and it's ridiculously easy to make. I'd made a big pot of it on Sunday and frozen half to eat later.

I didn't quite remember the whole recipe + photo = blog post thing.

As I'm a minor disaster I completely forgot to take picture as I went along so that's really all you're getting photo wise. But, I assure you it is oh so yummy and will make you feel superbly healthy.

Ingredient wise it's all pretty simple and should be stuff you just have hanging around in you're cupboards.

200g Spinach

2 big Potatoes

2 sticks of Celery 

2 cloves of Garlic

1 Onion

200ml Vegetable Stock

Plain Soy or Greek Yogurt

Now you get to see just how easy this recipe is, these ingredients should make you around 4 bowls of the stuff, enough for at least diner and lunch . 

First you want to chop your potatoes, celery, garlic and onion into nice little chunks and stick them in your pan. 

Next cover the vegetables with your vegetable stock and simmer for about 20 minutes on a medium heat.

Once those vegetables and potato have soften up a bit add your spinach to the pan. (it might look like you have too much for the pan, but it will shrink in no time and fit perfectly).

Simmer the soup for a further ten minutes, stirring frequently. 

After the ten minutes have passed let your soup cool slightly before pouring it into your blender (or getting your hand blended) and blend the soup so that the vegetable chunks have mixed in.

Finally, pop your soup into  a bowl and add a blob of whichever yogurt you choose. This bit is entirely optional but adds a slightly bitter bite to the soup, that cuts through the flavors nicely.

And there you have it, super simple spinach soup in less that 40 minutes. I had mine with think slices of read covered in butter.. just to ruin the healthy vibe. The soup is perfect on a colder evening but is a nice transition soup from winter to spring. 

Now, go whip yourself up a bowl and let me know what you think. And hey If you decide to comment back with a slice of crazy as well I'd be over the moon to know i'm not the only crazy cat around here this less than sunny Tuesday morning!

Quick and easy Nutella mini muffins!

I've been dreaming about this recipe for thelast couple of weeks and have finally got round to making it for you. These little muffins are easily the cutest and simplest cakes you can make, with only 3 ingredients and whatever toping takes your fancy. I first came across the recipe when I was living in halls and aldi had giant pots of Nutella on offer, safe to say that was not an offer a flat of students could pass up and within a couple of days we were practically swimming in the stuff.

The basic muffin mix is insanely easy, all you need is a couple of eggs, some self-raising flour and of course a jar of Nuttela! Normally this would make about 12 regular sized muffins, but I decided to spice things up a little bit this time and make mini muffins. I was also feeling just a little bit inspired by my weird and wonderful pancake concoctions I'd made on pancake day. I'd decided to forgo the usual combination of lemon and sugar on my pancakes and tried Nutella with banana, Nutella with blueberries, Nuttella with walnuts... To be honest I had Nuttella with anything and everything.

So, now you know the inspiration behind these tasty little morsels I think we should get down to it and start cooking. So grab your bowl and your wooden spoon, stick on your apron (you know things are gonna get messy!) and turn up the cooking music, I was loving a bit of queen and had a great time singing along much to my families dismay.

Right, we're all ready then. First of all you want to grab all your ingredients

250g Nuttella or about 2 thirds of a regular jar.

175g Self Raising Flour

2 Eggs

Blueberries, M&Ms, Walnuts... Whatever you're topping your muffins with.

Now turn that oven up to 180 degree Celsius and grease a muffin tray, I was making mini muffins so obviously I used a mini muffin tray but it's up to you.

Next you want to mix your Nuttella and your eggs together in a bowl until they're nice and blended. Try not to eat too much of the Nuttella is it moves from jar to bowl. The mixture should start to look all silky and luxurious at this point. 

Once it's all nice and blended you need to stir in your flour, to begin with it will mattify the texture but with enough mixing you'll find you have a bowl of glossy chocolate goo. 

Spoon the mixture into your greased muffin tin filling each space about 3 quarters full. 

Top each muffin with a sprinkling of your chosen topping, chopped walnuts added a savoury twist to mine, while blueberries added a slightly bitter bite and the M&Ms were just perfect, but what isn't made better by them!

Once this is all done pop that tray into the oven for about 10 minutes, or until a scewer comes out clean. 

That's it, you've officially got some mini muffins on the way. Turn up the music some more, lick out the bowl and use your spoon as a microphone, before you know it those ten minutes will be up. When they're ready leave them to cool for 5 minutes  and then pop them out of the tray and enjoy.

There you go. They're tiny delicious mouthfuls of chocolatey cakey-ness so why not pretend you're a giant while eating them, not that I did that or anything... Now go away and whip yourself up a batch and then hop back over here to let me know how they went!