You Are Already Amazing

January 8, 2016January 8, 2016

You Are Already Amazing

It’s the New Year and although we chinked glasses and wished everyone the best over a week ago, it’s taken for the normal routine to kick back in for me to get back to my computer and write about the subject that’s been burning away for days. In fact, it’s been burning away for years and no more so than at this time of year.

To kick this off, these are a few of the comments I have read on social media over the past few days:

“I’m overweight, I have no confidence.”

“I feel so fat, I don’t want to go out on a date with my boyfriend.”

“I lost 5 stone last year and put half of it back on, I’m such a slob. How could I let this happen?”

The diet industry has this brand of self-loathing well stitched up. Join our club, pay the fee and we’ll turn this all around for you.

Now, I’m not knocking diets. They work for some – I know plenty of people who have lost weight and kept it off. But they don’t work for everyone and I think in this case, it has less to do with the body and more to do with the mind: in particular, self-worth.

So, for everyone who’s ever felt like a big, fat, lazy failure, let me tell you something:

You are already amazing.

Do you know why?

Your liver performs over 500 vital functions, scientists don’t know about everything it does – you’d not live a day without it. Supplying glucose, fighting infections, storing nutrients, recycling waste and detoxifying your body it is a chemical powerhouse that gets on with its job without your knowledge.

Your skin spans 21 square feet, weighs nine pounds and contains more than eleven miles of blood vessels and 45 miles of nerves. Home to 1,000 bacteria (most of which are vital to its health) it rejuvenates itself every 28 days.

Your stomach produces hydrochloric acid (up to 3 litres a day) to digest your food – an acid so powerful that the stomach also produces its own neutralising agent in the stomach wall to protect itself.

Your strongest muscle? Your tongue. The smallest? Only 1mm in length in your ear, holding in place the smallest bone in your body. The hardest working? Your heart – 115,200 beats a day, 42 million beats a year, over 3 billion in a lifetime. It’s mind boggling.

And your brain? The only organ in your body to feel no pain, it contains 100 billion neurons (and there are 10,000 types of brain cell), weighs 3 pounds and contains 400 miles of blood vessels. Laughing at something uses at least five areas of the brain and it’s estimated that we have 50,000 thoughts a day, 70% of which are negative. The organ is 60% fat and it houses 25% of the body’s cholesterol: and without this, it would not be able to perform the estimated 100,000 chemical reactions a second. Information can travel at 260 mph.

Sit for a moment and think about all this.

Really think.

Granted, sometimes bodies fail but there is still so much to marvel about.

So:

How can a body be devalued because of a number on a scale or a measuring tape?
How does the size of someone’s clothing demean the complexity of the valuable gift they’ve been given?
How can something so vital, so unfathomable so irreplicable end up ready for the rubbish heap when really it’s nothing of the sort?

It’s nonsense.

However you feel today about your body and what it can do, know this: the fact that you are sat reading my blog post means that you are already amazing. The work of heart, the eyes, the brain, the liver, the lungs, the skin, the hormones and the millions of other processes going on have brought my ideas to you.

You love, you live.

Dammit, you rock!

Just breathing makes you amazing.

Consider:

Walking uses over 200 muscles. It is thought that it helps expand the hippocampus area in the brain: concerned with learning about new places, its shrinkage in women over 60 has been linked with dementia. Far from being a passive, ineffective form of exercise, there’s nothing like walking.
A recent American study found that female heart disease is more likely to be caused by inactivity than excess weight.
Swimming requires the rhythmical stretch and relaxation of the skeletal muscles, naturally inducing a restorative, meditative state. It releases endorphins, uses free floating to relieve stress and fight or flight hormones and regulates and strengthens the cardio vascular system without putting undue pressure on joints.
Regular movement like running or sport strengthens the digestive tract, making it more efficient.

So:

What if you didn’t need beast yourself at the gym or nigh-on starve yourself to be a valid human being?
What if you were to rethink the things you’ve been told about size, weight and dieting?
What would happen if you chose to nourish your body because it’s an unbelievably complex, unique, living organism?
And what harm would come from moving your body your way: making it stronger, more able to carry out your dreams, more capable of interacting with the people you love?
What if we found new and helpful ways of linking health and self worth?

Because there are those who will tell you that you need to be a certain shape or size, deny yourself life-giving food or beat yourself up on a daily basis in order to be an acceptable human being.

Ignore this: their thinking is self-defeating and counterproductive.

Because you are already amazing.

Use this as a starting point and allow everything else to follow.

I’m passionate about this subject so check out my other body confidence and plus size fitness blog posts using the tag cloud to the right. And if I’ve motivated you to re-engage with your most marvellous body, then drop me a line and tell me what new reasons you’ve found to love yourself.

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July 19, 2015July 19, 2015

A Quick Response on the Matter of Obesity

I’ve got a twenty minute training run to do before lunch today, so I’ll be brief.

This morning Sunday Morning Live on BBC 1 with Sian Williams featured the item Is Obesity a Disability?

Inflammatory titles draw both commentators and viewers, so we’ll chalk that one up to necessity.

Issues raised: exercise doesn’t result in weight loss? Lots of conflicting evidence out there but the one thing that pulling on your trainers and getting out there will do is make you feel a whole lot better about being yourself. If we’re talking about metabolic benefit then Michael Mosely is right in that it doesn’t physically melt weight but if we’re going to get to the bottom of the mental health issues that so often cause obesity in the first place, then exercise is the very best place to start. As I’ve said before:

I know I’d rather be breathing in and out in the sunshine rather than crying into a pot of processed low-fat goo

The programme opened with a great VT of fat runner Julie Creffield (check out The Fat Girl’s Guide to Running) but was not mentioned again. Why? She’s a force for good. The panel member patched in from another studio mentioned that when you get to a certain size, you feel helpless. Instead of promoting what Julie does, as a woman who gets big people feeling strong and vital, the panel continued with the same shit about food in and calories out.

Yawn. Change the record.

Those who know nothing keep spouting the same prejudiced, ignorant garbage and they aren’t helping. The likes of Julie and Lilz (and the HOOP organisation promoted on her t-shirt) are talking from an informed position. Taking away blame-talk leaves space and energy for us fatties to solve our own issues with the help of real science and research.

And then there’s the matter of Mail columnist Peter Hitchens. Well known for getting controversial speech and being a twit confused, his ignorance on the matter of addiction raised a quiet informed smile from experienced and well read broadcaster Michael Mosely sat on the couch opposite. It was a beautiful moment.

So, all in all, more sound bites, more over simplified truths, more ignorance about how people become overweight and how we manage/talk about the problem.

The only constructive voice on the coach was Michael Mosely, a well known advocate of fasting for health but notice how he didn’t feel the need to mention this once. He spoke science, compassion and strategies rather than anecdotes, moral judgement and blame.

That’s the way forward – not just because it’s kinder but also because it’s more likely to work.

Feeling Uncomfortable About Obesity?

Let’s have a conversation about Obesity.

No, I mean a real conversation. Not a let’s poke a judgemental finger at the fat people conversation.

Let’s look at the problem, first. This week alone the news reports:

Fire crews rescue 650 obese people a year using winches and cranes (Mirror)
125 diabetes amputations every week and obesity is blamed for 17% rise in operations (Mail Online)
Poor diet, which is thought to be responsible for 70,000 deaths a year and costing the NHS £6bn annually according to Prof Sheila Hollins, chair of the BMA board of science, has led to a call for the Government to impose a 20% tax on sugary drinks (The Guardian)

Big cost to tax payers, massive cost to individuals, not to mention embarrassment for politicians. Clearly, some tough talking is going to have to take place in order to bring the problem under control.

We all know the adage about how much a picture can say, so this is the kind of image the media choose to accompany articles about the obesity crisis. This gem came from the Guardian:

No head, no voice, no humanity. What do pictures like this really say? — A pie eater? A 24-hour a day carer? Someone who has already lost 4 stone? On his way back from the gym? How could we know?

Now the NHS burden can be placed quite firmly on this chap’s shoulders and there’s nothing he can do about it. He can’t turn around and talk to you about why he’s overweight and even if he could move, his head has been chopped off so he physically has no mouth and therefore no voice.

Well, not on this platform anyway.

Being a morbidly obese vegetarian runner, I’m a regular visitor to on-line forums for the overly podgy and let me tell you about the conversations they’re having:

I’ve run out of points this week and I’m panicking about what to have for dinner because I’ve come off a twelve hour shift and I’m hungry – any suggestions?
It’s weigh in tonight, I’m having pizza afterwards and there’s a whole week to make up for it
My diet isn’t working any more. I’m fat/stupid/lazy/a slob/confused (cue reams of suggestions in reply, some genuinely helpful, some shamefully judgemental)
I haven’t lost enough weight for my wedding/my daughter’s wedding/my holiday
My eating has gone so off track since my mother died. It’s been six months and you would have thought I could have pulled it together by now
Some stranger told me today that fat people shouldn’t travel on trains/have tattoos/wear leggings

All paraphrased but all genuinely posted.

And then I came across a group for plus sized ladies with a complete ban on weight loss chat. What do they talk about?

How does this top look with these leggings? Should I wear heels?
Which chaffing shorts work the best?
Which bikinis fit best?
What I’m wearing to work today
My new hair colour
I’m going swimming today! Something I wouldn’t have done without the support of this group!

That’s not to say the other groups don’t have positive posts – they do. And that’s not to say that the weight loss free group doesn’t have posts about keeping healthy – I regularly seek feedback about running as a plus-sizer.

But the environment is so different, so energising, so self-affirming when the focus on how much weight you’re losing and how you’re doing it is taken away. My size is not the most important thing about me – I can write, sing, cook, draw. I make people laugh, I love my charity work and I’d challenge any overweight 40 year old woman to offroad on a bike like I do.

And this is the nub of the matter for me – everything is just so over-simplified and no wonder: do some digging and the advice is all so confusing. Back in the day, fat was to blame and now it’s sugar. We need to move fast food joints away from schools and teach kids how to cook. Even the school holidays are fattening. Measure these ideas against the material I was reading this morning about how the rise in obesity coincided with the rise in the anti-fat movement and a new study suggesting that a high fat diet can impair the function of a hormone that helps you to feel full. The NHS Eatwell plate still promotes ‘plenty of starchy foods’ in the face of the anti-carb movement.

But from what I’ve read recently, the cure to all our obesity problems apparently lies in:

Taxing sugary drinks and snacks
Closing/moving takeaways
Teaching people to cook
Making fat people go to the gym

Think about this for a moment. I’m overweight, so therefore I’m:

Gluttonous and weak minded
Ignorant about food and cooking
Lazy

Weak minded? Ignorant? Lazy?

Really?

Perhaps I’m a one off? I’ve read enough on-line to know that I’m not but let me tell you one thing I do know: I tend not to see fat people any more – I see survivors: survivors of bereavement, illness, depression, domestic violence and post-traumatic stress disorder. Not always but more often than not. I’m training for a 5k charity run in October, I haven’t eaten meat in nearly twenty years and I knock out a home-made from scratch dinner for four on a budget every night. Oh and I’ve survived years of depression.

Everyone has a back story which no one will get to hear if all they ever see is your headless back.

So I propose we start a real conversation – one that will work. Let’s get to the bottom of why people get fat and what they can actually do to reverse this. I’m not speaking about a silver bullet here – do this diet/take this pill/do this exercise. I’m talking about a proper strategy that uses the ingenuity and strength of the human spirit to overcome adversity and acknowledges that we are all individuals with our own metabolisms, hang-ups and personal circumstances.

The aerobics classes I took in my early twenties to lose weight couldn’t finish soon enough but feeling my strong but fat-suit hidden legs doing Zumba at the weekend made me feel completely different

– because what I was doing was utterly relevant. I’m getting fit for my health, not because being fat makes me somehow unworthy of being part of society or having a voice.

I don’t have diabetes, I don’t have any weight related illnesses but because I’m overweight there is this idea going round that I’m going to be expensive later in life, so the UK taxpayer already owns me along with the right to say what they please about me.

But I refuse to be one of The Obese.

I am not a blob with no head, with my back to the camera.

I am full frontal, full throttle and full volume.

I’m not celebrating or promoting obesity, I’m saying we have to completely re-think the way we talk about it because the conversations that are happening on a public and policy making level are not working.

So, yeah, let’s talk about obesity, it’s clear that it needs to happen – but for it to work, it’s got to be two-way. Because that’s what the word conversation means.

An obese person in trainers - a more helpful image? — An obese person in trainers – a more helpful image?

Do you agree? Have I got it all wrong? How can we make things better? Drop me a line below, let me know. Perhaps I’ve missed something. And drop me a line if you’d like more information about the Facebook groups I visit.

For further rants on fat politics:

The damaging lack of self-control that could sink the NHS

It’s not that there’s a skinny person trying to get out

Plus size runner and proud – my top ten tips

Sausage or sizzle – which is better for weight loss?

How to get the body you want this summer

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July 2, 2015July 2, 2015

Confessions of a Complete Spiritual Tourist – When HH The Dalai Lama Came To Aldershot

I know what I like to eat. I like fresh, light flavours like coriander, lime and juicy tomatoes in the summer; warm, rich cinnamon and cumin to enrich the bounty of autumn and deep, indulgent, sustaining textures in winter. That’s what I like. Variety.

I spend much of my time buying and cooking food. I choose combinations to sometimes test, sometimes tease and sometimes simply satisfy the palate – but there’s always variety.

What has all this to do with spirituality?

I thrive on variety, choice and exploration. It’s about using my knowledge, experience and skill to find and prepare interesting dishes and then share them with my family and friends. Please don’t mistake my love of pick and mix for insincerity or lack of commitment – I just can’t imagine what it would be like to have the same meal whizzed up and spoon fed to me every day with the expression of choice or complaint not just frowned upon but punished.

This is the kind of theocratic tyranny that I grew up with and why I left prescribed religion behind me a long time ago.

These days, my spiritual exploration is much like a visit to an art gallery. And I’m not talking here about browsing the halls on the way to the coffee shop, I’m talking about really looking, thinking, leaving, reading, perhaps coming back, thinking some more. It’s about my response to what I’m seeing, how it relates to what I already know and what I’d like to experience more of.

Let me explain. I’m not a Buddhist but I’ve read several books written by the Dalai Lama (The Art of Happiness, is well worth a read if you haven’t already) and so when I caught wind that he was coming to Aldershot to open the new Buddhist community centre, I felt compelled to go see if I could catch a glimpse of him.

HH the Dalai Lama blessing the new Buddhist community centre after which he spoke about Buddhism in the 21st century and called for an end to religious division saying "killing in the name of religion is totally wrong". — HH the Dalai Lama blessing the new Buddhist community centre after which he spoke about Buddhism in the 21st century and called for an end to religious division saying “killing in the name of religion is totally wrong”.

I was very nearly disappointed.

I arrived in town on my very easy-to-park bike and after having been asked directions by a very wealthy looking family in a particularly flash car I found myself in what felt like another world. Next to the football stadium, the once rather drab looking social club was painted and beribboned, with red, yellow and blue flags flying high above the road. Fresh from Glastonbury, HH was due to open the centre, lead prayers for the Nepalese lost in the earthquakes and then teach at the stadium.

I don’t know what I was expecting to see but the cacophony was something I’d not experienced before. On the lower side of the road, a large protest against the Dalai Lama by Shugden tradition Buddhists was in full swing. The usually quite pedestrian barriers running along the footpath were festooned with banners declaring their message. Behind this, monks of all nationalities used loud hailers and voices to make as much noise as possible.

I saw one monk amongst the crowd, settled on the pavement in front of a sign for tyres and exhausts, deep in meditation. Behind were the coaches they’d arrived on – I couldn’t help wondering what 50 monks wandering around Heston services would look like.

A contingent of Shugden Buddhists protesting - one later chose to sit and meditate outside Mr Clutch. I like that. — A contingent of Shugden Buddhists protesting – one later chose to sit and meditate outside Mr Clutch. I like that.

So much dancing and singing on both sides of the road: both sides of the Shugden debate

The pro-Dalai Lama camp on the stadium side of the road were also in full swing. There were drums, wide flags flying above. People danced in all colours: emeralds, ochres, saffron, azure blues – from the elderly shuffling to the music to the little babies wide eyed at the spectacle.

I locked my bike to a railing and set off to find out whether I could make sense of what was going on.

According to my watch and the timetable I’d read online, the man I’d come to see would be leaving the community centre sometime soon in order to teach at the ticketed event in the stadium next door.

My phone rang.

My friend, the jammiest of all my friends, had secured a space away from the crowds at the back of the community centre. I smiled.

And so, I found myself with a rack of press, my friend and three Nepalese ladies around the rear of the building where the Dalai Lama was praying inside. A pathway carpeted with ornate rugs ran from a small side door to a huge, black waiting car – the kind you might find carting a celebrity to a premiere. Under the bright colours and intricate paintings of the gateway were a swarm of butch looking security in black suits and high vis jackets. A photographer was making a last minute bargain with one of them to get beyond the wire fence barrier we were stood behind. He won and was allowed in, happily taking up a crouching position beside all the other lenses.

Excitement built as thumbs up were sent out between the security suits, and few people piled out of the side door followed finally by two monks blowing horns.

The moment was arriving. I felt like it was all too much. How disappointed would I be if I didn’t catch glimpse of him? What if the men there to protect him denied me of my once in a lifetime chance? The chants from the road were distant but ever present. The line of attendees for the stadium event filed past the bottom of the steps some way away, unaware of me, my friend and the three Nepalese ladies waiting with baited breath. The drums and the singing rang in my ears.

I felt faint.

And then out he came: small, smiley and utterly untouched by the cacophony around him. I’d had my cameraphone poised for the past five minutes but I calmly put it in my back pocket: I felt compelled to see this one event with my own eyes rather than mediated through a lens.

Did he see me? Probably not. Did he hear my quietly offered Namaste? I hope so. He was ushered into the car and whisked away in a moment.

As we turned from the fence and went to walk down the steps back down to the roadway, my friend commented that I looked like I’d been hit in the eye. It would seem my mascara had gone a little astray.

What did I take from the day?

That even though the spiritual so often has to sit within a secular environment for functional or security reasons it doesn’t mean that all is lost. From what I’ve read of his writings, the Dalai Lama himself is a largely down to earth man. His teachings are as applicable, in principle, to an atheist or a Catholic as they are to a practicing Buddhist.

But I couldn’t help wondering whether he would rather be wandering in the public park up the road where the elderly Nepalese residents of our town like to gather and talk. Or how he felt about all the security around him and whether he felt it was interfering with his work. He talks so much about how powerful an opponent to kindness and real understanding fear is.

My friend and I then did what any good tourist would and went to a coffee shop to ruminate on what we’d seen and heard. The Dalai Lama had radiated a smile that I wore all day.

I think I’m still wearing it now.

And so my tour continues – maybe I’ll find somewhere to call home at some point, maybe I won’t – but it’s not the arrival that’s important to me, it’s the journey.

A colourful welcome from the Buddhist Community Centre UK in Aldershot

To find out more check out The Buddhist Community Centre UK and to follow the extensive travels of HH the Dalai Lama please visit his website

Just days after visiting Aldershot, His Holiness the Dalai Lama reacts joyfully to a cake presented by President and Mrs. Bush in honor of his upcoming 80th birthday during a luncheon at the Bush Center in Dallas, Texas, USA on July 1, 2015. Photo/Bush Center

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June 19, 2015June 19, 2015

My Veggie Kitchen Heroes – Luscious Veggie Tart

It’s Friday, you’ve guests arriving in a couple of hours and you get a text saying one of your number is a vegetarian. With the rose/cider/lager sorted and chilling in the fridge and the dips, chips and nibbles all ready to go, a small niggle of doubt rises from somewhere deep. What on earth can you make at this short notice?

Summer food at it's best - we love eating out at this time of year and it's so easy to go meat free — Vegetarian summer food at it’s best – we love eating out at this time of year and it’s so easy to go meat free

Puff pastry is your friend even if it’s not exactly the most classy of ingredients. It’s not sophisticated and if, like me, you attended one Tupperware party too many growing up in the 70s and 80s, you’ll shudder at the idea of chicken vol au vents. Let’s call it an ingredient reborn shall we?

Firstly, some make their own puff pastry. Life is too short and wine is too plentiful – so I buy mine, very often frozen because it’s cheaper that way. You can also buy it fresh in blocks or ready rolled. Do make sure that it’s vegetarian – check the ingredients (most are but a few more deli-style pastries might have animal fat in them, just for fun).

If you’ve bought frozen, defrost in a fridge for at least 12 hours. If you choose to take it out of the fridge, to help it along, please remember to put it back in again and chill thoroughly before use (trying to roll out warm pastry is like trying to roll out mud).

Get it to about 3mm thick for a good, crispy texture when cooked. You’ll get four decent 4-slice tarts out of a block and two 4-slices from a ready rolled sheet (and two slices is ample per person).

Then score the pastry 5mm from the edge all the way around – that way, the pastry will rise around the filling.

One I made earlier - you can trim the edges if you like but a bit of wonkiness won't affect the finished article. — One I made earlier – you can trim the edges if you like but a bit of wonkiness won’t affect the finished article.

This is the fun bit – getting creative with a few nourishing, flavoursome ingredients. These are my ideas for toppings to make a tart with a little wow factor (and very little effort):

Tomato, feta and basil – this one is dead simple. Place thinly sliced tomato over the base (leaving the edges so that they can rise) and then scatter feta over the top. When the tart has finished cooking, rip a handful of basil leaves over the top and leave for a few minutes for them to wilt gently over the hot topping. Delicious.

Gently caramelised tomatoes meet creamy, salty feta in this vegetarian tart - all finished with a little fragrant basil. Perfect. — Gently caramelised tomatoes meet creamy, salty feta – finished with a little fragrant basil. A vegetarian classic.

This one is a leek (softened in a pan with a little butter first), goats cheese and walnut version – really earthy and satisfying. Great with a few grinds of black pepper and a lovely fresh white wine.

Goats cheese, leek and walnut tart. I love goats cheese and walnuts

And this one is a simple favourite – tomato puree spread sparingly but evenly on the base with mixed chopped vegetables (in this case, courgette and red onion) and then lashings of cheddar. Add a few Italian herbs too if you like, it makes it more like a pizza – my kids can’t get enough of it.

Pizza tart, always a winner and so simple to make (add pepperoni or chorizo for the meat eaters)

To cook: place on baking parchment on an oven tray and bake for around 20 minutes at 200c, gas mark 6. Check after about 15 minutes to make sure nothing is burning.

To serve: green salad is great. I also love this fragrant potato salad – boiled and cooled new potatoes (about 200g per person) tossed with a handful of finely sliced radishes, a finely chopped red onion, a handful of chopped fresh coriander, a glug of olive oil and the juice of a lime. Season with a little salt and black pepper and let everyone dig in!

So simple to make but always a crowd pleaser (and fantastic from the fridge at night Nigella-style - if there's any left!) — So simple to make but always a crowd pleaser (and fantastic from the fridge at night Nigella-style – if there’s any left!)

So many toppings, so little time. What’s your favourite? I’d like to add more ideas to my recipe book, so drop me a line and let me know.

Enjoyed this? Then read my other posts in the series: Kitchen Heroes and Halloumi

And, of course, don’t forget to share (it’s nice to share – the buttons are at the top right) and sign up (also to the right in the menu) so you never miss a post.

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May 21, 2015June 4, 2015

How to get the body you want this summer

Start loving the one you already have…

I’m feeling excited. Not just because summer is coming but because change is afoot and I like it.

After having seen the fun pictures of fashion blogger Callie Thorpe and friends at Evans’ #stylehasnosize launch last night, I felt something stir from within. It was a feeling of excitement: that a culture of not just body acceptance but body celebration is growing from within the fashion industry and it’s been a long time coming.

People Magazine have endorsed plus-sized Tess Holliday's status as the world's first supermodel to be a size 22 by putting her on their cover this week. Tess, 29, - who became the first size 22 model to sign with a major modelling agency in January this year - recently shot a campaign with Benefit Cosmetic and has appeared in Vogue Italy. — Tess causing a storm on the cover of People magazine this week

Add to this, plus size model Tess Holliday’s feature on the cover of People magazine published today. According to her Instagram post this morning, her remit to the magazine was “I wanted show my body off & they listened”. The result? A beautiful woman creatively captured by photographer James White at home in her own body. She was not an unwanted guest there – she was there by choice and it shows.

Like just about every woman I’ve spoken to, my body has never really felt like my own. Granted, I had some special circumstances to deal with – I grew up as part of a controlling religious organisation that dictated just about every aspect of our lives right down to what we thought and how we acted when we were alone. As young women, our bodies were already owned by our future husbands and children and by the congregation for acquiring new recruits and serving the elders. Man-made rules were handed down as the pronouncements of their god. It never quite rang true with me.

So, when I left at 24 and finally got the education I deserved, naturally I had a teensy bit of a leaning towards feminism.

There, I’ve said it. The dirty word that’s been spat out too many times with regard to body issues and obesity. It’s as though the title of Susie Orbach’s totem of a book ‘Fat is a Feminist Issue’ has become an ignorantly misused sound bite for the fat shamers. The loving and taking control of our bodies has become a feminist issue and therefore all about man-hating – like we’re spiders seeking to eat the men that come anywhere near us.

Balls.

They’re our bodies and we want them back because we like them. Incidentally we like men too. The two are not mutually exclusive.

Now, I realise that not every woman has had the same prescribed and damaging upbringing as I had. But I do talk to a lot of women and the same issues keep coming up.

The need to prescribe to a diet – low fat, low carb, no biscuits/cake/chocolate for a month diet. Are you in the Weight Watchers or Slimming World camp?
I’m dieting for my holiday. I’m dieting for my wedding. I’m dieting for my sister’s wedding. It doesn’t matter what the reason is, there is always some external force at work to change the way we look. Somehow this body won’t be acceptable for whatever we are working towards.
I have to lose my baby weight. As if pregnancy, childbirth and the endless sleep deprivation coupled with unbelievable pressure to breast feed isn’t enough (don’t get me started on breasts by the way), then the media is obsessed with dropping the fat ten minutes after you’ve left the labour ward.
A suspended disbelief that one size fits all. If it did, we’d all be wearing the same shoes.
The need to buy and consume what the dieting industry and media are offering, unaware of the irony that our bodies are bought and consumed by the dieting and media industries. Like Tyler Durden in Fight Club says – we are having our own fat sold back to us.

Good grief, this is all starting to sound a little political. Apologies if this isn’t your bag (but if it is, Fat is a Feminist Issue by Susan Orbach is not just a cracking good read, it’s also a practical approach to controlling your weight and The Beauty Myth by Naomi Wolf is also worth checking out).

We’ll return to the fashion bloggers and why what they are doing is so exciting.

I’ve read enough clinical papers, newspaper articles and media sound bites now to know that the medical community are worried about our health. We have a rising obesity problem in the West and the strain this will put on services is causing great concern.

In some minds, frocks to fit a full bust, bigger belts to cinch a waist over rounded hips and a bikini that celebrates rather than hides a gloriously chunky body are going to normalise fatness and make the problem worse.

But don’t they see? Rather than being part of the problem, beautiful, well cut and on-trend clothes are part of the solution.

I’m going to go out on a limb here and state that I believe we should normalise fatness and please don’t quote me out of context. I believe we should normalise people being comfortable with the aesthetics of their own body – in that they should take ownership of whether or not it is beautiful.

So whether you are fat, thin, dark skinned, pale skinned, male, female, short, stocky, tall, lean or whatever innumerable permutations of the human body apply to you, they are yours and no one should be making money out of telling you that they are ugly and you need to change them.

What about health? Improving health is part of this, it has to be.

So to this end, let’s do something radical and separate health from aesthetics and moral judgement. Lumping these things together is not just insulting it’s profoundly unhelpful.

As I’ve said before, a body that feels strong and cherished is worth taking care of. We can’t all be skinny but we can all tweak our lifestyles (or overhaul them if we chose) to make them happier and healthier. And this doesn’t necessarily have to involve giving our money and self-esteem to a multi-billion pound industry bent on getting us to spend more by hating what we already have.

I digress again.

Back to my excitement.

I am old enough to have lived through the fledgling but influential low-fat movement of the 1980s. Protein came under fire off the back of the food combining adherents of the 1990s and I’m now sitting back and watching the anti-sugar/anti-carb evangelists with some interest and maybe even a little cynical amusement now. As a seasoned 40-year old I can’t say I’ve seen it all but I’ve seen enough to know that things move in cycles, absolute truth doesn’t exist and prescriptive diets are not an effective long term solution for everyone.

My interests have lead me to read so many inspiring, insightful and sometimes utterly radical and frankly confusing books about the body. About how it is so much more than skin, bones and organs – about how society paints meaning onto it, how the image we see in the mirror is not always what’s there and how it is used as a tool to control our choices.

And I feel like we have reached a point where if we see enough images of fuller figured girls wearing bikinis, beautifully tailored clothes and red lipstick, proudly showing off shapely legs and glorious acres of creamy white bust, the aesthetics of this will no longer be wrong, evil and worthy of distaste. In a utopian future, self-body-hatred, which so often leads to a negative relationship with food will be gone, leaving us big bottomed girls to get on with riding our bikes, safe in the knowledge that each heartbeat will be a little stronger than the one before, even if we’re wearing size 20 Lycra. Perhaps next year we’ll be wearing size 18, maybe even a 16 but this will be a by-product rather than a focal point of a healthier lifestyle.

Perhaps this new aesthetic environment will bring a smile to the writers and theorists of my university days – who knows but I like to think that the girls in London this week are edging us closer to our utopia and having a massive amount of fun while they’re doing it.

Notes:

In the film The Full Monty, Gerald says “Fat, David is a feminist issue…I don’t bloody know (what it’s supposed to mean) do I? But it is”. Body dysmorphia and the male body is just as important and I’m sorry I haven’t had the space to include more about this in my blog post.

You’ll notice the bevy of beauties I’m referring to in my post are pretty young women with luscious, bouncing curls, milky skin and wickedly long eyelashes. I realise that some critics, with some justification, will point out that in this they are as much buying into the beauty myth as the rest of the industry but – one step at a time eh?

Weight Watchers, Slimming World and the dieting industry as a whole: prescriptive diets work wonders for some people – they take the weight off and keep it off. For these people, I can only feel joy, it must feel wonderful to feel the benefits of their hard work. It doesn’t work for me and it doesn’t work for others like me – we must find our own way of taking control of our weight. Shaming and name calling isn’t likely to work either.

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May 6, 2015May 6, 2015

My veggie kitchen heroes no 1 – halloumi

Nando's mango and lime peri peri sauce — Mild enough for my tastes, Nando’s mango and lime peri peri is the perfect partner for halloumi

I started this blog series several weeks ago (if you didn’t catch the first one, please read up here). As the weather improves and barbeque season gets underway, I thought I’d post something about a personal favourite that’s also really great for cooking over the coals.

My first veggie kitchen hero is halloumi. This Cypriot cheese really is a handy ingredient to have around. Unopened in the fridge, it will keep for weeks and when you cook with it, absorbs flavours really well. It’s naturally quite salty, delightfully squidgy and for a cheese, handles heat really well, meaning that it can be toasted, griddled or roasted – and it’s great on a barbeque (a meat juice free one, naturally).

Nando’s have a superb grilled mushroom and halloumi burger on their menu at the moment and inspired by this I recently acquired a bottle of their mango and lime peri peri sauce. This was a fine acquisition and I can’t wait to slather it over a few skewers loaded with vegetables, lime wedges and halloumi chunks before slinging them on the barbeque or my stove top griddle pan.

If you’d prefer to make something from scratch, try roasting halloumi in a Mediterranean bake:

Throw chunks of halloumi, two pieces of a quartered lemon, a few par-boiled potatoes cut into cubes, courgettes and a chunky cut red onion into a roasting tin with a couple of glugs of olive oil a little garlic and rosemary. Season to taste (go ease on the salt) – then toss it all together to make sure it’s well covered.
To keep the carnivores happy, make the same thing in another tin with chicken thighs instead of halloumi (allow two, maybe three per person) and then multiply the ingredients in the vegetarian version above, depending on how many you are cooking for.
Roast the chicken version for a good 45 minutes at 200°c (180°c fan) or gas mark 6 for around 45 minutes, turning the ingredients over now and again to make sure the chicken is cooked through properly.
Roast the halloumi version for about 30 minutes, again turning it to make sure the halloumi doesn’t stick.
The chicken version of the halloumi dish above for those who can’t quite drop the meat – it’s easy to cook both at the same time
To slip a little extra nutrition in with some wow factor, try crisscrossing your tray with some stalks of purple sprouting broccoli for the last 15 minutes. Looks good, tastes good.

I cooked this for dinner only last night, chucking in a few plum cherry tomatoes off the vine five minutes before the broccoli. The sweet, sticky sauce it created with the lemon was delightful.

And, I was informed by both my kids that next time they’d both like the halloumi version rather than the chicken. Looks like my husband will be the odd one out for a change.

Most chicken drumstick/thigh recipes work well with halloumi. It can stick to a pan if you’re not careful but oil it well and you shouldn’t have a problem. Sticky, sweet flavours work really well but don’t go crazy with the salt – it’s already pretty salty and it’s easy for it to get overpowering. It’s great with plenty of veg and because it’s already pretty substantial, you can go easy with the carbs, which is fantastic news for a carb-sensitive vegetarian like me.

I’d love to hear about your favourite halloumi recipes or if I’ve inspired you to try something new.

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