My second project this year is the vegetable garden Hannah and I are slowing cultivating.

This all started back at Christmas when I bought Hannah a gift box from ALLOTINABOX. We patiently waited and watched the growing guide until sufficient time passed and we could begin planting our seeds, not long after we had little shoots of Spinach, Leeks, Chives, Spring Onions & Carrots slowing growing on our window sill. It was amazing to watch.

We quickly migrated them into larger containers and began to wait what felt like a life time before the British winter lifted and the little vegetables could be moved outside into the planters we built from scrap wood I'd collected at work. We just enjoyed our first batch of Spinach, freshly picked and rinsed then cooked into a Frittata. All that from a little seed I planted 2 months ago. I can't wait to see what Part 2 will bring!

This project has a lot to do with my desire to reach optimal health and I know you're probably thinking I'm too young to worry about that, but I've already had the unhealthy phase of my life and I never want to go back there. Not because I was unhappy, but because I wasn't capable of doing what I wanted.

Food is a huge part of my life and with this Paleo nutrition thing growing like a weed into every inch of my day to day thoughts I can't see it stopping. You see Paleo is all about enjoying real, natural foods that lend themselves to our hunter gatherer past. This means I eat mostly meat, eggs, organic veggies, some fruit, plenty of nuts & seeds and get to enjoy all the health benefits of doing so. Hello insulin sensitivity! Why did you leave when I was 11 years old?

AN EVENING WITH MONDOMULIA - #FRD2013

Hannah and I were lucky enough to attend Giulia's first cooking masterclass in honor of Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution Day, and with the promise of freshly made Italian pizza using only the best ingredients we did the typical English thing and arrived early! Thankfully, we were greeted by Sandy as he prepared the recipe cards for the evening.

After Wendy had arrived and the first bottle of red was open, Giulia began describing the importance of ingredients in food and made sure we understood why she had selected each ingredient for the evening, including where she had found such wonders in London. I loved hearing about real honest food and especially enjoyed learned about Olive Branch Olive Oil and how acidity determines the grade of oil. Once we had been through each ingredient Giulia began preparing the dough showing us each stage before kneeding it and leaving it to prove.

As we waited, the best Bruschetta I've ever had was prepared and eaten whilst we chatted about all things photography & blogs, the fact that Hannah and I should move to London and our future plans including #frenchiepicnic and a Canadian Thanks Giving. Bring on summer!

Unfortunately our dough was not to be trusted and hadn't risen as Giulia had hoped, but we all had a great laugh forming our pizza bases including hitting the roof and dropping the dough more than once! After we handed our base attempts over to Giulia she expertly topped them and baked them into some of the best tasting pizza I've ever had.

I had another wonderful evening and hope we get the chance to cook with friends more often.

BLUEBERRY BANANA BROWNIES (PALEO)

These brownies are fantastic, in fact I think they are some of the best I've ever had - George of Civilized Caveman isn't lying but I've modified the recipe slightly through some tinkering of my own:

Ingredients:
170g Almond Butter
2 Eggs
40g Honey (Melted)
1 tbsp Vanilla Extract
30g Cocoa Powder
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp Salt
200g Blueberries
100g 90% Dark Chocolate (Lindt) Broken Up
1 Ripe Banana (Mashed)

Method:
Pre-mix the almond butter to get it nice and creamy then add the eggs and mix well.
Add the honey & vanilla followed by the salt & baking powder.
Add the cocoa powder & mix into a smooth paste.
Add the blueberries & broken up chocolate followed by the mashed up banana & mix until smooth.
Bake at 200 until a knife comes out of the brownies clean then remove from the oven and cut into squares.
Place the brownies on a metal cooling rack and put them back into the oven for 5-10 minutes to double bake the edges. It makes them much more chewy!

My Paleo Experience (so far):
I first became really interested in nutrition in April last year after I saw Tim Ferris on Chase Jarvis Live talking about his new book The 4 Hour Body (4HB). I proceeded to read the book front to back and applied the diet side to my already dialed in training regime helping me to drop about 6kg of weight in few months, but the problem with 4HB is its a diet, not a lifestyle and so I slowly began looking elsewhere and started to hear about Paleo.

I've been eating a pretty strict Paleo since January and I'm just getting away from that pesky cheat day thanks to a 21 day stint after our last trip to Exmoor. During that time I've been playing with making the occasional treat to help satiate my cravings for baked goods and these brownies are part of that effort!

I'm hoping to bring more of this side of my life to the blog over the coming months including more of my journey and some of the amazing food & training I'm enjoying as a result.