Philips AirFryer Review

I was lucky enough to be given the opportunity to review the Philips AirFryer, something I have really wanted to try out.

The AirFryer makes it simple to give food a "deep fried" taste without using a lot of oil. The instructions say that, if you are using convenience food (like frozen chips (french fries) or chicken nuggets for frying), you don't need to add any oil to it at all. When using fresh, homemade ingredients, such as potatoes that you've peeled and sliced yourself, you need to add a very small amount of oil. For 500g of potatoes, you only need to add 1/2 a tablespoon of oil.

According to the materials that came with it, the Philips AirFryer will save you 80% of the fat in your "frying."

The Philips AirFryer arrived encased in a lot of packaging, but I was thankful to see that it didn't contain any styrofoam in its packaging.

I was given this Philips AirFryer in exchange for my reviewing it, so I figured I had better try out both methods of cooking with it. First, I cooked up some "fry chips" from the freezer section of the grocery store.

It was really easy to make them. First you set the temperature.

Then you put the chips in the AirFryer.

And then you set the timer.

Halfway through the cooking, you take them out and shake them up and put them back in. It was a very simple process, and by the end, my kids had some delicious chips (french fries) that tasted, as my five year old kept telling me "absolutely delicious!" (She also told me that she really likes my new "thingy" that helped me make them.) Chicken nuggets and chips (french fries)ar enot the healthiest of foods, in general, but if you must serve them up, then cooking them without any added oil is a good thing. And the Philips AirFyer lets you do that while retaining that "deep fried" taste that you won't get from oven baking.

Having made the chips for their dinner in just 13 minutes, I then added some chicken goujons to my AirFryer. The chicken goujons came out perfectly too, and they were just as easy to "fry".

Having cooked convenience food in the AirFryer, I then had to see how well it worked with fresh food, so I peeled and sliced up some potatoes and went through the very simple process again. The chips (french fries) made with the AirFryer came out really well, although I may have cooked them a few minutes too long. They did have a taste very much like they had been fried, and I only had to use a fraction of the oil I would have had to use without it.

After I'd done all of the food for the night, I realized that the machine had come with a metal divider to be used when cooking two things at once, so I could have "fried" the chips at the same time as the goujons.

The Philips AirFryer also came with a recipe book. I love recipe books, and this one had some great recipes in it! I found out I can even make brownies in the machine, but I will more likely use it to make some of the healthier recipes that the cookbook contained. It has recipes in it such as "fish and chips," "crispy curry potato cubes with coriander salsa," "feta triangles" and "meatballs with feta," just to name a few. All of the recipes in the recipe book contain the nutritional values of the dishes.

Overall, I am really happy with the Philips AirFryer, and I am looking forward to making many more meals using it.

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Kebabs!

A cookbook arrived in the mail today. It was addressed to me and it came from The Book People, a book company that I have ordered from in the past. It did not say who bought it and had it sent to me, and I don't remember ordering it. It must have been a gift from someone as the price was zeroed out on the ordering form. It was a really pleasant surprise!

The book is a cookbook called Kebabs & Other Light Grills. Robert and I cook a lot, so I had a look through the book. Most of the recipes look very healthy and light, so I will definitely be cooking from it soon!

I'm only mentioning it here to let you know that there may be some new kebab recipes being added to my recipe blog soon. (I will add the recipes that we try out, if they are healthy enough.)

Thank you to whomever sent this to me!

Super Slimmers!

A lot has been going on here at Skinny Dreaming in the last week. First off, Skinny Dreaming is now on Facebook, and is just a small number of fans away from reaching 100 fans! Please go and fan Skinny Dreaming over there and help us reach 100 fans!

Second, Skinny Dreaming has started a new page that's all about inspirational stories from people who've beat the odds and lost a lot of weight. It's called "Super Slimmer's." My hope is that these interviews from Super Slimmers, along with their before and after pictures and words of wisdom will help inspire you and anyone who needs inspiration to stick to a healthier lifestyle. I know, for me personally, it was the stories of others who had managed to lose a lot of weight and set themselves on a healthy lifestyle that helped to inspire me to achieve my own weight loss.

With that in mind, Skinny Dreaming is looking for future Super Slimmers to feature! Are you a Super Slimmer? Want to be featured on Skinny Dreaming's Super Slimmers? If you're selected to be featured, you will get a Super Slimmer mug for the month that you are featured in. Criterea: Must have before and after photos and have lost at least 50 pounds (3 stone 8 lbs). Just e-mail me through the e-mail link on the sidebar here and put in the subject line "Skinny Dreaming's Super Slimmer Interview." Go ahead and take a peek at the Skinny Dreaming's Super Slimmers site now. You can even "follow" it if you want to be updated when new interviews are added.

Our first Super Slimmer interview is already posted and available to inpsire you! Jennifer lost over 160 pounds and her interview is a must-read!

And third, several more recipes have been added to Skinny Dreaming Recipes, so go and have a look and see if there is anything there that you might like to try. Every recipe added to the site has been made and tasted by myself and my family before being added.

Planning Ahead & Doing Well

Planning is important when trying to lose weight. If you plan ahead what you are going to eat for the week, it is much easier to avoid those tempting moments when you are hungry, don't know what there is to eat and grab something unhealthy for a quick fix.

With that in mind, Robert and I did a lot of planning ahead for this week. We won the new Slimming World cookbook "A World Of Flavours" at the last Slimming World meeting, so we decided to cook from it this week. So far I have made us two things from the book.

The first recipe we tried was Baked Cannelloni (Italian). We had broccolli as a side dish and the meal was delicious! The recipe feeds four, so Robert, our two teenage daughters and I were all able to have it, and everyone enjoyed it. It was even enjoyable enough for my teenager Angelica that she was willing to eat spinach! (There was spinach in the recipe, and she normally won't eat anything with spinach in it, but she liked the cannelloni.)

Tonight we had Vegetable Lasagne (Italian). It was delicious too, and importantly, it got my teenage daughters eating vegetables without complaining about it! It was full of healthy vegetables like bell peppers, courgettes, onion, and aubergines.

Tomorrow we are having Falafels (Morrocan) and the Tomato & Courgette Flan (French). I'm preparing the mixture for the falafels tonight and cooking it tomorrow. If I have time, I will also be making us the Spanish Orange Cake.

Tuesday, we will be making New York-style Meatloaf (North American) and on Wednesday, we will be trying the Baked Gnocchi (Italian). I am really looking forward to trying all of these new dishes.

I will be adding all of these recipes to my recipe blog as we try them out, along with what we thought about them.

Next week, we might try some of the recipes from the sections for Greece, India, China and Thailand to add even more variety to our meals.

Robert and I have been very, very good this week with our eating and exercise. I've been on the elliptical crosstrainer many times this week, the Wii Fit (using handweights) many times this week, and we've gone on several long walks. We've stuck to the Slimming World plan all week and used very few of our allowed "syns."

I am very hopeful that this week I will finally get past this plateau I've been stuck on for five weeks. My weigh-in is tomorrow night. I'll have a good idea by morning whether or not I will have a successful weigh-in or not. I am probably going to be a little worried until then though, because for the past five weeks, being "good" with my diet and exercise hasn't given me any results. I'm just praying that adding a little extra exercise and getting more variety in my diet has helped.

Quark & Scan Bran

Just for a little help for anyone wanting to cook with some of the recipes in my recipe blog that use the ingredients Quark and Scan Bran (also many recipes in the cookbook in my give-away use it), I looked up some information to help you understand what those ingredients are and how you can either make them or find them to buy.

Scan Bran
Most bigger Holland and Barretts sell it at about £1.05 per pack here in the UK. It is called GG Scandinavian Bran crispbread. Here's a link to it at a shop in the UK. I'm guessing it can be ordered in the US from health food stores. It can also be bought on-line here in the US.

To me, Scan Bran tastes awful as it is, but I turn it into a powder and add it to chilli and curries for added fiber or make low carb cakes and muffins using it. At first, I had to get used to the grainy texture it produces when used to make cakes, but the cakes are very filling, and I enjoy them now. Robert actually likes to eat Scan Bran like a cracker just as they are. Sometimes he adds some tomatoes and lunch meat on top of them too.

Low Carb Banana Blueberry Muffins

Quark: Wikepedia entry about Quark (cheese)
and how to make Quark and another recipe for making Quark cheese and here's where you can buy Quark on-line in the US

Quark is a very soft, fat-free, high protein cheese that can be used to make cheesecakes, or as filling for things like ravioli. I find it tastes a little bitter by itself, but I love using it in a variety of recipes. I even use it as a healthier substitute for frosting by adding artificial sweetener and either cocoa powder or vanilla extract to it.

No Bake, Mini Lemon, Lime & Ginger Cheesecakes

Weigh-In & Squishiness

I lost one pound this week despite being very strict with my eating and exercising tons. (I've now lost 116.5 pounds.) I'm being told over and over that I am doing too much exercise. This coming week will probably see me gaining weight, hopefully not too much though. I am going to lay off the exercise for this one week only (except for a few bike rides which I'll be doing because it's fun). I am even going to let myself indulge in a few of the treats my parents sent back with my teenage daughters from their trip to the US.

I am hoping that my body will decide, with this week "off," that it doesn't need to hang on to my body's stores of fat and then the following week, I can start losing again without overdoing the exercise.

It might not work, but I am hoping it will, and either way, I know I can lose whatever weight I put on this week.

Our Slimming World group had its Woman Of The Year Competition. It was between me and a woman named Eve. Eve had been in the competition in a previous year and had lost to her sister. This year, she won. She has lost a total of 53 pounds, and she looks great! This is her second time losing the weight because she had a child after the first time she lost it and put the weight back on. However, she was determined to lose it again and did. Congratulations to Eve!


It was a "Bring & Share" night, so we got to try lots of different dishes. I brought Chocolate Nest Buns, my own variation on a recipe in my Slimming World's 100 Best Desserts book. Robert brought High Fiber Scotch Eggs and Chocolate Gingerbread Squares. He also made some healthy homemade Potato Chips ("crisps" of you live in the UK), but he forgot to pack them to bring with us. There were a lot of desserts brought and a few savory dishes too. It was a fun evening.

I brought along some before pictures to show people. (I still can't believe how big I had gotten and how fat my face was just a little over a year ago.) When I was printing the photos up from my computer, Gabby (my 6 year old) walked in, looked at the photos on the computer screen, and asked, "Mommy, are those pictures from when you were squishy?"

So I've now decided that I was never "fat" or "morbidly obese." I was just squishy.

For those of you who still have a lot of weight to lose and are still squishy, and you feel you need a little inspiration to get you losing, let me just say that I can't even describe to you, but I wish I could, how wonderful it is to feel like a normal person again. I still have 21 pounds to lose, but I already feel like a normal-weight person. I'm no longer lumbering along, tired and energy-less, encased in over 100 pounds of fat. And it feels fabulous!

Another Pound Down!

I lost another pound for a total loss in a little over ten months of 84.5 pounds.

At last night's weigh-in, we had another Bring & Try. There was some delicious food brought! I was particularly fond of the lemon cheesecake someone brought. I'll definitely be making it soon for my family to enjoy!

I got my 6 Stone award for having lost 6 stone. (6 stone = 84 pounds) I also won Slimmer Of The Month again for having lost 11 pounds this month.

Robert lost 1.5 pounds yesterday. Both of us want to lose 2 pounds or more this week.

I made extra desserts just for Robert, my friend Helen and me. They were No Bake Mini Latte Cheesecake Desserts. I haven't heard back from Helen yet (She took hers home with her.) However, Robert and I both enjoyed the dessert. I'll have to get it posted to Skinny Dreaming Recipes sometime this week.

I'm Still Here!

I have neglected this blog in this past week. I am so sorry!

I've been busy adding recipes to my healthy recipe blog. I have added No Bake Mini Lemon, Lime & Ginger Cream Pie Desserts and No Bake Mini Orange Chocolate Cream Pie Desserts to the list of recipes you can find there.

I still have a long list of recipes my husband and I have made to add, such as Mexican Egg Burrito, Apple Wrap Dessert, Bombay Spinach Potatoes, Vindaloo Potato Wedges, Beef Madras, Bacon Deviled Eggs & many more. I don't add the recipes until I get a picture of the resulting dish. It's the photographing that takes up the most time. (I usually forget to take a photo the first time we try a recipe.)

Then, of course, I try and list the nutritional information for each dish. There must not be a law in the UK requiring companies to list nutritional information on the packaging of the food they produce, because I am coming across a lot of food that doesn't have it listed and am then having to research it myself.

So that's why I haven't updated here recently.

I am hoping to lose another 1.5 pounds (minimum) this week, as it would get me to my next mini goal. I think I've lost some weight this week, but I don't know how much (or how little).

Robert and I took the kids to a beautiful park for a picnic last Saturday and wound up doing a lot of walking, which should have been good for us. My weigh-in is tonight, so I will find out if I've lost what I wanted later.

Here We Go Again

Tonight is my weekly weigh-in.

I was sick for part of the week and ate a couple hunded more calories than usual while exercising less, but made up for it by working out a couple hours a day for the rest of the week while going back to eating right. I have no idea what the scale will say, and as usual, I am nervous.

I hate the idea of going another week maintaining. Two weeks in a row would start to feel like a plateau for me, and I am always trying to change things up to avoid a plateau. Plateaus are bad for my motivation.

I may have lost weight this week despite being sick for part of it. I hope so!

On a positive note, a friend of mine shipped me some Crystal Light powders! I was such a terrific thing for her to do, and now I stand a better chance of drinking the right amount of water this week! (I have a dificult time getting myself to drink plain water, and I haven't found anything in the UK that I like flavoring it with. I really miss all of the healthy choices that were available when grocery shopping in California.)

I made my Bean Soup for dinner tonight. I made it in the crock pot as usual, and the whole house is filled with the yummy smell of it!

Greatest Loser Competition

The woman who weighed only one pound less than me lost 6.5 pounds this week.

I lost SEVEN and won the Slimming World's Greatest Loser award for our group! Robert took a photo of me in the sash standing beside our Slimming World consultant, Sharon.


I won an engraved paperweight and pen set, a sash, a sticker and a certificate. I'm still amazed that I was able to lose seven pounds in one week. I exceeded any hope I had for weight loss for the week.






I also won "Slimmer of the Week."


Losing so much in one week is going to make this week even more difficult. We'll be going out for dinner to celebrate my birthday, plus having birthday cake. Add that to the fact that I just lost a huge amount of weight and it could spell disaster for my next weigh-in. I'm going to spend Wednesday through Monday working really hard to maintain my loss. If I can get through this week without gaining any of the weight back, I will be thrilled. I do not expect to lose any weight this week. I just really, really don't want to gain.

Robert and I also won one of the raffle prizes. It was a rain poncho, a box of Orange, Mandarin & Cinnamon Tea, and a 3-pack of Lemon Hi-Fi Bars.

Tonight was also a "Bring & Try" night where everyone brings a low-syn dish to share with everyone else. Robert made Slimming World's Vindaloo Sauce from the "Slimming World's Saucy Secrets" recipe book. He made a small change to the recipe (as we usually do). He also baked up some chips (thick-cut fries) for dipping in it. He also made Bombay Bhajis and Cucumber Raita Dip from Slimming World's "100 Free On Green Recipes" book.

Here is a quick photo I took of the table of food that everyone brought to share.


I found a dessert recipe on the back of a packet of Hartley's sugar-free Lemon & Lime Jell-o mix. It was for making Lemon, Lime & Ginger Creams. I made changes to the recipe and added to layers to the dessert. It was a big hit at the meeting! I had people asking for the recipe, and a friend was telling me it's her new favorite dessert. She said it tasted like a mini cheesecake.




I will share the recipes for everything in separate posts.

New Recipe Blog

I started a blog to put the recipes I have tried out all in one place, with pictures of the food Robert and I have made. I wil still post them as I make them here, but in my recipe blog, it will just be recipes and all in one place, so it will be easier to search for recipes you might want to try out. Skinny Dreaming Recipes (I also have it listed in my sidebar now.

Slimming World Food Night

At the Slimming World meeting last night, everyone was supposed to bring a low "syn" food for others to try, so my husband and I decided to each make something to bring. Robert brought Onion Bhajis with Cucumber Raita, and I brought Baked Vanilla Cheesecake. They were both a hit at the meeting, and we will definitely make them again at home.

Recipes:

Bombay Bhajis & Cucumber Raita

Bhajis

Fry Light
1 medium onion, chopped
170g/6oz potatoes, cooked and chopped
227g/8oz canned chickpeas, drained
1 egg, beaten
1/2 tsp baking powder
2 tsp Bombay mixed spice (we didn't have this, so Robert used a hot madras curry spice.)
1 tsp dried mixed herbs
salt and freshly ground black pepper

Raita

1/2 cucumber, chopped
salt
113g/4oz very low fat natural yogurt
4 spring onions, chopped

1. To make raita, place the cucumber in a colander, sprinkle with salt and leave for 30 minutes. Dry well and transfer into a bowl. Stir in the yogurt and spring onions and chill until ready to serve.

2. To make the bhajis, spray a non-stick frying pan with Fry Light and cook the onion for approximately 5 minutes until tender. Transfer to a bowl, add the potato and chickpeas and mash together. Stir in the remaining ingredients and form into 20 small balls.

3. Arrange the bhajis on a baking tray that has been sprayed with Fry Light. Bake in a preheated oven at 220C/Gas 7 for approximately 15 minutes until golden. Serve immediately with cucumber raita.

Serves 4 as a side dish.

Free on Green on the Slimming World plan. (I'll look up and add the calories count later.)

I do not like cucumbers, so I was not fond of the dip, and when we made this at home for us (rather than this one which we brought to the meeting), I had Robert make me some of the dip with only spring onion in it and no cucumber. The bhajis taste great, but can be a little bit dry and crumbly, so having a dip with them is definitely a must.

Baked Vanilla Cheesecake

12 reduced fat digestive biscuits, finely crushed
6 level tbsp low fat spread
511g/1lb 2oz Quark
3 large eggs
1 tsp ground cinnamon
2 tsp vanilla essence
8-10 tbsp artificial sweetener
finely grated zest of 1 orange and one lemon
1 level tsp icing sugar, to dust
mixed berries, to serve

1. Place the crushed biscuits in a bowl and melt the low fat spread. Add to the biscuits and stir to mix well. Spoon into a 20cm/8 inch non-stick spring form cake tin, pressing down firmly to make a smooth and even base. Chill in the fridge, preferably overnight.

2. Preheat the oven to 170C/Gas 3. Beat together the quark, eggs, cinnamon, vanilla, sweetener and the citrus zest until well combined and pour over the prepared biscuit base. Place in the oven and cook for 50-55 minutes or until set and golden.

3. Remove from the oven and allow to cool completely. Cover with cling film and chill in the fridge for 6 to 8 hours. To serve, dust with icing sugar, cut into thin wedges and serve with mixed berries.

Serves 10.

6 Syns on Green on the Slimming World plan.
6 Syns on Original on the Slimming World plan.

I had never even heard of Quark until i joined slimming World and noticed it mentioned as an ingredient in so many of the recipes. It's basically a soft cheese spread like Philadelphia Cream Cheese is, so if they don't have it at your local store, you could probably substitute the Light Philadelphia Cream Cheese for Quark.

I found that adding the cinnamon gave a slightly brownish colour to the cheesecake mixture, so it didn't look much like the picture in the book. Next time we make it, I will try to get a good photograph of the cheesecake. The berries I topped it with were raspberries and blackberries. Everybody loved it, including Robert and I, but I realized later that I had miscalculated the artificial sweetener. I used Splenda, and I measured out 10 teaspoons of it instead of the tablespoons that the recipe calls for. It still tasted great though, so maybe it doesn't need as much sweetener as it asks for after all!

I will try and work out the overall calories for a slice of the cheesecake to add here later.