Avocado-goat cheese salad with apples

Hello Hello! In spring/summer everyone looks for light food that is refreshing but still gives you enough nutrients. This spring salad provides you with healthy fats, vitamins and proteins. It is easy to make and for any occasion, such as dinner, garden parties/barbecue or simply lunch at work.

Grocery list:

-          1 ripe avocado

-          1 box/bag of field salad

-          1 table spoon lemon juice

-          3 tablespoons of sunflower seeds

-          200 grams of shredded goat cheese

-          2 small to medium sized apples

-          1 bell pepper

-          1 tablespoon of mustard

-          2 tablespoons of honey

-          1 tablespoon of crème fraiche

Directions:

Wash salad and dice up apples and avocado and bell pepper. I shredded a cube of hard goat cheese myself  because I couldn’t get the shredded one anymore, so that works out too. For dressing: Squeeze the lemon and mix juice with honey, mustard and crème fraiche.  Put diced apples in the bowl where you mixed the dressing together.  Mix together in a big bowl the salad with the goat cheese, bell pepper, cubed avocado and put in apples with dressing.  Mix up salad. Sprinkle sunflower seeds on salad and voilà!

Enjoy the spring time and check out my new start of summer Swiss ball training and running special !

Karen :)

Hello Spring!!! Full body slim and tone- interval training

Today is the official start of Spring 2011 so GET READY to burn away the cozy fat layer and steel those muscles!

+  Slim down

+    Firm your whole body

+    Target especially the bikini body zones:
     legs,  stomach, and butt

+    Up your cardio

... Get big results in little time!

Click here for entire HelloSpring Intervall training!

The best exercises are the ones you do with your own body weight. I put together a workout when I was in Australia just in time with spring arriving!    With this workout you will burn more calories than with an easy 25 minute jog and gain lean muscles if done on a regular basis. Since this workout is VERY time efficient you can always squeeze it in and get results faster than you thought. Interval training is one of the hardest workouts you can do, but also one of the most efficient. Especially if you are on a weight plateau interval trainings like these can boost through those plateaus because they give your body new impulses that its not used to.

Do one exercise for exactly one minute, then switch to the next until you have completed all five exercises. After those 5 minutes you will take 2 minutes to pause and then repeat the whole circuit.

Go through the circuit if possible 3 times- (unlike you think) you will see that already two times can be enough! You can also make your pause a bit longer (or put mini pauses between individual exercises) to pull through.

How to do it: Combine this exercise (3-4 times a week) with a cardio program for best results. This interval training and the FitnessFountain AbCircuit (click here!) go together great as well.

Soon I will post a running plan for beginners-medium that want to get fast results in cardio training and body, so make sure to check it out!!

Exercise 1- minute 1

FitnessFountain jump:

Start standing up straight and then go down on hands with your legs jumping back into plank position. Now that in plank position, jump with your feet to your hands and from there push yourself up with your feet jumping high up in the air and landing in starting position. Do as many as you can in 1 minute.

Click here for entire HelloSpring Intervall training!

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Vegan Protein Peanut butter and Jelly Shake

Heeeey guys and gals!

I just came back from running and wanted a post workout snack that would give me a good load of protein and also a few carbohydrates to fuel up again. This is a vegan protein shake without any supplements such as protein powder etc.

the shakes with ingredients used in background

You will need  (for two tall glasses)

-2 cups of soy milk

-½ cup of oats

-1 tablespoon of peanut butter

-1 tablespoon of raspberry jelly (or any other jelly you like)

Pour ingredients in blender and mix!

 Nutrition facts for a big serving (one tall glass) :

-15 gram of protein

- 300 calories

If you choose the crunchy peanut butter it will go good with the little pieces of oats. I tried drinking this shake with a straw which kind of turned out a bit …complicated -J as it is kind of thick. You will feel full after this shake because it is very nutritious! When on a diet, there is the option to replace a meal with this drink.

This was definitely a yummy, very nutritious and high-in protein alternative to the traditional peanut butter and jelly sandwich!

Your Karen

Ab Circuit- 7 moves to great abs!

Click here for entire Ab Circuit

Just in time for Spring coming soon I want to present my AbCircuit which I have been doing for a time now already- it targets a wide range of your ab muscles for the best looks and strenght and at the same time you work up a sweat because the moves are dynamic and not static. So a light cardiovascular training, a lot of toning for your abs AND an overall body toning as you work with your own body weight.

This is one of my favorite workouts and combined with a jog, you will see how fast especially your middle section and the rest of your body will tone up.

For all moves: Try the number of reps I suggested, and for a lighter workout half or 3/4.  You can also make your own target of reps.. every person likes to work out in different intensities!  

Move 1-
Spiderman

Go into push-up position, and pull up your left knee up to your left elbow and then back down into push-up position. Then do the same with the right leg. Always stay in motion, so immediately after bringing one leg back, bring up the other to elbow. This is a very dynamic move, so don't shy back to look like a spidy in action :)

 

 Click here to see the other 6 AbCircuit exercises!

Watermelon-Raspberry-Mint-Smoothie



the smoothies

Since it's so hot here in Melbourne there is nothing more refreshing than a smoothie! I had this smoothie as a snack today and instantly felt "revived" :D Making this smoothie was pretty easy. All you really need to make great smoothies is a good blender though. Often or actually most times, cheap blenders around 10 $ are not capable of crushing ice cubes. This is very important though for many smoothies to give it that icy, refreshing "slushy" consistency.

Smoothies are great for breakfast, snack or as a post/pre -workout energy refill. They are a great source of vitamins and minerals, and if you add the right stuff, it can also be good source of protein.

This watermelon-raspberry smoothie is thought to be a snack or a refresher, but not really as a meal replacement because it doesn't give you the amount of energy that a real meal should.

Ingredients for 5 tall glasses:
-2 cups of diced watermelon
- 1 and 1/2 cups of blueberries
-1 cup of low-fat greek yogurt
- 1 and 1/2 cups of ice cubes

- a handful of mint-leaves

To make blending easier, first put in the watermelon with the yogurt, and then add the ice cubes, blueberries and mint.

For the guys and gals that love anything sweet, you can also add 2 teaspoons of maple syrup or 1 teaspoon of agave-syrup. Also remember that sweetening with "natural" sweeteners is the healthier option!

Enjoy!

Send me your favorite smoothie-recipe so the next smoothie-post can be yours.

xx

Urban Burger- the healthy burger option

Hey guys,



healthy indulgence



 I am in Australia right now and played a nice match of tennis with my boyfriend yesterday. We are living in a a beach house in Mount Martha, a beautiful little place about one hour away from Melbourne city by car. The tennis club is located in Mornington, a small village next to Mt. Martha and guess what I actually found there? Well, after we played tennis we decided to get something to eat and the first place that popped up was "Urban Burger"-a healthy burger store! Does that sound weird to you? It kind of did to me, but that just made me wanna try it out even more :) My boyfriend ordered a burger called "the legend" and mine was called "the lot". So the secret to the healthy burger was this (and I am keeping this in mind the next time I will make some burgers myself!!!):

• The beef was organic
• There was the option (which would make it even more fitness-friendly) to replace the beef pattie by a  chicken pattie
• They served the pattie with 2 wholewheat rolls
• To make the burger more juicy they put on sliced beet roots and a real slice of tomato instead of fatty mayo
•  They replaced the cheese by a sunny side up egg
• The store didn't even HAVE mayo as a dip for the chips, so they served us a yummy yoghurt-garlic dressing 
•  The place also offered chicken wraps! But be careful- often times when a wrap sounds and looks healthier, it actually isn't; especially in real fast food restaurants!

There was also a burger with avocado. The avocado contains what everybody knows as the "healthy fats". They are hearth-healthy and can lower cholesterol but too much again will give your body excessive calories.



For the extra-cautious some other do-it-yourself burger tipps:

• Only eat one roll instead of both. You can easily take the top one off - and the other profit: actually have less trouble eating the giant burger :P
• Forget about the chips. Most of the time the burger will fill you up anyways. As a replacement, ask  for coleslaw with french dressing or a salad; most stores offer that too

• Replace the sugar-filled soda with water or a less-caloric drink such as vitamin water (which we had)

• Even though juice as the same amount of sugar (= same calories) as soda, it is still filled with more vitamins.

So surprisingly, you CAN make a burger somewhat healthy!!! Enjoy