Asparagus Season!

I looooove asparagus! And so does my Mom, I remember when I was young my grandmother always took a lot of asparagus with her as a gift to my mother when she visited us. The white thick asparagus came from Germany, from the region where my dear grandmother lived. A region that was well known for this lovely vegetable. I wasn't a huge fan of asparagus, but I sure am now. I already whipped up an amazing pasta dish this week with the lovely vegetable, so good! I served gluten free corn pasta, a cream sauce that's actually not creamy and bad for your belly, smoked salmon, asparagus and spinach. And YES, I forgot to make a picture.. again. But it was sooooo damn tasty, so I promise to you all I will make it again soon and post the beautiful dish here on Hungry For Healthy Food.

Back to the asparagus, besides the fact it's damn tasty.. Did you by know that asparagus is full of health benefits of well? It's full of fiber, vitamins A, C, E, K, the complex B-group of vitamins and it's an herbaceous plant as well. A what? Next to avocado, kale and Brussel sprouts, they have a particularly rich source of glutathione - until now still not interesting right? But here it comes - this is a detoxifying compound that helps break down carcinogens and other harmful compounds like free radicals! That's why eating asparagus can actually help protect against and fight certain forms of cancer. Asparagus is also packed with antioxidants, ranking among the top fruits and vegetables for it's ability to neutralize cell-damaging free radicals. This may help slow down the aging process. Woooohoooooo Forever young! So it almost sounds like a superfood to me right? (And then I didn't even mention the fact it's a very low calorie vegetable (oops now I did), 100 gram of fresh spears provide just 20 calories.

Back to the recipe! A wonderful dish with on the bottom fresh lettuce and topped with steamed asparagus (so you won't loose all the vitamins), omega 3 packed salmon and more. So a dish that's rich in good fats, packed with protein and full of Vitamin A (good for your skin), B12, C and E! 

Ingredients

for the Salad

1 organic fresh egg
tablespoon of pine nuts
3 small radishes
some steamed asparagus (about 4)
100 g smoked salmon
Big handful of lettuce
2 small tomatoes

For the dressing
1/4 (60ml) cup fresh orange juice
1/3 (80 ml) cup olive oil
1/4 (60ml) cup white wine vinegar
1 tsp Dijon mustard
salt and pepper to taste

Boil or poach your egg the way you like, I love it when it's half way cooked and the egg yolk is running out of the egg and is drizzling over your salad. Stir fry the nuts in a dry pan until browned and fragrant. Then grab a plate and start off with a big handful of lettuce, top with radishes, asparagus, tomato, smoked salmon in pieces and serve with the egg on top, the pine nuts sprinkled all over and a big spoon of the lovely salad dressing.

Psst: you can store the remaining dressing in a jar in the fridge for a while.
Nutritional information: approx. 360 calories, 19.8 grams of fat, 29.7 grams of protein.

Bon appetit! 

My Dear Amsterdam

Haaay Guys!! 

This week I was back in lovely Amsterdam for 2 days. The very first day I had a gym date, I signed up for an insane workout with Model Workout! And we nailed it! After a million burps (okay Jeroen it were 45) and lots and lots of more excercies it was time to see one of my old friends again, Marianne. I know her since college time, when the economy wasn't that great, she made the choice to move to Amsterdam to find a job over there. And she did, she works as an attorney in a law firm. BUT I have never visited her place in Amsterdam! Shame on me, I know.. but it's just not in my system she lives over there hahhaa.

Me and the trainer of Model Workout!

We (me and Marianne) were both late and I was huuuungry so we decided it would be either dining out or dining in with a take away. And then Sla Amsterdam made the announcement on Facebook they would deliver to her region in Amsterdam as well.. YAY!! Easy peasy! I chose the amaranth chicken salad (my body was craving protein) and it was really delicious! Definitely one of my favourite places in Amsterdam to go to! My salad included rocket, amaranth, mushrooms, sweet potato, tomato, organic chicken and Parmesan cheese. A yummy combination including a very tasty dressing! First time I tried amaranth as well, I liked the taste of it. But I would still prefer quinoa though! ;-)

The next morning I had a casting, my first casting with my new book from Max Models. I signed up with them a bit over a month ago and am really happy with my new mother agent. A mother agent is the one that's taking care of your agenda, agency's abroad etc. The bookers are all really nice and doing a lot of effort, so hopefully I will work a lot with them!!

After my casting I went to Venkel, it's kind of a side kick of Sla. So I was eager to see if it would be just as good. And I have to say, I liked it, but Sla stays my favourite one. The portion was smaller, and I'm a big eater ;-) And the dressing was a bit sourly, I chose the "Lente kriebels" salad with chickpeas, peas, avocado, Parmesan, radish and I chose for a bit extra chicken (protein!) for my muscle recovery. I enjoyed it, I really did.. but too much of the sour dressing! ;-)

Lots of dining out!

Hey Guys!

As you may have noticed, I have not been posting a lot - OOPS! Sorry.. the reason? Mainly because I was working, booking my Holiday and had a lot of lunch and dinner dates with friends and family. Also because I forgot a lot of times to take photo's of my creations.. haha yeah not that smart when you want to post about it ;-) 

Lunch at "Concerthuis" Groningen

One of my friends is a great singer at "Housedieren" she was performing on Queens night- and day so we met up just before so I could help her shopping a bit and we could chat and catch up again. We went to "Concerthuis" a great place for foods & drinks. It's one of my most favourite places the last few weeks. We ordered a roasted butternut squash a "salad" of smoked mackerel, beetroot, fennel and cucumber and a buckwheat salad with roasted eggplant. Lots of food, really, really yummy!! 

Tapas with my friend Sanny (model @de Boekers) 

And look at this yummy food!! That was amazing Spanish tapas, again in Groningen. I haven't seen Sanny in months so we went out for drinks in the sun whole day and finished eating these amazing bites in the evening. We ordered a cheese fondue, patatas braves, chicken in plum sauce, spinach with raisins and pine nuts, lots of red wine haha, orange and avocado salad, beef and I don't know what.. haha lots of food, really yummy!! 

On Sunday I had to work, for lunch we got a three course buffet meal.. damn look at the desserts! How can you resist? 

And then last but not least, a visit to Bagel & Beans. I love their new menu, they have spelt and oat bagels now which I both tried. The oath bagel was a big soggy the spelt was yummy though! I also tried the chicken, avocado salad. DAMN tasty! And of course their juice, unfortunately they didn't had veggie juices today so I took the "all-in fruit juice". It was pure banana, strawberries, orange, banana, pineapple and raspberry. Really delicious! 

Tomorrow another dinner feast! My boyfriend is getting his master degree tomorrow, so proud! That means we have to celebrate well right? So with the entire family we are having a big Indonesian meal feast. Looking forward already ;-) 

Easy Peasy Snack

Sometimes it's really hard to think what to eat between meals. The other day I was out for dinner with my boyfriend and I knew it would be a HUGE dinner haha. In that case, you don't want to over eat the rest of the day ;-)
But of course, I got my usual 16 O'Clock snack time hunger so I wanted to whip up a quick snack that's easy, healthy and tasty. I often eat fruit, nuts, rice cakes with peanut butter in between meals but something like this I should do more often. You increase your veggie intake, which is always a good idea!

All I did is wrap some organic chicken breast around some pickles, sliced up a carrot, cucumber and bell pepper and serve with a good dollop of hummus (I also love tzatziki or cottage cheese mixed with 1 tbsp of peanut butter as a dip)

Happy Snacking!

Updated Heavenly Scones

Remember these yummy treats? I sure do! I made them again for the second day of Easter a perfect brunch dish to add to the table. I tweaked the recipe a bit, not completely lactose free anymore because I added "kwark" (for the Dutchies) also known as "Fromage Blanc". Maybe you can substitute it with soy yogurt as well, I haven't tried that one out yet. But because I added "kwark" I didn't had to use ANY fat. So that safes some calories and adds up the protein intake!

Ingredients

250g whole wheat spelt flour

150g oats

25g palm sugar

10g stevia sugar

16g baking powder

1 egg slightly beaten

2 tbsp apple sauce

100g kwark/Fromage Blanc.

50ml soy milk

1 teaspoon vanilla aroma

pinch of salt

Preheat an oven on 200 degrees Celsius. Than mix all the dry ingredients in one bowl and all the wet ingredients in the other. Than it's time to mix the dry and wet ingredients and form a big bowl of the batter. If it's to wet and sticky, add a bit of flower but these amounts should give you exactly the perfect batter and it should be a bit sticky! Divide the batter into 8 balls and bake them for 20 minutes in the oven. Make sure they are done, you can cut one in half and feel it should be completely dry. If it's wet pop them back in to the oven for an extra 5 minutes.

Note: Feel free to add currants, raspberries, chocolate or whatever you like! 

Serve with a dollop ricotta cheese, cottage cheese and (strawberry) jam.. hmmm.. bon appetit!

The Ultimate Healthier Chocolate Cake

Wooooohpp wooop!  I'm really excited about this recipe. BUT I have to admit 2 things straight away before I start off with the recipe...
1: I like chocolate now for about half a year, before absolutely hated it.
2: I have never ever ever had a chocolate cake/pie in my entire life (due to the fact I have always hated chocolate).

I'm still not a fan of milky sugary chocolate, so you can give me as much as Easter eggs you like, I won't eat them.. just not my thing.. BUT this cake? Yeah, that was definitely my thing.

To celebrate Easter I went to my boyfriends parents place for the first day where we had a typical "gourmet" night. That means having a grill plate on the table to grill our mini hamburgers, beef, chicken skewers, prawns and salmon. With lots of salads, potato salads, bread dips and sides. When you know you will have too much food, you want a light and fluffy pie right? Well that's why I came up with this recipe, not too much sugar, and guess what... NO flour! Yup, no almond flour, spelt flour and a million nuts.. nothing! And yes it will turn out amazing with just 175 calories a serving!

The great part of this pie, is that it contains healthy ingredients only. The cacao in the dark chocolate is rich in iron, copper, magnesium and cacao has been scientifically linked to a reduced risk of heart disease, stroke and diabetes. The eggs are obviously high in protein and even the butter is a good provider. It contains good amounts of fatty acids, which support immune function, boost metabolism! So I will just say, try out this recipe and enjoy your piece of chocolate pie without all the guilt.

Ingredients

200g good quality dark chocolate (I used half a 85% and half 70% cacao)

90g proper butter (grass half fat butter)

6 organic eggs 

50g palm sugar

10g stevia sugar

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 tsp sea salt

Preheat the oven on 140 degrees. Use a 20cm spring form and spray it with oil or butter so the pie will be easy to get out after baking. Melt the dark chocolate and the butter au bain marie (that means in a bowl with boiling water underneath without the bowl reaching the water). Stir the chocolate and butter well until it's 1 mixture. In the meanwhile your chocolate is melting mix the egg whites only until really, really fluffy. Add the egg yolks, with the sugar, salt and vanilla aroma with the chocolate until it's all combined. Then "fold" the egg white in to the chocolate mixture, reaaaallly gentle. This may take a while but you don't want to beat out all of the air. When everything is well combined you can pour the mixture in to the spring form and bake the cake for about 45-55 minutes in your oven. Check if your cake is cracked on top and when you press down on it with a finger, it should push back just a bit. Then your cake is set, for me it took 50 minutes. Let the cake completely cool down before removing it from the tin. Serve as it is, or sprinkle with cacao and raspberries like I did. 

Notes: 

- Really important to make fluffy egg whites and keep the fluffy texture

- To make it decadent, serve with a cream cheese frosting or serve it with a dollop if ice cream, cream or mascarpone and smashed berries.

- If you adore sweet sweet pies, add a bit more sugar. This cake will turn out sweet, but not super duper sweet as you will have when you buy a chocolate cake at the bakery. I would suggest to use 75 g of palm sugar or 100g of palm sugar and no stevia. But I would try out the cake like it is, it's yummy =) 

My Healthy Lifestyle

Today I want to write a blog about "being healthy". For me being healthy is really important, but what exactly is being healthy? For the last few weeks I have been snacking a lot, in a bad way, lots of  of processed and sugary stuff and felt and noticed it on my body straight away. My skin got bad, I got tired all day long, lots of belly pain and then I got an infection and had to be on antibiotics. I have no idea if this wouldn't have happened If I kept on my lifestyle diet completely.. But it made me wonder if it would. I was completely healthy before so there has to be a connection right? For me this was the ultimate reason to start all over again, no more sugar-free, sugary candy, chips, ice creams and everything else. I cleaned up my habits again and immediately felt better. After a few days I'm less bloated, not so tired anymore and I can tell the difference to my skin and body. Why the hell do we eat junk food anyway?

For me it has always been quite easy to eat clean and healthy, as soon as I'm eating things like pizza's, white bread, pork, pastry's.. I get sick straight away. But candy? Nope, nothing happens. And the thing is with sugar, you get addicted and just want more. So it's like a never ending circle, you put the bad stuff in your mouth to be satisfied but the thing is, you won't. You will be craving more and more and more..

But what about all the good looking stuff on your blog? People ask me. Well, to start with, all the food on my blog is healthy.. If you keep the portion sizes as they should be (thats one of my biggest issues, I just love food and it seems like I'm never stuffed haha) there is nothing wrong with oats, yogurts, nuts, fruits for example. Sure you will gain weight if you eat 6 of them, 5 boxes of nuts, 3 avocado's and 10 tortilla wraps. But it's all about balancing the right stuff! What I love to do when I'm in the kitchen, is mixing healthy (in simple portion sizes) and turning them in to a feast meal. But without adding all the calories, fats and sugars.

loaded shrimp home made salad

For example, this Easter I'm going to prepare little healthy chocolate cakes, no added sugars and bad fats. You shouldn't be eating 7 chocolate cakes, because they are "healthy". No, you can eat 1 without ruining your diet, without gaining weight and without feeling guilty. That's what it's all about for me, enjoying food. And yes, of course I will share my recipe with you if the cakes are successful ;-)

But a lot of people forget it's not all about your eating habits, abs are made in the kitchen they say. But you will have to fire up those abs in the gym if you would like me to see them ;-) haha. So besides my healthy lifestyle, I work out, as much as I can, about 5 times a week. And no, this doesn't mean I'm sweating like a pig 5 times a week doing 2 hour workouts. This means from running half an hour in the morning, to 1 1/2 hour strength and cardio in the gym, to 45-60min cardio in the gym to workouts at home. Just how I feel like. I don't like being in the gym all day every day, so that's why I love running outside or jumping in my living room at home. Or well, most likely this means jumping in hotel rooms for me.
When I'm on the road for a job, nothing makes me feel better than breaking a sweat, it gives me some piece of rest and in the same time lots of extra energy. I loooooove to work out. So when I'm not in the gym, but on the road a lot, I can and will do a workout. Even if it's just 20 or 30 minutes a day.  

Therefore I was really excited when I booked a job for Model Workout end of last year. I met Jeroen Krak, the one that created Model Workout; a special fitness and health program for models. Especially young models have no idea what to eat, how to work out and lots of models are even afraid to work out. They all think they will become body builders. Well, woman in generally won't bulk up as much as guys do but yes when you do strength straining there always is a chance you will add extra centimers because you gain muscle. So how should you workout then?
Well that's the thing I have learned from Jeroen, his training is all about using your own body weight. You don't need any special equipment so you can basically do it wherever you want. Model Workout created an on line program with cardio and strength workouts and nutritional feedback as well. So if you would like to have some more information about that, just check their website www.modelworkout.nl and for information about their memberships click!.

To end this blog, I just want to say: Listen to your own body and do what makes YOU feel happy. Try to do what feels good for you, my body is not yours and the other way around. And give it some time to find out what's the best for yours. 

xoxo

Almost Easter Time!

Hey there!

It's almost Easter, that mean's time for a wonderful food party ;-)

Hereby some tips for your morning Easter Brunch

Try out the gluten free crackers for a wonderful bite snack, the pear & pecan treat and Carrot Cake Oats as a sweet side (make a big tray of both so everyone can spoon in) have a lovely healthy side salad so you won't be over eating the "bad" stuff. And for Easter it means it has to have some chocolate, so why not the healthy bounty's as a wonderful dessert?

Serve with, tea, fresh juices and/or my homemade Chocolate smoothie in small glasses for everyone!

Have a lovely Easter

 xoxo

Easy shrimp quasadilla

Hmmm this is a wonderful tasty quick lunch, comfort food to the max. It's incredibly easy, quick and nutritious. Good carbs from the tortilla, healthy fats of the avocado, protein because of the shrimps, veggies and the cheese is just a delicious good to add ;-)

Ingredients
Hand full of shrimps (cooked)
half an avocado (ripe)
half a bell pepper
grated cheese
salt and pepper
sweet chili sauce
gluten free or whole wheat wraps

This dish is incredibly easy, simply heat a pan and warm up one side of the tortilla (no oil needed), than the other side and set aside. Grab another tortilla and only heat up one side. Grab that tortilla and layer it with all the ingredients and a drizzle of chili sauce. Top it with the other tortilla and bake in the pan until everything is warmed up and the cheese is melted. (You can use a lit if you prefer everything to be really hot and gooey).

Lately - Food on the go

One of the best parts of my job is to able to travel, a lot. I was lucky to be all over the place again the last period, Bremen, Antwerp, Zurich, Amsterdam, Knokke.. Lots of fun, lots of good food to share with you!

Love the outfit. Pastel for summer 2014 it is!

Love SLA, One of my favourite places in Amsterdam 

I love Belgium, they always take care of the models with great food on set (well almost always). Fresh strawberries, whole wheat pasta salad with tomatoes, basil and mozzarella, smoked ham with cheese and rocket, roasted goat cheese fennel with pine nuts, goat cheese dip.. okay I will stop here.. Just a LOT of delicious food!

Beautiful Zurich!

In Zurich I had to walk a runway show, the client gave me an amazing hotel "Boutique Hotel". In the middle of the city centre, around the corner of the train station, just perfect! It's not cheap, but hey Zurich isn't in general, but a definitely must visit when you want to visit Zurich.
I was surprised about the beauty of this city and the wonderful people. The women explained to me she had fresh croissants and yogurts for breakfast, when I told her my food intolerance she whipped up a special breakfast for me the next morning: bircher soy muesli, boiled eggs, gluten free toasts, fresh fruit, fresh juices. Amazing !!

The other day I was working in the north of Germany, after work I passed by a lovely little restaurant.  What an amazing place I found, felt so lucky! It's always hard to find good places in cities you don't know. That's what is great about modellist-id.com ! Have you heard about it? Well if you're a model and/or travel a lot check it out. There are a lot of tips about all kinds of cities. Anyway in this restaurant I ordered the fish of the day, some kind of white fish (not recognisable because it was a German name ;-)) with mojo sauce, asparagus citrus salad, foam of champagne and some puree of a vegetable I don't remember as well, served with a side of really tasty roasted potatoes. And that's hard because I'm not a big fan of potatoes but these were finger licking good, well the entire dish was! 

So far my post about my food on the go, hope you liked! =)