British Military Fitness Cookbook

It might not be an Amazon best seller, but I'm in a book! A recipe book, to be precise, crafted and made possible by British Military Fitness. They asked a handful of foodie, fitness and healthy lifestyle bloggers to share a recipe for either breakfast, lunch or tea as part of their #FitFoodBMF campaign.

I do circuits outdoors three times a week, and the bootcamp element to British Military Fitness classes has always (weirdly perhaps) appealed to me, so I was honoured to be asked to take part in this..

I chose to make a slow cooked lamb dish; to me it's something I look forward to tucking into after having battled with the elements (and kettlebells) at circuits, and it seemed a good fit given that we're in the middle of winter.

The recipe for this slow cooked paprika lamb with pomegranate quinoa can be found below, and if you want to download the e-book, the link is here!

You can't really make lamb stew look too pretty, so sorry about the picture...!

Slow cooked paprika lamb with pomegranate quinoa

Serves 4

400g lamb shoulder
1 can chickpeas, drained and rinsed
1 1/2 can chopped tomatoes
2 celery sticks, chopped
4 carrots, diced
1 sprig fresh rosemary (or 1 tbsp dried)
2 tbsp hot paprika
1 tbsp cumin
3 garlic gloves, chopped
1 onion, diced
Salt and pepper to season

For the quinoa:

100g quinoa
Seeds from one large pomegranate

I served mine with Greek yoghurt and a couple of handfuls of spinach.

I always remove the majority of excess fat from the lamb before putting in the slow cooker. Once I've done this, I throw it all in the slow cooker and let it do its thing for around eight hours. If you don't have a slow cooker, you can do this in a large, deep pan, and keep things cooking on a really low heat - just make sure you keep your eye on it every hour or so.

As well as being one of my fave comfort meals, BMF also asked nutritionist Ben Coomber to look at each recipe from a nutritional perspective to sound them out. Ben reckons the dish is a great recovery option as it's full of proteins and carbs, which is good enough for me! Personally, I like using quinoa rather than rice in this - it's lighter and contains more protein. Plus, the dish as a whole is so easy to make - chuck everything in the slow cooker and voila. Freeze what you don't need and whip it out when you're stuck for making time to cook.

One of the best things about the campaign was discovering a load of new like-minded bloggers, as well as featuring along side my good pal Vicki :)

The variety of recipes everyone created in the book is diverse, and as well as sounding really tasty, none of them look too complicated to make! Each one has a nutritionally sound profile too so ideal if you're looking for a bit of healthy cuisine inspiration.

As a thank you, British Military Fitness have given me a free pass at one of their classes, so if I give it a whirl I'll be sure to let you know how it is..!