Are you thinking about what to have for dinner? I love tuna, it’s such great food and you can use it for everything. Make a warm sandwich, a wrap, a lunch sandwich, in a salad, with pasta, you name it and you can use tuna. Here is an easy made lasagna recipe, give it a try I’m sure you will like it. 

Simple tuna lasagna

FILLING

2 leeks, finely sliced
4 zucchini (courgettes), diced
150 g (1 cup) green peas
200 g baby spinach leaves
400 g tin tuna in spring water, well drained
2 tablespoons chopped oregano
2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley
Cracked white pepper
tomato and fresh herbs to garnish (optional)

WHITE SAUCE
500 g ricotta
pinch of nutmeg to taste
cracked white pepper
50 g grated parmesan cheese

Combine all the ingredients in a food processor and blend until smooth and creamy.

TO MAKE THE FILLING:

Preheat the oven to 180°C .
Sauté the leek in a saucepan with 1 tablespoon olive oil over a low – medium heat until soft.
Add the zucchini, peas and spinach.
Cook for 5 minutes, or until the spinach and zucchini has slightly softened.
Remove the saucepan from the heat and fold through the tuna and herbs.
Season with white pepper and fold the tuna through the vegetables, making sure to leave some nice chunky bits.
Spoon the tuna mixture into individual ovenproof dishes or one large baking dish.
Spread over the white sauce.
Grate over the Parmesan cheese.
Bake the casserole for 30 – 40 minutes until golden on top and heated though.
Serve and enjoy.
Garnish with tomato and fresh garden herbs.
Serves 4

Yours in Health & Fitness,
Birgitta

www.newfitness.com.au

I have to admit, I do like a fit and good looking body but I feel we have gone to such an extreme. 

A couple of months ago I went with a friend to Melbourne fashion week, a great event and we have so much fun. But I was chocked to see the posture and bodies of the models. These are girls that are supposed to be role models for our young girls and some maybe even for us more mature magazine readers, most of the girls were probably 5-10 kg underweight and had postures that will give them hunch backs in later years. Mind you the boy models had healthy weights and pretty good postures.

The western societies are struggling with epidemic obesity, and here we have girls that are only skin and bones. We need to start sending out the message that an attractive and healthy body is a body that is fit, have muscles that you can see (in moderation when it comes to girls) and has a healthy color from being outside. 

We know that depression is related to many of these issues, not enough exercise, bad body image, and not enough daily light. Why do we have to go to the extreme in both directions? In Swedish we have a word that covers everything, it is LAGOM, that means it is not too much and not too little - it is LAGOM.  

And even though most Swedes think that the LAGOM word is quite boring and a “don’t get too excited” word, when it comes to health and fitness I think it is perfect. I would like to see our young, mature and elderly as well, exercise on a regular basic, eat healthy, be outside for at least 20 minutes a day and party in moderation; all with the goal in mind for a fit, healthy and good looking body.  

Wouldn’t it great if we all could look ourselves in the mirror and say – Hey, I really like what I see!!! 

Yours in Health & Fitness,
Birgitta

www.newfitness.com.au

    

What is life if we can’t enjoy some lovely chocolate?

I’m sure many of you saw my twitter the other day, that I spend a great day on Sunday at gnanache chocolate testing and making chocolate.

Now you are thinking – How can she that is supposed to be a fitness expert spend a day eating chocolate. Easy, it all comes down to balance of life.

I love chocolate, maybe not a Mars bar or Freddo Frog, but a nice small piece high quality chocolate, preferable dark. I like cooking and making nice healthy food, and a nice chocolate cake for dessert. I believe in 80/20, if we eat well and exercise during the week – Monday to Friday afternoon – of course we then can enjoy the weekend with a bit of indulgence.

Start Saturday morning with a healthy breakfast and do some exercises, and you have your 80/20 in a perfect balance.

Life is here to enjoy with a bit of TLC for your body!!!!

Yours in Health & Fitness,
Birgitta

www.newfitness.com.au

Beef Stroganoff sometimes is classified as not healthy food because traditionally you use cream as part of the dish, but this is a healthy variation and very nice. Why not make this as you Thursday night dinner.

 Beef Stroganoff

2 brown onions, sliced
2 cloves garlic, smashed
few sprigs thyme
300 g mushrooms
350 g  lean beef fillet or sirloin, thinly sliced
1 cup (250 ml) beef or vegetable stock
 1/4 cup (60 ml) of tomato paste
1/2 – 1 teaspoon arrowroot (optional)
2 handfuls baby spinach leaves
chopped parsley

Sauté onions, garlic and thyme in a little olive oil over a medium heat for a few minutes until browned.
Add the mushrooms and continue to cook for another 5 minutes until dark and caramelised.
Remove the cooked mushrooms and onion from the pan into a bowl then return the pan back to the stove.
Add the beef and sauté quickly for a minute until browned.
Deglaze the pan with the stock then add the tomato paste.
Return the mushroom and onion back to the pan and heat through.
Thicken if necessary with arrowroot…but this is optional.
Add the spinach just before serving and serve.
Garnish with chopped parsley.
Serve immediately with rice or quinoa and enjoy.
Serves 2

Perfect for a cold winter day!

Yours in Health & Fitness,
Birgitta

www.newfitness.com.au

Almost every week we have reports about how inactive Australians are, and that we are getting more overweight and obese by the minute.

That is sad and I know we really need to focus on changing the mindset of people when it comes to healthy eating and an active lifestyles, but we also have to congratulate everyone that makes a difference and tries.

Yesterday I ran Mothers Day Classic. I did the 8km run and had an early (for a Sunday!) start at 8.15am. It was 10 degrees, raining, and windy, but in and around Alexandra Garden there were people everywhere. Young, old, big, small, with or with-out prams, everyone were out to support Breast Cancer research but also they had gone out of bed on a rainy cold Sunday morning to be active and exercise.

Mothers Day Classic Melbourne had more participants this year than ever, 40000 that if nothing else shows us that Australians are on the move and wants to get fitter and healthier. 

We don’t have to join a gym, get a whole gym set up at home, pay long-term expensive PT fees (I know I’m a PT and I need business, but if I can change someone’s habits to a healthier and more active lifestyle in 6 months time then I feel I have done a great job), we have a lovely green city to walk and run in.

If more people joined the 40000 Mothers Day walkers or runners and did 10000 steps every day, we would soon have an obesity epidemic that comes to a halt and then decreases. 

Yours in Health & Fitness,
Birgitta

www.newfitness.com.au

Planning meals and making sure you have ingredients at home for good healthy meals can sometime be very hard. So making sure you have some base food at home can be one way of getting out of the last minutes fast food pick-ups.

I always have some frozen spinach in the freezer for the great quick Spinach soup.

Spinach soup

4 severs (made in microwave oven)

2 package frozen spinach, 375gr

1tsp salt

7dl vegetable stock

Thickening

1dl milk

2 ½ tbsp flour

Methods

Take off the packaging, and thaw under lid for four minutes in a bowl with lid.

Cut the spinach up in small pieces. Add 3 dl of the stock and the salt. Cook on high for 5 minutes.

Mix the thickening, add that to the soup while steering and cook on high for another 3 minutes.

Add the rest of the stock and cook for another 3 minutes

Serve with hardboiled egg and piece of dark bread with cheese and red capsicum. 

A nice and healthy dinner made in 15 minutes, perfect!!

Yours in Health & Fitness,
Birgitta

www.newfitness.com.au

The wonderful feeling of passion and motivation.

I had a great dinner with my girlfriends on Friday night. We were at my place so I had spent some time preparing dinner, and after a few glasses of wine and a late night I was quite tired the next day. To be honest I didn’t do much at all on Saturday, I did take the dog for a walk but spent most of the time on the sofa reading and just enjoying being lazy.

Today (Sunday) when I woke up and thought I need to go for a run my body was still in “lazy mode”, and I thought I might spend another day on the sofa. But when my daughter took off for her run and then later also my husband, I thought I need to do something! The decision landed on Body Balance.

I did a Body Balance class, and even though I know the amazing power exercise has on our mind and body, it still blows me away the difference in thoughts and feelings you have after an exercise session.

I have now made a long list of things that needs to be fixed at home that I have thought of, but has been a long way from action due to lack of motivation. Motivation can come from something you have seen, something someone said or something you have read, but when it comes from passion within and just appear, and makes you feel strong and confident, it’s just a wonderful feeling.

Yours in Health & Fitness,
Birgitta

www.newfitness.com.au

So many times clients ask me what they should have for snack, and that they struggle at work with snacks that looks like you are on a very very strict diet.

These delicious protein-packed sweets are excellent when you’re craving something sweet, and would like something different from your fruit or nuts.

Bliss Balls

Makes about 20.

Ingredients

4 fresh dates, pitted

1 cup mixed nuts, (sunflower seeds, walnuts, almonds, cashews, pumpkin seeds)

1 tbsp sultanas

1 tsp pure cocoa powder

Freshly squeezed juice of 1 orange

About ¾ cup desiccated coconut

Methods

Put all ingredients except coconut in a food processor and blend to a smooth paste. Roll into small balls and coat in the coconut.

Store in the fridge in an airtight container and eat within 5 days.

Note: Bliss Balls can be stored in the freezer and taken out to snack as needed.

Enjoy your healthy snack, I have one with my tea in the afternoon almost everyday.

Yours in Health & Fitness,
Birgitta

www.newfitness.com.au