Skinny Sriracha Eggs
There's nothing like an impending wedding and three weeks in a bikini in Thailand to sharpen one's resolve when it comes to losing the Christmas lard, so with 5lb of pastry, fererro rocher and Gavi to go my house is now in bootcamp lockdown and my fridge looks like a fruitarian's heaven. Being skinny in January doesn't have to be horrible though - you can still eat great tasting food with a few clever tricks. First up, is this little weekendy brunch idea of crispy polenta, sauteed kale and poached egg with sriracha.
If you haven't heard of sriracha and you want to shed the festive flab then I suggest you get yourself some quick smart - its a Thai chili sauce but a million miles away from the normal sugar laden sweet chilli sauce you might be used to. You can get it in most supermarkets for about £2 and it has the benefit of imparting lots and lots of lovely garlicky, hot flavour for not many calories at all.
Ready made polenta is also a bit of a godsend for the dieter and I turn to it a lot as an alternative to potatoes, bread and other banned carbs. 100g of ready made polenta is about 75 calories and you can dress it up with all sorts of things to make it interesting. During less austere times I grate a bit of parmesan and sage over it and grill with some truffle oil. Today, I used a few sprays of Fry Light and cooked it in a frying pan until it was crispy and it was still yum.
While your polenta is crisping up, get started on your kale which just needs sauteeing in a hot pan. Use more kale than you think you'll need as it shrinks a bit when it cooks, and seeing as kale is about 8 calories you may as well have loads! I did mine in coconut oil, which is another thing that comes out when I'm on calorie lockdown; yes it's still a high fat product, but you don't need much (I used a teaspoon for the two of us) and there are studies to show that it actually might help burn fat and boost your metabolism.
I don't need to tell you how to poach an egg, so once you're all sorted, pile the kale and eggs prettily over the polenta, top with some fresh coriander if you like and then drizzle the lot with sriracha and season to taste.
190 calories - YES.
