Get the Glow

GET

the

GLOW

100 delicious and easy recipes that will nourish you from the inside out

M A D E L E I N E  S H A W

contents

Title Page

introduction

SIX-WEEK PROGRAMME

week 1: ditch the junk

week 2: fat: friend or foe?

week 3: eat clean, think clean

week 4: beat the bloat

week 5: rest and digest

week 6: live your glow

RECIPES

breakfast

snacks

soups and light salads

speedy suppers

weekend wonders

sweet treats

drinks to glow

acknowledgements

copyright

introduction

This book was written for you. It brings together all the food I love, along with all of the lessons I have learnt and the experiences I have been so blessed to enjoy. Most important of all, it is here to enliven the hottest, happiest and healthiest you, so you can shine from head to toe and really get the glow!

my story

Not so long ago I used to wake up foggy-headed every morning, dragging a second day hangover. I would pinch my flabby stomach, stare into my lifeless eyes and groan in despair. I suffered from terrible IBS, my belly was bloated, I felt tired and uncomfortable. My skin was dull, my hair lifeless and my head quite lost.

How on earth had I got to this place?

The world seemed hard to control, so I decided to control the only thing I felt I had the power to . . . food.

I realised that controlling this aspect of my life allowed me to block out the other uncontrollable things. It started to consume me; I thought about food 24-7. I counted calories all day. I felt nervous in social situations around food and never ate anything that could potentially fatten me up. I felt faint and never quite there. I would binge and then experience horrendous ‘come-downs’, beating myself up for failing to stick to ‘the plan’.

Being thinner and having ‘control’ over my life was supposed to make me happier . . . but it really didn’t. But upon leaving school I embarked on a journey.

Since the age of seven I had been obsessed with Australians (which might have had something to do with
Crocodile Dundee
!). So, on hitting 18, I made it my mission to spend time in this paradise.

From the minute I landed in Oz I felt at home. It was the strangest feeling. A sense of calm washed over me and I knew deep in my gut that I had to live there – that somehow this place would help me uncover the true me.

Being a tad impulsive by nature, I applied to Sydney University and was accepted a few weeks later, so I returned to my London home, got my gear and hopped on a plane to Oz.

It was a bold move and so many people thought I was mad. I was, of course, very far away from home. However, as I sat on that 22-hour flight, I repeated, again and again under my breath, a line from
The Alchemist
, by Paulo Coelho:

’Remember that wherever your heart is, there you will find your treasure.’

This was totally true for me.

I was blessed to find a job working in an organic café in Bondi. I blossomed there. It was quite amazing; I had never experienced a job that didn’t feel like a job. It was so effortless. It sounds corny but it felt like an expression of who I was. I learnt so much about the importance of food to our health, mood and general well-being. I realised that my body had been starved of proper whole foods, nourishment and love. The café was filled with the most miraculous people I had ever met; people who taught me how to properly prepare, source and cook food.

Moving to Sydney was the wake-up call I needed. It made me really want to take care of my body. I felt inspired to jump out of bed, to catch the sunrise or paddleboard the shores. Eating a wholesome diet enabled me to experience life on another level. My IBS cleared and for the first time I felt well. I studied nutrition, created my blog and moved back to London to spread the message of healthy eating.

I began teaching my Get the Glow programme in 2012 with the aim of helping others overhaul their health through food, and I’ve since helped countless men and women to ditch the fad diets and make healthy eating a way of life.

I genuinely feel like a changed woman because of the education I had in Oz, and this is why I feel so passionate about sharing my knowledge with you. With this book, over the course of six weeks, you’ll learn how to nourish your beautiful body so you can get not only an outer glow but an inner one too.

These are my top tips to help you get through the next 6 weeks:

• 
Prepare:
Decide how many recipes you’re going to cook and do your shopping and prepping for the week on a Sunday.

• 
Buddy-up:
Studies show you are more likely to start and succeed at a new diet or lifestyle if you’re doing it with somebody else.

• 
Be your biggest cheerleader:
Write down little reminders and encouraging words to give you the motivation to keep going (follow me on
Instagram@madeleine_shaw_
for daily inspirational quotes.

• 
Put it out there:
Tweet it, Facebook it and tell it to all your friends. You will be more inclined to stick at it if you have the world watching.

• 
Manage your mindset:
Don’t despair and fixate on what you have to give up; instead focus on all the exciting new foods you will be filling your plate with. It’s going to be a tasty affair, I promise.

I hope you enjoy this book and that by the end you’ll believe that healthy eating should be a way of living, not just a monthly ‘fad’ or ‘phase’. I would love more than anything for this book to help inspire you to fall back in love with life and yourself.

Madeleine

six week
programme

DITCH

the

JUNK

week one

Our skin is a reflection of our inner health. This week we are ditching the junk to get the outer glow.

you are what you eat

Do you feel foggy-headed? Have tired, dull skin, and most of the time (let’s be honest) . . . feel like crap? Can you really eat only one biscuit and walk away?

If the answer to any of these questions is ‘yes’ – well, I think it’s time to kick that sugar monster.

desert the sugar

‘Everything in moderation.’ Right? ‘A little bit here and there won’t hurt . . .’

These are our justifications when it comes to sugar. However, it isn’t always as simple as that.

Historically sugar was an expensive rarity, but as trade with sugar-producing countries increased, it has become cheaper and cheaper, and we are now eating more sugar than ever before.

The average person in Britain consumes about 700g of sugar per week – that’s 140 teaspoons! So what is this sugar doing to our bodies, and why do we need to quit?

• 
It sends us out of whack:
High sugar intake upsets important hormones in our bodies – especially insulin, the energy-storage hormone.

• 
It can make us fat:
When our blood sugar levels are high we use a certain amount for ready energy, but the rest we store as fat.

• 
It masks the taste of other food:
Sugar trumps all other tastes; it dulls them so you will think you only enjoy the sweet stuff. When you come off it, you will actually be able to taste food properly again!