Omega-3 | Heart attack waiting to happen

Another beautiful day in sunny Scotland! After Rehab, I headed out for couple of meetings. The girls are away for a night, “sightseeing” (shopping!) in Glasgow, so I packed my fishing rod… just in case!

As a complete novice, I headed to the only place I know for Mackerel. When I arrived, Inverbervie bay was packed. There were up to 6 people trying their luck in the tranquil North Sea.

Apparently the fish were “flying in” yesterday evening. Not so much this afternoon!

Another beautiful day in Aberdeenshire!

Lady luck was on my side!

I caught a fish. More than that… I caught fish! Very exciting!

I’m still eating a lot of fish. Mackerel is an oily fish, high in Omega-3. Good for me (and you)! So I bagged them up for tea.

Today’s Mackerel Haul!

There’s something satisfying about catching, gathering and / or growing your own food. I don’t do it very often, but I do think it makes you appreciate what’s on your plate, and think about where it comes from.

It’s fresh and healthier too, the absolute opposite of processed food.

Having bagged four fish (a single and a very exciting treble that was almost a quadruple, for a second or two at least… the one that got away!), it was way too much for me to eat on my own so I bagged and froze two (bait for later in the year!).

Having cleaned and prepared the fish (it’s OK, I made sure I cleaned up behind myself!), it was time to select a recipe. Unfortunately I couldn’t find anything that took my fancy so I decided to go free-form… Mackerel stuffed with crushed garlic, fresh ginger, lemon wedges and freshly ground pepper. Baked in a hot oven for about 20 mins. You might want to stuff yours with something else!

A little something I put together earlier.

I served mine with broccoli and green beans that had been carefully gathered from the Supermarket, but you can serve yours with whatever you like!

The fish was tasty (nothing mush to do with me!) and surprisingly filling (lots of good meat).

I definitely prefer catching to fishing!

So, although the pies were only a minor factor in my heart attack, they will be (or, in fact, the lack of them will be) a major feature in my recovery / future quest for health.

My Body Mass Index is high. At 29 “point something”, I am at the top end of “Overweight” (25-30), borderline Obese (>30). To get into the “Normal” range I would need to lose about 40lbs (2.5st). This seems like a huge amount of weight to me.

“Big bones” have always featured in our family… it appears that it’s generally accepted that inability to account for differing frame sizes is one of the flaws in the BMI (incidentally, muscularity for athletes is another one, but I’m not going to go there!).
http://www.nhs.uk/tools/pages/healthyweightcalculator.aspx

Having said that, losing weight really won’t do me any harm. As with everything, it needs to be one step at a time – no need to set a firm “final” target just yet.

There are other reasons to think more carefully about what I eat… the heart attack has increased my awareness of “good” (HDL – High-Density Lipoprotein) cholesterol and “bad” (LDL – Low-Density Lipoprotein) cholesterol, of my “five a day”, fibre, Omega-3, etc. etc. As a result, my diet has already changed dramatically… Sustainably? Only time will tell.

Fortunately I (we) like many of the “good” foods… salads, fruit and veg will feature more heavily going forwards… crudités have already become the snack of “choice” and oily fish is the new cold meat.

Equally as important are the foods to be avoided… Fish Supper, Onion Bahji, Butter, Roasted Nuts, Bombay Mix, Pâté, Cheesy Nachos, etc. etc. (“MMmmm!” – Homer Simpson)

Diet for diet’s sake won’t work for me. Creating a healthy heart is a good, noble incentive, but I may well need to set myself a different target, something more tangible, something that ties in both exercise and diet.

I’m starting from a fairly low level of base fitness so I’ll give it a few weeks, until I’m into Rehab Phase 3, before I decide what that target might be.