Nuts About Nutella....

Hands up who likes, no, loves Nutella....

Me, me me, me!  When I am in the shopping isles, I often pop a jar or two of the hazelnut spread in the trolly. I happily give it to my children (in moderation and who are happy, healthy, alert and not over weight )and was fortunate enough to get an invite to go along to a delicious Nutella Breakfast, with a chance to talk to top experts on how to encourage our children to eat in the morning, and get a good start to the day. Also the Television chef Alan Coxon would be there amongst others to show us how to create some delicious recipes, and my lovely children were invited too, and whilst I would be learning new and exciting things about nutella, they would be entertained with a mix of magic, juggling, animal balloon making, entertaining and fun nutella activities and much more besides. All this to be taken place at the fun adventure land, that is known as Legoland. Hmm let me check my diary....

How could I say no, so I kindly accepted the invitation and very much looked forward to the exciting event. The day before the nutella breakfast, which also happened to be my birthday, a lovely and pretty looking hamper arrived, Ohooo what lovely has the husband got me I thought. Well imagine my delight when the PR company that were organising the event sent me this mouth watering hamper from Hobbs House Bakery

I love posh, healthy, tasty bread, I love nutella, could a birthday girl be any happier....

A true feast for my eyes....

The breads were delicious, extra tasty with the nutella on top ;0)  As we were staying with a lovely friend that night who doesn't live far from legoland, we piled some of the breads and nutella in the car to entertain our stomachs should they get hungry on the way.

I thought you may like a little peek at my sleepover room in my friends beautiful home....

After a lovely birthday evening and sleepover, we made our way to Legoland early in the morning. The traffic queues were quite something heading into legoland, so I was a couple of minutes late, dropped the children ( and husband) off with the wonderful entertainers and made my way upstairs, walked in, looking a little sparkly and with everyone already there. My eyes were drawn to pile of yummy looking breakfast delights in the middle of the table. Introductions were being made and I sat down, next to the very charming Mauro De Felip who is the U.K.'s marketing director for Ferrero, ( loved his trendy orange swatch) and had not long got my breath when everyone turned to me for me to say my hello's, and a little about myself. It always makes me chuckle a little when I introduce myself as Mary Poppins, it was a blogging event and was lovely to meet some more lovely bloggers. I explained that I am a lover of Nutella, infact we all are as a family, maybe too much, but being the ickle size I am can get away with eating more than I probably should, but that I would love to learn a little more about it, the nutritional aspect, and how to conjure up some super recipes, that had more ingredients, other that one jar of nutella and one silver spoon ;0)  

We were than introduced to a very knowledgeable and in my opinion stylish lady, Professor Karen Pine who shared with us some very informative facts about the psychology of food, and how children's behaviours/habits around food can often have us, as mother's and father's, pulling our hair out, but that these issues can be resolved. One of her theories is around the letters, and word E  A and T 

Here are Karen’s ideas:

E is for example.... always set a good example and have good eating habits ( having a sweet tooth, this is one of my hardest ) How can I refuse my children a bag of sweeties when they see me scoffing them by the bucket load

A is for attention – do your best to try not to focus on your children's eating habits, or food related  behaviours ( my son was recently referred to speech therapy for a slight stammer, as soon as I and the family stopped focusing on it, it went, and I think that says something in itself )

T is for try - try, try again, and then try some more with introducing good healthy habits and food related behaviors.( My two are generally good eaters but my 8 year old has become a little of a fussy eater, and introducing new tastes is sometimes a battle, but I now know to keep at it and keep on trying....)

I really enjoyed my one to one chat with Karen afterwards (photograph above courtesy of Karen Pine) and learnt some very interesting things, especially about shopping, my favourite past time, more about that on another post.
Then it was Sian, who is a nutritionist's turn to talk, and who taught me some very interesting nutritional advice, and then it was a question and answer session where we all had lots of questions, refusal of milk, picky eaters, times to eat, choices of breakfast foods being many of them. Sian explained how breakfast really is the most important meal of the day, which I knew and agree with. She also told us that one portion of Nutella, which is 2 teaspoons ( 2 teaspoons is never enough for me)  but has less fat and sugar than jam, another of our family loves. A 15g portion of nutella combined with other breakfast components such as a slice of wholegrain toast, a bowl of unsweetened cereal with milk, a glass of fruit juice can be a good option at breakfast time (375 calories, 19% GDA) You many not know that nutella is a hazelnut spread and releases its energy slowly. It is a low glycaemic index (GI) food. In fact, every 15g portion contains 2 whole hazelnuts, some skimmed milk and a dash of cocoa. When using nutella the hazelnut spread there is no need to use butter or an alternative fat spread, and low glycaemic index (GI) breakfasts (because they release energy slowly) can help maintain energy levels and reduce the need for snacking later on. So after our nutella breakfast it was then over to Television chef Alan Coxon to entertain us with some exciting recipes, and boy did he do just that.

We had fun donning our aprons, of course took me 10 minutes to get my bow just right ;0)

 Alan demonstrated some inspiring recipes using Nutella and I especially liked the idea of using a spoonful of it in smoothies, and the banana and nutella wraps looked delicious. Then it was our turn to have a go and we were put in little teams and it was then I really needed the toilet, and when a lady has to go, a lady has to go, so my team got on with making up something lovely and original, we only had 7 minutes and the toilet was good 2 minute walk, so I knew I had to be quick. Quick I was, and got back to see my team had come up with some lovely ideas, and had enough time to make up my recipe idea for the group, a wonderful strawberry, blueberry and nutella skewer.

 Isn't the presentation wonderful ;0) We were given some super recipe ideas to come away with and shall definately be having a go at them, please do share with me any lovely things you have made with my favourite hazelnut based spread. Also the  Nutella Website is re launching on the 30th August, so keep your eyes peeled for some wonderful and new ideas nutella shall be bringing us.

So after all that fun and frivolity, we were treated to a fun day at legoland, and along with the q-bot, definitely helped on our queuing time, and a super day was had by all.

Please Note: I have not been offered Nutella for life for all the lovely mentions of Nutella in this post, ( I do genuinely love it ) but a girl has got to give it a go, so if you are reading  Mr/Mrs.Nutella, you know where I am ;0)

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