Aaaah Detox!

It's a relief, isn't it, when New Year arrives - the relatives gone, the presents given, the food eaten, the drink drunk - and the quietness, the drabness, the raininess of January spreads itself out. Thougts of detox bring one fellow blogger to mind. Several friends, when I told them I had started a blog, shuddered and said "oh, please, not like Gwynnie's?" Well, only inasmuch as I am the shorter, plumper, rock-star husband-less twin of Gwynn ;-)

Truth be told, I am a moderate fan of La Paltrow and I will certainly be incorporating her Asian Chicken Lunchbox Salad into my post-holiday diet [scallions are salad onions, by the way, and I found that the quantity of cabbage was disproportionately greater than the other ingredients]. It will have to be the diet of the century to make me fit for the outfit suggestions on her website, Goop, but I still think it's a site worth checking out because we can all dream...

...unfortunately this Christmas most of my dreams came in the form of Brie, a kilo of ripening brie to be precise, dreams which recalled home-made chutney and bacon and just one more glass of burgundy...

So it will be a punishing penance to be paid this year. Serious measures are required.

Green tea starts the morning, with a few goji berries thrown in.

I have been taking Perfectil Plus Nails for about six months now, and have noticed my nails are stronger, so I gulp a couple of these down. 

Since my mid-teens, I have taken Oil of Evening Primrose for the last two weeks of my cycle to help with period pain and it has been a lifesaver. For the rest of the month, I take a fish oil supplement: don't ask me why, but the gelatin free versions are the least likely to leave you with fishy aftertaste.

Detox is a great time to take a digestive supplement and feed your gut some healthy bacteria. Bio-Kult is the brand of choice amongst the colonic cognoscenti.

Breakfast is usually granola or porridge (a commercial microwave variety - sorry Gwyneth, but in the real world we eat and run), though I throw on some linseeds which come with all manner of omega-related benefits and cleanse the digestive tract.

In a perfect world, you would grind the linseeds each morning or have each day's portion soaking overnight (in your Bircher muesli). But then, in a perfect world, I wouldn't have eaten all that brie.

Finally, uncontroversially, blueberries on the top, to fight the good fight against free radicals.

Ready to face the day, be slimmer, taller, and marry rock-stars.

Ok, I know the taller bit isn't going to happen!