Netflix, Anyone?

Ah, Friday… The start of the weekend. Any plans? In the UK, it’s getting colder and wetter—perfect weather to curl up with a mug of tea, a slice of cheesecake and a bit of Netflix viewing. I’m new to Netflix. So far I’ve only used it to watch Matt Smith’s Doctor Who and a David Tennant film that’s not available in the US.

Today, I’m sharing some amazing, diverse series that I love watching. This list started off much bigger, until I realised how underrepresented British TV is on US Netflix. (Such a same, we have loads of US series.) I hope you enjoy checking out this selection. 

1.       Black Mirror: very dark British humour set in the near future. Individual stories, so if you don’t like one, you might love the next.

Read more on IMDb

2.       Derek: quite controversial when it first aired because of the apparent learning difficulties of the central character. But it’s actually a brilliant, funny, poignant comedy series, filmed as a mock documentary.

Read more on IMDb

3.       Merlin: a brilliant family-friendly drama reimagining of the King Arthur stories. The first series started off light and humorous, but it gets a lot darker as you work through it.

Read more on IMDb

Have you watched any of these already? What did you think?




Besides being a pro at getting healthy, Annalisa Crawford is a multi-published author of literary fiction and dark, psychological suspense. She lives near the beach in Cornwall, UK with her musician husband, her two boys, and some furry critters. Check out Annalisa's work HERE.



 
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Thanks for stopping by Annalisa! I always find it fun to weed out the differences in our very similar cultures. 

I never realized Brits used scales over cups when cooking- I suppose that saves on dirty dishes. 

I also get a kick out of digestive crackers from her mum's cheesecake recipe. I imagine a wafer made by Pepto Bismol. Annalisa promises if she ever flies to the States, she'll bring me some. She also assures me a cracker is a cookie. As we all know, I'm all about the cookies, so I'm eagerly awaiting Annalisa's visit. 

And I certainly didn't know they have access to so many awesome shows that we can't get. It's like they have their very own, secret Netflix. What's up with that?

Annalisa’s Mum’s Cheesecake

I love desserts. We don’t have them every day, but my evening meal always feels a bit lost without one. So today I’m going to share my mum’s recipe with you. It’s a perfect dessert to make with kids, because it requires a lot of mashing, smashing and mixing, and no cooking.

Serves 8-12 and has approx. 280 calories for a one-eighth slice.

Ingredients:  *American equivalent below*

170g digestive biscuits (or, apparently, graham crackers/animal crackers)

85g butter (I think you might need more if using graham crackers)

400g reduced/low fat cream cheese

285g non-fat Greek yoghurt

28g sugar

200g strawberries/raspberries/blueberries (for the authentic Annalisa’s mum’s version, use tinned black cherry pie filling - it was the 80s, after all)

Method

1.       Mash up the digestive biscuits/graham crackers into crumbs

2.       Heat the butter and mix into the crushed biscuits

3.       Put the mixture into a baking tin—preferably a 10” round tin (greased and prepared the usual way)

4.       Blend the cream cheese, yoghurt and sugar together and pour over the biscuit base

5.       Mash/slice/arrange nicely the fruit of your choosing and smooth over the top

6.       Refrigerate for at least a couple of hours (preferably overnight for the cheesecake to set fully).

7.       Lick out the bowl J (Why do recipes omit this very important step, I wonder?)

Enjoy! 

Oh, and if you fancy a laugh, pop over to my blog today to read the behind-the-scenes exclusive on the whole cheesecake fiasco…

*Let's pause a moment and Americanize that recipe:
(Now, let me just say- I did this ciphering myself, and as a writer, I've never been accused of being good at math. If these numbers seem insane, they most likely are. Use conversion at your own risk!)

170 grams of digestive biscuits (or graham crackers/animal crackers) = 2 Cups 
85 grams of butter = 1/3-1/2 Cup
400 grams cream cheese = 2 cups 
285 grams of yoghurt (or yogurt) = 1 Cup
28 grams sugar = 2 tbs. 
200 grams of fruit = enough fruit to cover the top...come on, wing it!

Thanks for stopping by Annalisa!




Besides being a pro at getting healthy, Annalisa Crawford is a multi-published author of literary fiction and dark, psychological suspense. She lives near the beach in Cornwall, UK with her musician husband, her two boys, and some furry critters. Check out Annalisa's work HERE.

Need Better Sleep?

While Tara is busy launching her newest book, Simulation, and I'm busy trying to catch up on the laundry pile, we asked the marvelous Annalisa Crawford to do our work visit! Annalisa is a trainer and physical fitness buff from the United Kingdom. To get her here, all we had to do was float a trail of biscuits (AKA cookies) across the Atlantic. 

Welcome Annalisa!!

How to get a good night’s sleep  by Annalisa Crawford

Hey, it’s Monday. Are you up and raring to go? Or feeling a bit groggy, like you didn’t get quite enough sleep? Did you lie there last night, tossing and turning, getting more and more frustrated? Did you watch the sun rise and realise your quest for sleep was in vain yet again?

Never fear, I’ve got a few tips that might help if you have the odd few days of sleeplessness.

1.       Massage your feet. Find a really thick, aromatic foot balm and spend a few minutes rubbing it in - run your thumbs directly up the middle of your foot, make deep circles just beneath the balls and into the arches, sweep your fingers along your toes and pull. As an added benefit, your feet will be beautifully soft in the morning!

2.       Keep a notebook beside your bed and write your thoughts down. Write down any worries, important to-dos, the name of that actor from that film you were talking about and just remembered. Get it all down, and your mind will be freed up.

3.       Just lie there. Get comfortable—perhaps in a position you wouldn’t normally sleep in—and just enjoy the fact that you are resting and you don’t have a hundred different tasks to complete. Just rest. Allow your mind to wander into daydream territory:

a.       What would you do with a million dollars?

b.       What award are you up on stage receiving?

c.       Imagine you’re lying on a beach, in a mountain cabin, in Paris or Milan or Venice, rather than in your own bed.

4.       Breathe. Properly. A lot of people don’t—we’re shallow-breathers (using only 50% of our lungs) or we manage to bypass our lungs and fill our stomachs with air instead!

a.       First, picture your lungs like the branches of a tree. The trunk (your trachea), the branches, the twigs, the buds.

b.       Breathe in. Focus on getting your breath as far up the tree as possible. When you’ve breathed in a much as you can, pause for a second, then breathe in a little more. Let the breath out very slowly. It takes practise to get enough air to reach the very tips of the ‘branches’, but—hey!—you can’t sleep, you’ve got the time.

c.       Make sure you aren’t breathing into your stomach. If you can see your stomach rising, then you need more focus.

Do you have any tried-and-tested methods? I’d love to hear from you.

Besides being a pro at getting healthy, Annalisa Crawford is a multi-published author of literary fiction and dark, psychological suspense. She lives near the beach in Cornwall, UK with her musician husband, her two boys, and some furry critters. Check out Annalisa's work HERE.