Please welcome Diana to Frame, our new marketing intern! The Danish that has stopped eating danishes and now wants to get fit!

If I were to categorise myself within the fitness domain, I would place myself in the “turbulent wave gym-goer” box. The one that might binge over the weekend, then books a trillion classes Monday morning when the guilt trips in. I have probably had a gym membership since my twenties, bouncing from Spinning to Zumba to Pilates; an indecisive soul some might say.

But today I tried a class that has laid my soul to rest! I am very new to Frame, so when I tried Frame Work today I did not expect to take part in a class that embodies all my schizophrenic personalities into one!

The class started off with a fusion of soft ballet, stretch and conditioning. I felt like a swan, I might have looked more like a flamingo, but I felt like this sophisticated, slender being that floated into pliés and swayed into yoga-like positions. Bear in mind, this is my first time doing any ballet-like moves.

Next thing you know, we were on the floor swinging our hips, while doing the “John Travolta”! This might sound like a typicalsaturday night, but this was intense! And I’m one of those people that needs to feel the burn to feel perfectly satisfied with my experience. And I was! There was a bit of booty shaking, yoga positions with a twist, and strengthening exercises that I didn’t even know I was capable of. I was doing the one leg dog jumping down to the one legged plank, thrusting my body for the first time in a burpee routine, rolling my back up to a squat and tip toeing like a real ballerina. However, what I noticed that was so different to any other class I have tried, is the amount of stretching we did. I feel happy to have done all those invigorating moves, knowing I will most probably be able to walk tomorrow! It’s amazing!

What are you wearing? 

Just about anytime I’m not at work I’m wearing a pair of stretchy workout leggings, a sweatshirt, trainers and my favourite ball cap (your typical American, I know, I know), but I do have to go to work, so after class this morning I threw on the summeriest dress I own (vintage with a ridiculous Laura Ashley-meets-Morocco pattern) to make sure the sun would stay a while.

What did you have for lunch?

I’m lucky enough to work a stone’s throw from Gail’s on Bedford Square. I’m a sucker for their salads. Today it was a delicious something involving quinoa, aubergine and spinach. It’s healthy, but kinda smooshy, so it makes you feel a little less like you’re being overly self-righteous about your 1 o’clock food decisions.

What does this award mean to you, and what do you plan on doing with the title? (push for world peace perhaps?)

I gotta say, I’m so honoured! For someone who was, for quite some time, so over exercise, I’m chuffed. I’m celebrating by working late (alas, deadlines) while washing a handful of pistachios (dinner, whoops) down with a beer.

What class are you heading to?

This morning I went to Holly’s Beginner Reformer class, and beware – she throws in some of her signature Method tricks, only this time with added weight! The weather’s been so nice, I’ll go for a run tomorrow so that I’m ready for Rob’s Frame Camp!

Tell us something interesting about yourself:

I never learned to properly ride a bike.

Favourite place in London….

On a crazy Saturday, it’s always the quiet of Golden Square paired with Nordic Bakery’s exquisitely made (exquisite because it’s so darn simple) coffee. Lately, though, I’ve been going for walks in Nunhead Cemetery (not spooky, just so cool) to dog-watch, explore and take in an all-around magnificent view into London from the south.

Any tips for a pre/post workout snack?

You know that episode of Portlandia about putting birds on everything? I tend to throw a banana in anything. My favourite post-workout snack is an iced coffee (I know, so bad!) alongside a banana smooshed into a glob of coconut yoghurt. Om nom nom.

Any tips for getting from a class to the bar with minimum effort?

Go to a class that doesn’t require trainers so you don’t have to tote those along later! When the sun’s out, I’m less likely to go to a bar and more interested in camping out on the nearest green spot. I’ve found there are plus sides to such a lazy strategy: you can bronze yourself and hang out in your gym clothes (if you so choose), AND gym bags are the ideal size for bootleg g&t ingredients!

If you could dance/squat/jump/downward dog to any song in the whole world, what would it be?

I’m so glad you asked! I love Hall and Oates. Probably in a half-ironic way, but honestly who writes songs like Maneater?!  At my two-mile mark or when I don’t think I can squish the pilates ball any harder, I just picture the keyboard cat cameo, which makes me laugh (hello ab workout!) and then – as Holly says – the pain goes away.

Where is your favourite bar nearby to celebrate getting through another Frame class?

That’s a toughy, but I love Street Kitchen – it’s a great meeting spot, a hop, skip and jump from Frame and makes juicy-messy burgers that require eight napkins. In other words, it’s the bee’s knees. And the local beer there is tops.

Who’s your favourite Instructor at Frame? What is it about them that gets you going?

You can’t tell already? Holly’s great! She’s such an awesome mix of funny and focused, which is exactly what I need when I’m dripping with sweat, and it’s Friday. She doesn’t just get you to work hard; she gets you to want to work hard. I also swear by Naomi’s FrameBarre classes. I have never sweated so much (then again, I’m always the sweaty girl). Okay, one more – Jeannine, who taught the bikini body workshop, is amazing. Anyone who can get me to do squats for two hours AND smile must specialise in some kind of black magic.

You look incredibly fabulous and successful… What is it you do with your life?

HA! That’s a funny joke, but thank you for being nice! I’m a writer and editor – I help publishers untangle letters and words in architecture and design books. I’m also a lecturer at LCC, where I try to get 20-year-olds jazzed about Foucault. And occasionally I channel Peggy Olson for the odd copywriting job. In other news, I’ve recently quit my 26-year habit of nail-biting. Tina’s shellac manicures have helped with the fabulous part.

This is your time…Any self-promotion you want to hit us with?!

My writing and longish essays on trousers and TV are scattered around the internet, but some faves can be found on my personal website (which needs significant updating!) – www.sarahhandelman.com. There you’ll also find a couple of zines I publish – one on food and one on sexual health and body-image issues.

Cupcakes are the best. They are the perfect sized treat!

Commercially made cupcakes are usually laden with sugar and all sorts of preservatives to keep them on the shelves. These cupcakes wont last long as long but I wouldn’t say the only reason would be the lack of preservatives..

Whenever I make anything chocolatey I use raw cocoa powder. You can buy this at many health food stores or order it online. Raw cocoa is the highest whole food source of magnesium, which also happens to be the most deficient mineral in the diet. Magnesium is incredible it….

• Relaxes muscles.
• Improves peristalsis in the bowels. (gets things flowing)
• Relaxes the heart and cardiovascular system.

The antioxidants in the cocoa have been clinically proven to dissolve plaque built up in the arteries which helps in reversing heart disease and causes naturally lower blood pressure!

Ingredients

(please use organic/local/sustainable produce where possible) – makes 10-12 cupcakes. 

4 eggs

5 TBSP of honey

75 g of coconut oil

250 g of hazelnuts

3 TBSP of whole milk yogurt

1 teaspoon of baking powder

30g of raw cocoa

A pinch of celtic sea salt

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 180ºC.

2. In a food processor blend the eggs, honey, coconut oil and yogurt. Place this into a bowl and leave to the side.

3. Clean the food processor and grind 200g of the hazelnuts (leave the other 50g to the side) until they form into a flour. Add in the baking powder, salt and raw cocoa and mix together. Poor the bowl of wet mixture into the dry mixture and blend together.

4. Grease (with coconut oil) cupcake tins or line up cupcake holders on a baking tray and place the mixture into each one, then pop them in the oven. This recipe makes 10-12 cupcakes.

5. Bake for 12-15 minutes.

6. While the cupcakes are baking crush the leftover hazelnuts into small pieces.

7. When the cupcakes are done sprinkle the hazelnuts on top.

8. Happy Cooking!!

Tip: Serve with some fresh cream or yogurt. 

Madeleine is a qualified nutritional health coach from the Institute of Integrative Nutrition, creative chef, vociferous blogger, fledgling presenter and self-professed yoga enthusiast. She is committed to helping her clients enliven the hottest, healthiest, happiest versions of themselves. Through her website and consultations, Madeleine helps reeducate her clients in the appreciation and effects of eating wholesome, organic produce. She helps them to work towards better relationships with their bodies, boosts confidence, injects energy and sculpts beautiful silhouettes.

Visit Madeleine’s her website www.madeleineshaw.com
Follow Madeleine on Twitter @madeleine_shaw_

Suncream; check, passport; check, bikini; check, BIKINI BODY..aaaah! It happens to us all, we book our Summer holiday, buy our Summer wardrobe, book our festival tickets then the hot days get us carried away with beers and BBQ’s and generally forgetting that we want to get noticed on the beach for all the right reasons! Thankfully FRAME are here with the ultimate EMERGENCY BOOTCAMP… if you only have a week to get yourself ready for the beach then this is for you. 4 x FRAME CAMP classes for £40 which is a massive 20% discount!

FRAME CAMP is one of our most popular Signature Classes. This one is for those of you who want to sweat and love the feel of adrenaline pumping through your body. Unlike the other Frame Signature classes, this one is HIGH IMPACT and just 30 minutes. Trust us, that’s all you’re going to need before you feel it!

Frame Camp is a whole body workout, based on interval training methods, which unlike the other Frame Signature classes, really targets the larger muscle groups.

The class is split into 2 sections; A cardio section consisting of sprint and hill intervals on the treadmill, and a conditioning section using a mix of dumb bells, the vibe machine (at Frame Shoreditch) and your own body weight.

Psychologically, the class will result in a huge rush of adrenaline and you will leave feeling physically tired, but with a massive exercise high and reduced tension and anxiety due to the endorphins that will be released. With interval training, endorphin production is ramped to the max which makes the ‘post-exercise high’ even better than from other forms of exercise.

So there you have it Framers, all you need to get your body ready for the beach!

This article loosely follows on from my previous article and is once again looking at your relationship with food and food mentality.

When I deal with issues around food I think about it from lots of angles. One of the ways of looking at the issue is identifying if it’s being driven by everyday meal habits or if it is a deep-seated issue relating to something else. I looked at how I deal with deep-seated issues in the last article, so this time around I will explain about what I mean by everyday food habits and how they can impact on your relationship with food.

A lot of clients have issues with binge eating. I tend to find that these people are perfectionists and as part of this they often see things in black or white. They refer to ‘good foods’ and ‘bad foods’ and talk about ‘good days’ and ‘bad days’. Food weights heavily on their mind and even though they often skip meals they think about food an inordinate amount of the day. They are incredibly hard on themselves and normally deal with their binge eating by deciding to be stricter and more determined than ever.

In my experience, binge eating most often happens in the evening time. They are ‘good’ during the day, normally eating very small amounts of food, having a salad or getting by on just a soup. There is a tendency to skip meals and often breakfast or lunch is missed (or both). On the rare occasion that I have someone who binge eats in the morning, the pattern is the same but the order of their meals is reversed. They will have a small dinner or none at all, possibly choosing to skip lunch as well.

How this relates to everyday eating habits is structure. Binge eating normally happens after a period of food abstinence. The person who binges in the evening has gone all day with barely eating anything. They have spent all day thinking about food, congratulating themselves on being strong-willed but secretly wishing they could sit down to their favourite forbidden treat.

Without fail I make my worst food choices when I go a long time without eating. When I am hungry, self-control takes a back seat and I want something that is packed with flavour and that I barely have to chew because I am so hungry. For me this would be something like pizza, or burger and chips.

And this is what I often see happening with binge eaters. In all my years I have never come across a binge eater who eat 6 or 7 meals a day, it just doesn’t happen. Hunger needs to build to a certain level before the desire to binge kicks in. They have gone for such a long time with no food (or minimal food) that the urge becomes too much. Rather than breaking the fast with something sensible, they want food that is a taste overload.

In this case, the best place to start is meal structure. I will get them to eat every 3 hours starting as soon as they wake up. Even if they aren’t that hungry I want them to eat at least something. Often they aren’t very good with registering hunger as they are used to waiting such a long time; unless they are feeling faint and about to collapse they don’t think they are hungry. By instilling structure they get back in tune with the feedback their body is giving them.

When people implement this kind of structure the binge eating normally goes away. Often they had been telling themselves they were doing it for some negative reasons (my Mum doesn’t love me, I am weak willed, it runs in the family) when this was just a story they created to explain their behaviour. Really it was just about how they were structuring things.

Altering meal frequency isn’t always the final answer and for some people they still get problems even with regular food (although it does help). What I tend to find in these cases, are a consistent pattern of behaviour that leads to the binge even when it feels random, unconscious or out of their control.

The trigger can vary but it is normally something that stirs up some negative emotions. This could even be a positive event that gets switched in their head to something upsetting. For example they go around to a friends house to see their new baby. They are super happy for them and love seeing their new tot. Unfortunately they start focusing on their own life. Maybe they are single and dwell on this, or they are in a relationship and it is not going so well, or they are in a happy relationship but they haven’t been able to conceive. Whatever it is, it triggers an emotional response.

It is at this point that the consistent behaviour kicks in. They start to say certain things to themselves. They say them in a certain tone of voice. They ask themselves questions and fill them with negative answers. They change their body to bring these feelings on stronger; like lowering their head, altering their breathing, and altering their walking gait. There are certain things that they know will pull them down into the state even more and they focus on them. Before you know it, they’re heading towards their favourite binge food and nothing can stop them.

In situations like this, we need to give some conscious control back to the person and I like to do this with a pattern interrupt. I get the client to describe the process of what happens leading up to the binge eating. Most of the time they start out describing it as out of control and end up realising there’s a logical set of steps they take.

Now it is one thing to see this when sitting in a room chatting with me and another to notice it while it’s going on. It is not as simple as just telling them to stop doing it; they’ve tried that before. Instead I want to pull them out of the experience by interrupting the pattern.

I tell them that I am happy for them to binge but when they feel themselves ‘in the zone’ and heading in that direction, I want them to stop for a second and write a list of 5 things that they are grateful for. Or write a list of 5 things that they will accomplish by having the binge. Really think about the responses, make the best list they can. Once they have written it down, they can get right back on track and have a binge.

Writing the list means the binge doesn’t normally happen. They have had to stop and do something else that is not part of the normal pattern. The couple of minutes they have spent writing the list changes the focus; it pulls them out of state and stops it in its tracks.

Or I get them to change the voice in their head. There is normally a particular tone that they use that really helps bring on the experience. I ask them to make the voice in their head sound different. Do their best impersonation of a Glaswegian or Caribbean accent. Make the voice sound like Daffy Duck or Homer Simpson. If they want to continue saying the usual stuff then go for it, but it has to be in a different voice and they have to totally nail the accent. I want them to really think about how they would pronounce the words.

Once again this helps to pull the person out of the state they are currently in. They start to realise what is going on and change the direction things are heading.

Obviously these are just a couple of examples and depending on the person and the situation I will pick whatever I think is going to be most useful. I am focusing on the structure of how the problem gets started and interrupting it before it goes any further.

Next week I will be doing a workshop at Frame looking at body image, diet mentality and your relationship with food. How you structure your food habits and your pattern of behaviour can be much more important than what you actually eat. If you aren’t totally happy with your relationship with food then I highly recommend coming along.

Each month Chris will run a 2-hour Nutrition Workshop at both Queens Park and Shoreditch. Workshops are £25. This month is NUTRITION  FOR Body Image, Diet Mentality and Your Relationship With Food

Tuesday 18th June 7-9pm Queens Park /  Saturday 22nd June 1.30-3.30pm Shoreditch

Chris Sandel is our resident nutritionist and runs the company 7 Health. For daily health tips and articles you can follow his Facebook page.  If you have any questions or comments about the blog piece or want to get in contact about setting up a consult you can email him on chris@seven-health.com.

To read other articles written by Chris Sandel PLEASE CLICK HERE

We popped in to see our friends at the Painted Lady to learn all about the best Summer treatments to get you looking fabulous in a flash! Tina aka Nails at the Painted Lady showed us the hot new colours from Shellac, with Pink Bikini, Lilac Longing and Tropics to chose from you’ll be holiday ready in no time. Shellac is perfect for holidays as the super strong polish stays looking good for two weeks! Shellac is painted on like normal but dries instantly under UV light meaning you won’t mess it up fishing your lipstick out your bag when you leave the salon. Tina is offering Framers a fabulous 20% off all nail treatments (simply quote FRAME when booking) Tina will be at Frame Shoreditch this Sunday 16th 11-2 to give you a file & polish ABSOLUTELY FREE! If you can’t make it this week don’t worry as Tina will be making an appearance once a month, just keep an eye on the blog and our Facebook and Twitter for updates.

As if that wasn’t enough super Summer discounts Framers, the lovely Izumi will be offering 15% off haircuts at the Painted Lady for the month of June! Now you really will be looking hot from head to toe.

Follow Nails at The Painted Lady on Twitter @shoreditchnails
Or on Facebook