Live Well London

February is here, and we are proud to say that we are keeping to our New Year’s Resolutions at The Amazing Blog (well, for the most part anyway). Many resolutions revolve around health and fitness, aiming to make 2019 our year of maintaining a healthy body and mind. We were therefore excited to discover the new event, Live Well London, taking place from the 1st-3rd March in Old Billingsgate.

This event will encompass a full line-up of classes, workshops, inspirational talks, live kitchen demos and much more. From fitness to nutrition, beauty and well-being, Live Well London offers a number of contributors and influencers who will be giving well-founded advice, from both personal and professional experiences. This ensures that you will leave having gained wisdom from a range of experienced professionals. Understanding the need for a varied range of advice, organisers have secured speakers from all walks of the fitness and health industries. Matt Roberts, one of the UK’s leading personal trainers, and best-selling fitness authors, will be on hand to provide science-based advice, to help you live a more energised life. The founder of Mind and Meditation, Niraj Shah will imparting her knowledge for those looking for well being and inspiration. If that’s not enough, then skincare expert Liz Earle will be offering advice on how to really take care of your skin. These names are just the tip of the iceberg, with a vast amount of other speakers with equal amounts of wisdom to share. Click here to see what's on over the course of the three days.

The event will also include sessions from More YOGA and Barre Studio, unique and popular classes that prove exercise isn’t limited to running on a treadmill (although this is of course allowed if it’s your thing). The event focuses on four key areas: Well Moved, Well Balanced, Well Nourished and Well Restored. Well Balanced will help you to find new ways of moving, from addressing fitness crazes, to explaining the benefits of HIIT or Pilates. Well Balanced is centred around mental health, an ever prevalent and important topic. You can expect advice on mindfulness and meditation, as well as life-coaching and therapy. Well Nourished will focus on getting the glow from within, with tips and tricks on upping your intake of vitamins, and nutritional food and drinks. Finally, Well Restored will allow you to discover retreats, spas, wellness holidays, courses and more - because we’re all in need of a little escape sometimes.

We predict tickets will sell fast for this event, and as they are limited, we urge you to order sooner, rather than later. If you’ve fallen off the New Year bandwagon, or are simply looking for ways to ramp up your healthy routines, then we’re sure there will be something for you. Click here to purchase a ticket from £35.

Fitty London's Paleo Box

Stereotypical it may be, but we're making a conscious health effort this January. After an extended period of overindulging at The Amazing Blog, we're actively trying to get ourselves back on track to a healthier lifestyle. Through these trepidations, we discovered Fitty London, a brand bringing performance-enhancing products to our doorsteps, with boxes full of nutritional and affordable goodies. This is something we can certainly get behind!

Fitty London's premise is simple, to bring proper nutrition, with specific foods, drinks and workout products. We're not always hot on this, and when we do endeavour to make a better effort, we admit that it is often difficult to find products that are truly good for us. So many promise the world, but instead do the opposite, with a variety of hidden sugars and ingredients that are best avoided. We were therefore pleased to discover that Fitty London's products are all sourced by specialised nutritionists, allowing us to be secure in the knowledge that we're not being sold another hyped and overpromised subscription box.

We tried the newly launched Paleo Box, as we were keen to learn more about the paleo diet and lifestyle. Despite being trusted by millions of people, we were admittedly unaware of the vast amount of health benefits this lifestyle can promote. Although we may not be full paleo converts, we were pleased to try Fitty London's selection of products, our first steps in a healthier direction. This box contains eight specially selected brands and is worth around £60, making it an economical way of trying a multitude of paleo products. We enjoyed the Four Sigmatic Mushroom Coffee as a morning pick me up, providing a fruity drink that packs a superfood punch! For a mid-morning snack, we have been reaching for the Blue Dinosaur Paleo Bar. The Banana Bread flavour has a cinnamon kick, reminiscent of the past festivities, without the calorific indulgences! For those with a more savoury tooth, the Raw World Company Biltong has proven to be popular. We were intrigued by the crackling black pepper flavour, adding a bit of kick to the 100% grass-fed and dried beef.

Aside from snacking, this Paleo Box also contains the Bare Biology Lionheart Omega 3s supplement and the Symprove probiotic. The Lionheart capsules have helped to boost the appearance of our congested complexions, and the Symprove probiotic has helped to up our gut health, after let's face it, a month of rich foods. Finally, the box also contains a few products to help with your day to day cooking, the Happy Butter Ghee has become a firm cooking oil favourite, and the Cocofina Coconut Aminos has replaced the usual salty soy sauce in our stir-frys. For our New Year salads, we've also been loving the Willy's Apple Cider Vinegar - it's great as a dressing.

So there you have it, we're feeling much healthier and happier, and although we can't completely put it down to Fitty London's Paleo Box, it certainly makes a change to swap our sweet snacks with nutritional ones! To purchase a Paleo Box for £32, visit the Fitty London website here.

Ancient + Brave with their True Collagen and Cacao + Collagen

It's rare to find a brand with such a passion for inspiring healthy living. Ancient + Brave have captured our attention at The Amazing Blog, encouraging us to take control of our lifestyle choices, no matter the amount of time we have to do so. We're in no doubt that their ethos has had a similar impact on others - by combining naturopathy and cutting-edge innovation, the company's ambition of creating delicious and nutritious products certainly will inspire others to look into their lifestyle choices more deeply. We were also fascinated by the Brave Method, combining intermittent fasting and Ancient + Brave products, to create a simple lifestyle strategy that draws back to the eating patterns of our ancestors.

Conceptualising the Brave Method, founders Annelie Whitfield and Kate Prince used their combined knowledge of naturopathy and entrepreneurial techniques to redefine the fasting regime. No longer must we only drink water to avoid calorific beverages, as Ancient + Brave's products are suitable to consume during the fasting period, providing optimal fat burning, while ensuring that we ourselves, do not burn out. Annelie's story is particularly interesting, as a former stunt woman, who suffered a life-threating injury, she began her nature quest after receiving healing treatment from bone mending monks in Sri Lanka. She chose to develop her newfound knowledge, by spending five years in a back-to-nature barefoot existence, studying indigenous medicine in Costa Rica. It is here that she unearthed the medicinal benefits of coffee and cacao - hence the introductions into her product lines. Upon her return, she teamed up with Kate Prince, who used her entrepreneurial nouse to help innovate a new lifestyle brand, to fuel health and performance simultaneously.

As you can imagine, we were excited to try their products, especially those of us who were collagen novices. The True Collagen powder proved to be a simple way of easing us into the collagen world, a product packed with 100% hydrolysed grass-fed bovine collagen (a welcome addition in comparison with many other products), and high in crucial nutrients to replace proteins. Like all of the Ancient + Brave products, True Collagen is also suitable for those following a paleo diet. True Collagen is both odourless and tasteless, meaning that we can boost our level of amino acids by drinking it on its own, or within a beverage of our choice. Ancient + Brave recommend using 2-4 teaspoons for a potent amount of collagen and suggest adding it to a smoothie of your choice.

Secondly, we tried their Cacao+ Collagen product, a delicious hot chocolate alternative that is antioxidant rich thanks to the use of organic Peruvian cacao. Other ingredients include cocoa, grass-fed bovine collagen, beetroot, cinnamon, carob, Siberian ginseng and baobab (all of which are organic), and a touch of pink Himalayan salt. Together, these ingredients act as a potent delivery system of collagen, that still tastes delicious. In one serving, you can expect 2000mg of nourishing True Collagen for a fat burning and energising hot drink. We recommend mixing it with hot plant-based milk, or it can be made using hot water too. What more could we ask for on a cold Autumn morning?

If you too would like to give collagen a go, purchase Ancient + Brave’s True Collagen 200g for £27 here and the Cacao + Collagen 250g for £22 here.