That's what she said

Get a load of this zucchini!

It was hiding in the bottom of the CSA box that Daniel picked up yesterday.

To give you some perspective.  This zucchini is large enough to be used to alleviate ITBS symptoms

or for assistance when practicing half moon pose.

I'm thinking I'm going to bring in zucchini bread to the office as a treat on my birthday.

We also got a monster tomato this week.  It's like three tomatoes in one!

That plus the peppers, onions and garlic that came in the box mean homemade salsa on taco salad for dinner tonight.

I'm really enjoying getting the CSA box.  Not only do we get all the benefits of having a garden with none of the hard work, the contents is a surprise until the day we pick it up so every other Wednesday is like Vegetable Christmas.

Anybody have any good zucchini recipes?

Easy as pie

We got the first bag of grape tomatoes from our CSA last week.  Unlike the beets- which neither of us like- or the rest of the veggies- which both of us like- tomatoes are 100% my responsibility.  And I don't really like raw tomatoes.  A bit of internet searching came up with a zillion recipes for a tomato tart/pie, so I threw one together with ingredients we happened to have around, sliced it into quarters, and now I have lunches for a week.

Easy tomato pie-  

Ingredients:

• One refrigerated pie crust (I used Pillsbury from Target)
• Tomatoes- any kind you want- sliced so they'll lay relatively flat on the crust (I used the lovely orange ones shown above)
• Cheese- something melty (I used Gorgonzola because we had quite a bit left over from a previous dinner)
• Seasoning- Whatever you think would taste good (I didn't use any because Gorgonzola has a lot of flavor on its own)

Directions:

• Preheat oven to 400ish.
• Place pie crust in a pie pan or a round cake pan.  Bake for about 10 minutes while you cut up the tomatoes.  The ingredients cook way faster than the crust, so it's good to give it a head start.
• Remove pie from oven and layer in cheese and tomatoes.
• Put the pie back into the oven and bake until the crust is brown and the cheese is melty.
• Devour or allow to cool and slice into lunch-sized pieces and store in Tupperware for later

I had a slice for lunch yesterday and thought it was really tasty for the tiny amount of work involved.  Can't say I'll be sad to eat this 3 more times.

What's your favorite quick and easy thing to throw together for lunch?

And with that, it's time to fly.  115lb bench press- you are mine!

Beets are Digusting

I'm a big girl.  I like most vegetables.  So when I got some beets in my CSA box this week, I wanted to try to like them.

Aren't they cute?  It's like a little, spiky-haired beet family.

I even researched the proper way to cook them- wrap in aluminum foil and roast for 60-90 minutes at 400 degrees.  After they cool, the skin an hair can be pulled off easily with a paper towel.

The good news is that the process worked.  Beets = cooked and ready to go.

The bad news is that the peeling process left me with a cookie sheet full of carnage.

Who's up for some car accident delite?

The other thing is that beets STINK.  Ew.  I had planned to make a salad with the beets and take it to a potluck we went to last night, but I just couldn't inflict these stinky, rubbery things on people in their natural form.  Time for plan B.

Daniel's mom suggested beet brownies, which had two points in their favor.  1. They would use up the beets and 2. They involve chocolate.  After doing a bit of internet searching, I found this recipe, which looked like it would do the job.  Not too many recipes out there for beet brownies.  Imagine that?

So the nasty beets went for a ride in the food processor and were dumped in the blender with sugar and eggs.

  
Then comes the secret ingredient: Jello pudding mix.

The only way this desert could get more Midwestern is if it somehow involved Ritz Crackers.

No one will ever know...

Now no one will really ever know...

So what was the verdict?  They were kind of cakey and floppy compared to real brownies.  I think that had to do with the fact that the recipe didn't use any oil.  A few people ate them at the potluck but we took most of the leftovers down the the high school youth group meeting, where they were devoured in seconds by a pack of wild 10th graders.  I saved two big pieces for us to sample later.  I don't think Daniel ate his yet because he had a watermelon, which trumps all other deserts for him.  I thought they were okay.  They tasted mostly like chocolate, although I think I got a few distinct bites of beet in there.  The frosting made a huge difference.  I don't think I would have eaten a whole one plain.  If you want brownies, make brownies.  If you have beets you don't like, give 'em to the neighbors next time.

Anyone actually like beets?  Ever made a "sneaky" dish before?    

Five Things Friday

1. I got my hair cut yesterday (by Gen at ChaCha on Willy St. if anyone wants to know).  It's really short in the back now-  not so much the front- and I love it!  You can see it in the reflection in the mirror.  It's really hard to take a picture of the back of your own head.

2. I had another lovely evening at Concerts on the Square Wednesday evening with the stat group at work.  Lots of food and good company.  One of our fellows is moving on in a couple weeks, so it was one of the last times we'll all get to hang out together.  She would be very unhappy if her face ended up on the internet, though, so we'll pretend that R.A. Fisher joined us.  That's appropriate, I think.

I has mad Paint skillz.

 For my part, I made fruit salsa and cinnamon chips based on this recipe I found on Pinterest.  I actually used soft corn tortillas for the chips because that's what we had on hand.  Mmmmm... Summertastic.

3. The Brooks shoe fairy sent me a new pair of shoes to wear test.  This was perfect timing because I'm about 450 miles into my last pair, and it was about time for some new ones.  Thanks, Brooks!

4. I accidentally left two Mt. Dews in the freezer yesterday and they exploded.  I didn't even mean to put them in the freezer.  I was just going to stick them in the fridge, but when I came home to defrost something for dinner, my fridge looked like Slimer came for a visit.

Why you want to treat me so bad???  Don't you know I love you?

5. Our CSA box is filled with all kinds of exciting vegetables this week.

We've got beets, carrots, 2 kohlrabi, some fennel, and only two heads of lettuce.  I can't believe I'm finally saying this, but after eating a salad every day at work and often on the weekend for lunch for the past year(?) maybe longer, I think I'm officially sick of salad.  Too bad I have no idea what else to take/make for lunch!  I know a lot of people do leftovers, but anytime I make anything that's actually good for dinner, we always finish it up and don't have leftovers.  I only take leftovers for lunch when the dish was kind of gross.
 
Anyway, I'm looking forward to trying everything in the box except that I'm slightly nervous about the beets.  I don't know if I like beets (def. hate pickled beets like on a salad bar), so I think I'm going to cook those and take them to a potluck we're going to on Sunday evening.

And with that I've got to take off so I can beat the 19-year-olds taking calc 2 in summer school to the squat rack at the gym.  Happy Friday!  Got any big weekend plans??

Hipster Saturday

It all started with a trip to Art Fair on the Square...

We, and 75% of the rest of the local population, converged on the capitol at 9:30am to see some art before it got too hot (Read: 85 degrees- That's weak, people!).   Fortunately it wasn't too hard to see because at least half the people there had to hit up the food tents for a breakfast beer and ice cream cone with a side of Hot, Spicy Cheese Bread! before they were ready to shop.  Our mission was to find an appropriate gift for two certain someones who are having an eventful summer.

We made our way through the exhibits, trying to decide.  99.5% of things were automatically eliminated for costing more than 1/2 our monthly rent.  I was a fan of the giant metal yard giraffe, but after further discussion, we thought that TSA regulations wouldn't allow it to be carried on and stowed in an overhead compartment.  We also considered a painting of SNOW with one little tiny brown leafless tree.  (It's coming for you, A! - No, not really.  I bet you'll learn to love snow in DC because it means you get to sleep in for a few more hours until the plow comes by).  In the end we did find what I hope will be a fun gift.  However, it must remain a secret for now.

On the final stretch, we stopped at the busiest vendor we'd seen so far.  Kitchen ceramics + ironic stamps + nothing more than $100 = hipster bait.  It worked on me.

 
Do I need a spoon rest with a whale on it?  How could I not?

And what is the most appropriate first use of a hipster whale spoon rest?  Attempting to make homemade ice cream in the food process, of course.  Inspired by this recipe at cooking with TJ's and a huge bag of cherries in the fridge, I set out to make my own Cherry Garcia froyo.

Pitted cherries go in the freezer.

Then they get thrown in the food processor with Greek yogurt and sugar.  After pureeing everything, I stirred in some chocolate chips and poured it into a container to stash in the freezer for a couple hours.

Dinner is served:

So what?  I had a salad, too.  It was pretty good!  Not Babcock Hall, but so what?

Daniel's contribution to Hipster Saturday was to watch the entire Ken Burns Civil War Series on Netflix (also he helped me pit the cherries).

And now to start Hipster Sunday with a bike ride to church...  In the spirit of national reconciliation, I hope all the  Northerners are stocking up on their vitamin D and the Southerners are enjoying their central AC!

Why yes you can

1. Make classy "grown up" nachos in a cake pan in then oven (idea courtesy of, Eat, drink, AND run).

I was sort of afraid that they'd turn into chip cinders coated with cheese dust, but no.  They turned out pleasantly crunchy and melty, and made a mean taco salad*.
 

No more microwave nachos at our house!

2. Make a giant chocolate chip cookie in the crock pot.

I actually tried doing this once before, but I rushed the cooking process (the recipe calls for 3 hours in the crockpot plus cooling time), and ended up with a chocolate chip cinder block with a molten lava core.  We ate the lava and tossed the outside.  This was the time I learned that it is advisable to only include the amount of chocolate chips called for in the recipe rather than the whole bag even if there's "not that many more".

I wanted to try it once more on a weekend when I had the time to let it cook all the way through.  Sadly, this didn't turn out to be quite a winner either.  The best thing that could be said for this guy was that it was a giant chocolate chip cookie.  Buuuuutttttt... it was kind of dry and not really very sweet.  It was more like a "healthified" chocolate chip muffin.  This might have been my fault because I left it on the "keep warm" setting for a little while while we were out rather than taking it out immediately after it was cooked.  I put a slice in a bowl, topped it with milk, and mashed it up, which was pretty good, but meh, I don't think I'd try this again.  It's not like it saves a lot of time.  I really only did it for the novelty factor.
 
Ever made anything "non traditional" in the crockpot that turned out surprisingly well?  We actually made yogurt using ours a couple times.  It takes all night, but it makes a ton of  tasty yogurt.

*If it has lettuce, it counts as a salad, right?

Just to prove

That I'm not a total degenerate (every day) when it comes to preparing healthy food, I give you last night's dinner:

Broiled asparagus and spicy catfish topped with honey-lime coleslaw (riffing off of this Cooking Light recipe). Plus strawberry rhubarb pie, which is not pictured because it turned into strawberry rhubarb soup with pie crust garnish, but it was still really good.

So far we are two for two on good on our use of the CSA veggies (rhubarb + asparagus).  We still have some kale, some chard, two root things that *might* be ginger, some spring mix, and a bunch of arugula(?) to go.  Any tips for tasty ways to prepare the kale, chard and arugula?  I've seen arugula on top pizza before, but we have about 10 pizza toppings worth of it.

Even though it's only a four day week, I'm already ready for the weekend.  Not so much to take a break from work but to sleep a little later.  Just a little because I know that it's best to keep one's sleep schedule as stable as possible, but getting up that extra hour earlier coming off of vacation has been brutal!  Plus it's one thing to go to bed at 8pm in January when it's already been dark for 4 hours and quite another to try to sleep at 8pm now when it's light out and kids are out and neighbors are opening squeaky doors over and over and over again.

After work today, I'm going to a retirement party for a co-worker, but other than that I have no concrete plans for the weekend so far.  Maybe a trip to the farmer's market is in order?  How about you?  Got anything fun going on?  

Okay, gotta get it together to go to the gym while I'm still not running late.  First time this week, yay!

Oh!  And last, but certainly not least, a huge congratulations to Dr. J!!!!  Can't wait to see you and A in August and crash at your freshly painted new place sometime.

Now with 80% less funk

Good funk:



Bad funk:

Nasty.

Ewwwwww... this is what happens when you and everyone who comes to visit you takes off their snow boots in the same place for six months.  It feels pointless to clean it when ever day brings another layer of sludge, but fortunately, maybe, possibly we are beyond all that for awhile, so it was time for scrub-a-thon 2011.

The lineoleum is old so it doesn't *look* that much cleaner, but I guarantee you, it is.

Whew.

 I'd say I was doing spring cleaning, but it really feels more like summer.  It was beautiful yesterday, but the weather is about to go all Wizard of Oz on us this afternoon.

Eeek.

Our indoor/outdoor thermometer is confused:

Indoors: 76.4 (that'll be fun for sleeping tonight); outdoors: who knows?
What is this "warm weather" you speak of?

I wish I could say I spent the day outside, working on my tan, but it's already windy and thundery.  So instead I played Miss Domestic (Servant) and cleaned (see above) and cooked lasagna for our neighbors who just had a baby

Cheese-a-licious

While I'm on a roll, I'll share my #1 (and only) cleaning tip with you:  Denture cleaner will clean anything.  Well, I haven't taught it how to vacuum, but every week we soak our dish drier and my water bottle in hot water with a few Target brand denture cleaner tablets, and it clears up all the hard water and general gunk that builds up.  

So fresh and so clean, clean.

Now it's time for straight chillin'.  And hoping we don't get hit by a tornado.  And finding the fan for the bedroom.  Please deposit any lazy cleaning tips you have in the comments section.

Madison... the Seattle of the Midwest

Snow, thunder snow, wintry mix, sleet, freezing rain, and just plain old rain- the kind we're getting right now.  It seems like there's always some kind of precipitation going on up here.  Fortunately this is a gym morning (tomorrow I get to decide if high 30s is too cold to run in the rain), and it was slightly windy but dry for my interval run yesterday.  It wasn't the greatest run in the world, but I'm feeling better about my paces now that I know that 1km is 0.62mi, not 0.65mi, which is what I was running.  I did 8mi total with 1k, 2k, 1k, 1k fast.  My splits for the 1k were just above the 1k paces shown on McMillan so I'm thinking the extra seconds were due to the 0.03mi extra I ran.  Or at least I'm going to just keep telling myself that :).

As of 4:45 when I went home yesterday, a big project at work was heading out the door.  I had the dreads about going back yesterday after my long weekend in Chillsville, but it was actually a non-stressful and productive day.  

We did go back to Bach around the Clock on Saturday, and I got a picture of Daniel's* radio debut:

Bach cello suites arranged for electric guitar was well received.  We also got to hear a few other talented pianists and a classical guitarist while we were there.

The "make your own takeout" theme of the week continues with Saturday night's dinner, my favorite looks-disgusting-tastes-delicious Indian dish, palak paneer.  It follows the rule that if you put enough cheese/barbecue sauce/catsup/ranch dressing/seasoning (in this case) on anything, it will taste good.  Spinach + yogurt + paneer cheese + spice pack from Indian grocery = tasty.

Last night we actually followed a recipe from an old Cooking Light for shrimp pad Thai.  It wasn't Chopstix, but I also didn't have to wait for 2 hours to get it.

And finally, another non-take out slow cooker winner, from Real Simple- Sunday's dinner- creamy chicken and biscuits dumplings.  Easy, tasty, and with plenty of leftovers for dinner tonight.

And sadly it's time for me to see if I can get my raincoat to stretch over my jacket and my backpack so I don't get soaked going to and from the gym and work.  It's really coming down... sad face. 

*streaming online 

Whew

It's the weekend.  I'm still sleepy and have been kind of a bum all day.  I did rally a bit on Thursday morning-  when I stared writing this post yesterday the "whew" was about how much better I felt after a good night's sleep- but it was still a drag to get up at normal time this morning to squeeze in a long run first thing.

Don't want to be like this guy- even if he's lucky
enough to be at the beach.

The good news is that the run went well.  It wasn't freezing, and I didn't fear being blown away by crazy March wind.
We are finally starting to see signs of spring.  A lot of the snow has melted, and the birds are back, including the surly geese.  I already saw one go after a woman on the bike path yesterday.  This was only my second double digit run of 2011 (I think) but I felt strong the whole way.  I tried running 10 minutes easy then 20 minutes harder and finished in 1:50 - a little slower than I would have liked, but I guess I'm still recovering from the DST and last week's race combo.

One last thing- I wanted to give some food link love to last month's Real Simple (which has recipes from the magazine online here).  Whatever you want to say about the rest of the magazine, the recipes are almost always truly simple and tasty.  Last month the feature was my favorite "I don't want anything but taking off my shoes to stand between me and eating dinner when I get home" appliance: the slow cooker.  One "bad" thing about many slow cooker recipes is that you actually have to cook everything before you slow cook it.  This probably makes things taste better, but it often defeats the purpose.  Both recipes we tried out (plus the others in the issue) were assemble + on.  Now I'm laughing because true to the "feed me now" nature of these dishes, I only got a picture of one before it was devoured; however, I assure you the chipole beef tacos (which we actually made with the other 1/2 of the pork roast we bought for the stir fry dish) were taste tested and approved.

Asian pork with snow peas, red peppers, and soba noodles:

Veggie-tastic

After punting last week and pretending that I'd never eaten frozen spinach in a frittata before, this week I give myself an A for New Year's Resolution #1 - try one new veggie or preparation each week- because I actually tried 3.

#1 - Trader Joe's roasted turnips and carrots (served with sauteed chicken with sage browned butter from this month's Cooking Light).  TJ's has a great frozen vegetable section, but you never know what will be there from one week to the next.  These were nice and firm out of the oven and had a lightly sweet sauce.  Good stuff.

2. TJ's healthy 8 chopped veggie mix - I eat a salad almost every day for lunch, and I wanted a way to add extra veggies without having to buy (and chop and store) a zillion whole vegetables.  I'm not sure if this was a new item, but it was the first time I'd seen it, and it was exactly what I was looking for.  8 veggies, chopped and ready to be added to a salad by the handful.  The only thing this mix contained that I don't like was celery, and it was the last ingredient on the list and easy to pick out.

3. Chicken fried "rice" with leeks and cranberries - This was another CL recipe but instead of brown rice I used cauliflower.  I steamed the cauliflower the day before and stuck it in the fridge overnight.  When it was time to make dinner, I chopped it up into little pieces and cooked it just like the instructions called for "frying" the rice.  This actually worked really well.  Both of us decided the recipe needed some soy sauce and rice vinegar, but the cauliflower was a perfect veggie stand it for the rice.  With all the other flavors in the dish, it didn't taste cauliflower-ey or vegetable-y at all.

Workout:
I debated on running outside vs going back to the gym this morning and decided on the gym.  It just takes so darn long to get ready to run outside when it's cold, and I'm definitely planning on going tomorrow.  Only 6-7 more weeks of winter- le sigh.

I'm on a lake!

I'm on a lake.  I'm on a big frozen lake.

I got the lake pictures (taken Monday) off my camera*

It's amazing how clear the ice was.  If you looked down through the cracks (which were frozen back together) you could see that it was about 6in-1ft thick.  See coworker Dan walking on water:

A picture looking back on campus from out on the ice:

Taking all the fear out of walking out on the lake- it was actually really shallow where we were walking.  If the ice did crack the worst that would happen is wet feet.  There's a piece of lake weed suspended in the ice:

Crazy ice fisherman:

 Picture of downtown.  If you squint, you can see the capital right in the middle:

For all the times I've toted my camera around and not taken any pictures, this was the first time I'd really wished I'd had it.  I'm sure I'll have some crazy extra charge for sending these pictures, but I think it was worth it.

Resolution update

I was on such a role with accomplishment yesterday I also checked off two resolution goals for the week.

The first was a little bit of a punt.  I have cooked spinach before- and probably with eggs for dinner- but I didn't have a chance to do any real meal planning before we went to the store on Sunday, so my new veggie for the week is cooked spinach in a coconut curry frittata:

This was a little bland, but you can't really taste test the raw egg so we covered it in ketchup, and it wasn't too bad.

I also sent a Christmas letter electronically to a friend who let me know I accidentally sent her card without a letter or even signing it.  Oops.  I think I remember thinking I might not have filled up her card before I sent it, but I was so tired of doing cards at that point that I didn't worry about it.  Anyway, she got to be my first "reach out and touch someone" of 2011.

Workout

I'm headed back to the gym this morning to do a treadmill track workout.  It's gotten cold again- boo- but fortunately no snow buildup.

Stay warm out there!

*Thanks, Dr. T. for the suggestion.  I was able to send a Pix Message to my e-mail account.  Hopefully I will not have to un-thank you when I see my phone bill ;).

Paleo Recap

Yesterday, or today, or something like that ends my 1 month paleo diet "trial."  I put trial in quotation marks because I didn't stick to the diet (no grains, no legumes, no dairy) 100% strictly, but I'd say I hit it about 75-80% of the time.

First of all, I don't think that I can fairly evaluate any of the claims made about the diet because, as I said, I wasn't 100% compliant, and it seems like that's a must.  But here are what I'd consider my take-away points from the experiment:

• I never had any GI problems after eating a paleo meal
• I feel like I've gotten over the idea that I absolutely "have to" eat some sort of starchy carb with every meal.  For some people who run mega miles or who don't eat animal products, eating more starchy carbs is necessary, but for me- especially now that we are in winter hibernation mode- it would be better to replace them with non-starchy vegetables. 
• I've expanded my vegetable horizons (a bit)
• I realized that I can put a meat and vegetable meal together as quickly as any other kind
• There are a lot of great paleo foods out there, and there's no reason to feel restricted or like you can't enjoy a good meal within those parameters
• It is really hard to break the psychological "need" to have bread, cookies, etc. when they are served to a group.  However, most people don't actually care what you eat.  If you don't want something- for whatever reason- a simple "No thanks" will suffice.

In general, I really like the way I feel when I stick to the diet, and- like with healthy veganism- I think when you focus on what you can have, there are a wealth of healthy options out there.  However, the diet is not really supported by our social structure*.  So I've decided my goal is to make all of the food that I prepare myself be paleo compliant (again meaning lean meat, vegetables, fruits, nuts, and healthy fats), and then try to make good choices when I'm eating out and in social situations.  I think this is a fair compromise that will hopefully get my ratio of paleo to non to about 90% to 10%, respectively.  

And with that I'm headed out for my last treadmill run for awhile.  We will be on the road today and tomorrow, and the weather changes from snowy to nasty icy cold rain as we drive down south.  Any thoughts/prayers/good vibes you want to send our way while we travel are much appreciated.

If I don't post again before then, Merry Christmas to everyone! 

*But you can say that about any healthy way of eating.  For example, there are absolutely 100% no healthy snacks to be purchased in my building, but there are a lot of unhealthy ones (by any standard).