Books I'm Loving Right Now

I love when my favorite bloggers also have books.  Such is the case with both Happy Herbivore and Peas and Thank You.  I'm plowing through both books and have so far loved everything I've made. 

My favorite from Peas and Thank You has to be the hummus (for now!).  There are so many awesome things in her book but in the last 2 weeks, I've made the hummus 3 times! 

It's such a great base recipe but it's even better when you play with it a bit.  She suggests roasted red peppers which I've done and LOVE and also kalamata olives...yum!
 
Happy Herbivore is another of my favorite blogs.  Her Apple Jacks Smoothie is to die for.  Notice that I drank half of it before snapping a picture....I just couldn't wait! 

I've never thought to add cinnamon to a smoothie before but wow is it incredible! And chocolate zucchini bread?  Um, yes please!

I ran my final long run before the Richmond Half (12 days - ack!) yesterday.  I decided to do 13 again.  It was fine up until mile 10.5 when the usual low back pain started creeping in.  I'm SO frustrated by this pain!  It's like clock work - just over 10 miles it starts as a dull ache but by mile 12, it's all I can do to stay upright.  It has me very concerned about Richmond, to say the least.

A Couple New Recipe Attempts....A Crappy Run...Laziest Lunch Ever

First of all, I discovered sunflower butter.  I've tried to get on the almond butter bandwagon but I just can't do it.  I've tried several brands and for some reason, it just tastes gritty to me.  I love peanuts and of course peanut butter but too much peanut in my diet does me the wrong way so in my quest to find an alternative, I decided to give sunflower butter a try.  Well whatta you know!  It's actually really good!  And shockingly tastes just like sunflower seeds...go figure.

Now for my recipe attempts.  This journey to a all vegetarian (and no dairy) diet has been great so far but I'm starting to feel the need to branch out and try new recipes.  I can only eat so many bean burgers and sauteed spinach.

Ina's Eggplant Spread with Added Beans

Yesterday, I tried to make Ina Garten's Roasted Eggplant Spread. I followed her recipe exactly and wasn't all that impressed.  I felt like it was lacking something....it was rather bland.  I added more seasoning...still bland.  So then I decided to dump a can of chick peas in the processor (along with a bit more tahini).  Better, but still, not great.  I nibbled on it with some veggies and flax chips then I tried using it on a sandwich in place of my usual hummus.  Yawn.  I need to keep looking for a good eggplant spread.

Last night I decided to try Angela's 15 Minute Creamy Avocado Pasta.  I love, love, love her site, Oh She Glows and have had a ton of fantastic creations from there.  The creamy sauce looked so good to me that I had to give it a whirl.  It was good.  I didn't love it like I thought I would, but it was good. 

Angela's Avocado Creamy Sauce with Added Tofu

This is going to be a really stupid review/thing to say but I thought it was a bit too avocadoy.  I know.  That's the point, isn't it?  Maybe it was the idea of avocado on pasta that I didn't love.  I probably should have had it with chips.  It truly was a 15 minute meal which I loved after sitting at my son's baseball game all evening and I think I will try it again only next time, I may use a half of an avocado instead of the entire thing.  Next from her site, I'm going to try her Butternut Squash Mac 'n Cheeze because that looks freaking delish!

Today I had a totally shitty run.  I've been taking a ton of classes this week instead of focusing on my running which is stupid since I have a half marathon next month. It came back to haunt me today.  After Body Pump, I jumped on a treadmill with the intention of running 6 miles and only managed to crank out 3.  My legs were lead.  Ugh.  Back to the running program next week!

After the gym, I was hungry but pissy and a wee bit lazy so I broke out the steam bags.  I threw some spinach on one and butternut squash in the other and was eating a yummy lunch within 10 minutes.  Now that is success!

Les Mills Kicked My A$$ Today!

I finally got back to yoga yesterday.  I can't even remember the last time I went.  Certainly before my knife/toe incident back in June and I think at least a month before that!  I was feeling so stiff after the weekend so I thought it would do me some good to slow down, take a deep breath and stretch.  I was right.  I felt so great after.  I had forgotten (a) just how hard yoga is, and (b) how totally fantastic and relaxed I feel after.  The only thing I did wrong was wait until after yoga to get my run done.  Kinda stupid.  Running on stretched out jello legs is not only hard but probably not very smart.  Lesson learned.  Next Tuesday, I run first, then I get my yoga on!

Today I went to Body Step followed by Body Pump.  The new release in Step is hard-freakin'-core!  I really wish I had worn my heart rate monitor because I would have loved to have known just how close to a heart attack I was!  After, my legs were shot but I stuck around for Pump anyway.  Yeah.  Killer.  The lunge track is never ending and the shoulder track is pure torture.  I am going to be really sore tomorrow....yay!  Love that!

So last night was my first experiment with using flax and water as a substitution for egg when making my bean burgers!  The recipe I love uses one egg white as a binding agent.  I googled 'flax egg' and I swear, came up with 47 different methods.  So, since I was tired and hungry, I picked the easiest one (the idea of cooking the 'goop' first seemed really odd to me).  I used 1 Tbsp of ground flax seed and 3 Tbsp of water.  When I initially mixed it up, I was worried because it seemed so watery but the more it sat as I prepped the other ingredients, the more it thickened up.  I baked the burgers and when I ate them - sans bun - I thought they were falling apart more than when I used to use an egg white but the taste was the same.  And actually, I think I liked them better....they tend to be a bit dry normally and were very moist last night.

Goop on sides of burgers is ground mustard

Served up with my favorite side - sauteed spinach and mushrooms - I was a happy, happy girl!

In other totally unrelated to anything news....know what these are:

When did I go blind??

Yeah.  Readers.  Flippin' old lady readers people!!!  Seriously, out of nowhere I suddenly became one of those people who has to hold a piece of paper way out in front and squint then hand it to my kid and ask him to read it to me!  What. The. Hell.  So when I was at Wegmans the other day, I tried a bunch on and settled on the lowest....um...power? Magnification? Setting?....ones I could find and reluctantly threw them in my cart.  I hate to admit it but they are pretty awesome.  All those pesky little words are not so annoying anymore!  Sigh.....

CrossFit....Check.

I survived CrossFit on Sunday.  Not exactly sure how, but I survived!  My friend and I got there a bit early...early enough to look at the stations and contemplate changing our minds.  We decided to tough it out and see what it was all about.

They divided us up into teams of six and put each team at a station.  Once at the station, we divided up again into three.  At each station, three of us would do the workout, then add our 'points' to our three teammates points and that would be our total.  There were five stations in all, 2 minutes per station, and we went through it twice.  The good news is that the workout obviously wasn't an hour as I was expecting but 20 minutes was plenty!

Our first station was push ups.  Easy enough, right?  Well, in a CrossFit push up, you go all the way down to the ground, lift your hands up then push up again.  The idea for each station was to do as many as you can then the next teammate takes over.  If you can only do three, no problem, the next person will jump down and continue on.  However, who only wants to do 3 knowing that your teammates are going to have to pick up the slack for you?  Not me!  I started out on my toes but those things were hard so I ended up dropping to my knees for the remainder of our time at that station.  And I have to say, that's one of the really cool things about CrossFit.  Your team mates are cheering you on like crazy which really helps tough it out and not only that, but there is no way you could slack off because they are watching and counting!

Next, there were plates set up for us to choose from where we would lift them straight up over our head, then drop down to a deep squat hitting the plate on the ground then back up again.  My friend and I chose the 15lb plate while our CrossFit experienced male teammate went with the heaviest plate.  That station wasn't as hard as I thought it would be....it was probably the easiest of the five.

Station three had us carrying a 35lb gas can (filled with sand) while speed walking down to a cone then all the way back.  That got heavy and quick!

The fourth station was burpees with a push up.  Yuck, yuck, yuck.  Hate burpees!  Very tough.
After burpee torture, we went to the toss a 15lb medicine ball over a volleyball net to your partner station. Ha! That was a good one.  You have to catch the ball (a lot hard than it looked) then drop down into a deep squat before throwing it back. 

We had only about 30 seconds between each station so it all moved very quickly and before we knew it, it was over.  Wow.  We felt great after, like we had worked out for a super long time and yet, it was so fast!  Although in the same breath, we were also so happy it was over, we had expierenced it and now could go back to our regular workouts at Gold's.  Before we went, we looked up CrossFit Rubicon and saw just how expensive it is to be a member there.  I told my friend that I hoped I hated it because no way could I afford to join.  Well guess what?  My name got pulled and I won a free one month membership to CrossFit Rubicon in Tysons Corner.  Say what??  Holy crap balls.  Does this mean I have to go back??  I think I'll wait until after Richmond Half!

As Sunday wore on, I realized just how exhausted I was.  The two classes on Saturday followed by my 13 mile run then CrossFit on Sunday was a lot packed into 2 days.  I was in bed by 8:30!  On Monday morning, I decided to take the day off.  My upper back and shoulders were screaming at me!  I did my usual mom-errands which kept me loose so now it's just my shoulders that are still sore.  Back to it today though!  Gotta get a short run in and maybe yoga.  I haven't been to yoga in forever and I really miss it.  Hopefully it will stretch out my shoulders!

Put a fork in me...I'm Done. And so is my food processor!

This morning, I met some friends at Golds for the launch of the new Body Step and Body Pump classes.  They were only 30 minutes each but I still assumed I wouldn't feel like doing my long run today and I knew for sure I didn't want to do it tomorrow before the big CrossFit experiment.  But leaving a long run for Monday just sounds so unappealing that I decided to start the run and see how I felt.  Unfortunately, I had to do it on my treadmill because of kid issues so I assumed I'd get 6 miles in.  Well!  I'm super happy to say that I got all 13 miles in that I planned on running on Monday - yahoo!  Cross it off.  After the run and my shower and a 'tuna' bean salad sandwich, I realized just how spent I was.  I've been sitting on the couch watching football for the last three hours unwilling/able to move.  I did, however, manage to get up for the 10 minutes it took me to throw together some fresh salsa!

The good news is that my "Empty the Fridge Salsa" is a big hit....really, really tasty.  The bad news is that once I got all the ingredients into my food processor, I realized I couldn't get the lid on.  After trying to force it way too many times, I noticed that part of the bowl was warped from the dishwasher.  Freaking awesome.  I just wanted to chop up the salsa and get my butt back on the couch.  My husband got all manly with it and forced the lid on allowing me to get a quick chop done.  Then it took us forever to get the lid back off!  Guess I'll be back at Costco getting a new processor next week.  Next to my Vitamix, it's my most loved appliance!

Empty the Fridge Salsa

6 Roma tomatoes, quartered
1/2 can corn
1/2 can black beans, drained and rinsed
1 jalapeno (I left the seeds in because I love a hot salsa but you should take them out for a milder taste)
small handful of cilantro
1/4 red onion
red pepper flakes to taste
cayenee pepper to taste
juice of 1 lime

Throw it all in an unbroken food processor and pulse.  Slurp up with your favorite tortilla chips!

Lazy, Rainy Day

Apparently today is a day off.  It wasn't supposed to be.  Typically on Wednesday's, I go to the gym for Body Step and Body Pump but I just feel like I needed a day of rest.  If there is one thing I've learned over the past couple years of marathon training it's listen to your body.  It will tell you when it's time to take a breather.

I think I'm slow to the game on this, but have you heard of CrossFit?  I don't know anyone who does it (I hear it's quite the hardcore bunch) but I've seen competitions on ESPN.  It's a bit more than I think I'd be into but this Sunday, Potomac River Running and New Balance are holding a free one hour CrossFit workout in Reston.  My workout buddy and I decided we had to go and try it out!  I'm pretty excited to see what it's all about.  I can't imagine what they will have us do for an hour.  I'm assuming they will have a big turnout.  I hope it doesn't kill me because I have to do my long run on Monday this week.  Should make an interesting blog post if nothing else!

As I mentioned yesterday, I was SO stinking excited that I got a comment from THE Chef AJ that I had to make something yummy out of her new book, Unprocessed.  I decided to try the Fruity Quinoa for breakfast this morning.  Super simple to throw together (a big plus for me when it comes to breakfast!)...I mixed a half a cup of quinoa with a cup of orange juice, cinnamon and vanilla and brought it to a boil.

Once it cooked down, I took it off the heat and added raisins.

SO good!  I have to admit that I was a bit leery of this one only because I've only ever used quinoa in savory recipes.  Salads, main dishes with squash, etc.  It was hard for me to imagine eating it for breakfast.  Quinoa is such a fantastic thing to cook with because it really takes on the flavors of whatever you put with it so this breakfast was sweet, warm, all around yummy.  I'm not a big fan of oatmeal because it leaves me feeling overly full, no matter how little I eat, and bloated but I miss having hot cereal on cold, rainy mornings.  This fit the bill perfectly.  I think next time I may add apples to it.  Yum!

I Passed Out Twice This Morning

This morning I was feeling very blah and unmotivated to get going.  I made a cup of green tea, (by the way, today marks my 1 month anniversary of being 100% coffee free! I have 1 cup of tea a day but that's it!) woke up my youngest son for school and shuffled over to the computer.  Well.  Can I just tell you what I saw in my inbox??  A comment on my blog from Chef AJ! THE Chef AJ people!!!!!!  Holy mother of all crap balls!!!  I passed out for a minute, read it again, and proceeded to pass out a second time.  I then became a total groupie/obsessed/wack-job and ran around the kitchen saying, "Holy cow! Chef AJ left me a comment!"  Quinn shook his head and made his way through his waffles.  Then, I realized that she was commenting on my post where I mentioned her bean dip that I made a couple weeks ago.  I quickly pulled up the post and wanted to punch myself in the face for saying that the dip "was a bit runny for me"....gah!!!!  I cannot believe I used the word runny AND that Chef AJ read it!  Son of a biscuit.  I like a chunky dip is all....and that is what I should have said.  Oy.

Anyway, it got me moving and out of my morning slump.  I'm now ready to tackle my run before meeting a friend for lunch.  After my lunch, I'm going to hit Wegmans and get the ingredients needed to make the Fruity Quinoa and the Pico De Gallo from her book, Unprocessed.  My evening appetizer and dinner will be a shout out to Chef AJ.  Woot!