by Sam Tackeff | Oct 17, 2012 | Challenge, Meat, Soups
A few weeks ago I went into the gym with a cold, a red face, and a killer sinus headache and nearly had a panic attack when I saw Evan in the gym with his camera. For those of us who live behind a camera, being in front of one is not something we are accustomed to. In fact, I may have rudely let Evan know that in no uncertain terms was he to take a photo of me. I was a total jerk about it – I blame the headache!
Well, he managed to sneak one. And I think it’s awesome.
* * *
10.15.12
Coffee this morning was a little fancy. Although I grew up in a house where my mother drank her coffee black, I much prefer mine with a heavy dose of cream. Having kicked the cream for this challenge, I’ve been doing quite well with black, but I decided to doctor my mug with a little bit of coconut oil to add back a little bit of that creamy texture. I won’t do this everyday, but it certainly was a treat!
There was no breakfast. I wasn’t hungry, and had to go out and about on a few errands. I’ve been really struggling to get in a good breakfast. Part of my problem is that I much prefer to eat a big lunch, a good size snack, and a big dinner. I’m on the fence about whether or not to actively change this habit as long as I’m getting in proper amounts of nutrient dense foods…
For lunch, I had a very specific craving for Tortilla Espanola– a Spanish frittata with eggs, onion, and potato and lots of olive oil. Seeking similar textural consistency, I made myself a big frittata with leftover roasted cauliflower, over a spinach salad with a bright mustard vinaigrette. I let the eggs cool down to room temperature before eating, which is really the best way to eat frittata.
In the late afternoon I went for a walk and grabbed a gala apple and some Justin’s Maple Almond Butter as I walked out the door. Portable snacks!
When I got home, I set to work making dinner: Mel’s Chocolate Chili from Well Fed. I can’t recommend this book enough. I don’t often actually cook with cookbooks (I usually just read them for inspiration), but I’ve actually gone about and cooked several of the recipes in here to the letter, and they’ve been marvelous.
I have a few tried and true chili recipes, and make a similar version, but I thought I’d stick to as close to the book as possible for the sake of an honest opinion.
I made just a few small adjustments to the recipe: halving it because I didn’t have enough beef, using the ultimate cheater move onions, shallots and garlic pre-chopped from Trader Joes, and omitting beef broth because I had a limited supply of tasty bone broth and needed to re-stock. (I just used the whole can of tomatoes instead of halving it, and added a little bit more water.)
The chili takes literally 10 minutes to put together, and then you just let it simmer away on the stove top for a couple of hours. Your house will smell fantastic.
I served it with a dollop of guacamole, and ate two bowls full.
My biggest mistake? Not *doubling* the recipe. This one is definitely a winner.
by Sam Tackeff | Oct 16, 2012 | Challenge, Races, Running
(Via SI)
Doug Flutie is a bit of a celebrity around here.
Aside from that legendary Hail Mary pass, a Heisman trophy and a spectacular career in the NFL, one of Doug Flutie’s most important legacies has been his work through the Doug Flutie, Jr. Foundation, focused on raising money and awareness for autism. For my third race this season/ever, I decided to run in the 13th Annual Eastern Bank Flutie 5K to benefit the Doug Flutie, Jr. Foundation for Autism. Here’s my recap:
* * *
Race Day
When I woke up Sunday morning, it was raining, cold, and I felt miserable. My arm and elbow hurt from an hour of handstand practice on Saturday, I had the sniffles, and my thumb was tingling because I had jammed it. I was planning on heading to the race alone, but my lack of planning had made me an anxious wreck. I nearly had a meltdown because I was too tired to make coffee and we were out of bananas.
And this is when a very kind Devon came to my rescue and drove me to the race. I wouldn’t have made it without him.
When we got there I found a banana, and things began to turn around!
{In the background, check out the modernist architecture of the Leonard Morse Hospital. Wet concrete makes this former architecture major giddy! Designed by Marcus, Nocka, and Payette in the late ’60s, this was actually at the cutting edge of high-tech hospital planning when it was designed. It was particularly progressive in its huge windows, generous daylight, and lush wooded environment. Also, carpeting. Not so sure about that one.}
We were early enough to tour around the little expo tents. Wegmans was a lead sponsor, which I was excited about. I was less excited when their main booth was giving out Doritos and Sunchips, and the “lunch provided post race” ended up being roll-up wraps. They did have a little gluten free section set up though, and had provided me with my savior banana, so I was much appreciative!
While I ate my banana, I went over to stare at the free Dunkin Donuts. They were giving out both donuts, including my second favorite chocolate glazed (my favorite being butternut), and pumpkin mocha spice lattes. I wish that they had brought regular coffee, but I can appreciate that most folks quite enjoy their seasonal offerings. Alas, staring was all that I did.
Another vendor I was happy to see was Crescent Ridge, a dairy in Sharon, MA, serving up some cold chocolate milk, along with some literature about chocolate milk as a post workout drink. For folks who can consume dairy, and don’t mind the sugar hit, this stuff is delicious. I seriously contemplated taking a sample. And then remembered that a) I haven’t consumed dairy in over a month, and b) I was about to run a race. Plus, while their chocolate milk is delicious, it isn’t as good as the crack that is their seasonal egg nog. I backed off wistfully and wisely.
5-Hour Energy also had a booth, and people were downing these like dope at the Tour de France. (Too soon?) Now, I’m not one to judge, but… these drinks are not for me. After the race Devon had mentioned that a very small child had run up to the table and grabbed one of these cute pink bottles before being loudly reprimanded by her father: “Don’t you ever put that stuff in your body!!!” Teach ’em young.
Perhaps a better option was the Vita Coco – although I may be one of the only people in the world who doesn’t like coconut water.
Before heading over to the starting line, we watched the STRIVERS Running Club for Girls go through their warm-up. Clearly this worked, because a bunch of these speedy demons surged past me during the race. Seeing these girls thrilled to participate was one of the highlights of this race.
Finally, I headed over to the line-up. Having lined up too far back during my last race, and being nearly run over by jogging strollers, I decided to seed myself more wisely this time, and shuffled closer to the front.
There were still plenty of people in front of me at the starting line, including Joe, from the gym, who came in at a speedy 19:47!
As we waited in the cold, my friend Bets lined up next to me! It was so good to see a familiar face!
Although not so good when she mentioned that the “rolling course” I had briefly glanced at when I signed up was actually full particularly unpleasant hills… It was at that point that my goal went from “maybe I can do better than last time” to… “Oh dear lord, I hope I can do this without dying.”
After a false start which was a ploy to take a photograph, the crowd started moving and off we went!
Here’s my race on Runkeeper:
Mile 1. 10:14/pace: Almost as soon as we started, the rain started coming down. I ran near Bets for the first 3/4 of a mile past rolling green fields and farms, until we hit the first big hill coming around a corner. I had been running at a good clip – between 9:00 and 9:30, but hitting the big hill I literally had to slow down to an unplanned walk.
Mile 2. 9:55/pace: Hoping to make up time in the second mile, I skipped the water break, and ran a little faster, taking a single walk break to get myself up another little hill.
Mile 3. 10:38/pace: By mile three I was sick of the rain, and ready to be done with this already. I had assumed, at this point, that I wasn’t going to make my goal. And then I saw kids passing out oranges – I grabbed one and it was like a little miracle! And then I saw more kids, hands outstretched, and decided to run over to give them all high fives. For my slowest mile of the race, this ended up being the most enjoyable.
The last .1: Like my previous 5k, this race ended on a not so gentle ascent. As I turned the corner into the last .1 mile, I decided to gun it with what I had in me. The second the clock came into view, I saw that I could make it if I ran fast. In a split second, the race went from kind of sucky, to wait, I can do this! I’m doing this! Yes, yes! I’m doing this!
I set my eyes on the clock, knowing that if I beat 32:14, I’d PR.
And boy was it close. Sprinting up the hill, I glanced at the clock and I saw 32:03.
And then I was through, they handed me a water, and I gave a high five to folks from my gym…
Before walking off to avoid puking 🙂
The Result: 31:58 – 529th place, 43/89 in my age group (F 20-29).
Yep, beat my time 16 seconds on a much harder race course!
Never have I been more excited to be middle of the pack!
After I finished, I found my friends to watch more of the race, saw Doug Flutie run to the finish line with his wife (after running a respectable 25:25 himself), and nearly lost my voice cheering for all of the kids running to the finish line.
Here I am, after the race:
Can’t wait for the next one!
by Sam Tackeff | Oct 15, 2012 | Meat
Sorry for that title. Really. The puns and bad jokes are getting worse and worse around here. I’ll let the management know.
Saturday
On Saturday morning, I woke up and picked up my race packet for Sunday’s 5k. I was having a bad morning, worried that my car was dying, and then running late to Jeremy’s gymnastics clinic. I normally only go to the gym twice a week, but the focus was on handstands, and bar practice (toes to bar, kipping, and pull-ups), all of which are skills that I desperately want to improve on. Mostly for the street-cred, really.
When I finally made it (with about a minute to spare), I was psyched to see that the class was really small: D-Paine and Melody, Alexann, Mary and myself, which meant that we each got a lot of hands on attention. By the end of class, we were all working on being able to kick up into freestanding handstands, and my kipping on the bar may be getting somewhere.
When I got home, I made myself brunch: fried eggs and mini lamb merguez sausages from the butcher. I always forget how much I enjoy merguez. It’s a rich and spicy sausage common to North African (and French) cuisine, and is so completely satisfying.
In the afternoon, I took a pomegranate break, and spent a good 40 minutes or so picking out the jewel-red seeds one by one, popping them like popcorn.
For dinner, I had garlic-thyme sausages from the butcher, and these perfect little lamb kidneys to play with. I debated what to do with them – as the bulk of my rognons-eating occurred in France nearly 15 years ago, I was unsure what I wanted to do. So first I set about cleaning them.
I then butterflied the kidney, to assess how much I’d have to clean from it. Most of the recipes I consulted were for whole kidneys with minimal cleaning, so after breathing in the smell of the kidney to make sure it wasn’t ahem… uric smelling, I opted to do as little to it as possible. I trimmed off most of the attached fat, and saved it to render later.
Kidneys are a lusciously textured, strongly flavored (a little bit like a barnyard, in the best way) cut of meat, and stand up well to assertive spices. I debated Chichi Wang’s version of Fuchsia Dunlop’s deep-fried, huo bao slices of kidney in Serious Eats, and Nigel Slater’s classic devilled kidney recipe. Ultimately, I decided on a riff on these grilled lamb’s kidneys with rosemary anchovy butter from Odd Bits: How to Cook the Rest of the Animal by Jennifer McLagan.
To prep the kidneys, I drizzled them with olive oil, seasoned them in salt and pepper, and stuck some rosemary in the middle. I then set about making my dressing. Because I’m not cooking with butter (for now), I made a dressing with anchovies, olive oil, salt and pepper.
I cooked my kidneys for two minutes on each side, so they were just cooked through but still pink in the middle. They were served on a bed of baby spinach, with my garlic-thyme sausage on the side, and the anchovy dressing poured over. Delicious.
For dessert, because I was craving something a little sweet, I made a small chocolate mug cake. I’m still trying to tweak the formula – they tend to come out a little bit dry.
I went to bed early to get some sleep before Sunday’s race.
* * *
Sunday
I’ll be posting my race recap separately, but the race went well! Despite the cold, rainy weather, and a near meltdown when I woke up in the morning, no coffee, and a single banana 20 minutes before the starting line, I made it through the race, and P.R.’d!
When I got home, I set about making lunch.
I sauteed brussels sprouts with a little bit of bacon.
And served the bacon-y brussels sprouts topped with sardines and lemon juice, and a side of guacamole. This is one of those meals that you eat alone and don’t tell anyone about, but I swear it was good.
In the afternoon, I realized that I hadn’t had a cup of coffee yet, so I remedied that quickly.
Because our house was freezing, I put my oven to good use, and roasted some romanesco and cauliflower, and this ambercup squash with some salt and pepper.
For dinner, I had another off-cut from the butcher to use – lamb neck. I was first introduced to lamb neck in 2009, thanks to (top chef winner!) Chris Cosentino – during this spectacular meal at Incanto.
I wanted to prepare it as simply as possible, so I adapted this Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall recipe.
I rubbed the neck in olive oil, salt, and pepper, and browned it on all sides in a small pot in a few more tablespoons of olive oil. I then added the juice of two small lemons and a cup of water to the pot, added about a teaspoon of dried thyme, a teaspoon of oregano, and a sprig of rosemary on top. I brought it to a boil, turned it down to a simmer, and covered the pot. I then cooked it for an hour, turning it every 15 minutes in the braising liquid. (My neck was about a pound, but if you had a larger one, you’d just cook a little longer, until tender.)
While the meat was cooking, I microwaved cauliflower for about 15 minutes until super tender, and added salt, pepper, and garlic powder, and pureed with my immersion blender. Voila! Mashed cauliflower!
I then took the lamb out of the pot, and shredded the meat – all 4 ounces of it… this was a very small lamb.
Devon got his shredded on a bed of mashed cauliflower, with a side of cheesy toast. I got mine in a bowl with the neck to gnaw on, and the rest of the braising liquid poured on top. While I would have liked a little bit more meat, the flavors were outstanding, and I’ll be making something similar soon.
Dinner was served in front of the television – for good reason (brace yourself) – it was my first time watching The Shawshank Redemption. I should clarify, first time, aside from the 50 + times I’ve seen various 20 or so minutes of it on TV*.
(Via)
I’m not sure what I was expecting. Actually – I was expecting to be let down. There’s no way that the movie (#1 rated on IMDB of movies of all time) was going to be that good. But it was. Thank you Stephen King, Frank Darabont, Tim Robbins, Morgan Freeman, and everyone else involved in this motion picture for being awesome.
