Thanksgiving recipes

Food is always a huge affair at my family's household. This year, I made sure I bought dishes so I wouldn't feel deprived during the holiday. I made and brought the following to dinner:

Quinoa Loaf with Mushrooms and Peas (Whole Foods Market)

This was a disappointment. It wasn't bad, just a little bland. My "loaf" also did not stick together at all, so we had to scoop into the pan and dig up the mixture. It wasn't the end of the world, but it was a little embarrassing!

I followed the recipe exactly, except sticking with the ETL guidelines, so I didn't use the olive oil to saute the mushrooms (I water-sauteed) and did not use salt. It tasted like a quinoa grain salad, and although it had plenty of "goodies" in it, I didn't seem to taste much of it. Some people tried it and told me they liked it, but I'm not sure they weren't just saying that to be polite! In the end, I was happy to have a main dish that I could eat without guilt, but I am not sure I would make this again.

Kale with Caramelized Onions and Walnuts (I made this one up)

2 large onions, sliced
2 cloves garlic, minced
4 small bunches of kale (about 2 lbs), de-stemmed and chopped roughly
2 tbsp apple cider vinegar
1/2 cup walnuts, roughly chopped

In a large pan, water saute the sliced onions until soft (about 10 minutes). Continue to cook the onions on low heat, stirring every so often. Eventually the onions will caramelize - it took about 25 minutes for me.

In a large pot, steam the garlic for a few minutes in a little water. Add about 1/4-1/2 cup water and add the kale, gently steaming for about 3-5 minutes. Remove from heat.

Combine the steamed kale and caramelized onions, tossing to combine. Mix in 2 T apple cider vinegar and top with walnuts.

This turned out surprisingly good and was easy to make. Even the non-vegetable eaters had some of this. Will make this one again.

Green Beans Almondine (Dr. Fuhrman)

The recipe can be found here (second one down).

This was a simple recipe green bean recipe that I felt much better making over the usual canned mushroom soup fried onion concoction (I have never made that recipe!). I thought it would taste a bit more "almond-y" but it didn't. I even invested in the $8+ almond oil (found it at Whole Foods) and it didn't taste like almonds. I love green beans so I enjoyed it and I think most people at the table found it acceptable.

Raw Apple Crumble (McDougall newsletter)

This one was getting praise on the forums at Dr. Fuhrman which convinced me to try it. I made it as specified, but doubled the recipe. It made a TON! I covered an entire 9x13" glass pan. I used organic Granny Smith apples and liked that because of their tartness and ablity to hold up. I made this recipe the day before, saving the topping in another container. It held up fine in the fridge.

I think most people were weirded out by the "raw" aspect of the dessert but tried a little. The sugar-holic BF told me it was "too tart" and went for the pumpkin pie. Another relative said it was good and was surprised to hear there was NO sugar in it. It is only sweetened with dates.

I thought it was good, and tasted close to a real apple crumble, but not exactly. :) Still tasted "healthy" to me. But I much rather preferred eating this to the other sweets on the table.

Overall, even though I spent a few hours making all these dishes and they weren't as good as I hoped, I was pleased to have plenty to eat among the deep fried turkey, ribs, potatoes, bread, pumpkin pie, and other traditional dishes that were offered.

140.6

What an experience! The days leading up to the race were a mix of chaos, relaxing, and lots of waiting in line. With well over 2300 athletes preparing to compete at the Ironman on Sunday, there was a lot of energy in Tempe.

I won't bore you with the pre-race details so here is how the actual race went:

swim: I was told to start at the front because I'm a strong swimmer and by starting in the front, I wouldn't have to fight my way through people to pass them. However, I could see all of the men lining up at the front (they wore different colored caps than the women) and that made me nervous since they can be stupidly aggressive. I overheard one guy behind me say he was also told to start at the front because he is a fast swimmer but that he did that last year and STILL got swum over! That pretty much sealed the decision for me. A lot of people also start out way too fast, even though this is not a short distance (2.4 miles). They can't sustain that pace for more than 50 meters and in their excitement and madness, they swim over people.  Happens every time!

I started out in the middle when the gun went off and wasted some time fighting people to pass them as expected. At least I didn't get swum over though! There seemed to be no shortage of bodies and hands grabbing at me. It didn't clear up until almost the turn around buoy. I was feeling that my pacing was okay, but was looking for someone to draft off of. A woman swimmer passed me, and she looked like a good candidate so I stuck to her for a while. It was going pretty well and I could tell we were moving quickly until some kayaks signaled that we were off course and needed to turn right! Oops. I dropped her after that, wanting to navigate on my own. There wasn't much of the course left and I swam into the finish stairs easily. My swim time was just over an hour, which is okay, but I think I could have done just a little better. :)

bike: I started relatively easy since I knew it was going to be a long day. I felt fine the first hour, but shortly after started to have bad stomach cramps. I hadn't felt anything like this before and couldn't figure out how to make them go away. I finally ended up stopping at an aid station to stop cycling and see if they would stop. They didn't. Was my HR too high? I stayed there for almost 10 minutes (my HR definitely dropped by then) but they were still there. I had some food and decided to try spinning easy. I cycled slowly and started getting panicky because I didn't think I could finish 70+ miles feeling like this. I didn't want to pull out at mile 30-something but was feeling that this might be a possibility.

Thankfully, the cramps did eventually go away, but very slowly, and after mile 50! I felt okay for a while, but the cramps came back two more times later, although to a lesser degree. I have a feeling this had to do with my fueling plan (probably not enough calories).

The weather wasn't helpful either. Wind and rain made the conditions tough. But even though this made it harder, I preferred this over blazing heat. By the third loop, I was ready for the bike leg to be over. By then, I was finally feeling okay, which showed in my time, since my last bike loop was the fastest. My final bike leg time was probably 30 minutes longer than it should have been, which I am not pleased about. However, I didn't have to pull out and am glad my stomach finally cooperated!

run: I took my time in T2 to get ready for the run. I started the run off steady but felt surprisingly good! I felt fresh on the first half of the run, and kept having to tell myself to slow down, since I knew I had a long way to go.

I didn't have any "goal run time" in mind, but I did want to see if I could run the entire thing, no matter how slowly. I felt like I was doing well after the first 2 laps (~16 miles), and thought if I could feel as good as I was feeling on those first 2 laps, I'd be doing great! I thought about how the longest run I'd ever done in my life was 14 miles and that I was going to run 12 more than that. It seemed overwhelming so I pushed those thoughts away and just concentrated on getting to the next mile marker.

Around mile 17, the pounding really started to get to me. Most of the course is on concrete and my feet really started to HURT. It was weird because I didn't feel aerobically tired, but my feet really hurt! At one point, I thought I had a rock in my shoe, so I stopped to check my shoe for the rock. I couldn't find one, and accidentally touched my foot and found it must have been a blister. Ouch. I walked a little after that, which was also painful, and now my pace was a very sloooow walking pace. I decided it was going to hurt walking or running so I might as well run and get my pain over with.

Those last 6 miles were tough. I looked at my watch and was motivated that if I kept running, I could finish in less than 14 hours. That seemed like something to shoot for and gave me focus. It looked like I was going to make it once I reached mile 25, even though by this point, I was "running" super slowly! I finally reached the long finish chute and I saw my coach and other friends cheering me on. That was really awesome! My final run time was a little over 5 hours, which I'm happy about because I was able to run mostly the whole thing -- with the exception of walking though the aid stations and when I thought had blisters.

There was no better feeling than crossing that finish line and hearing, "You are an IRONMAN!" I was quite emotional afterward. I did it!

I trained for this, I'm ready

My good friend and coach says you need a mantra to get you through race day. I did the 98% -- I'm ready. I don't have any specific goal time in mind. I didn't want that pressure. I want to finish, and finish feeling as good as one can feel doing an Ironman.

We leave for Arizona today. Bring it!

Dream of Tomato Soup

I've been watching tasty videos from Chef A.J. and Julieanna Hever recently. Their excellent show, The Chef and the Dietitian, features recipes that are fully ETL-compliant and contain no oil, sugar, or salt.



I made their Dream of Tomato Soup tonight for dinner. It was really, really easy and tasted great. I'm still trying to get over my salt addiction and this really did satisfy my salty cravings.

Here is the recipe from the video:

Dream of Tomato Soup

1 lb tomatoes, cut in half
2 red bell peppers, roughly chopped
2-3 cloves garlic
fresh basil
1 lemon, juiced
3-4 sun-dried tomatoes, not in oil
1/2 tsp chipotle powder [I omitted because I didn't have any]
up to 1 cup hemp seeds, or other seeds/nuts (optional)

Blend all ingredients except the seeds in a high powered blender (e.g. Vitamix) until smooth.

Blend the seeds, if using, into the soup to make it creamy.

Makes approximately 6 cups.

I found that without the seeds/nuts, the soup seemed creamy enough and tasted fine. But a little fat increases the absorption of nutrients better, so I added about 1/2 cup of cashews since I didn't have any hemp seeds. This lightened the color and made the soup a little richer.

I used a Vitamix but it didn't heat the soup up enough to steam like in the video. I gently heated my serving after it was done, but it would probably still taste good at room temperature.

You know you're training for Ironman when ...

... your kitchen counter looks like this:

 ... your snack foods resemble this:

... and you look like this every Sunday afternoon!

2 more weeks!