outta mind outta site

I went to NYC and I found some great alcohol

Guys, don't let anybody ever tell you meeting people off the internet is a bad idea. Do people still say that nowadays? Like, how literally does anybody meet a person otherwise? Anyways, I've been meeting people off the internet since 1996 in a lot of different formats, and I'm IRL friends (that stands for internet relationship likely just kidding it stands for In Real Life) with so many of them now.

 

Last weekend I went to New York City with several internet friends who are now just friends (one I met through DCist; one I met through Tumblr; one I met through Google reader) and we had a grand time. Here are the things we did:

 

-Ate at a Mario Batali restaurant, where FRAN DRESCHER WAS ALSO EATING (she uploaded a youtube video of it, it was her birthday, she's 59 and let me tell you she looks good) and proceeded to get the theme song to "The Nanny" stuck in our head for hours

-Ate every smoked fish imaginable at Russ & Daughters where I also drank two 'breakfast' martinis by 11am

-Ate soup dumplings at Shanghai Cafe Deluxe in Chinatown

-Went to the Met and drank $15 glasses of wine on the roof (me in the museum: "Art, art, old artifacts, boring... OH MY GOD THEY HAVE A ROOFTOP BAR?! SEE YA")

 

And finally, we had a group fried chicken dinner (it was truly incredibly delicious) at Momofuku Nishi where I casually ordered a cocktail called the Penicillin which is now my favorite drink ever.

 

Turns out it's also everybody's favorite drink ever and it's not hard to find out how to recreate it via the internet, though a lot of the recipes vary. Here's what I did. 

 

-2 oz of a blended scotch (I know so little of scotch I had to ask another internet friend what this is; she said I could use Johnnie Walker basically so I did)

-3/4 oz fresh lemon juice

-3/4 oz a magical concoction, ginger-honey syrup. To make this syrup, take half a cup of water, half a cup of honey, and whisk them in a pot til blended over medium heat. Then take a big knob of ginger, peel and slice it, and dump it into the honey water. Bring it all to a boil, then turn down heat and let it simmer for 10 minutes. Let it cool, then strain the syrup into a jar, leaving out the ginger pieces.

 

Then do the cocktail-y thing which is shake it all up in a mixer with ice and strain it into a glass. Preferably one of those super huge ice cubes. Listen, I don't know anything about cocktails, but this is the first one that's made me want to buy a super huge ice cube tray and make huge ice with like, imported Arctic stream water, it's that good.

 

Other recipes said to serve it with an Islay scotch floated on top. I don't know what that sentence means or what Islay scotch is, but I did read a trick which is you can take the half ounce or whatever of the Islay and "float" it on top by pouring it onto the drink over the back of a spoon. I guess that does something cool? 

 

It's nowhere near as good as the original but I think it makes a very fine autumnal cocktail and you should make it and I will toast you virtually, or IRL.

 

How to have a delightful solo vacation in Charlottesville (without a car)

 

The post I wrote earlier this year about taking a solo vacation was noticed/reread by a couple of other friends this week, so I thought it would be a good time to revisit the subject. As timing would have it, I treated myself to a little solo vacation in Charlottesville just last week. Want to do the same for yourself? Here's an itinerary. (If you don't feel like reading through the narrative, I've compiled all the places I visited and dined towards the end.)

 

I find Charlottesville exceedingly walkable (if you're staying downtown nothing is really more than a 20-30 minute stroll away), but your mileage may very. And if you do want to visit wineries, Monticello, etc., you will need a vehicle. 

 

Thursday

Drive down midday with your coworkers for two days of business meetings. (Bonus, when you don't own a car of your own, this is a very convenient way to get down to Cville.) Go to Studio IX, a lovely coffee shop and coworking space in a former textile mill warehouse space. You can rent their conference rooms by the hour or day. Have enormously productive work meetings! 

 

For dinner, go to Oakhart Social (this is a really buzzed-about place, and it was solid, but we found it just pretty good, not great). That said, it's still pretty cute, the atmosphere and cocktails are awesome, and the pork belly and pizzas were good.

 

Wander to Downtown Mall, have several beers at Citizen Burger Bar. Too many several beers. Consider second dinner; don't. Walk back on a pleasant spring night to hotel.

 

Friday
Assuage work beer hangover with giant bagel from Bodo's on the corner (I went for an onion bagel with lox and cream cheese and a large lemonade. Magic). Go work back at Studio IX for a few more hours. Studio IX happens to be in a larger complex housing a lot of other cool things, including Brazos Tacos, a nice little taco joint. Get lunch there. Work a few more hours. Bye, Studio IX! Bye, work!

 

Go to your Airbnb in the neighborhood of Fifeville. Nap. 

 

Then treat yourself to a nice evening out: oysters, an IPA, and a custom cocktail at the excellent Public Fish & Oyster just up the street. Walk over to Belmont to have tapas and a margarita at Mas (order the shrimp, the dates, and the boquerones). Have a leisurely walk home through the Downtown Mall, where the free Fridays After Five concert series is taking place, with lots of folks and children milling about, listening to the music. Get a butter pecan ice cream cone at Chaps Ice Cream, where the same woman who served you ice cream 15 years ago when you went to UVa is still doling it out and calling you honey. 

 

Saturday

It's coffee time. You're going to get so much coffee. Head up to Sheepdog Coffee, in the new-to-you Graduate, a boutique hotel that's taken over the old Red Roof Inn space next to Mellow Mushroom. Get a La Colombe cold brew. Walk down towards the Downtown Mall because it's time for more coffee. Stop in Milli Coffee Roasters for another iced coffee.

YOU ARE VERY CAFFEINATED AT THIS POINT. It's also time to eat something, because you haven't technically had breakfast yet. Stop over at Marie Bette Bakery for two -- yes, two -- croissants -- one almond, and one ham and gruyere. Walk around a bit on the Corner, indulging in the easy rhythm of nostalgia -- oh, that's where -- oh this is different -- oh, that's the same -- and enjoy the sunshine, which feels like the rarest pleasure of all.

 

Saunter back home and decide you have time for a quick run around campus. Lace up shoes, wheeze around for three miles, surprised at the fact that Charlottesville is hilly. Did it seem so hilly when you were running through it at 21? No, no it did not. Run past the Rotunda -- still under construction, sad face -- and down the lawn. Run past your old house of senior year -- gosh, it's not even there anymore! -- and the houses of your other friends -- they're still there, and, shockingly, even more decrepit when you all lived there. College students have not gotten more discerning with time, it seems. 

 

Shower, change, and meet your friend right before a giant thunderstorm rolls through town for your most excellent meal yet, a beer, some bread, and a giant prosciutto pizza at the neapolitan pizzeria Lampo. Eat entire pizza by yourself while rain slams against window, then clears up as quickly as it came in.

 

It's time for a nap after that, then you meet your friends again at a lovely park and hang out with their kids for a while (you're full, from previous entire pizza, but they've bought delicious savory and sweet pies from the Pie Chest to snack on). You leave them and stroll up to the Livery for a beer on the downtown mall, then Tavern Grocery over on Main Street, which has this stunning atmosphere -- dark wood, gas lights, low ceilings, right out of Thomas Jefferson's time for a beer and some fried oysters, then sneak downstairs to this "secret" speakeasy you read about online (so, not really secret) called Lost Saint for a cocktail at the bar.

 

It's bedtime after that, then it's Sunday, and you have time for only one more breakfast. It's gonna be Ace Biscuit & Barbecue for a pork belly breakfast biscuit. You scarf it down, run to the nearby Bodo's for a bagel with walnut raisin cream cheese for the trip back, run to the Amtrak, hop on the 11:17 train back to Washington, DC, and google Charlottesville real estate the whole way home.

 

Where to go:
Breakfast:

Bodo's Bagels

Marie Bette

Ace Biscuit & Barbecue

Lunch or Dinner: 

Oakhart Social (modern American, very hipster-y atmosphere)

Mas (tapas)

Public Fish & Oyster

Brazos Tacos

Lampo (pizza)

 

A cooking delight

Remember, lo, a billion years ago, when I did my 30 while 30 project? (The tldr version for you who are newer: I listed 30 goals I wanted to accomplish while I was 30 - everything from learning to pitch a tent to paying off my student loans. I got most of them done!) One of my goals there was to teach myself to cook. That's right, I'd reached 30 and barely knew how to scramble an egg, boil a pot of water, or butter my own toast. I was a straight up disaster in the cooking front. 

In the years since then, mostly thanks to that 30 while 30 kickstart I've achieved what I would call "relatively decent cookdom." (TM) I'm not a great cook, but I'm not a bad one, and I can finally say I know my way around a kitchen. I even know how to make rice! (Seriously. I didn't know how to make rice at one point, so this IS an accomplishment.) I cooked everything from homemade pasta to fried chicken to scallops.

In December of 2015, when I was doing some reflecting on why the year had ended up so crappy, one of the things that popped to mind was that I had barely cooked at all. I, like many people, I think, take much solace in cooking. It is meditative; it makes you feel accomplished; it nourishes the body AND the soul (or whatever). So when I was making my list of goals for 2016, cooking once a week made the cut.

So far I've cooked several delicious things in the new year, and what I hoped was true: it's rewarding. It makes me feel happy. It keeps me occupied during my social media diet, hours I probably would spend otherwise scrolling endlessly through Facebook. To encourage the continuation of this, I blocked out Friday and Sunday on my google calendar to remind myself I have to cook one of those nights. It's worked so far, and I wanted to share the especially delicious things I've made in 2016. As I come across more good recipes, I'll share them here, too.

Dark chocolate salted oreo pie

This thing is like five ingredients and gloriously goopy and delicious. Definitely freeze it before you serve it though - I don't think I did for long enough and both the chocolate and caramel layers were really difficult to cut through and all the servings sort of ended up a mess. But they also all got eaten to the last crumb. I would definitely make it in a springform or a fluted pie tin where you can remove the sides, as that should make it a lot easier to cut and serve. I just did it in a regular pie pan and boy THAT was a mistake. WILL YOU EVER LEARN CATHERINE?

Roast chicken in milk

I'm a little of the mind that all decent roast chicken recipes are pretty good, but it's fun to experiment. This one creates a very moist, cinnamon-spiced roast chicken, with delicious accompanying golden lemony sauce to pour over it. Tip: I didn't brown it well enough up front (have you ever tried to brown a chicken in a small pot with a stick of butter using only a set of tongs and spoon up the chicken's butt? It's not easy) but I wish I'd tried harder because it would have made it taste even better.

West African peanut soup

Turns out if you mix broth, tomato paste, and a crap ton of peanut butter all together (adding in a lot of other stuff, of course) you get this tasty soup. It's nice and thick. I eat it over rice. Very easy and a good winter meal.

No-knead bread

I know I already raved about this in a different blog post and I KNOW all of you cool people have already made bread a billion times in your life but I NEVER HAD because making bread is like BEING A WIZARD and it seemed totally incomprehensibly difficult how exactly does a SOLID LOAF OF BREAD come out of some flour and water but it DOES and when it is done you're like I'M A FUCKING MAGICIAN and then you eat the entire loaf covered in butter and cheese and life is great. I'm going to make this every couple of weeks this year.

What recipes would you recommend to me for my 2016 cook once a week goal?  

The Complete Guide to Losing Weight in Your 30s

*Just kidding, this is just some random tips that have worked for me. I'm not a doctor. Also, don't sue me.

 

My dad is relatively fit. Into his 70s, he still runs a couple of times a week and tries to eat right. And back around when he was my age, he was quite a marathoner - he once ran one in around 3 hours 10 minutes or so. 

 

He wasn't always a runner, though. In fact, he didn't start until his 30s. It always stuck with me that he said he only started running for one reason: he gained 30 pounds basically the second he turned 30. 

 

I remembered that - and it started to happen for me, too. It still does. I weigh about 12 pounds more than I did in my mid-20s and have basically accepted that's just the way it's going to be. Your bodies change as you age, and what are you going to do about it? Except cry a lot, but that's like any other day of the week for me, so it's cool.

 

About a year ago, though, I weighed about 20 pounds more than I did in my mid-20s (I was weighing about 155-157 depending on the day). I decided to try to lose a little bit of weight, and I did it semi-successfully -- about 8 pounds. Right now I hover between 145 and 150. 

 

A few things helped me along the way, so I thought I would write them up here. Qualifying statement: I'm doing this in part because of winter malaise and holiday parties I'm creeping up on the scale again. I'm hoping writing down all these tactics will help get me back on track. 

 

Tip #1: Find a community

I don't really think it matters if it's Weight Watchers or a coworker, losing weight with someone else or a group of people is just easier. You can support each other and help each other stay motivated to work out and not eat that second entire pizza as was my wont. I used my Slack community and a channel we created there dedicated to helping us lose a few pounds, and I think it was the #1 reason we were all successful in shedding 5-10 pounds. We also all kept a shared Google Doc food journal, that recorded whatever we ate and drank every day, as well as any exercise we did. Which leads me to...

 

Tip #2: Keep a food and exercise journal

It sounds a little psycho, but I found it enormously helpful. It's not so you can write down, "I ate a head of lettuce and six gallons of sun tea today." It's so you start to be more mindful about what you're eating, and any patterns you may notice about when you eat and why you're eating it. Kelsey Miller over at Refinery29 has a good piece on this. (In fact, all of her writing on exercise, healthy eating, and body image is fantastic, and you should check her out.)

 

Tip #3: Buy a scale

I feel like anyone who's advising people to lose weight are like, DON'T BUY A SCALE JUST GO BY FIT OF YOUR CLOTHES. Which is also useful. And the number doesn't always matter or doesn't tell a real story (you could gain weight if you gain muscle, etc). But it mattered for me. I could tell when I was gaining 1-2 pounds over a week or two, or when I lost a pound or two. It was very motivating, and I weighed myself daily. I stopped for several months, but now that I've noticed myself creeping back up I'm doing it again and it's useful.

 

Tip #4: Stop drinking

This is the suckiest and hardest one. Like I said, and I will say again, and maybe several more times throughout this post: I AM NOT A DOCTOR OR MEDICAL PROFESSIONAL, IT'S ACTUALLY ALSO A MIRACLE I GOT A COLLEGE DEGREE, but I truly believe that the reason so many of us gain weight in our mid 30s is we keep drinking like we're 25 but our metabolism doesn't work as well. Booze has SO many calories. Also, then you get drunk. Then you eat pizza. Or pizzas. Then the next day you're hungover, so you get six burritos. Just me? Ok, maybe just one burrito. It just really spirals. I didn't quit drinking entirely, but I would just drink light beer, spritzers, whiskey and soda, or red wine, and yes, I did try to drink a lot less.

 

Tip #5: Cardio is doing nada for you

This tip comes despite my dad's success at losing weight via marathons. I'm a runner, but this is a fact: every time I've trained for a marathon (I've done three) I gained weight. And this is very common. Running does not often help with weight loss -- unless you're doing speed work or intervals where you're sprinting to your maximum effort several times in a row. If you're running a couple of times a week in hopes of losing weight, it's not going to work. If you're on the elliptical at the gym for 45 minutes at a stretch, it really won't help. I mean, it's good for you for sure. I'm sure it's good for your blood pressure or whatever? (AGAIN NOT A DOCTOR) and also your overall health. But if weight loss is your goal it is not your path. (OK well I'm going to modify this to say if you've NEVER worked out it might help with weight loss. I don't want to be too dismissive of it. But it does not work for me. And if it doesn't work for me, it probably works for nobody in the world.)

 

If you would like to stay on the treadmill or the elliptical, just introduce intervals into the workout: sprint (or ... ellipticize?) fast for 2 minutes, jog for 3, then repeat.

 

Tip #6: Your path is HIIT

HIIT means high-intensity interval training. Basically you go balls out til you think your lungs are going to explode for a few minutes, then you move back to the slower part of exercise, or rest for a minute, then ramp it up again. It is certainly dreadful while you're doing it, but you can usually work out for less time and see more effects. And there's tons of HIIT YouTube videos you can just do at home for free that don't require any equipment. My friend recommended this woman's HIIT workout videos.

 

Tip #7: Paleo may be a stupid ass diet, but it works for weight loss

There was one time a few years ago where I went paleo (basically only ate meat, veggies and fruit) for a month and I dropped like 8 pounds in two weeks. The reasoning behind "paleo" is stupid, nobody knows how our ancestors ate, and they probably didn't eat that healthy. Also it's like basically a weird cult. But cutting out booze, dairy, wheat and sugar is pretty effective. Even if you don't go 100% paleo, eating a little bit more in that direction helps with weight loss. An example? Scrambled eggs and avocado for breakfast. Snacks? Carrots, nuts, fruits throughout the day. Lunch or dinner? Fish, meat, salads. It's not unhealthy at all, and technically when you're paleo you eat as much as you want whenever you're hungry, as long as it's not dairy, grains or sugar. 

 

Tip #8: Consider a day of fasting

This is probably my most cray-sounding tip but it's effective and also the health benefits of intermittent fasting are more documented now. This is what I did - pick a day of week. When you wake up, just don't eat until like 5pm (or eat pretty light, some nuts, a can of tuna, an apple). That's it. Intermittent fasting done. Boom. Once a week. It's not that hard. I hate putting this tip in here because I think it will make some of you think I'm not right in the head, but it's a thing with other potential health benefits other than weight loss.

 

And that's it! A combo of any or all of the above tips should ideally be helpful in getting you to shed a few pounds. I'd love to hear your tips - put them in the comments. And good luck -- I'm off to eat a pizza and wallow in shame and regret, aka just another Friday.

Catherine Cooks: Wonton Soup

Way back in the annals of 2010, when I was completing my 30 whil 30 challenge, one of my most favorite and most rewarding challenges was teaching myself to cook, and attempting at least one new recipe a week. Forcing myself to cook -- anything, really, whether it was a simple risotto or a complicated pork dish -- over and over again really gave me confidence in the kitchen that had long been lacking.

Unfortunately, in the past year or so I've resorted to dining way too much at the Whole Foods salad bar, or out at restaurants with friends (nothing wrong with that! Friends and restaurants are great). But I've lost the cooking mojo and momentum, and really miss how fulfilling it was. So one of my upcoming goals for 2013 will be to get back on the cook-one-recipe-a-week bandwagon. And I decided to get started early on the process. Last night I was feeling run-down and cold, and was about to order some soup and ma-pa tofu, but then was like, CATHERINE. NO. YOU ARE CAPABLE OF COOKING. So I found a recipe for a homemade wonton soup and made it, and it was delicious.

Recipe is here. Only adjustments I would make that if you are using store-bought boxed chicken broth (as I was) you need to amp up the flavor, so I added some garlic, ginger slices, salt and Chinese five-powder spice and simmered that with the broth. Also, you should boil the dumplings in water for 5 minutes first, then put into the simmering/hot broth (this saves the broth from getting completely starchy and cloudy).

The outcome. Perfect for a cold, wintry November Sunday night.

I still remember the password to this here blog!

And that's a pretty amazing thing.

Well, three months after I stated my goals for 2012, I figured it'd be worth doing a check-in, and also to let you know a bit about what's going on in my sexy, thrilling, exciting life. So sexy and thrilling I don't blog anymore!

Okay, it's not that sexy or thrilling. In fact I think I act more like a 90-year-old lady than ever. But it's all pretty great, though. What have I been up to? (...digging through Facebook timeline to aid my addled memory...)

January:

-I got an iPhone! What! I gave up my not-so-beloved Droid and quickly became the most obsessed user of Instragram. That app is something magic.
-I turned 32! Yeah for ambivalent ages that don't really signify anything.
-I continued to run quite a lot and threw in some speedwork and track workouts to try to get faster.
-And I also started marathon training for a spring marathon at the start of May.
-Um... that's it! Oh, I quit drinking for a month at the end of January...

February:
-...and continued to quit drinking through most of February. Guys, I made it 29 days without alcohol! I don't know quite how I did it. It wasn't as hard as I thought it would be, either. Tips on doing this:

• Start after a month of utter debauchery with your birthday, your boyfriend's birthday, all your friends' birthdays, your dear friend leaving for France forever and you gotta party all the time, ugh booze. Trust me, you won't feel like drinking for a month after that, either.
• Have a special present waiting for you at the end. In my case, that was a trip to Mexico with Zach, where I knew I could drink all the beer. Made waiting that much easier.
• Sodastream USA! Used this little fizzy guy a lot.
• Club soda and ginger ale, while out at bars, are your best friends.
• Just tell everybody what you're up to straight away at the beginning of the evening and then you're held to it that night.
• Track progress. I love using socialworkout.com and checking off each day booze-free and seeing them tally up was very motivating.

-What else? Oh yeah, then I went to Mexico and drank all the beer. Seriously, I turned into a can of Negro Modelo. Zach and I booked a, dare say I, fabulous vacation to an all-inclusive resort just north of Tulum. It was the Hotel Catalonia Royal Tulum and it was wonderful. I'd never done an all-inclusive resort thing before and worried it would be terrible and cheesy. I think some must be, but this one was adult-only, very grown-up, had excellent food, and one of the most beautiful beaches I'd ever been on. We read, snorkeled, swam, drank, napped and did that on repeat for four days. One day, we got pina coladas on the beach at 11am, because, why not? Mexico! A few photos.

March:
-I didn't quite quit drinking entirely post-Mexico (when I needed another cleanse) but I would say the sober month changed my relationship with alcohol a bit. To be fair, I was already headed down a path of not drinking as much as I used to (which has got to be pretty normal as you enter your 30s). Not because I don't still think beer's awesome, but because I get hungover from 2 beers and the pain and lost time due to even a minor hangover was not worth it anymore, I'd decided. Plus my body is taking aging hard enough and I don't need need to help out its breaking-down-process at all.

Anyways, so I decided at the start of March, from now on, I'm going to try to limit my drinking a certain amount. No more than 3 drinks in one sitting (because 4 drinks in one sitting for ladies is considered binge drinking by the CDC); at least 2 days a week without any booze whatsover; and ideally no more than 7-10 drinks a week total. Definitely exceptions will be made for special ocassions, but hopefully I can stick to that plan (which I still track on socialworkout.com).

-I also ran the Rock 'n Roll Half Marathon March 17 and came away with a new personal record of 1:43:57! Hooray. Sadly, that does not count as beating my brother in a half marathon (one of my 2012 goals) - his best time on that course is 1:39. Damn those fast legs of his. But I have the rest of the year to try another half.

-I continued to run a lot, in hopes of qualifying for the Boston Marathon at some point this year. Um, I think I blogged before that I thought quitting booze for a month would be harder than qualifying for the Boston Marathon. Um, I think I was wrong. Running that fast for that long is going to be real hard. If I want to make it happen (it being running a marathon in under 3:35), my (maximum) pace per mile has got to be about 8:10. I can run that pace for a half marathon (my pace on my half was 7:50), but twice that long is a whole different story.

I ran my first 20-miler this past Saturday and I felt pretty strong and hit my goal paces, but am trying to be kind to myself and recalibrate my expectations for the May marathon. If I don't hit 3:35 this May, I won't be disappointed in myself. I'll just work harder for a fall marathon. After beating myself with a cat o' nine tails, that is.

 -I've also obnoxiously gotten into my diet and into juicing this month, as well. Zach was out of town for 10 days this month on a work trip, and what did I do while he was gone? Did I party to relive my days of boozy singlehood? No, I juiced, like, obessively. And then ran a lot. And I made cauliflower rice. Then went to bed at 10pm every night. WHAT IS GOING ON. I am kind of confused as to what's going on with me in terms of my interest in health. I've never been uber unhealthy, but I've never been very healthy, either, despite being relatively slim much of my life. I drank a lot. I smoked occasionally. I ate crap. I sat on the couch for long periods of time.A regular day's food for me would be: coffee, bagel, pasta, pasta, ice cream.

Now, out of nowhere, I have a very active interest in my health and particularly what food I put in my mouth. Is this just something that happens when you hit your early 30s, like how when you turn 50 or 60, you get a weird interest in your family tree and start documenting all of your ancestors? (That's not just my family, right?) Anyways, it's interesting and I can't quite explain why I'm so into it. I'm trying to eat 5-10 fruits and veggies a day as well as juice every morning as well as cut out most refined foods and wheat and processed sugar. It might be comforting thinking that with somebody of a family history of breast cancer, I can take an active control and role in my health in terms of prevention.

Anyways... what else? I've kept up pretty well with my other 2012 goals. I've been hiking each month. I'm listening to two albums a month (Tanlines is my favorite). Guys, I WENT TO THE DENTIST! Two cavities and need a new crown. Not great, but for not having gone to the dentist in about 4 years, I'll take it.

And most exciting of all, I just booked a trip to Glacier National Park in August! And I'm dragging along Susan and Tracey. It'll be a fantastic trip of girlfriends gone wild amongst the glaciers. Glaciers, please stick around for the next few months till I can see you.

I think that is a long and windy recap of what I've been up to the past three months. Et tu?

My other dorky obession of late

You can really tell I'm getting older because all I love talking about lately is my exercise and my diet.

This hasn't really held recently because I was eating pasta like nobody's business for 1.5 weeks before the marathon, but I've semi-transitioned to what I would disgustedly call a "paleo" diet for the past few months and I love it. I say "disgustedly" because I'm not trying to eat like a cavemen (not that anybody can really know that anyways) and sometimes the paleo people are cuhraaaazy and also recommend you eat 12 pounds of meat and 36 eggs every three days, and no.

But what I have done is try my best to cut out all processed foods and flour/refined sugars as well as most dairy. It's not as hard as a I thought. A sample diet:

Breakfast: Smoothie, with frozen fruit, spinah or kale, a banana, sometimes some canned pumpkin, flax seeds, almond milk, a raw egg.

Snack: Nuts of some sort, or baby carrots, or an apple.

Lunch: Some sort of meat pattie - a burger, or turkey burger. Today I had some sort of delicious chicken/pork premade pattie I picked up from the butcher counter at Whole Foods. This is usually accompanied by an avocado, maybe a tomato, some spinach, another veggie (I buy frozen veggies in bulk now because no matter what I do, all the fresh produce I seem to buy seems to spoil no matter how fast I eat it).

Snack: Lara bar

Dinner: Pretty much a variation on lunch, maybe fish. Occasionally I'll have couscous or brown rice and there's usually some red wine in there. Maybe a couple cans of tuna over spinach with some hardboiled eggs.

Dessert: Coconut ice cream or dark chocolate.

I like it. I'm not a nazi about it, when I go out to eat at restaurants, or wherever, there's still a good chance I'll eat some bread or pasta or whatever. But I try to minimize it.

Benefits - I have better energy, no weirdo carb cravings, a better mood in general. Also feel slimmer/leaner.

Drawbacks: I found I still need carbs for the kind of energy that helps me with long-distance running. I figure I'll just incorporate those in the 1-2 weeks before a race to help me out.

The best part about it is it really makes me look at the food I've been consuming, even stuff that touts itself as healthy. Like in your typical granola bar, here are the ingredients:

Whole Grain Rolled Oats, Sugar, Canola Oil, Crisp Rice With Soy Protein (Rice Flour, Soy Protein Concentrate, Sugar, Malt, Salt), Pecan Pieces, High Fructose Corn Syrup, Brown Sugar Syrup, Salt, Soy Lecithin, Baking Soda, Natural Flavor, Walnut Flour, Almond Flour, Hazelnut Flour, Peanut Flour.

Not terrible, but not a lot of nutritional value, and certainly nobody wants the nasty high fructose corn syrup.

Anyway, my overall general rule for my food intake these days: only eat stuff that a) grew in the earth b) whose entire list of ingredients are visible to the naked eye (ie a Lara Pecan Pie bar has in it: dates, almonds, pecans). I also eat whenever I'm hungry, as long as it's food that meets those rules. So I'm never hungry!

Sounds pretty good to me.

Things I Am Doing

You know what I miss most about this space? Writing about  my cooking. Guys, I am now a cooking fiend. I mean, I'm no Julia Child, but the past 1.5 years or so of just trying -- anything -- in the kitchen has rewarded me in myriad ways. I'm far more confident in my cooking. I make shit up, which is something I never dared do before. I tackle roasts, homemade pasta, sauces of all sorts. Like I said, nobody's going to pin a #1 Gourmet pin on my lapel, but I like it. I'm cooking lots. I should be posting the results here, because they're pretty good, and I'd like to access them later, but I'm a bit lazy in the posting lately, if you hadn't noticed. Reminder to self: Don't ever doubt Marcella Hazan, especially not her bolognese recipe with fresh tagliatelle. What. Up.

• What else? Well, I've finally tackled an item on my 30 while 3...1 list that had been important to me: I'm volunteering. I tutor at a local elementary school literacy and math program. And though my 8-year-old tutee has made it pretty clear he thinks I'm a mean and relentless hard-ass, it's very rewarding and he's improving. I think.

• Oh yeah. We went to Italy. It was, you know, whatever, pretty fine and stuff:

• A dear friend who I've known since I was 12 had her baby, and I saw him for the first time this weekend. She's the first "old" friend of mine to reproduce. Newborns are cute and resemble giant burritos when swaddled. They cry a lot, but nobody seems to mind due to aforementioned cuteness... except maybe the parents who haven't achieved REM cycle sleep in 4 weeks.

• A few trips are in the planning for this summer - Charlottesville, Michigan and Wyoming. The latter two are for giganto family reunions. I'll finally be able to meet all 16 of Z's aunts and uncles... no joke. As for Wyoming (August), I'd love to tack on a few days there after we spend a family reunion weekend in Laramie, but am not quite sure what to do that's within a half a day driving distance (Yellowstone, regrettably, is not). Any ideas, Wyomingites?

• I've become disturbingly obsessed with higher-end make up and beauty products. Guys, this is not a habit you want to get into. Kiehl's products make me happy, and make my wallet empty. Trips to Sephora produce full lashes and rosy cheeks, but disappearing bank statements. Stick to CVS. (Oh, especially stick to those Sally Hansen sticker manicure things - they're definitely one drugstore thing that is super rad, I can attest. And vinegar on your hair still works wonders.)

I think that's it for now. Spring in DC is really quite lovely, and it's been a wonderful and happy season so far. So glad to be out of the winter doldrums and on the way to...hellish humidity? Ah well. As long as there's sunshine involved, I'll take it.

Catherine Learns to Cook: Recipe #28: Sweet Potato Ravioli in Cheese Broth

Last June Zach and I went to Brooklyn for the weekend. He'd lived there a few years before moving to DC and took me to one of his favorite spots, Frankie's in Carroll Gardens. I lucked out when ordering the sweet potato ravioli in cheese broth. It was enticing - sweet, savory, spicy, lots of other adjectives that start with S, etc - and I thought I hadn't had pasta so good since the last time I was in Italy, and despaired of only ever having it every time I went up to Brooklyn.

But just days later, my prapers were answered, and Serious Eats posted the recipe to the very dish I was obsessing over! You know what was funny? The ravioli was made with WONTON wrappers!

I set out a few weeks ago to recreate the dish and found it relatively easy for such a complex-tasting meal. It does require several steps, as well as finding wonton wrappers (I could only find egg roll wrappers at Whole Foods, which, when cut to circular sizes with a can, seemed to work), but it's well worth it. And the cheese broth - so simple, so delicious. Who knew adding a parmesan rind to some simmering water would end up so tasty? The one caveat is that making the ravioli, stuffing the wrapper, sealing it, etc etc, takes absolutely forever, so prepare some time. However, you can make these ahead of time and freeze them for later, too.

 

Anyways, in short, very recommended. You make it in your kitchen and end up with a dish that tastes like it came out of a really great restaurant. Which, I guess, it does! You can find the full recipe here.

 

Catherine Learns to Cook: Recipe #27: Pork Ragu with Homemade Pasta

Wondering what this is? As part of a list of 30 goals I want to accomplish while I'm 30, I promised that I would cook one recipe a week. You can see the list of recipes so far here.

Woo! I'm cooking again! Sunday, blessed Sunday. This past Sunday I had literally nothing to do except a quick brunch with my family. This meant two things: I could BUY ALL THE THINGS at the Bloomingdale Farmers Market, and I had several hours of uninterrupted time to cook to my heart's content. So I chose a rather involved recipe: This Macheesmo recipe for pork ragu. Not content with cooking something that took 6 hours, I decided to make homemade tagliatelle to accompany it. (Here's my original post on making fresh pasta; the recipe and method are the same as I used there.)

The result? 

It was mindblowingly good. And really, though the recipe DOES take several hours, it's mostly unattended simmering, so it's pretty easy. One thing of note: my ragu took far less time than Macheesmo's to finish simmering. So just keep a close eye on it, and look out for when the liquid has finish mostly reducing. But otherwise: perfection. Kriston and Lana came over to try it out and we couldn't stop stuffing our faces. Recommended!

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Catherine Learns to Cook: Recipe #26: Lamb Kebabs with Mint Cilantro Pesto

Wondering what this is? As part of a list of 30 goals I want to accomplish while I'm 30, I promised that I would cook one recipe a week. You can see the list of recipes so far here.

Short version: These were quite good, but as I did them on a grill pan, instead of a real grill, they were blastedly hard to actually properly grill all the way through. I cooked the meat properly, but the veggies never got quite nicely grilled. Would recommend, but only over an open flame. Recipe here.

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Orange Polenta Cake with Vanilla-Scented Blackberry Plum Compote

It's been a while since I baked anything, what with all this ever-loving never-ending cooking I'm doing in the kitchen these days. But I knew I was going to be able to go to the Bloomingdale Farmers Market this morning for the first time in ages and ages, and I knew peaches and blackberries and plums and a million other amazing fruits were going to be calling my name, and I was determined to bake something delicious out of them.

I hit it on the nose with this cake. It's incredibly easy and a wonderful way to incorporate fresh fruit into a dessert. It's nice and spongy, with just a hint of orange, and the blackberries and plums are so, so magnificent. The recipe says to serve it with buttermilk ice cream, but the thought of making homemade ice cream in addition to everything else I cooked today was just exhausting, so I served it with a simple whipped cream. 

Catherine Learns to Cook: Recipe #25: Pancetta-Wrapped Peaches with Basil

Wondering what this is? As part of a list of 30 goals I want to accomplish while I'm 30, I promised that I would cook one recipe a week. You can see the list of recipes so far here.

Hey, guess what? I didn't use a recipe for this! I read it in some magazine but then lost the recipe so decided to just forge ahead on my own! Sure, it has all of three ingredients, but that's progress, right? 

Basically you take some amazing peaches from Reid's Orchard at the Bloomingdale Farmers Market, put a little salt and pepper on them, layer a basil leaf on top, wrap in pancetta, and cook in some olive oil for a few minutes on each side.

As you can see the first attempt did not go so swimmingly: 

Don't get me wrong; they still tasted great. It was just messy. But once I realized I just need to cut the peach wedges in half, all was PEACHY! HAHA! Ahem.

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Catherine Learns to Cook: Recipe #24: Fried Chicken and Corn+Zucchini+Cilantro Salad

Wondering what this is? As part of a list of 30 goals I want to accomplish while I'm 30, I promised that I would cook one recipe a week. You can see the list of recipes so far here.

Another week, another attempt to make one of my boyfriend-in-absentia's favorite foods. I tell myself I'm trying to get a handle on these recipes so I can have them perfected by the time he gets back from his EPIC WORK TRIP, and he gets excited by that fact, but probably the truth is that I'm so lazy I'll only ever make all of these once. Plus, frying stuff is splatter-y. Burning terror droplets of oil splatter-y.

Regardless! I figured that fried chicken was a good thing to try out, never having made it before. And it seemed slightly intimidating, and I'm trying to get over Fear of Intimidating Recipes. It's a chronic condition, you know.

Luckily, everything was simplified by this easy-peasy recipe over at the Bitten Word. The basics: If you can, take your pieces of chicken and soak them in saltwater overnight (we're talking like a half a cup to 4 quarts of salt. Go crazy). I only had 2-3 hours, so that's what I did. 

Then have a bowl filled with milk, and one filled with flour/salt/pepper (and probably anything else you'd like to throw in there for flavor). Dip chicken in milk, dredge in flour. Repeat.

The recipe calls for a chicken cut up into 8 pieces, but I used drumsticks because, well, I was in Whole Foods, and I just try to get in and out of that place as quickly as possible, and well, all these drumsticks bundled up looked like a whole chicken I KNOW I'M AN IDIOT OKAY also I can't read.

The Bitten Word recipe doesn't say this, but elsewhere on the internet I read that you should let the chicken rest after it's dredged so the coating has time to set. That's what those drumsticks up there are doing, about 15-30 minutes.

Then pour about an inch of vegetable oil in your cast iron skillet. Heat it up, medium high. Place the chicken bits in there (do it in batches so there's plenty of space for all the pieces and they're not crammed in there). Fry 7-8 minutes on one side; flip and do the same on the other side. Use tongs. Dodge splatter-y oil bullets. Then put on a wire rack over a baking sheet to cool/rest/drip off extra grease.

The end result?

Tastiness. For good measure, I also made this zucchini and corn salad, also from the Bitten Word. Super easy and very of the season.

This all resulted in four very happy lady guests, who were over to help me declutter my apartment (another 30 while 30 goal). But that's another post for another time...

This happens to me a lot

I'm sorry, I know it's new lowests of lows when I make a blog post out of somebody else's Facebook status updates, but I just wanted to explain to the world this: The below is very often how I end up eating an entire ball of mozzarella myself. Or at least justifying it to myself.

These are from my friend Matt:

HOW THE HELL DO YOU STORE MOZZARELLA?

Oh what?! What kind of stupid foodstuff needs to be stored in liquid? How high maintenance does it want to be? I don't have enough to cover it with the juice from the packet now! Can I substitute it with something else?

I DIDN'T KNOW I NEEDED THE LIQUID! I DISPENSED WITH THE LIQUID! THIS IS RIDICULOUS! I WANT CHEESE, NOT LIQUID! WHO CAME UP WITH THIS?!

FORGET IT! I'VE JUST EATEN IT ALL NOW AND I FEEL REALLY SICK. THIS REALLY IS THE MOST NONSENSICAL FOODSTUFF EVER. THIS IS THE LAST TIME I STEAL FOOD FROM MARK AND JO'S FRIDGE WHILE THEY'RE ON HOLIDAY. THE LAST TIME!

Catherine Learns to Cook: Recipe #23: Lamb Burgers Stuffed with Mint and Feta + Grilled Tomatoes

Wondering what this is? As part of a list of 30 goals I want to accomplish while I'm 30, I promised that I would cook one recipe a week. You can see the list of recipes so far here.

A few weeks ago after a long Saturday training run, we were sitting around zonked watching food shows and infomercials. (Seriously, you would not believe the crap we zone out to after being exhausted by these runs. One day, we watched the entirety of the Brady Bunch Movie [although, that is pretty funny, all said and done...] and the other day an entire informercial about ZUMBA! ZUMBA ZUMBA ZUMBA! Has anybody else seen this REVOLUTIONARY DANCING WORKOUT?). One episode that came on was Martha Stewart's Everyday Food, and it was all devoted to grilling -- but indoors, using a grill pan.

A grill pan?! As somebody who's never owned her own grill, and probably never will, and is entirely too lazy to do that whole...thing...with the coals and the fire and whatnot, this appealed to me enormously. So I went out and bought a $20 grill pan at Macy's. And tonight I tested it out with these lamb burgers and grilled tomatoes. The result?

All very tasty. Now, I really do think the tomatoes would have been better if grilled on a proper grill, but I was nevertheless happy with the result. And the burgers were divine. How could they not be? They were stuffed with cheese.

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Catherine Learns to Cook: Recipe #22: Shredded Pork Shoulder

Wondering what this is? As part of a list of 30 goals I want to accomplish while I'm 30, I promised that I would cook one recipe a week. You can see the list of recipes so far here.

One of my favorite things to eat in this city is the pork shoulder on a garlic trencher at Bar Pilar. Every time Zach and I go there we order it without fail (usually whatever variation of mushrooms they have, too) and every time, without doubt, it makes our eyes roll back in our heads, it's so good.

Zach left today for a 1-2 month stint for work out in California, and I figured since I'm going to have a lot of time coming up, I should try to perfect the elusive Bar Pilar pork shoulder. I started out with this Kitchn recipe, and holy moly. It was no Bar Pilar version (the flavoring was totally different, which I knew going in) but it ruled my world anyways. Photos and directions below.

I suppose I could have plated this a bit better.

Weekend Report: Art, crabs, and a lot of naked Tilda Swinton

I haven't done a weekend report in forever! And my weekends have been quite full and fun. I've just been utterly lazy. But I had a particularly good weekend this past one, so why not share? AND TALK ABOUT SO MUCH NAKED TILDA SWINTON? 

Friday night: Charles took me to the orchestra! We swung by his parents' place in Arlington and had a beer with his wonderful mom, whom I hadn't seen in forever. Then we grabbed a tasty Salvadorian dinner at La Union up the street, and then it was off to Wolf Trap for orchestral/operatic renditions of music inspired by Romeo & Juliet. It was lovely and we were in literally the very first row of the pit. I have never been covered by so much opera singer spit ever in my life.

Catherine Learns to Cook: Recipe #21: Pan-Seared Pork with Potatoes and Lemon

Wondering what this is? As part of a list of 30 goals I want to accomplish while I'm 30, I promised that I would cook one recipe a week. You can see the list of recipes so far here.

I'm going to do you a favor and tell you right off the bat about this Martha Stewart recipe: if you're looking for a completely average yet totally easy to put together dinner, make this. It won't blow your mind, but you won't be retching while eating it, either. You may even go back for seconds because, hey, it's food, and it's there. And if that isn't a ringing endorsement for a recipe, I don't know what is!

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Catherine Learns to Cook: Recipe #20: Fusilli With Zucchini and Lamb Sausage

Wondering what this is? As part of a list of 30 goals I want to accomplish while I'm 30, I promised that I would cook one recipe a week. You can see the list of recipes so far here.

The reason for cooking this recipe came about as many do during this time of year, I suspect: Way too many fucking squashes and zucchinis in my house. In a desperate move to get rid of them, I found this recipe, which seemed promising and relatively easy. And it was relatively easy -- but the result? Kind of meh. Turns out dumping a bunch of zucchini and unseasoned lamb all together and stirring it in with a bunch of pasta does not a flavorful meal make. You'd be astounded if I told you the amount of salt I dumped into this thing. Nevertheless, not terrible, just not outstanding.

See? Even the photo makes it look a bit bland:

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