Marathon Training Monday: Eventbrite and my Favorite Races

So, something super cool happened recently.  Eventbrite inspired me to chat about some of my favorite races.  Eventbrite is the largest self-service ticketing platform.  You can use them to create your own events!  Just go to their Event Planning and Management page and sign up!  They help you get organized and get everything you need to get your event planned and make it happen!

Races are obviously some of my favorite events.  One of my favorite races of all time was the Chicago Marathon.  It is such a terrific event and although I was super nervous to be running a marathon, the event was so well run that it made a lot of my anxieties go away and I could just focus on being there and running well.  I felt like I just had to talk about this phenomenal race today because I was just accepted through the lottery system to run it for my THIRD time!

To prepare for a marathon, I start the week before.  I drink plenty of water to stay hydrated, I eat normally (I don't try anything new), and I wear comfortable footwear.  I start to lay out everything that I will need for race day a few days in advance.  This includes my running outfit, but also my energy gus, sunscreen, chapstick, advil and whatever else I feel like I may need.  Then, I make a reservation at an Italian restaurant for the night before so I can get that typical carb-loading dinner in.  Basically, I have everything planned out and ready to go.  The Chicago Marathon itself is very much the same way.  They have everything super organized and well planned.  When you get there crazy early in the morning and you are feeling nervous, there are plenty of volunteers and signs helping you find your way.  They also have tons of water and gatorade, supplies you may need, and tents for you to change in just in case you need that space.  They are playing music and the overall atmosphere is just inspiring.  This is what really gets me into running and makes me want to run more!

Eventbrite is really great because you can create your own events and they support you by helping with all the logistics as well as the web page.  If I were to create an event, I would want it to embody the same sort of spirit as well as organization as the Chicago Marathon.  Maybe one day I will host my own event!

Guest Blogger! A story of Fresh Pasta, Eggplant Involtini and Braised Chicken Thighs

My good friend, Shantanu, is an excellent chef. Last Friday, he invited us over for dinner because he "felt like making fresh pasta." I was super excited about this and I readily agreed to come over and help. We made:

• Fresh Pasta
• Eggplant Involtini
• Braised Chicken Thighs

Sigh...it was a lovely meal and although it wasn't ready for 2 hours, it was a super fun night with some great friends and amazing food. So, without further ado, here is Shantanu:

Full disclosure: I’m the reason we didn’t have dinner ready until 9:30 last Friday, but to be fair, it was a weeknight, dinner was delicious, and I had a food craving to take care of.

Food cravings are definitely a thing, one that I experience way too often. Usually, it’s something that’s full of grease and flour, of minimal nutritional value, and almost always involve fried chicken. This time though, while being a bit heavy on the carbs, the food I was craving was just indulgent enough to be worth all the extra calories. And then after a long week of the chicago cold, nothing really warms you up like a bowl of fresh, homemade pasta.

Fresh pasta is one of those foods that’s incredibly simple, it’s four ingredients including the water to boil it in and some salt for seasoning, and yet so eye opening. How making a giant mess with flour and eggs leads to flowing, delicate strands, with just the right amount of bounce to each bite is almost magical (although really, it’s more science, but I’m done with work for the week and don’t have to do any more science until Monday).

While I very well could have just sauteed some shallots, garlic, red chili flakes, and tomatoes in olive oil and tossed in batch after boiled batch of freshly cut spaghetti, cracked open a beer and called it a night, pasta is more fun to share with friends. Especially friend’s that I’d planned to make dinner for but haven’t gotten around to it. Double-especially when one’s a vegetarian and you have the perfect reason to make a vegetarian meal.

As often as I cook for friends, I rarely have to cook for vegetarians. I’d always felt a bit of pity for Brian, often times the vegetarian part is merely a collection of side dishes, or is presented as the “option” while meat is the focus of the dish. Therefore, I decided to make this meal a vegetarian meal, that happens to have a meat option, because if you don’t some of your non vegetarian friends will text you asking if they can bring a steak for you to make for them. To be fair, I was flattered, because I can make a pretty mean steak.

If there was a vegetable equivalent of flank steak, I’d say it’s the eggplant. It responds well to being heavily salted, can be grilled, or rolled and stuffed, and has a nice meaty quality to it. I’d also say both are equally nutritious, although a bavette might be more nutrition for your soul whilst eggplant is actually nutritious. One of my favorite ways to prepare eggplant that goes well with pasta, while avoiding breading and frying it, is to make eggplant involtini.

Since I did have to have a meat option, I went with the foolproof chicken thighs. Because I planned to cook them sous vide, I started preparing those first. I was hoping to get them into the water bath before everyone arrived, but sadly Brian had to witness me deboning, stuffing the thighs with rosemary and basil, and folding them tightly in the skin. 

Once vacuum sealed, they still look pretty unappetizing; if he had any doubts about being vegetarian, I think they were gone at that point.

Once that was started, I could focus on the next longest item to prepare, the pasta dough. Preparing the dough itself is quite quick, however I could use time productively to drink wine and eat some cheese, which has the side benefit of letting the dough relax and develop some gluten. To make the dough, I heavily flour my counter (and my floor, and my apron) and pour about two cups of flour in a mound, making a crater in the middle large enough for four egg yolks and two whole eggs. Swirling the yolks and whites around brings the eggs together, and slowly pulls in more and more flour. The swirling goes on until the liquid resembles more of a batter, at which point flour can be added in a bit more aggresively, and once it comes together, the kneading can begin. I’m not much of a baker, but to knead my dough I do a simple fold, push, and quarter-turn. Fold, push, quarter-turn; fold, push, quarter-turn. This goes on, until the dough feels like the sticky part of a post-it, at this stage it’s almost done, so I let Jodie handle the kneading while I went off to make some tomato sauce. Incorporate a bit more flour until the dough is just tacky, and put aside. To store the dough, I wrap in plastic wrap and set on the cleanest part of the counter

With the dough done, I got the guests going to make the filling. Some lemon zest, ricotta cheese, and fresh basil all came together in what could make a pretty decent dip on it’s own. But then after I fried up the eggplants a little to soften them, they got stuffed with the cheese and placed in a pan with the tomato sauce, with some more drizzled on top and fresh mozzarella slices to melt all over them, and got tossed into a hot oven.

Meanwhile, I consumed enough wine and cheese for a bit so it was time to roll out the pasta. Again, flour absolutely everything and cut the dough into quarters. I slowly run it through the machine at the widest setting, tri fold, rotate, and pass through again. I do this a few times, helping knead the dough, developing it a bit before stretching it out. As the rollers get closer, the pasta gets longer, eventually ready to be cut into linguine. Arrange in little nests after it’s cut, and then toss them into boiling water.

While getting the water boiling, I sauteed some garlic and red chili flakes in olive oil, keeping it warm. Once the pasta is cooked, taking only a few minutes, I toss it into the pan with a nice ladleful of starchy pasta water, helping to bind the now flavored oil to the noodles.

Last thing to be finished off is the chicken, which I pulled out of the vacuum bags, perfectly cooked, and quickly seared it off, with a bit of help from the searzall. True fact: almost everything is improved by a blast with the searzall.

And at that point, I think we were all had enough wine and were hungry enough to not give much of a damn about plating, and just dove in. It came out pretty great, hopefully the rest of the crew thought so as well! And if it wasn’t, I don’t think Jodie will ever let me post on this blog again. (Jodie here...this is totally untrue :))

Cheers,

S

Guest Blogger! How Nutrition Affects ADHD

Today I have another post from a guest blogger for you all.  This is a really interesting article about how food and ADHD work together.  If you have a child or a friend with ADHD definitely share this with them! Enjoy!

How Nutrition Affects ADHD

It seems there’s always something or someone talking about Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) and what kids who suffer from it should or shouldn’t eat. This isn’t new. As a matter of fact, the link between nutrition and ADHD is something that researchers have been looking into for years and years now. Unfortunately, even after all of this time and research, the jury is still out on whether or not nutrition is the best way to treat ADHD.  Whether or not it’s the best way might not matter as much as whether or not it can help a parent whose child has ADHD though, even if just a little.

What is ADHD?

ADHD is a chronic condition that, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Preventions (CDC), affects a reported 6.4 million U.S. children. The condition, that starts in childhood and persists into adult ADHD, is made up of a series of issues such as hyperactivity, problems keeping attention, and impulsive behavior. As you can imagine, this can have a negative impact on a child’s performance in school that may continue on to affect their work life when they get older. It can also interfere with relationships and wreak havoc on one’s self-esteem. Unfortunately, there is no known cure for ADHD—only ways to manage it.

The Nutrition Connection

As mentioned, there’s been much debate over the nutrition-ADHD connection, with studies having been done on everything from diets and certain foods for the treatment of ADHD to the link between food additives like dyes to the condition. The results have been mixed and though more research needs to be done in order to come up with anything conclusive; parents have been managing their children’s ADHD with special diets and nutritional changes for decades. One of the most popular and oldest diets used to treat ADHD is the Feingold Diet.

Since there is as much controversy surrounding drug treatments for ADHD, like Ritalin, as there is with diet, it really comes down to the parents and child working with their doctor to come up with a treatment that they’re comfortable with. Since most of us don’t like to give our children drugs unless we have to, a lot of parents are opting to try nutritional changes to treat ADHD.

The Feingold Diet program, which has been around since 1976, is based on eliminating certain additives and chemicals from the child’s diet to see if they are triggering certain behaviours. This diet in particular tells you to eliminate foods containing: dyes (Red 3, Red 4, Blue 1 and 2, Yellow 5 and 6, and others. It also recommends removing foods containing artificial flavors and sweeteners, BHA, BHT, and TBHQ which are preservatives, and a chemical called salicylate.

Some parents opt instead to keep track of their child’s diet and behaviors rather than following an elimination diet and seeing instead if they can come up with a connection or list of possible triggers and then changing the diet accordingly. Others simply try their best to have their child eat healthier foods while restricting their intake of caffeine and sugar—though limiting sugar doesn’t seem to help much, according to the Mayo Clinic Website. Then there’s been some evidence that you can treat ADHD with caffeine. Again though, the evidence isn’t yet sufficient enough to make this a conventional treatment and many doctors still maintain that increasing a child’s caffeine intake is dangerous.

So what can a parent do? What all parents want to do and that is to encourage the healthiest lifestyle possibly, be patient, and learn as much as they can about ADHD and their treatment options. Not all children are the same, so the nutritional changes that work for some may not necessarily work for others. You can learn more about ADHD and the latest research, as well as get information about the Feingold diet and other ADHD diets at Healthline.

Adrienne is a freelance writer and author who has written extensively on all things health and fitness for more than a decade. When she's not holed-up in her writing shed researching an article or off interviewing health professionals, she can be found frolicking about her beach town with husband and dogs in tow or splashing about the lake trying to master the stand-up paddle board.

References

·       Mayo Clinic Staff. (2013). Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in children. Mayo Clinic. Retrieved on February 18, 2014, from http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/adhd/basics/definition/con-20023647

·       Attention-Deficit / Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). (2013). Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Retrieved on February 18, 2014, from http://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/adhd/features/key-findings-adhd72013.html

·       A Parent’s Guide to Diet and ADHD. Center for Science in the Public Interest. Retrieved on February 18, 2014, from http://www.cspinet.org/new/adhd_bklt.pdf

·       What is the Feingold Diet. (2013). The Feingold® Association of the United States. Retrieved on February 18, 2014, from http://www.feingold.org/what.php#.Uwe-ifldVqV

Guest Blogger! How Good Food Makes Us Healthy and Happy

Today I have a special treat from a guest blogger! I think it is great how this is a place where we can share others ideas as well as our own.  Enjoy! 

How Good Food Makes Us Healthy and Happy

By Leslie Vandever

What is good food?

Quick answers: It’s food that nourishes. Food that doesn’t make you fat. It’s food that tastes good and feels good in your mouth and in your belly. It’s food that generates smiles.

Hippocrates, that famous old physician/philosopher once said, way back in 430 BC, “Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food.” Even all those centuries ago, people knew that eating good food had a beneficial effect on their health.

But not just physical health. Good food effects mental health, too. Protein, fats, carbohydrates, vitamins and minerals are essential parts of a good diet. The lack of any of them can have profound physical consequences, including the way the brain functions. But what, exactly, is good food?  

Michael Pollan, the author of In Defense of Food, wrote that we should, “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.” Sounds like “good food” to Mr. Pollan, from all his research and experience, is mostly vegetarian, eaten sparingly. The result of that particular diet would result in, for most of us, a slender body and a sharp mind.

Good food makes us happy by helping us feel nourished, full of energy, and light on our feet. It has to taste good, too, or we won’t want to eat it. But we’ve got to be careful. A drive-through hamburger and french fries taste good, but they’re also clogged with ingredients that cause plaque in our arteries and makes our blood sugar spike. That burger and fries also contain two-thirds of a full day’s calories for most people.

That doesn’t mean we should never eat fast food. We just need to make it the exception rather than the rule.

To be healthy and happy, we should eat a tasty diet of vegetables and fruit, whole grain breads, pasta and cereals, low-fat dairy foods, and lean meat, fish and eggs. MyPlate.gov, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s nutrition webpage, suggests that when we fill our dinner plate, half of it should be full of vegetables and fruit. A quarter should be filled with grains (half of them whole grains), and the last quarter of the plate should be proteins in the form of lean meat, fish, nuts, beans or legumes. Low-fat dairy foods—1 percent milk, low-fat cheeses and yogurt—can be a portion of the meal. Good fats, like canola oil and olive oil, are OK in small amounts.

 Another way to eat healthy is to eat, as much as possible, fresh foods rather than processed and packaged foods. Grocery shopping becomes really easy when you eat fresh: you shop mostly the perimeters of the store, making only a brief forays toward the middle for low-fat dairy foods, nuts and beans.

Cooking fresh is simplified, too. Most vegetables taste best raw or very lightly steamed, but for a treat, roasting them with a light brushing of olive oil is a delicious way to go. Meats and fish should be baked or grilled rather than fried, and whole grain breads and pastas are filling and satisfying. Desert can be as simple as low-fat yogurt topped with blueberries or as complex as an apple pie with a whole grain crust and a blob of homemade whipped cream.

By sticking to fresh foods, simply seasoned and prepared with a minimum of fat, meals can be naturally low in calories but rich in all the good things that make us healthy. Choosing a wide variety of foods makes a “good” diet worth eating.

Some foods can make us feel better than others. Sugary foods and foods that are made with a lot of fat and refined flour, like cakes and cookies, and high-carbohydrate and salty foods like potato chips might taste good, but in large quantities or as a routine snack, they’re a health—and happiness—no-no.

“One cannot think well, love well or sleep well if one has not dined well,” wrote Virginia Woolf in A Room of One’s Own. How right she was.

For more information about eating a healthy diet, click here.

Leslie Vandever is a professional journalist and freelance writer. Under the pen-name “Wren,” she also writes a blog about living well with rheumatoid arthritis called RheumaBlog (www.rheumablog.wordpress.com). In her spare time, Vandever enjoys cooking, reading and working on the Great American Novel.

References:

·      ChooseMyPlate.gov (n.d) U.S. Department of Agriculture. Retrieved on February 22, 2014 from http://www.choosemyplate.gov/

·      Nutrition for Everyone. (2012, Sept. 27) Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Retrieved on February 23, 2014 from http://www.cdc.gov/nutrition/everyone/basics/foodgroups.html

·      10 Tips Nutrition Education Series. (2011, June) U.S. Department of Agriculture. Retrieved on February 22, 2014 from http://www.choosemyplate.gov/food-groups/downloads/TenTips/DGTipsheet1ChooseMyPlate.pdf