Lazy Chicken and Some Goals

First, the lazy chicken.

This is really, really lazy. Everything you need:

Chicken thighs (that's 4.5 pounds or so - about 15 thighs)

Herbs de Provence

Yellow onion (this would be really good with a Vidalia, too, but this is what I had around)

Package of dried mushrooms - I like shiitake for the smoky, bacon-ish flavor, but you could use whatever

Couple cloves of garlic

Unpictured kosher salt

...that's it.

Liberally coat your chicken thighs with herbs de provence and kosher salt. Use lots of seasoning and a decent amount of salt, and use your hands to really get in there and make sure the chicken is coated thoroughly and evenly.

Smash a few cloves of garlic and peel off the skin - I used four or five.

Slice onion into rings and arrange in a single layer on bottom of crockpot. Dump mushrooms over onions and toss in garlic cloves. Pour in chicken. Cook on low for 4.5 hours (yes, that's all).

And that's it. No liquid - the chicken generates more than enough juice by itself. If I had skin-on, bone-in thighs, I'd probably have browned the skin first, but I didn't...so it was a season-and-crockpot meal. This would be a great candidate for something to make in the morning before work, IF you have a crockpot that will shut off after 4.5 hours - it's really easy to overcook chicken and dry it out.

When there were about 15 minutes left on the chicken, I tore up some collard greens and cooked them with a slice of bacon, kosher salt and pepper.

Lazy chicken, completed:

Easy, lazy, and very tasty with collards on the side.

And with nothing on the side. I picked at that chicken for an entire week, between lunches at work and extra-lazy dinners (sensing a theme here?).

So, this past Monday started another CFCC BCCC. This time around, my goals are to be stricter with my eating to really lean out, and then to (probably through trial and error) figure out what I need to eat in order to maintain that level of body composition.

Ideally, I would lose enough fat to drop at least one more size and about an inch and a half more off of my waist. At that point, I think I'd be satisfied, and it would be something I could sustain without being incredibly restrictive all the time.

Performance-wise, my goals for this 30 days are to continue to improve my deadhang pull ups, to master kipping pull ups, and work on bodyweight skills (pistols, push ups, handstand push ups). Leaning out is definitely going to help with this. Longer term goals are still a 300lb deadlift (or 2x bodyweight, which may come first if I keep dropping weight).

Tuesday night I had my first meeting with Erin to review my food log and discuss my goals. She warned me - and I in turn warned my husband - that I was in for a cranky 30 days. This week's dietary changes: no nuts (not a big deal at all), no chocolate (gasp! not even on weekends!), no cream in my coffee (except on Saturday and Sunday mornings...SUPER GASP!), and experiment with making bone broth and substituting that for my usual afternoon snack of buffalo jerky (iiiiinteresting). I'm also under strict orders to be IN BED by 10pm, which is going to be a challenge, since at least three nights a week I'm at CFCC until 8:45 or so - right now I'm usually home by 9, walk the dogs, make a quick dinner, play with my pups and then in the shower by 10, asleep by 10:30. We'll see how this goes.

After our meeting, I stuck around for the 7:30 class. Foolishly. On the plus side...I climbed a rope (not all the way to the top, but a good 10 feet or more). That was an achievement. And then we did a hero WOD that I'd never heard of before - "Dae Han." 3 rounds for time of 800 meter run with a plate (45/25), three 15' rope climbs, 12 thrusters (135/95) - with a 25 minute cap. I scaled the rope climbs to 15 strict pull ups with a light band and used 65 pounds for the thrusters - in retrospect, they didn't feel too tough and I probably should have done 75 or 85.

So how did it go? Well, let me tell you something about running with a bumper plate. There's no good way to hold it. As soon as we started the run - within 15 seconds - we were all like "AW CRAP." I started with it behind my head, over my upper back, but it kept hitting me in the back of the head. I yelled "THIS IS STUPID" before switching it to over my chest...and then tucked under my arm...and then back to my back...repeat ad nauseum. Or for the six minutes or whatever it took me to run 800 meters. The pull ups were slow, but legit, and the thrusters were pretty easy - I was able to do 4 or 5 at a time without any issue. But that run. OH, that run. 2 rounds in 21:57. I could have gotten another 400m run in but I just did NOT want to.

My back is killing me tonight from those runs (or awkward shuffles, whatever). Time for a little more foam rolling, shower and then my 10pm bedtime.

Cow Share Beef Green Curry

Back in October, a bunch of us at the gym split a cow.

No, really. I thought I posted about it, but I skimmed my posts and I guess not - but there's not really much to it. A fellow CFCC'er organized a cow share through Philly CowShare. For just under $350, I got an eighth of a cow - about 50 pounds of beef total. I'd estimate half of it is ground beef, whether in patties or in one-pound blocks. The rest of it is a split between roasts, steaks, and stew meat.

I will definitely do this again. I was worried initially about freezer space, but once I got rid of a lot of the freezer-burned shit I had in there (ancient steam-in-bag veggies, a sad caving-in box of Dr. Praeger's veggie burgers (incidentally, as much as I WANTED to like those, they were really kind of gross and soggy no matter what I did to them), a Costco-size bag of bagel thins from god knows when), I had more than enough room for everything and then some.

But the best part is that it's forced me to have a lot more variety in my diet. Which is not something that comes easily to me.

The other night, I took advantage of something I'd normally never have - beef cubes - and made something I'd never made before - Thai green curry.

I got the inspiration from Modern Paleo Warfare (by the way, if you don't read him, you absolutely need to). Since I had pretty much none of the necessary ingredients on hand, I perused a few other sources (Nom Nom Paleo and good old Google) and added a few things to my shopping list.

Not all of this is new to me - fish sauce has been a pantry staple for me since the first time I went to Vietnam (the restaurant, not the country) about five years ago, and I've been using coconut oil since sometime in October. However, this the first time I've ever bought coconut milk, and I recently swapped out my dusty bottle of soy sauce for this new, shiny bottle of coconut aminos. And, of course, the star of the show: green curry paste.

And the fresh stuff: about a pound of cow share beef cubes, red pepper, snow peas, and (lazy) pre-shredded cabbage.

This is only the third or fourth time I've had the chance to use my beautiful Le Creuset 5.5 quart dutch oven, but holy crap do I ever love this thing. I snagged it at the Le Creuset outlet, and it's worth every penny of the seriously-reduced price (about $130, I think).

I browned the beef in coconut oil with some salt and pepper.

Once the meat was browned, I put it aside and added a tiny bit more coconut oil to the bottom of the pot. I fried a couple tablespoons of green curry paste in the coconut oil and beef drippings for a couple minutes ("until fragrant" - or at least until MORE fragrant, since I think this stuff's pretty fragrant to begin with). I added the coconut milk and whisked thoroughly until it was completely combined, with no chunks of cream or curry paste, before adding the fish sauce and coconut aminos.

Once the sauce was mixed, I added the veggies (including half an onion that's not pictured), except for the cabbage, and the beef back to the pot.

I combined everything well and ended up adding about half a can's worth of beef broth so that there was sufficient sauce to cover. Next time, I'd probably get a second can of coconut milk and just make more. I brought the entire thing to a boil before covering and popping into the oven for an hour at 300 degrees.

When there was about ten minutes left, I pulled the curry out, dumped in the cabbage, and put it back into the oven. The remaining time was enough to soften the cabbage without it getting mushy.

Dinner is served.

This shit was BANGIN'. And so, so easy. I ate two bowls, which was just about half the batch. I just got done eating another bowl of leftovers for lunch, and let me tell you, it (like most soups/stews/chilies) just gets better and better as it sits.

Recent workouts: Not too much.

As I mentioned, Wednesday's classes were cancelled for a nutrition seminar. Thursday my office was incredibly stuffy, and I was just dragging and exhausted. I ended up deciding to skip deadlift night (!! my favorite!) in favor of this curry, which was clearly a good choice.

Friday, January 6: Strict press, peak of one. 45x3 - 55x1 - 65x - 70x1 - 75x1 - 80x1 - 85F. So frustrating, because 80 goes up without TOO much trouble, and then 85 I just can't get past my nose. GAH. Still shooting for this at the total. Metcon was 21-15-9 American kettlebell swings (1.5/1pood) and burpees. This flew by, though I wish my burpees were a little faster. 4:52 as RX'ed.

Saturday, January 7: some skill work on the squat clean and the ab wheel rollout. I was lucky and snagged one of the good ab wheels - with actual handles, not just a bunch of electrical tape wrapped around a thin piece of metal. Metcon - 21-15-9 squat clean (135)/ab wheel rollouts. I used 85pounds, which blew. Or, to be more specific, my oly technique blows. Since I have SO. MUCH. TROUBLE. pulling under the bar, I ended up power cleaning and then doing a front squat...which is pretty much twice the work. So my 21 cleans took for-freaking-ever - I was the last one still going. I decided to switch to power cleans for the 15/9 rounds, which I (as usual) now think was stupid. I should have just finished what I started, even if it meant being the last one moving. Oh well. At least I can do ab wheel rollouts now, which I couldn't do without band assistance before. Anyway - 16:33.

Got measured in this afternoon for the next round of the BCCC. While my weight was back up a couple pounds (to 157.4 from my recent low of about 152), I'm very proud to say that my waist is down another inch from the end of the last BCCC, and three inches total from October 1. THREE GODDAMN INCHES. DO YOU HEAR ME, PEOPLE? EAT PALEO!

...and on that note I'm off to get ready for a birthday dinner tonight. Happy weekend! And do yourself a favor and MAKE SOME CURRY.

Make This Chicken

I know it's not really much to look at, but this chicken is fucking delicious.



And it's so, so simple.

Make this rub:

2.5-ish tsp. salt
4 tsp. paprika
1.5-ish tsp. cayenne pepper
2 tsp. onion powder
2 tsp. thyme
1.5 tsp. white pepper
1 tsp. garlic powder
1/2 tsp. black pepper

(adapted from this recipe. I decreased the salt and increased everything else to make a little less than double the amount in the original post. as with most rubs, you can screw around with the proportions to taste.)

(also, please note that I do not, in any way, endorse that forum's reference to "the Neanderthin diet." seriously??)

Pour the rub and a buttload of chicken thighs into a large ziplock bag. Mix it around to coat. I used about 15 chicken thighs and everything fit nicely into a gallon size freezer bag. Let the entire mess sit and marinate overnight.

In the morning, dump into a crockpot. Cook on low for 6-8 hours (I think 6 would have been sufficient, but my crockpot is not flexible and forces me to choose between high for 6, which I think may have dried it out, and low for 8, which was completely fine). You don't need to add any liquid, since the thighs are much juicier than breasts and will produce more than enough in cooking to keep everything nice and moist.

Once this is cooked, give it a stir with a spoon and watch it shred to pieces. Per the original recipe inspiration, this rub would be amazing on a whole roast chicken, though I think I would steer clear of crockpotting a whole chicken (I like the skin to be a little crispy). I used boneless chicken thighs, but I bet bone-in would deepen the flavor. I would NOT substitute chicken breasts - if you are scared of the fattier cuts of chicken and insist on using breasts, grill them instead, or add some kind of liquid (orange juice maybe?).

To give you an idea of quantity, fifteen chicken thighs was about 4.5 pounds total, and yielded enough pulled chicken for PhillyGuy and I to have nice big bowls for dinner last night, PLUS leftovers for three days' worth of lunches for me.

I cannot say it enough. This chicken is fucking delicious.

Recent post-total Crossfit workouts:

- Monday: Sandy Fran. 21-15-9 of thrusters and pull ups. This is a classic Crossfit benchmark workout typically done with a barbell. Instead, we used giant canvas bags of sand. I used a 40lb sandbag and the "average" band. To say that it is awkward to clean a sandbag from the floor is a vast understatement. Also, to say I suck at pull ups is similarly a vast understatement. 13:40 (to give you perspective, a good Fran time is under 5:00. Plenty of people finished Sandy Fran in under 7-8 minutes on Monday). My thrusters were actually fine, once I got the bag up, but after my first five pull ups, I could not string together more than 2-3 at a time. My last three reps took me an entire minute. GAH.

- Wednesday: Christine. Another benchmark workout, and I could not be less thrilled to share my name with her. 3 rounds, for time, of 500m row, 10 deadlifts with 50% max (115), and 21 box jumps (20"). At 18:19, I was the last to finish in my heat by a good couple of minutes and I do not think I could have finished a second sooner. I hate Christine for the same reason I hate racing 5Ks: you need to sprint the ENTIRE time and you never get to hit your stride.

It's Cold in Here

...that's what Cosmo thinks, anyway.

He's been burrowing in with me at night, too, which is good since our upstairs heat is apparently busted. Again. Just like it was at this time last year. Hooray for new construction!

I've been reading voraciously the past few days. Mainly because PhillyGuy bought me this for my birfday:

NOOK COLOR!

Not going to lie...one of the best features about this as opposed to the original Nook or the Kindle? I can subscribe to US Weekly on it. I brought it to get my nails done this weekend. Spent half my pedicure reading this week's US Weekly, and the other half reading Stephen King's new book.

In my defense, I read "smart stuff" too - but since I'm not planning to re-buy anything I already have as a good old-fashioned PAPER book, you're probably not going to be seeing too many Virginia Woolf or Jeannette Winterson books on my Nook library.

Anyway. The Nook was a welcome addition this weekend as I was fighting a lousy cold. And, unsurprisingly, PhillyGuy inherited that cold just as I've been getting over it. He e-mailed me tonight to tell me he was freezing and tired. That gave me a great dinner idea:

homemade soup!

I don't really have a soup recipe. That's the beauty of this kind of thing. You can basically throw whatever you have in a pot and it'll taste delicious after simmering for a while. Unfortunately for us, "whatever you have" is a third of a pan of leftover stuffing, two turkey legs and about half a bunch of fresh rosemary...so a grocery store run on my way home was in order.

I went classic: chopped up a couple of celery ribs, two carrots, and half a Vidalia onion, and sauteed with garlic, olive oil, fresh rosemary, salt and pepper.

Once it was soft, I dumped in a package of white mushrooms, chicken stock, a bay leaf and some random seasonings (which may or may not have been inspired by a certain Simon & Garfunkel song) and let it simmer for half an hour.

Next came the chicken.

Chopped up and seasoned with kosher salt, pepper and parsley.

I added the chicken and a package of whole wheat tortellini, brought the soup back to a boil, and let it simmer for another fifteen minutes. I meant to add in spinach at this point, too, but completely forgot about it.

BAM! Soup.

It takes a little while, but it totally hit the spot tonight. My grandmother - the Italian one - used to make an amazing chicken, rice and escarole soup. I never thought to ask her for the recipe, and unfortunately that chance has passed...but I think maybe one of my projects this winter will be to mess around and see how close I can come to replicating it.

Favorite soup recipes? Good books you've read lately? I have some David Sedaris cued up and then I'm going to need something new.

More Pumpkin Obsession

I am really blowing through some Libby's pumpkin this year. This week's follow-up to this weekend's pumpkin cinnamon rolls and the pumpkin scones I pulled out of the freezer last week and the pumpkin oats I made for breakfast the week before that?

More pumpkin oats.



I'm re-using the picture from the LAST TIME I bragged about my delicious pumpkin oat breakfast because, well, let's face it. Every little tupperware container of oatmeal topped with craisins looks pretty much exactly the same.

Today's breakfast is a little different, though, because rather than assemble the raw materials at home and cook in the microwave here at work, I made a big batch of oats last night in the crockpot.

My vat-o-oatmeal contained the following:

- 3 cups steel-cut oats
- 3.5 cups skim milk
- 3.5 cups water
- 1.5-ish cups of plain canned pumpkin (I didn't really measure this, just sort of winged it)
- Generous squirt of sugar-free Log Cabin "maple" syrup
- A chunk of Splenda brown sugar blend (again, no measuring - just kind of dumped)
- Few shakes of salt
- Little pour of vanilla extract
- Plenty o' cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg and clove

I gave it all a few stirs, tasted the "batter" and adjusted the spices a bit, and left that bad boy alone to cook 8 hours on low. When I woke up this morning, it was done and it smelled AWESOME.

It looked kind of nasty, though, to be honest. Part of it is that my crockpot has a bit of a "hot spot," so one side of the oatmeal cooked much faster than the other. It also developed a bit of a tough "skin" on top - not particularly appetizing. And the side of the crock without the hot spot left me with separated, kinda-watery oats, while the other side was much, much thicker.

But I stirred that bad boy vigorously, plopped a fat chunk of it in my tupperware, topped with craisins and booked it to work. I hoofed it today, and after my 15/20-minute walk, the oats needed just 30 or 40 seconds in the microwave to be the perfect temperature.

Verdict?

Delicious. Ugly, but delicious. I would strongly recommend this for people who, like me, are complete creatures of habit and don't mind eating the same thing for breakfast every day. I overserved myself today and am still working on my bowl of oats nearly an hour after getting here...this would make four-ish FAT servings like this, or about 5-6 still generously-sized servings.

I might change the ratios to add a BIT more liquid, since this is one thick-ass bowl of oats, but I'm not sure. I might just need to stir it better once it's done. The steel cut oats are key for this, too - don't try this with "regular" quick oats. I'm reasonably certain you'll end up with a mushy, disgusting mess in the morning.

Personally, I'm delighted to have come up with a way to have oats every morning without (1) taking the extra few minutes to assemble, or (2) paying through the nose to get it from DiBruno's. I've been doing that here and there, and good grief - a SMALL oatmeal (and, to be fair, the small is pretty hefty in size) is more than $4. I'd estimate that this vat of oats cost about $7 or $8 total - and that takes into account that I bought the majority of the ingredients at the overpriced grocery store down the street from me.

Pumpkin Cinnamon Buns

So when you spend the weekend hosting a party and cooking up a storm, you don't really feel much like grocery shopping. Or, well, if you're me, you don't. So I spent the week eating leftovers. Leftover Trader Joe's vegan meatballs, leftover black olives from the chili toppings, and leftover tortilla chips from the gargantuan Costco bag.

I mixed in some baby spinach and dubbed it "vegan meatball nachos." Honestly? not so bad.

This morning, Stephanie and I had a running date to do ten miles. When I woke up, though, my right foot hurt. BAD. I couldn't really put weight on it when I stepped out of bed. I walked the dogs, hoping it would start to warm up and I'd be fine. No dice - I limped the whole time. So, I called Stephanie to bail on our date.

I'm hoping that a day of rest fixes things. I'm very sore on the side of my ankle/heel, and have no idea why. I'm planning to get up and run tomorrow morning. I'm not happy about this, and I'm frustrated and will probably post about this later this week.

For now, I'd like to show you how I spent my morning.

I've been giving this lil' guy quite the workout lately.

I was inspired by Heather's post earlier this week. Pumpkin cinnamon buns? Seriously? Bring it. BRING IT. Especially this morning, when I was up and chipper, and it was 7:30 and my plans for the next few hours had been kind of blown. Since I didn't have many of the ingredients on hand (spelt and whole wheat flours, etc), I googled around for an alternative recipe, and ended up with this guy.

Rolled out, after the first rise:

Filling ingredients:

Spread over the softened butter and pumpkin dough.

All rolled up.

And ready for the second rise.

Are you doubled in size? Who can tell? It's been a good amount of time, so you're going in the oven, period.

Oh. Wow. Hello there.

Yes, I think it's important to slather you with as much cream cheese frosting as humanly possible.

GAAAAAAAAH.

Now, the only problem is that I have fifteen of these suckers left. But I guess, in the grand scheme of things, it's not a bad problem to have. Who wants to come over and finish these off?

Friday Night Adventures

Adventures in baking, that is.

But first. Sometimes, there's only one thing you need at the end of a long week.



Okay...maybe two things.





After enjoying some Murphy-Goode pinot noir and a couple pieces of Lazaros - my favorite delivery pizza in the city! They do some crazy magic that makes the crust juuuuust right, the sauce is sweet but not too sweet...I love it! - I got down to business.

REAL business. The key ingredient in Friday night's baking adventures was...



BACON.

Yeah, I went there. I made bacon chocolate cupcakes with homemade caramel buttercream icing. I used Scrumptious Photography's recipe - no adaptations at all. Except that I made a half batch, which should have yielded 12 cupcakes rather than 24...but it actually ended up yielding 16.

I started with the cupcakes. Melt together your chocolate and butter. I used the metal bowl of my mixer as a double boiler:



Stir in your sugar:



While the chocolate cools, whisk together your dry ingredients and chop your super-crispy bacon.





After adding your eggs, one at a time, to the chocolate, it's time to stir in the dry.



And then your secret ingredient - fold in most of the chopped bacon. I say "most" because I decided to reserve a bit to use as topping/decoration for the cupcakes...couldn't tell you how much.



Once it's all just incorporated, fill cupcake liners about 2/3 of the way full. Bake at 350 degrees for 20-25 minutes.



While the cupcakes are baking, start the icing. By, you know, MAKING YOUR OWN CARAMEL.



I MADE MY OWN CARAMEL, BITCHES! Honestly, I think you'd do just fine using store-bought caramel topping, but making your own is surprisingly easy. And then you get to say "I MADE MY OWN CARAMEL BITCHES!"

This is what FOUR STICKS of butter looks like beaten in with eggwhites and sugar.



And then it's time to switch to your paddle attachment to blend in your HOMEMADE CARAMEL!





MAN, this frosting is delicious. I mean, wow.

Now, my decorating skillz are...shall we say...amateur. But for having never made cupcakes before? Ever? Let alone making them from scratch and making the icing from scratch and using an icing tip for the first time in my life?



I can deal.





Thank goodness Stephanie and I had a running date this morning. I only ate a couple bites of cupcake, but way more than my fair share of frosting and batter while I baked :) We braved the Kelly Drive/West River Drive/Art Museum loop, despite yesterday's insane flooding, and covered 8 miles in about 1:25.



Busy day - time to go get my haircut, hang with some great bloggy friends for a fun event at Sabrina's, and then out to the 'burbs for a "Diaper BBQ." Some of my bacon cupcakes might make the trip out with me...