Month: September 2011 (page 3 of 7)

Kimchee!

Kimchee is taking over the world. YAY! You will all be assimilated into our glorious, garlic-infused future. (Link courtesy of M-H’s Twitter.)

How to Start a Cookbook Club

How to Start a Cookbook Club. Neat! I wonder if any of my friends in Sydney would like to do that…

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Blackmore’s Half-Marathon 2011 Race Report

Me and the SnookBlackmore’s Half-Marathon 2011 Race Report
Remember how last year I said that the half-marathon distance was CURSED for me? The streak continues. This past Sunday was the 2011 Sydney Running Festival, where the two of us were toeing the line for my fifth Half-Marathon and the Snook’s first. Our training plan had went pretty well, with the exception of me spraining my ankle twice and missing a couple long runs. I felt pretty good on the day though, and we soon found ourselves at Milson’s Point getting ready for the start. (I took a quick photo just to prove that this year I didn’t lose my iPhone.) We started at the back of C group and we planned to do 2:30/45s intervals from the start. I didn’t want to aim too high given the state of my ankle, but I had hopes that a PR (around 2:30) was possible. From the start, we were flying. We were going under my PR pace, but I didn’t feel like we were going too fast. It was great.

Here’s the cursed part: It was an unseasonably HOT spring day. We were wearing sunscreen and hats, but there’s only so much you can do. I wore my water belt, but I could tell we were hitting it hard. When I had my first Hammer Gel at 45 minutes I felt briefly light-headed, almost like I might faint. (Thankfully the feeling passed.) We hit 8K at the one hour mark, and that’s when it all started to fall apart. My lower legs started to cramp. We extended a few walk breaks, thinking I could shake it out. I had already been taking Endurolytes, so I also started hitting the Powerade at each aid station. It didn’t help. I ended up battling cramps for the entire second half of the race. Every 5-10 minutes they were back, first one leg and then the other depending on the camber of the road. Sometimes my shins, sometimes my calves. It SUCKED. Snookums tried to keep my spirits high, but I was in a lot of pain. My dreams of a PR slipped away. It was just about surviving to the end. My face was gritty with salt and my shirt had white patches on it. It was so hard. Eventually I limped my way across the finish line, a full 20 minutes slower than I’d hoped to run. I was so glad to be done. I wasn’t the only one having problems; we’d seen the medics treating a LOT of people out on the course. And the poor marathoners! I was glad I hadn’t picked this one for my first 42K. Anyway, we collected our bag and met up with the fabulous Knitabulous, who ran her first half-marathon as well. And hey, that’s the important thing! Rodd and Ailsa ran their first HM, and that’s AWESOME. I’m just glad I got to come along for it!

We actually got some pretty good race photos this year. Have a look…








Jamie’s 30 Minute Meals #30: Steak Sarnie

Jamie’s 30 Minute Meals #30: Steak Sarnie
This was our 30th
cooking/blogging experiment from Jamie’s
30 Minute Meals
. For this week, we chose “Steak Sarnie, Crispy New
Potatoes, Cheesy Mushrooms, and Beetroot Salad.” We made this meal on
Saturday, the day before the Sydney Running Festival Half-Marathon. We
chose it because we had the episode recorded, and it seemed like a
good choice for a pre-race meal: a good amount of carbs, but not
overly heavy like pasta. We also prepared this for lunch instead of
dinner so we could just eat a light meal of leftovers in the evening.
I was on chef’s duty for this one and I was flyin’! I finished it in
29:44.

Steak Sarnie

Substitutions: We already had normal
potatoes on hand so I used those instead of buying “New” potatoes. You
can’t get pre-cooked beetroot here, so I simply boiled mine up ahead
of time. We’re not 100% certain if our mushrooms were Portobellos; basically we just got the biggest ones we could find. I was going to use the jarred red peppers as indicated, but when I opened mine they were moldy so I left them out. Other than that, everything was as written in the recipe.

Quick
verdict:
I had guessed this one would be a crowd-pleaser, but it
ended up being somewhat divisive! It was mostly the mushrooms. Neither
of us are big mushroom eaters, but I’ve been making an effort to learn
to like them. I actually really liked these. I thought the
strong flavours and the rich cheese really complimented the thick slab
of mushroom. The Snook didn’t like the texture of the mushroom itself
though. The sandwich and the potatoes were good, and the beetroot
salad was tasty and different. Overall I rated the meal an 8.5 out of
10, while the Snook rated it an 8. It’s a simple, quick, and (mostly)
unobjectionable meal that lots of folks should like.

Read on
for a photo essay of the preparation.Pre-start prep: We got out all the necessary ingredients,
tools, and cooking vessels. The kitchen was clean (well, as clean as
it gets) and everything wiped down and ready to go. The oven grill was
turned on full whack, the kettle was boiled, and the food processor
was fitted with the grating attachment.

First up are the
ingredients for the potatoes: potatoes, garlic, rosemary, and
lemon.

Potatoes

Next are the components
for the cheesy mushrooms: Portobello mushrooms, garlic, chilli,
parsley, lemon, and Cheddar cheese.

Mushroom
ingredients

For the beetroot salad: pre-cooked
beetroot, balsamic vinegar, lemon, parsley, and feta
cheese.

Beetroot salad ingredients

Lastly, for the steak sarnie: rump steak, thyme, a
ciabatta loaf, jarred peppers, parsley, horseradish, and
rocket.

Steak sarnie ingredients

The
food processor was fitted with the grating attachment.

Food
processor

Pots and pans, ready to go! The baking
tray is for the mushrooms. The frying pan is for the potatoes, and the
grill pan is for the steak.

Pots and
pans

Allez cuisine! I started by prepping the
potatoes, cutting them into smaller chunks.

Prepping
potatoes

These went into the frying pan with a
kettle full of boiling water. I also added garlic cloves and
salt.

Cooking the potatoes

Next I
peeled the mushrooms. As Jamie says on the episode: This is very
therapeutic.

Peeling the mushrooms

For the
flavouring, I crushed some garlic and chopped up half a red
chilli.

Garlic and chilli

To this I also
added parsley and lemon zest.

Zesting
lemon

I finished it with olive oil, salt, and
pepper.

Seasoning

The flavour mix got
rubbed all over the mushrooms and piled up inside. Then I added a few
chunks of cheese to each one. The tray then went into the oven under
the grill.

Adding cheese

Time to grate the
beetroot!

Grating beetroot

I drizzled it
with balsamic vinegar and extra virgin olive oil…

Dressing
the salad

…and salt and pepper…

Seasoning

…and lemon juice.

Squeezing lemon

I also finely chopped some
parsley and added that.

Chopping parsley

To
finish the salad, I put it in a bowl and crumbled feta cheese on
top.

Adding feta

Here’s the finished
beetroot salad.

Finished salad

Now for the steak. I sprinkled it with salt and pepper and then picked over some fresh thyme leaves. I also drizzled it with olive oil.

Seasoning the steak

The potatoes were done, so I drained them…

Draining potatoes

…and then returned them to the pan with some olive oil to get crispy. I also put the steak into the hot grill pan.

Frying the potatoes

After a few minutes, I flipped the steak over. Looking good!

Cooking steak

I copied a trick from the episode. I fished out some of the garlic cloves from the potatoes and mashed them up on the board with a fork. I seasoned it with salt and pepper and put it back in with the potatoes.

Mashed garlic

This is where I’m meant to be making the “salsa” for the sandwich. I’ve chopped up all the parsley, but when I opened my peppers, I could see they were moldy. So we only had parsley and olive oil.

Chopped parsley

The steak was cooked, so I placed it on the board on top of the parsley mix to rest.

Resting the steak

Next I sliced open our ciabatta loaf…

Slicing the ciabatta

…drizzled it with extra virgin olive oil…

Drizzling with oil

…and spread it with horseradish.

Horseradish

I gave our rocket a quick wash…

Washing the rocket

…then added it as the base of the sandwich.

Adding the rocket

Then it was finally time to slice up the steak!

Slicing the steak

I piled the slices up on the bread to finish the sandwich.

Piling the slices of steak

I finished the crispy potatoes with a squeeze of lemon juice.

Lemon juice

The mushrooms were well done, so I pulled them out of the oven.

Mushrooms

Here’s a view of the completed steak sarnie.

Steak sarnie

And here’s the completed meal of steak sarnie, crispy new potatoes, cheesy mushrooms, and beetroot salad.

Finished meal

Tasting notes: I wonder if the peppers would have made a big difference to the sandwich. It was good, but it wasn’t mind-blowing or anything. (Or maybe it would have helped if I’d STABBED IT TO A BOARD WITH A KNIFE as Jamie suggested?) The potatoes were fine. The beetroot salad was good, but it’s a lot of work and mess without the vac-packed beets, so I’m not sure I’ll be in a rush to make it again. And the cheesy mushrooms were, as mentioned, quite divisive. I think it would come down to whether the person likes the texture of big grilled mushrooms. I thought they were good, but the Snook didn’t finish his (and he usually eats everything). Still, this one is relatively easy to finish within the 30 minutes and you can’t really go wrong with a steak sandwich and potatoes. Definitely an 8-8.5 out of 10.

Stay tuned for another recipe from Jamie’s 30 Minute Meals!

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Women, Swearing, and the Workplace

“Women, Swearing, and the Workplace.” Interesting. This is something I’ve been thinking about, now that my role has me meeting directly with clients more often. In my experience though, there’s no double standard. Anyone who swears like a sailor in a meeting looks unprofessional. I’ve been in meetings with women who do it, and it makes me cringe a little. (Granted, I cringe when my deskmate swears and I’m the only one that can hear it.) It’s not a question of being “lady-like”; it’s a question of showing respect for the people around you.

Why A Heterosexual, Married, North Carolinian Father Of Three Cares About LGBT Equality

Why A Heterosexual, Married, North Carolinian Father Of Three Cares About LGBT Equality. HEAR, HEAR!

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