Operation Stair Climb

We've all heard it. "Just take the stairs" is a typical comment from people when us couch potatoes whine about trying to find free and easy ways to get in shape. On the other hand, my Jillian Michael's workout video tells me that's a false message of lethargy. Well, no offense to Jillian since I truly believe that she's incredible at what she does, but in the right context "just" taking the stairs can be a decently intense workout.

A couple of weeks ago my co-workers approached me with the idea that we should use one of our breaks to go climb the stairs in the tallest wing of our building. The concept appealed to me on multiple fronts. 1) It would get me away from my computer. I'm one of those people who, unless given a compelling reason, spends most of my breaks continuing to stare at my screen. 2) It's a free and convenient way to involve fitness in my day. 3) There are other people involved to keep me accountable.

I should mention, the tallest wing of our building happens to be 19 stories. We've calculated it to be somewhere in the range of 390 steps.

So we began. We're all at different fitness levels, so within a few flights we had started to separate with our speedy rabbit at a near jog and our couch potatoes (yours truly) huffing and puffing at the rear. I'll admit, that first day I was already hating myself for agreeing to such a massochistic activity by the time we reached the fourth floor. (Actually, that would be the fifth flight. Our building likes to call the basement "-1"). By the 19th flight I thought my lungs were going to burst out of my chest. I was clutching the handrail the entire way down for fear that my legs would give out from under me and I would roll in an uncontrollable heap to the bottom. When I got back to my office (just 15 minutes later) my legs were trembling in a major way. I felt pretty pathetic.

But it's getting better. I don't start cursing the jerk who created stairwells until the 10th floor or so now. And it only feels like someone is stabbing my lungs with a pitchfork for a minute or so. As horrible as it sounds still, it's nice to see progress.

Maybe one day I'll be as crazy as these guys and compete in the Empire State Building Run-Up. But I doubt it.

Update

Hey gang, back again with a short update. Life has been busy, so that has made it hard for us to plan fun things to post about. We promise though, as soon as things calm down again, we'll have fun things to post!


First, we can talk about Thanksgiving. Chrissie and I always do Thanksgiving at our place. It's the holiday that we consider "ours." Some perks to this: we don't have to go anywhere and we can make whatever we want. When was the last time we had turkey for Thanksgiving? Three years ago. I'll confess, I don't miss it. Turkey is fine, but it's not my favorite.  Our main meat this year was prime rib. We try and mix it up year to year, and this year we splurged a bit. If you were wondering, prime rib is good.

Thanksgiving went well. We made a plan of attack and didn't run into any hitches. That's probably the biggest recommendation I can give anyone who's preparing a large meal - make a plan. That way, you make the most of your resources. For us this year, it was managing four burners, one oven, and time.

Other things I've been working on, I'm still looking for glass jars to start making vinegar, but nothing in my price range has been popping up. Funny fact, thrift/second-hand stores don't sell everything at a super discount. Some things, like glass jars, are about the same price used as new. It makes sense, glass doesn't go old, but disappointing.

Anyway, that's it for now. Will try to post again soon!

Snickerdoodle Muffins

Many months ago I spotted a recipe on the web for snickerdoodle muffins and I got very excited. They looked positively delicious. Snickerdoodles rank high in my love of all things cookie, so transforming them into something that is socially acceptable to eat for breakfast sounded positively ingenious. I was so excited that I forgot to bookmark the page.

My only memory of the recipe was that it used cinnamon chips so I figured I would track those down before scouring google to find the recipe again. It took a fairly good while to find the chips, I guess they're a relatively seasonal offering. (note to self: stock up!) When I finally tracked them down, I came home happily with visions of sugary goodness in my head.

But I couldn't find the recipe. I found many similar recipes for similar muffins, but the version that had piqued my excitement months ago was apparently lost in the depths of the interwebs. My love of snickerdoodle prevailed, however, and I decided to come up with a recipe of my own. They turned out wonderfully, a cinnamony-sugary concoction that grazed the line between snickerdoodle and coffee cake. The cinnamon chips surprised me by melting into the muffin batter when they were baked, adding dots of sweetness rather than crunch. While originally I'd been hoping for the texture of the chip, I loved the way it turned out. My breakfast for the week was saved and yours can be too:


Snickerdoodle Muffins

Ingredients
1 3/4 cups all purpose flour
1/2 cup sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 egg, beaten
1 cup milk*
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1 pckg cinnamon chips
Cinnamon topping

*I ran low on milk and ended up using about half milk, half heavy cream. Cream can do no harm, right? That's what I thought.

Cinnamon Topping
1 cup sugar
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

Directions:
Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Grease your muffin pan. In a good sized bowl, combine your dry ingredients (flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt). In another bowl, combine your egg, milk, and vegetable oil. Add the wet ingredients into the dry and mix until just moistened. Stir in the cinnamon chips.

Fill the muffin cups about 2/3 full then dust lightly with cinnamon topping. Bake 25 to 30 minutes or until the muffins look golden brown.

Makes 12 muffins

Sick

Another week has gone by and Chrissie and I still aren't totally back on the blogging horse. The culprit this time was that both of us were sick. A lot was left undone around the house, but we're on the mend now and hope to be more productive soon. This did get me thinking about an interesting blog post though: Home Remedies. I know a couple that I'll share here and if any of you readers know of any, please let us know about them in the comments section!

Aaron's Asian Family Remedy for Sore Throats: The Salt Water Gargle. Fill up half of mug of warm water. Put about 3/4 of a teaspoon of salt in it. You can totally guestimate on the amount of salt. Stir. Drink a little, gargle, and spit out. Do this a few times. It's not pleasant, but I guarantee your throat will feel better!

Aaron's Dad's Remedy for Colds: Garlic Soup. Take 3 cloves of garlic and 6 sprigs of green onion. Throw them in a small pot with 1 cup of water. Boil liquid and reduce to half a cup. Drink the liquid. I've tried this and it tastes nasty. Unfortunately, I can't really say much to its effectiveness. My dad swears by it though.

Aaron's Asian Family Remedy for Heat Stroke: No clever name. Get some cool water. Get a porcelain spoon or bowl. Dip the spoon/bowl in the water and gently drag the edge of the spoon/bowl along the patient's shoulders. Aim for right behind the tops of the shoulders. Redip the spoon/bowl in the water when it gets hard to drag. Another good location to drag is along the muscles that go up & down with the spine, both sides. Then, have your patient go an lay down for a while. I've done it, I've had it done to me before and swear by it!

Chinese culture is awash with herbal remedies for things. It's something that I have interest in learning, but don't have the time to put into learning it right now. One thing that I think is really positive about Eastern medicine is that it strengthens your own body's ability to heal & fight disease, whereas Western Medicine is more geared towards finding and exterminating the offending organism. If you're interested in giving them a try - pop into your local Chinese apothecary/herbalist and they can whip up a concoction for you. My disclaimer - it will taste nasty, but it will work. I still remember how nasty my Grandma's Bloody-Nose-Soup-Remedy tasted, but hell, it worked.

Back Home

Hello again, everyone. Sorry for the long hiatus. Chrissie and I were out of town last week visiting family. Oh yeah, we went to Paris - yes, that Paris.

Short story on the food - it was good. We had a lovely time eating out over there. Our favorite haunts were cafes (French for cafe), restaurants (French for restaurant), and brasseries (French for Bar & Pub). The food was varied and filling. Not the architectural, 5-course, 6-bite plates of haute cuisine. More like topped over plates of meat and potatoes. The wine was cheaper than the beer.

The thing that struck me the most about eating there was how often I got really full. "Really full" is one past "normal full." I got to normal full after I finished the entree, but somehow, after sitting for a minute to let it all sink in, I always managed to find room for desert. If not that, then ice cream from a street vendor, or chocolate from a sweet shop, or something. The really nice thing about it was that I didn't ever feel sick from it.

That's something I've come to realize in my wanderings - good food will leave you full and never leave you sick. You always find a way to finish off the last bit with good food. With bad food, you look at the pile still sitting there and you just can't bring yourself to eat any more. Now, don't get me wrong, I've had good food other places than Paris. It's just there, it happened to me every day, and I felt very confident in picking a place on a whim and knowing my stomach would be very happy.

Having said all this, it seems only fitting that I conclude with a toast - here's to Paris, here's to good food, and here's to good friends!

Tomato Sauce

Remember all of our green tomatoes? Remember how a few of them were actually red?

Actually, close to 4 pounds of them were red (or close enough). We took that chunk and decided to make some fresh tomato sauce that we could jar and save for some fun pasta dishes in the future. This time we used a recipe out of a James Beard cookbook that we picked up when Borders was going out of business. Such a sad, sad day. Borders was the only place I could consistently find Seattle's Best Coffee. Which happened to be the home of my absolute favorite cup of hot chocolate. I think they still exist in airports sometimes, but I'm not totally sure anymore.

But I digress. Tomato sauce. We'll post the recipe later, but the portion we used on pasta that weekend with our friend was absolutely delicious. So good in fact, that when we forgot to make salsa out of one of our other bowls of green tomatoes and they magically turned red, we made MORE sauce!

I wish I could say that we're set for the winter or something, but three jars just won't last very long. So, sorry fellow food-growers of the area. I'm not sharing this time. Unless you have something dang good to barter with. Be warned: I'm a picky girl.

Chasing the Carrot

I grew up with plenty of cartoons depicting rabbits desperately chasing carrots that were kept strategically out of reach in front of them. Never did I imagine that one day I'd become that rabbit, almost literally.

I didn't really think that I'd ever grow a more pathetic carrot than the one pictured early in this blog's existence, here. Seriously. As cute as that little guy was, it wasn't exactly a gardener's dream. So imagine my chagrin when I decided to pull up a carrot from this year's garden and found this:

Let's do a side by side comparison. That's the same housekey after all.

I realize now that when the seed packet mentions that thinning the plants when they start to sprout is a good idea, they probably mean it. For the time being, I'm hoping that leaving my carrots in the ground for a little while won't subject them to the same rot that it did my tomatoes last year. Maybe then I can at least grow a crop of baby carrots. The chase continues.