Cupcakes for daffodil day

Cupcakes for daffodil day at work. Not paleo but it doesn’t hurt to look! Some very clever decorations!

Where did a month go?

Wow! What happened to July. I blinked and missed it! Here are a few snapshots from my month

Gold Coast half marathon on my way to a PB.

A couple more days girls holiday on the Gold Coast.

A clear summer evening around the lake in Canberra.

Some local wildlife sighted on a picnic at Mt Ainslie.

The dog swimming on a freezing morning!

A trip to Bangkok.

Back home with my girls 🙂

Some plants think it’s almost spring!

Some tasty meals! Recipes will be shared eventually I promise.

Some MTB racing in the mud!

An unusual lettuce? Or something? Even the seller wasn’t quite sure what it was!

And finishing with some more food – my breakfast this morning 🙂 yum!

Breakfast salmon with asparagus and pumpkin mash

One of the hardest things I found when I first tried Paleo was breakfasts. I know the concept is simple – a bit of protein, some vegetables and health fats – but I have spent 28 years eating certain food for breakfast (minus phase in high school where I had pasta and cheese for breakfast for a few months) and reprogramming my mind has been hard. I have found it easier to adapt to having white meat in the morning rather than starting the day with a steak but that might just be me!

So here is an example of a filling breakfast that can actually be cooked surprisingly quickly if vegetables etc are prepared the previous evening. I don’t know about you but time in the morning at my place seems to operate on a different scale! No matter how early I get up I always end up in a mad rush to get ready…

Breakfast salmon with asparagus and pumpkin mash

Ingredients
salmon steak
leftover pumpkin mash
asparagus (or another green vegetable)

Simply cook your salmon in a fry pan. Meanwhile heat up pumpkin in the microwave and steam asparagus or another veggie in some boiling water. Once the salmon is cooked top with some herbs and in about 15 minutes you can have a delicious, filling, nutritious breakfast on the table! Yum! Just try not to set off the fire alarm like I did :-0

Yes I know that these are potatoes and not pumpkin… I include these if I am having this after a morning training session. Since getting my new camera I have been trying to sort my existing photos and in the process managed to ‘misplace’ a whole lot, including the salmon and pumpkin… and a salmon and silver beet and sweet potato… perhaps I will add them when if I find them again!

The balance between fear and respect

I was speaking to a friend who is relatively new to triathlon who has signed up for her first 70.3 Ironman later this year. She has previously raced one Olympic distance race early last year and hasn’t done much since due to work, study and family commitments. She said something that got me thinking. Her coach had asked her what part of the race she was most scared of. Her answer “Nothing. I know I can swim that far if I train, I know I can do the bike slowly and I can definitely jog/ walk the run”. She doesn’t disrespect the distance – she knows she will need to train but she isn’t limiting her possibilities through fear! How many of us would have the confidence to sign up for a race more than twice the longest distance we have ever done before (and that only once a while ago)? If we are honest I don’t think many. Sure it may not be the ‘sensible’ way to do things but sometimes we have to forget sensible and normal and all sorts of other mental limitations we put on ourselves and go after that dream!

Ok enough philosophical musings… I mentioned in a previous post that we spent the weekend cleaning bikes. I wanted to recognize a brilliant website on bike maintenance that was a bit of a bible when it came to the more thorough deconstruction like taking apart the rear dérailleur! Mountain Bike Maintenance provides clear step by step guides on nearly anything you could want to do to your bike in way that even I could understand what I was doing (and put my bike back together so it works!)

Carrot cake ogre juice

I am loving starting every day with a smoothie (which L calls orge juice) again – so much so that when we went away for the weekend I took my blender with me! There are some things you just can’t easily replace. I the spirit of my smoothie craze I made a new flavor – carrot cake! Why hadn’t I tried this before? It was delicious! Just like a good carrot cake batter (licking the batter out of the bowl is the best part isn’t it?)

I was inspired by the fresh turmeric I found in the fruit shop (be careful – it leaves yellow marks on the bench). I have started including turmeric in my smoothie for its natural anti inflammatory properties and although I normally use ground turmeric I figured fresh would be better! I also included some of my homemade almond butter. I couldn’t believe how easy it was to make – once I got past the doubt that it would never turn into a paste…

Carrot cake smoothie

Ingredients

300-400ml almond milk
1 tbsp almond butter
4-5 stalks kale
1 small grated carrot
1 banana
1 tbsp flaxseed meal
1 tsp chia seeds
2 tsp cinnamon

1. Put all ingredients in a food processor and combine until no lumpy bits remain!
2. Pour into a milkshake mug, insert straw and enjoy 🙂

Almond butter

Ingredients

4 c almonds

1. Roast almonds for approximately 10 minutes or until they start changing colour.
2. Allow them to cool.
3. Pace in the food processor and process for about 10 minutes or until they turn into a paste – don’t worry it will happen! I did it in spurts so my food processor wouldn’t overheat. A couple of minutes on then a few minutes to cool down.
4. Put your almond paste in jars and store in the fridge for up to a week. So much tastier than the store bought stuff!

It’s ok to be you

I hate making a fuss about what I eat. I am attending a workshop this week and for this reason I didn’t put anything on the special dietary requirements form. It’s not like I have to eat this way for medical reasons – I chose to because it makes more feel better. But after seeing the array of other requirements from our group (2 vegetarians, one egg and dairy free vegetarian and one low fat low sugar) I had a rethink and politely asked the caterers if from the following day I could have a grain free dairy free meal. They were very accommodating and even came back to ask more questions about what I could and couldn’t eat. Luckily today was chicken salad for lunch so no worries there. Not so much luck with the morning tea or afternoon tea but I came prepared with some almonds and beef jerky (which I had to eat surupticiously as I was sitting next to a vegetarian). I leant today that it is ok if I don’t eat certain things. I am not being difficult and generally people are very understanding.

A gratuitous Gold Coast photo because I love using my new camera…

Weekend antics

The weekend started with an early morning run

Followed by a delicious breakfast cooked by my friend Jade who was staying the night! She’s welcome again 🙂

Then a LOT of bike cleaning…

(L just getting started… 4 more to go!)

Tavelling to warmer places

Today I left the depths of Canberra winter to travel to warmer paces… specifically the Gold Coast.

The Gold Coast Festival which is currently happening provided an afternoon snack (beef jerky) and an opportunity to browse market stalls on my way to the supermarket.

Luckily I’m staying in an apartment that has cooking facilities (if you can call a kitchen with barely enough room to bend over, blunt knives, a wonky pan and a stove with dud elements facilities…) so I managed to make a (huge – i missed lunch) healthy dinner.

Followed by a few treats…

Now off to enjoy that glass of red wine… 🙂

Olive oil, cheese and wine

I have a new love… truffle infused olive oil! Mmmm so tasty! But I’ll go back the the start of the story…

Last weekend we had a lovely long weekend away in the Hunter Valley with some friends. The trip included visits to wineries for wine tasting, a trip to the Smelly Cheese Co. for some delicious cheese (later eaten with said wines) and an indoctrination into olive oil tasting.

I didn’t realise it was such an art – you can only sniff once, you need to smack our lips and suck in air to fully appreciate the flavour – at the end of the tasting we all went home with numerous bottles of olive oil of a variety of flavours (blood orange infused, lemon myrtle infused, truffle infused, basil infused). I hadn’t really considered what I would do with the oil but last night while making dinner I was inspire to drizzle a little of the truffle infused oil over the veggies we were having with our steak… Heavenly!! It gave them such a lovely rich earthy flavour there is no going back to regular vegetables… And again on the lettuce and egg salad for lunch a drizzle of basil infused oil really brought the flavours together! I am in love with my infused oils and can’t wait to try them on everything!

MTB madness

A new toy!!

I am the very proud owner of a shiny new Giant xtc carbon composite 29er mountain bike! I took it out for the first ride last night and wow it was amazing! Where my old bike used to ‘bounce’ it just glided over the trails! It is also light a as feather – hopping over log rolls or other obstacles is easy peesy! And it feels so comfortable. The geometry and setup make it a dream to ride 🙂 I’m off to go drool over my bike a little more…

If you get a chance to ride one of these give it a go – you never know you might be hooked like me!