...Caveman Garden (Jardin du Grog)

First, there has been an appalling lack of posting by myself over the past few months. Apologies. Blogging time was in short supply between working full time, yoga teacher training, and life in general. But I'm back and aim to post much more regularly.

Today Danimal and I planted a garden outback. Now D has been working on the 10 x 20 plot of land adjacent to our garage for months now, digging up rocks and dirt and creating beds. A veritable jungle of plants had taken residence on the radiator in our dining room a few months back.

 (Displacing one very upset black kitty).

During his first full weekend off in about 6 weeks, he rented a roto-till from the Handy Rents up the street and churned the clay/dirt/compost up. He had the biggest grin on his face throughout! Meanwhile, I planted some shrubs around the deck. Tilling complete, he rolled the machine back up the street. Farmer Dan at large in Cleveland.

When he returned, and after a brief siesta by both of us from the hot Cleveland sun, we plotted out our Jardin. Peppers, Cucumbers, zucchini, huevos plantes. We put some crushed eggshells under the tomatoes before putting them in the soil so that they would have extra calcium to grow nice and strong. Serious fun. I hadn't played in the dirt like this in years!

Stay tuned to see if all our hard work pays off!

...crockpot shredded beef!

Today is GROUND ZERO... for a Whole30 challenge! As part of my Yoga Teacher Training program at Cleveland Yoga, we are supposed to do a "cleanse" for 3 weeks. As in no Alcohol, Animal Products, Dairy, Caffeine, Gluten, or Sugar. But all the "karma yogi" food such as rice, beans, corn, tofu, quinoa is allowed. What's a Paleo girrrl to do? Well, I can't bring myself to eat such a diet for 3 weeks. I've read too many primal nutrition books to do that to my body (especially the corn) so I enlisted danimal and decided to conquer a Whole 30 instead. Still no Alcohol, Dairy, Gluten or Sugar, but delicious and good for you grassfed meats, free range poultry and eggs, no grains of any kind. I'm also making a very conscious effort to decrease my caffeine consumption. I don't think I'll be able to get off the morning cup of Philz (oh sweet nectar of the gods!) but I'm substituting my afternoon cup for tea. Turns out Yerba Mate is pretty delicious!

Which comes to the point of this post... cooking. There's some prep work that comes with a Whole30 in addition to buying tons of Steve's grassfed paleo stix and the Just Mangoes from Trader Joes. One of the girls from Crossfit Distinction, Janine, pointed me over to paleOMG.com. This hystical crossfitter out of Colorado has one funny food blog. I poked through some of the crockpot recipes and found one that I had all the ingredients for in the house, but made some adjustments. I'm on a huge cumin kick - the spice of life! - and needed to add that in there along with a bit more heat. The final version came out pretty tasty. Equally important, it was super easy and produced a ton of grassfed meat to get our chow down on.

Easy Shredded Beef

Ingredients

• 2-3lb round steak (I used one from our CSA - buy whatever beef is cheap)
• 2 large yellow onions, sliced
• 1 4oz can of diced green chili peppers
• 1/2 cup chicken or beef broth
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1/2 teaspoon cayenne
• 2 teaspoons of Penzey's BBQ3000 (more to taste at the end)
• 1 teaspoon cumin
• 1 teaspoon black pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon ancho chili powder

Instructions

1. Pull out crock pot.
2. Put meat in pot.
3. Put broth in pot.
4. Put onions on top of meat.
5. Put spices on top of meat and onions.
6. Cover.
7. Put crock pot on low for 8-10 hours
8. Take 2 forks and shred
9. Pour off excess juice
10. Season to taste
11. Eat it like you mean it.

...california

heading back to CALIFORNIA tomorrow.

Granted it's San Diego and not SF, but it still is going to be great!

...more later...

...crossfit

Today I had to go to a doctor's office for a checkup and part of that was a height/weight check.

I never weigh myself. I used to. There were years when I would get on a scale and that fucking number would determine my self-worth, how I would feel about myself, whether I would run three miles or four, eat one cookie or two. There were countless days when I would get on an elliptical machine with my headphones on and pedal until the calorie count arrived at the number I wanted.  So over half a decade ago I made a pact to myself to just not look at at the scale. I put it away. I would go by how I felt, how my jeans fit. It's just a number, right?

And then I found crossfit. There are a lot of reasons why I love it. One of them is it's emphasis on functionality rather than looks. Fitness rather than fashion.

Well, the number today told me that since starting crossfit last year I have gained 10lbs. 10lbs and I can still wear the same clothes as I used to. 10lbs and my waist is pretty much the same size....but I feel like a new person. I feel alive and STRONG. I feel the best I have ever felt in my life. I am not some "model" that can walk down a paris runway. But who the fuck cares? Because I can do so much more than those hungry girls. I can press over half my weight above my head, I can do FRAN in my garage in under 7 minutes, I can deadlift 1.5x my body weight, do more pullups than most boys I know, look "Helen" in the face and laugh, saying BRING. IT. ON.

And THAT, my friends, is beauty.

...Curry

 Made this for dinner last night, a  sweet potato and chicken curry stew that I Paleo-ized from Cooking Light. Dan and I wolfed it down before heading to the near by Irish Pub Parnell's for a Whiskey Tasting.  Dan's verdict: De-RIC-ious 
It was a perfect dinner for a snowy evening in Cleveland. Enjoy!

Sweet potato and chicken Curry
2lbs chicken (1lb thighs, 1lb breasts)
2 shallots, diced
1 red pepper diced
2 cups sweet potatoes peeled and cubbed
1 14oz can light coconut milk
1 14 oz can diced tomatoes
1 tablespoon minced ginger
2 teaspons penzey’s sweet curry powder
heaping tablespoon green curry paste (thai kitchen)
1 teaspoon tumeric
1 teaspoon coriander
1 bay leaf


Season 2lbs of chicken with salt and pepper and Brown in pan.
Remove chicken.
Using the same pan, sautee shallots, and pepper, add garlic
When almost done add in curry powder, tumeric, coriander, ginger and saute a minute
Add tomatoes, scrapping up browned bits. then add coconut milk and bay leaves,
Add back chicken to the pan and  simmer a minute while you get your chicken stock.
Add about ⅔ carton of chicken stock (1 ½ cups approx)
Bring to a boil then simmer for 1 hour
Add in sweet potato, bring to boil then simmer on low for at least 1 hour or until ready to serve. 

...cant get it up

dear snatch.






i hate you.


that is all.

~jen

...Calender

I can't believe it is 2012 already. That totally snuck up on me. Last year, I created a calendar on snapfish of some photos I took during my travels around the US and Europe. I meant to make another one for christmas gifts but the time just got away from me.  Luckily, a few days ago a coupon for 50% off calendars popped up in my gmail inbox. With a snowstorm outside, and a fire roaring a few feet away I sifted through my pictures.

Jackson. Utah. Galway. Point Reyes. Sierras. Wicklow. Kauai. Lots to choose from. It took me a while to whittle down my choices because I kept getting sucked into just looking at each of my past adventures. I had forgotten about the wild chickens and roosters that were running all around Kauai, and the "Ho-Made Pies" sign in one small town halfway between Zion and Bryce National Parks in Utah.

I ended up making two versions, one of Wyoming pictures and one of an assortment of pictures. The Wyoming one has many shots of the Tetons. It's honestly one of the most beautiful mountain ranges in the world, mostly because how quickly the sharp peaks rise about the plains and Snake river basin. I mixed in some shots of the Aspens and horses too.
The assorted album is a selection of landscapes from places I've visited the past two years. I had some other good shots of buildings in Ireland and candids of people but decided to keep it au natural this time around. My reasoning for that was partly selfish; I wanted a slice of nature on the kitchen wall to stare up at each day while we are here in Cleveland. (Which some might call the anti-california).

Once I selected the pictures, I played around with the backgrounds. There are a lot of "styles" to choose from, many with cutesy drawings all over them. But I stuck with some plain solid colors so that the photos would stand out by themselves. After a few hours, I hit the order button. Can't wait to get the final product in the mail.