Runner's Bread

I've run three marathons.  Mind you, this sounds like I'm a stud.  I am not.  I don't run fast.  I do a run-walk the whole time and usually complete a marathon in around 5 hours.   Still, finishing my first marathon was one of the greatest accomplishments of my life.  I always remember the feeling I had as I crossed the finish line.  I was so impressed with myself and so happy that it was OVER.  I felt like, if I could do that, I could do anything.  I know a lot of people say that but they say it because it's true.

One thing that people who run marathons know is that, when you are training it is as much about running as it is about food.  When you are running for 5 hours, you get hungry.  You burn massive amounts of calories and you loose electrolytes as much as you sweat.  Before any run, I eat toast and peanut butter with sliced banana, a cup of coffee (which I know is not good, thank you) and a big fat bottle of water.  Most runners actually eat while they run.  It's totally counter intuitive to the old adage that was drilled into us as kids to "wait 20 minutes after eating before you exercise."  But when you run a marathon you have to learn to eat while exercising.  I eat a power bar, 2 goos, a banana, pretzels and anything else, my family and friends bring along the way.  When I am done with a run, I want to get something in my body right away.  I always crave savory foods after a long run, like a chicken sandwich and of course a ton of fluids.

In between marathon day and the beginning of training, there are a lot of medium runs.  I like those runs the best.  They are work but without the extreme physical burden of race day.  My favorite of these runs is the 7 mile run.  This is because I live 7 miles from the beach.  There is a bike path that takes you down to the ocean along the Ballona Creek (which, thanks to the army corps of engineers, is now a huge concrete drainage basin).  At no point do you cross traffic just the occasional cyclist, so it is the perfect 7 mile run for me.  When I get down to the ocean, it's so rewarding.  The marina opens up and the ocean breeze rushes in, cooling me off and telling me that I am almost done.

I haven't run a marathon in 4 years.  I remember asking The Husband (when he was still The Boyfriend) if he would wake up early on a Sunday morning to pick me up at the beach after one of my runs.  It was sort of a litmus test for our early relationship, and of course it worked out just fine.  I would ask him to pick me up in the little town of Playa Del Rey at a coffee shop where I finished my runs.  I would stretch and go inside for a huge glass of ice water and a muffin.  They served these insane muffins there that I called "Everything Muffins" because they seemed to have every kind of fruit, veg and nut inside them that you could imagine.  They were so hearty and delicious that I remember feeling like no muffin had ever been more delicious that they were.  Of course, endorphins will do that to you but still they were pretty damn good.

I have been thinking about training for a half marathon recently maybe in the fall and I thought that I would attempt to recreate the Everything Muffin on my own.  Also, I have a surplus of zucchini in my garden and it's a good way to use them up.

I've modified a few recipes to create this one.  Muffins seem fussy to me unless I'm cooking for a party so I made bread.  The bread is very hearty and dense.  It's more "healthy" than the original Everything Muffin.  If you wanted to add 1/4 cup more sugar and use white flour instead of white/wheat they would probably be more like the original.  And I'm sure it would be even better with cream cheese frosting but that's more like cake at that point.  Here is the version that I like.  It's good for an every day breakfast or for an post-run recovery snack.

Runners Bread

3 Cups White Whole Wheat Flour
1 t Salt
1 t Baking Powder
1 t Baking Soda
3 t Cinnamon
1/4 Cup Milled Flax (I have one with dried blueberries from Trader Joes that I like)
1/4 Cup Shredded Coconut (I used unsweetened but it doesn't matter either way)
1/2 nuts (I prefer walnuts but used almonds because that is what I had)
3 eggs
1 Cup Grape Seed Oil
2 t Vanilla Extract
1 1/2 Cup Turbinado Sugar
1 Heaping Cup Grated Zucchini
1 Heaping Cup Grated Carrots
1/2 Cup Yellow Raisins

Combine flour, salt, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon,  flax, coconut and nuts and set aside.  Then in a separate bowl, combine eggs, oil, vanilla, sugar whisk together.  Add zucchini, carrots and raisins to wet mixture.  Add dry ingredients to wet.  But into a parchment lined bread pan and bake on 350 degrees for about an hour.

White whole wheat is a great substitute for regular white flour.  You usually don't have to modify the recipe like you do with whole wheat flour and you still get some fiber.
Combine dry ingredients.  My dry ingredients included flax seeds with dried blueberries.  I bought it on accident and it was a great mistake.
Oil and eggs.
Add vanilla and sugar.
Add in the vegetables and then the dry ingredients.
Line a loaf pan with parchment paper.
Fill loaf pan with batter.  Slam down on the counter a few times to get the parchment in it's proper place.
Bake for about an hour at 350 degrees.  Use the ole toothpick test because it can take as little as 50 minutes depending on the oven.
Enjoy (with or without the run).

Seattle - Doughnuts

Our 2nd morning in Seattle we went all the way. I'd been wanting to try Top Pot Doughnuts for a while. We Don't have them in LA. When The Husband and I found out that there was one walking distance from our hotel, well it was pretty clear what breakfast was going to entail. We took a group of cousins on the brief trek to Top Pot. We walked into the place like an angry/hungry Greek mob and proceeded to buy out the store.


Best apple fritter of my life and it was huge, the size of a CD. This and a cup of coffee, forget about it.









I couldn't finish mine, I'm ashamed to admit. It was the largest most amazing doughnut ever. I've got a sugar intake max before my body goes a little crazy. But the Greek mob took care of the rest. After breakfast, we took a three hour walk through Pikes Place Market and to The Seattle Library to burn off all the calories that we ingested. Hardly a punishment, more like a reward for rewarding yourself. Hey, it's vacation.

Divinity and Breakfast

My husband and I are officiating my cousin's wedding in August. So yesterday I had to become an ordained minister at the Universal Life Church. I prepped for the online application process with some Trader Joe's cinnamon rolls from a tube (which are not bad considering I usually make my own) and a huge coffee. But it only ended up taking 5 minutes to become ordained, so I ended up eating half the tube's worth of rolls and reading blogs all morning. Then I absolved myself of all my sins. It was lovely.

Tuesday's Score: Strawberries

I had, 20 minutes Tuesday afternoon before I had to meet a friend for a top secret birthday mission. If you know me, 20 minutes is never enough time for the Farmer's Market. What can I say, the day had gotten away from me. My iPhone screen turned white and crashed, I forgot the pin to my debit card (come on it's new), and traffic, oh god. But somehow, some way I found myself on Main Street with my shopping bag and a list. With the ambition of putting together some coq au vin this week I trekked right over to Rivadeniera for half a chicken. But I was late and they were out. This day was not the Tuesday, I had hoped for. Then I saw them, organic, 3 baskets for $5, my friends...I ate three while I was buying them. They were like candy.

The thing about buying a row of berries like this for a 2 person household, is that you can never seem to eat them fast enough. They are so fragile and tender that the slightest touch yields a bruise. They keep for 3 days tops and then it's off to the freezer. I usually find myself offering some to everyone who steps into my house. They go in every lunch, every cereal, last night we even ate them at the movies. My friend Robin made a pie out of hers last week that I am still thinking about. It takes a lot of creativity to find new ways to eat your berries in time. But I'd have to say, my absolute favorite thing to do with these red little friends is one of the simplest. it's a Greek/California hybrid, just like me. You can eat it for desert, or breakfast (cause that's how I roll people).

Greek Yogurt Sundae

-1/2 cup of Greek yogurt
-1 basket of strawberries
-1 t good honey
-1 T of sugar if you like

Slice up strawberries and macerate them with a tablespoon of sugar by mixing them together and leaving them in the fridge for an hour. This lets the juices spill out and make a nice little sauce. If they are sweet enough and you don't want the sugar, don't use it. After an hour, put your yogurt in a bowl and drizzle with honey and the syrupy strawberries.


Words cannot describe. Just try it and we'll talk.

I was so inspired by the strawberry bounty that I decided to plant some. Last year's strawberries went the way of the neighbor's dog, Potato.

He loves them too, what can I say. To keep him out of the goods this year, I put my strawberries in a hanging planter. My one little plant probably won't yield a farmer's market style bounty, but hey, a girl can dream.

And, I'm doing a lot of dreaming because the husband is 6'3" and this basket is hanging over the back stairs. But what's a little forehead bruise when you get strawberries in return.

Granola, because I forgot to buy cereal

Last night I had a dream that I was an Ecstasy dealer. In my dream I had an epiphany that selling drugs was wrong so the whole dream was really about me flushing little pink pills down the toilet. Plus, all my 'drugs' were in these little, hard to open zip-lock baggies. Of course since it was a dream, someone had to be coming to get me if I didn't open the baggies and flush faster and faster...

When I woke up I realized that the pills I had been flushing were actually my dog's thyroid medications. I checked the cupboard this morning to be sure that they were all still there. They were.

So since I almost destroyed my dog's life-saving medications with my unconscious neuroses, I decided to do something especially cleansing and healthy for us all today (plus I forgot to buy cereal).

I smudged my house and made granola. Enough with the California jokes.

I told the husband "I'm about to do something and you're not going to like it." Then I walked around the whole house with my smoldering sage. He didn't seem to even notice.



Then I set to baking. Here's my nod to Ree Drummond...



Fruity Pecan Granola
3 Cups Oats
1 1/2 Cups Raw Pecans
1 Cup of diced dried fruit (apricots and strawberries are good)
1 T Flax Seeds (ground or whole)
1 T Sesame Seeds
1/4 Cup Maple Syrup
1/4-1/2 Cup Brown Sugar
1/4 Cup Veg Oil
1/2 t of Salt
dash of cinnamon

Toast and chop pecans



Mix together with oats, flax seeds, and sesame seeds



Mix together syrup, sugar, oil, salt and cinnamon.



Combine dry and wet and spread out on sheet pans. Use two if you need to, just be sure that the mixture is not too thick.




Put in a 250 degree oven and stir the mixture about every 15 min for an hour. It's worth it. While the granola is baking take your fruit and dice up tiny. I used apricot and strawberries but you can use whatever. Candied ginger would have been really good.




After an hour or so, when you feel like the moisture is gone from the granola, pull it out and toss in your fruit. That sounded really dirty.



The finished product is great all week long. Store it in an airtight container and be sure it's completely cool before you seal it up.



Feeling better already.