Zucchini Scones

A friend gave me a gigantic zucchini the other day.  She told me as long as you didn't use the inside portion where the seeds are, the zucchini is perfectly edible despite its gargantuan size.  So I pulled out one of my favorite kitchen gadgets and went to work on the 1/3 of the zucchini.

I had some of this zucchini spaghetti with last night's delicious dinner, but there was still some left over.  (Not to mention the 2/3 of the zucchini still uncut...)  Today I decided to bake something with the remaining zucchini spaghetti.  My first thought was chocolate chip zucchini bread, but the recipe calls for 3 eggs and I wanted to do something that required fewer eggs.  Then scones came to mind.  I found this recipe online, and then adapted it.  Because we all know I hate following recipes.

Zucchini Scones

preheat oven to 400

1/2 c whole wheat flour

1 1/2+ c white flour

1/2 c sugar

1 tsp sea salt

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp cumin

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/2 c butter

1 c spaghetti-ed zucchini

1 peach, chopped

1 egg

1 tsp vanilla

1/4 c almond milk

bake for 20-25 minutes

I mixed the dry ingredients together in my stand mixer.  I used a pastry cutter to cut in the butter until it was in small pea-sized lumps.  I dumped the zucchini and peach on top of the dry ingredients, then, after mixing the wet ingredients separately, I added them and let the mixer do it's work.  The dough was super sticky, so I added flour 1/2 c at a time until it was...less sticky.  I added at least another cup.  Then, I floured my silpat and transferred the dough.  It was still too sticky to spread well, so I sprinkled more flour on top.  Then I was able to pat it down to about 1/2 inch thick.  I cut out the scones and transferred them to a greased cookie sheet. 

The scones were tasty, but not nearly as flavorful as I was hoping.  If I make them again, I will increase the amounts of cumin and cinnamon, and see what happens.  Also, I was going to put chocolate chips in them but I forgot...so that might happen next time too!

Cumin-Rosemary-Ginger Pork

This is the first time I cooked pork in the oven instead of in the crock-pot or on the stove-top.  I had originally intended to stick the 1 1/2 pound tenderloin in the crock-pot to make some of my delicious apple-cider cinnamon pulled pork, but I never quite got around to getting out the crock-pot.  So, I decided to use the oven for once.

I coated the pork with ginger, cumin, and rosemary, and stuck it in the 400 degree oven for 30 minutes.  Then, I flipped it over and cooked it for another 30 minutes.

I had some for dinner along with zucchini spaghetti (sauteed in olive oil with garlic and ginger) and quinoa. 

It was delicious.  

I went for a run and I didn't die

I was holding off on running as long as I could, to give my foot as much time to heal as possible. Yesterday marked 75 days since my last run. As of yesterday, I had biked 80.6 miles that week, and only taken 1 day off. I usually take 2 days off per week, but I also usually bike closer to 120 miles a week. Last week I did shorter rides because I'm trying to get my back to stop hurting. I've been feeling pretty good with the shorter rides, and could have done another yesterday, but I wanted to save my back for a longer ride. The real deciding factor, was the weather. I had given my bike a thorough cleaning after a wet ride on Saturday, and the weather was similar yesterday. I really didn't want to get the bike filthy right after I cleaned it. So, I decided it was time to try a run.

There is ONE loop I can do straight from my house that is relatively flat terrain. So that is what I did. The main loop is about a mile long, and By looping through downtown (also pretty flat) at the end, I ended up with 2 miles. I kept the run as slow and steady as I could. I didn't have trouble breathing, but I could feel that if I tried to go any faster, my lungs would protest. It will probably take them awhile to get up to speed. My legs on the other hand, were ready to race and begging for speed. As for my foot...I think it was ok? I think there was a tiny bit of an ache during parts of the run, but I was so focused on looking for it,  i'm hoping I just imagined it. I iced it afterwards just in case. And stretched it. And rolled it on a hot water bottle later in the day. 

Oh, and I ran that 2 miles in 15 minutes. So relieved I can still jog below an 8 minute/mile pace! 

I'm still not sure exactly how I'm going to go about this return to running...but I think I'm going to try to start by doing that 2 mile loop every other day and see what happens.

Mini Peach-Ginger Pies

Disclaimer : If you have a sweet tooth, this is probably not going to satisfy you.  

If you are like me and prefer your desserts to be less sweet, you might love it. 

preheat the oven to 350

The Crust

1/4 c butter

1/4 c whole wheat flour

1/2+ c white flour

1/4 tsp sea salt

3 tbsp cold water

The Filling

2 peaches, peeled & chopped

1 inch ginger root, grated

1 tbsp brown sugar

1/8 c flour

1 tsp ginger powder

1 tbsp mint leaves, chopped

1 tsp butter

I rolled the pie dough out and then used the mouth of a large plastic cup to cut out circles, which I then placed in 6 cups of a muffin tin, with some dough left over for the pie tops.  I mixed all of the filling ingredients together and then spooned them into the little pie shells.  I used the extra pie dough to put Xs on top of the pies.  

Bake for 20-30 minutes. 

I almost threw out the peach skins, but then I decided that instead of letting them go completely to waste, I could make a nice, refreshing, cocktail out of them.  

Peach-Skin Cocktail

skins from 2 peaches

2-3 sections of grapefruit

2 sprigs of basil

Jameson

Club Soda

muddle together the skins, grapefruit, and basil

add Jameson and Club Soda

add ice

stir well

2 months and counting

71 days, to be exact.  71 DAYS since my last run.  I have not run since my birthday at the end of May.  2 months came and went, and I still have not run.  At this point, it is a difficult decision for me, for various reasons.  And the longer I wait, the harder it might get.

At this point, I have no delusions about the fact that I may be starting from scratch.  I have never in my memory taken this many weeks off in a row.  So I am rather afraid of what it will feel like when I try to run again.  Part of the problem is that I really, really, really want to go for a run.  But I want to walk out the door and take off like I used to, and fly through the miles at a sub-7 minute pace and feel great doing it.  But realistically, there is a 0% chance that I will be able to do that.  There are days when I think about going for a run, but I don't trust my ability to keep it slow.  And so, I don't let myself run at all.  When I start running again, I have to be able to start slow.  And knowing myself, I know that will be the hardest part.  And sometimes it's easier not to run at all than to think about going for an easy jog.

My personal desire to run fast and hard aside, there is also the fact that I really have no clue what the state of my tendonitis is.  Most days my foot feels perfectly fine.  Sometimes it aches just a bit, but not necessarily in the precise spot that it used to.  10 weeks and 1 day after my last run, and I have no idea if my foot is actually better or not.  I am pretty sure the only way to find out is to run.  And to start with a flat mile or two and slowly build up if there is no pain.

Obviously I'm going to have to make a decision.  I'm going to have to pick a day when I think I can make myself jog (right now I'm thinking I will have to go for a long bike ride first to tire myself out...), and I'm going to have to find out whether or not I am pain free.  When precisely that day will come...I have no idea.  I have some vague notion that it will coincide with the beginning of school (in last than 2 weeks!!).

In the meantime, I will continue biking.  I have had to take some time off to let my back recover from the wheels of hope ride.  Last week I had content myself with my minimum weekly mileage of 75 miles, rather than pushing for 120-ish like I usually do.  However, despite the fact that I had to lower my average daily mileage and my average weekly mileage due to back pain, I have recently noticed that my legs have gotten significantly stronger.  Some of the hills that used to wear me out even in the easiest gear, I now find myself climbing easily in harder gears, sometimes without even changing my front gear.  Stronger legs help me keep more pressure off my back.  I've also had to start doing some yoga stretches for my back, which have helped me loosen it up.  The fact that biking has finally started working for me is another factor that is helping me take extra time off from running to give my foot as much time as possible.

Wheels of Hope Metric

I'm still not running...and will probably be taking off another month before I attempt running again.  And since I've been biking so much (I'm now up to 110-120+ miles per week) I had no excuse not to ride in the  Wheels of Hope event yesterday.  There were 4 different distances to choose from.  The 18 and 31 mile options were too close to my normal daily mileage, and the 112 option was definitely much too long for me.  So I chose the 63 mile option.  I had never ridden more than 50, but thanks to my new yoga-ish 10 minute morning stretching routine, my back has been doing better.  And I'm always up for a challenge when it comes to exercise.

Lewisburg has been suffering from a drought all summer.  We have been in need of rain for awhile now.  The rain picked yesterday to finally show up. (Also, it was barely 60 degrees out...not my ideal weather!)  Running in the rain stopped bothering me a long time ago, but I had not yet gotten brave enough to really ride in the rain.  However, I had signed up for this thing, and I had paid for it, so there was no way I was going to let myself wimp out.  There were some changes made to the course because of something wrong with a bridge somewhere on the course, so the course was shortened to 58 miles.  I had no complaints about that.

When I run races, I am used to starting at the very front and doing my best to stay ahead of the pack so I don't get pushed around or boxed in.  I had no such delusions with biking, so I tried to start near the back.  It was still a miserable traffic jam at the beginning.  Being boxed in on a bike with people swerving all over the place and rain spraying off of tires into my face was not a pleasant experience.  It was rather terrifying.  I had to deal with that for the first 2 miles or so before I could finally get around the craziness and find a nice empty stretch of road between packs of people.  It meant riding faster than I had planned, but at that point all I cared about was feeling safer.  And getting the ride over with so I could get out of the rain.

After a lot of back and forth with the local bike mechanic (mostly me pulling ahead on climbs, and him pulling ahead on flats/descents), we ended up riding together.  We still had some back and forth with climbs and descents, but whoever was behind always caught up to the other eventually.  It was really nice to have someone to ride with and complain with about the weather and our various aches and pains.  My back held up remarkably well, didn't really start bothering me until somewhere around mile 40.  By mile 50, I was beat.  My neck and shoulders got really cramped, and my legs were worn out.  There were a few small climbs in those last miles, that normally wouldn't be a big deal, but I'm pretty sure they caused my legs more pain than I have ever felt before while on a bike.  I really wanted to give up and lie down on the side of the road until someone came to get me.  But of course I just get spinning the pedals and eventually the ride was over.

We finished the 58.3 mile ride in 3:41.  There was 4,538 feet of elevation change in that ride.  There was a 2.5 mile climb somewhere in the middle of the ride.  Thankfully, I had ridden that part of the ride once before, so I knew what to expect on that hill.

Overall, I'm really happy with how the ride went.  It was cold, wet, and miserable, but I didn't wreck, and I didn't get injured.  Aside from the cold/wet part, I actually felt pretty good throughout the ride.  I thought I would be really sore today, but there's just a little bit of stiffness in my shoulders.

Pesto, Pesto, and more Pesto!

I bought a pound of basil from a friend's farm this morning.  I wasn't quite sure what I would do with a whole pound of basil, but I was happy to help them out and I knew I could find something to do with it.  It baked in the car for a bit while I was visiting my horse, and it made my car smell fabulous.  Then I finally brought it home and decided to make some pesto.  I made 3 batches...and there is still basil left.

3 jars of pesto

still enough basil left for a 4th jar...

I used my little food processor for each batch.  It worked like a champ, but it was getting a little tired by the end...I could smell the motor getting burned out. 

These pestos are great for pasta dishes or as a dip with crackers.