YOLO in NOLA pt.1

In the midst of your journey into a whole food lifestyle, there are times when you will ask yourself if all the extra effort is worth it.  Is it worth it to forgo the canned diced tomatoes and chop them myself?  Is It worth it to make my own pizza dough and marinara sauce?  In the long run, it is definitely worth it.  Not only does it make your body feel better when you put fresh and real ingredients into it, but your food actually tastes better.  Herbs, fruits, vegetables, and spices all have their own unique flavors.  If you ever find yourself eating a tomato or any other vegetable that doesn’t have a distinct flavor, you need to drop the silverware and back away from the plate. 

My love of nutritious food that tastes good compels me to be on the lookout everywhere I go.  I just recently got back from a weekend trip to New Orleans.  I have been on several trips to New Orleans, and I love so many things about.  The history, culture, music, and architecture are so unique, but what keeps me coming back time and time again is the food.  I spend my trip indulging in delicious food, and then I come home and am saddened by the fact that the sea food, among other things, just doesn’t taste the same here.  In my opinion, there is nothing better than enjoying dinner out with a small group of friends and enjoying well prepared fresh food.

 

The first day of my trip started out great!  We had found an awesome place to go and run by the river, so we decided to start our morning with a 2 mile run.  It was humid, but ultimately it was refreshing.  After the run we came back to where we were staying and met up with our husbands, who did not want to get up early and run.  Then we got ready and went into New Orleans for lunch. We went to an old restaurant known as Antoine’s.  It is extremely unique in multiple respects.  The restaurant itself has been around since 1840.  It has a vintage charm that you can’t help but notice right when you walk in.  The restaurant also has 13 unique dining rooms and a massive wine cellar.  I was lucky enough to secure a private tour of the dining rooms a couple hours after we enjoyed lunch there. 

Upon entering the establishment, we were seated in the large annex room.  You couldn’t help but notice the elegant feel, and I was happy my friends had prepped me prior to lunch on the dress code and elegance of the restaurant even during lunch.  I had chosen a nice dress and a cardigan for lunch, and I felt right at home.  Everyone in our lunch group decided to order off of their lunch special menu.  I had a trio of oysters each with a different sauce.  One was a topped with a tomato sauce and piece of bacon, one was topped with a cream heavily flavored with Worcestershire, and the final one was topped with a cream and white wine sauce.  I really liked the one with tomato sauce.  Each oyster was nicely baked and each sauce had a nice delicate crust on top.  For entrees I chose scallops on top of creamy grits.  The scallops were cooked perfectly, so they had a nice sear on the top and bottom and still had a nice give when they were cut.  The creamy grits and seared scallops were a perfect combination.  The portion sizes were small which we all appreciated since no one wants to feel overly full from lunch and still be expected to move around.  I got a cheesecake that was sitting in a pool of homemade strawberry sauce.  I stopped eating sugar about 4 months ago, so I didn’t get to indulge in any of the cheesecake, but I was a nice wife and gave it to my husband and let my friends all taste a bite.  Everyone remarked on how nice and light it was, and they said the sauce was to die for.  I’m just happy that we don’t truly eat with our eyes, because after surveying all the desserts at the table, I would’ve gained about 15 pounds in a 1 minute period.  Everyone in our group left the restaurant full and happy.

We returned about an hour later to tour the dining rooms.  We were taken around by one of the waiters, and he gave us history on each of the dining rooms.  I won’t turn this into a history lesson, but I will tell you some tidbits about my favorite places.  Antoine’s has a tab on their website to find out the history of each room, so if you find my tidbits entertaining, you can go there and find out more.  My best friend who was with us had a grandfather who was once King of Proteus during Mardi Gras one year.  I don’t know how familiar you are with Mardi Gras, but it’s actually so much more than the drunken, flashing mob you see on television and in movies.  It is actually a really amazing time, and if you go to the right parades at the right time, you don’t have to witness any of the night time spectacle.  Elite groups actually get together and host a parade.  They will have a King and Queen which is a great honor.  My friend’s grandfather was King of Proteus, so she was very excited to see the Proteus room since it was dedicated to their group.  My favorite room would have to be the mystery room.  During prohibition it was used as a speakeasy.  You could actually leave the other dining rooms and go to the women’s restroom and go through a trap door in the back which would lead you to the mystery room.  People would return with alcohol and when asked where they got it they would reply, “It’s a mystery to me.”  If you ever get a chance to go, it is well worth it.  You can call and make a reservation for dinner and request to be seated in any dining rooms you choose.  They are all first come first served for requests.  They are all extremely interesting with their own ambiance to add to the evening.  Be prepared to get dressed up and have a night full of good food.

 

 

After the tour of Antoine’s our group left the city and returned to our residence for the weekend.  We had dinner that night at N’Tini’s in Madeville, Louisiana.  They are known for their martinis.  They even have a menu as big as their dinner menu which is full of martinis.  The members of our little dinner group each got a different martini to try.  I am not a big fan of alcohol, so I opted out.  They all really enjoyed their drinks.  For dinner I chose a piece of fried eggplant covered with a cream sauce of crawfish, crabmeat, and shrimp.  You can’t ever pass up the opportunity to get seafood in Louisiana and especially not crawfish.  It is too die for.  It also came with feta and green onion risotto and sautéed squash and zucchini.  Normally, I wouldn’t order anything fried, but when you’re on vacation, it’s okay to splurge right? 

My friend’s husband ordered an appetizer with escargot in a delicate homemade tomato based sauce.  I’d had a chance to try escargot 11 years earlier on a cruise, but my friend who was cruising with me told me she’d get sick if she saw me eat a snail.  Not being an adventurous foodie yet, I declined the opportunity and it has taken me this long to find another opportunity to try it.  I’ve always heard it is rubbery, but it must be that everyone who told me that didn’t have it cooked correctly.  I thought it was delicious.  I’m not going to lie and say it tasted like chicken, because it certainly did not.  I was expecting it to have a texture like calamari due to all the comments I’ve heard about it being rubbery.  I also recall seeing an Olson twin movie where one of them eats escargot and says it tastes like a balloon.  Needless to say, I was preparing myself for a less than pleasing texture.  Boy was I surprised when I bit into it, and it seemed to melt in my mouth.  I would say it has a texture more similar to a scallop, but the escargot is still softer.  It was actually one of the best things I’ve ever eaten.  If you know me, your jaw is probably hitting the floor right now because up until about 3 years ago, I was doing good to eat anything that didn’t come out of a Kraft macaroni and cheese box.  Now here I am eating snails!  Who would’ve thought?  If you ever go to N’Tini’s you have to find out if they have the snails and tails appetizer (oh yeah did I mention it had alligator in it too?).  It will not let you down.

Dinner came, and I enjoyed the delicious creamy seafood sauce.  It had huge chunks of crabmeat, shrimp, and crawfish.  It was absolutely outstanding, and I ate every bit of it off of the eggplant.  In hindsight I probably would’ve enjoyed the eggplant more if I’d asked for it to be grilled.  Oh well, there’s always next time!  I was a little disappointed that what they advertised as risotto was actually orzo with green onions and feta.  It was still really delicious, but orzo and risotto are not the same.  If you aren’t familiar with them, orzo is actually small pasta which is basically in the shape of rice.  It really looks like rice, and when I first started cooking it, my husband thought it was rice.  Risotto is made from Arborio rice, and it has a very creamy quality to it.  It is really delicious if it is cooked right.  Either way the orzo with feta and green onions was delicious.  I was just upset to find orzo being masqueraded as risotto.  Those of you who know the difference in taste and texture will probably be appalled as well.  I was, however, excited to see sautéed squash and zucchini on my plate.  Two of my all time favorite vegetables!  They were cooked perfectly just the way I like them.  I thought the dinner couldn’t get much better until I looked over and noticed my husband had untouched real green beans on his plate.  Yum!  One of the rules of being married to a foodie is that you are required to share the deliciousness from your plate with your spouse.  This works especially well for me, because my husband isn’t a foodie.  I gobbled up his green beans in an instant. 

 I have to stop and explain my green bean obsession.  Growing up I was only fed green beans from a can…yuck!  These I do not consider to be real because they have sat in a can on a shelf for goodness knows how long soaking up liquid, sodium, preservatives, and all other kinds of unhealthy junk.  Real green beans are the ones you select individually in the produce section and come home and snap each end off and cook them to your desired texture.  I happen to prefer them roasted with a tiny bit of olive oil and salt and pepper.  I enjoy the texture to be soft and delicate.  My mouth is watering right now just thinking about them.  I’m growing them in my garden this year, but they aren’t quite ready for picking right now.  Maybe I can find some snails out there too… just kidding.

We went home that night and continued our enjoyment by playing a riveting game of phase 10.  If you don’t play phase 10, you are really missing out.  It’s one of the few games where you can spend 75% of the game losing, and in the final round you can jump way ahead and beat everyone.  I being an ultra competitive person happen to love it!  The game went late into the night, and we were all really tired the next morning.

Navigating Clean Eating and Exercise While on Vacation

My husband has a job where he gets to travel a lot.  Sometimes he goes to the same, usual places over and over again, but other times he gets to go to new and exciting places that I haven't been.  I try to go with him as often as I can, so that I can enjoy a nice, mostly paid, vacation with him. 

The summer is probably the busiest travel season due to the fact that kids are out of school.  The thought of an impending vacation can be fun, but also scary.  Sometimes before a new vacation, I find myself agonizing on how I will stay on track with my running and clean eating.  It is extremely easy to get caught up in the whole vacation experience and fall off of the bandwagon.  So how do I do it?

I'm going to make individual posts for each place I've been to tell you exactly how it worked in that particular place, but for now, I will just give you some basic tips.

1. If you're going to be staying over a weekend, chances are there will be some kind of race, usually a 5k, near or actually in the city you are staying.

• If you don't have a car, you need to find the race before you book the hotel.  After you know where the race is, you can check for the hotels around it, or see if there are any hotels around subway stations that could get you to the race.  It all depends on how comfortable you feel with what you will have to do to get yourself to the race.

2. If you're not staying over a weekend, your chances of finding a race are very slim, but you can still be looking for running groups.  There are usually multiple running groups that have a facebook page or a website with an e-mail.  I usually google something like, "running groups in __________".  When you explain you will be there for vacation, and you want to link up with a local running group to stay active, they will happily allow you access to their facebook page and let you join. 

• I have actually done this, and I've never had anyone turn me down.
• This is also a good way to find out about local races going on.  The group might know of some smaller races that you didn't find advertised online.
• Also, the group can help you in choosing a hotel for proximity to their group run location, and they can give you the skinny on how safe and reliable the public transportation is.

3. I spend a lot of time before trips looking up restaurants in and around the hotel we're staying in.  My husband will be at an office during the day, so I am usually on my own for lunch.  The safer I feel in the city = how far I'm willing to travel by myself to get food. 

• When you find menus online, don't be discouraged if they don't have everything exactly to your liking.  There are always ways to "tweak" your order, so that it is health friendly. 
• It is a good idea to have a couple things from each place around you that you could eat, because you never know where everyone else will want to go. 

4. When you first arrive at your hotel, walk around and take in what's around you.  You might be surprised to see people jogging, walking dogs, pushing baby strollers, etc. in  an area where you hadn't even considered running. 

• This is also a good way to find restaurants that you didn't find via your "google search".  I usually use "yelp" to find things near me, because it will also give you directions to follow if you need to walk a block or two. 

5.  You can also check to see if there will be gyms around your hotel or in your hotel.  Most hotels have a very basic gym that consists of a treadmill, bike, elliptical, and free weights.  You can use whatever picture the hotel provides to assess what they have available and make your own workout routine with those items, or I like to utilize pinterest to find workout routines to my liking.

• sometimes there will be crossfit facilities or a big gym around you that will be willing to give you a pass to come and workout for the week you're there (for a small fee of course :)).  I haven't been lucky enough to find anywhere that's doing TRX, but  one day it will happen.

6. Try to locate some good running trails or paths that will be near you.  My rule about running in a foreign place is that I don't run by myself anywhere where I will be alone.  You have to be safe when you're in a new place.  How you handle that is entirely up to you, but here's what I do.

• I use my phone as my Ipod, and my husband and I are linked via the "find my friends" app.  He can use the app on his phone to see where I am at any time.  This makes both of us feel safer.
• I own runner's mace that sits in the palm of your hand while you run, but you can't always take that since the airports aren't so excited about finding things like that in your bags. 
• The main thing is that you should ALWAYS be aware of your surroundings.  Don't EVER be caught off guard and unaware of something that potentially could or is going to happen.  That is how people get hurt.

I hope these tips help.  Please take a look at my specific location pages to see specifically what I've done to be prepared and stay healthy and active in each place.  Above all else, PLEASE BE SAFE!

Happy Running!

junk food or longevity of life?

Everyone starts their journey with a specific goal in mind.  Sometimes, we aren't completely honest with others or even ourselves about what that goal is because we don't want to hear that it is unrealistic or unobtainable.  I know I am always my biggest critic no matter what the situation, and the same goes for my journey to get healthy.

I cringe at the words "weight loss journey".  The journey shouldn't ever be to lose weight, it should be to get healthy.  What is the point of being super teeny tiny if you are seriously unhealthy?  I want to be healthy, so that I know I am putting forth the effort to prolong my life instead of cutting it short.  Greasy pizza, cheese fries, milkshakes, ice cream, cake, candy, etc. are all vices that you might indulge from time to time or more often than not, but I would rather live longer than eat another slice of pizza any day of my life. 

My plan is to exercise regularly, eat non processed food, and just make smart choices in general.  I want my body to be fit and solid, and I don't want parts of it to move as I walk across a room.  We all have those places we'd like to see smoothed out, tightened, toned, and flat.  We need to be honest with ourselves about how we feel about these things.  Here I go.

I have the way I feel when I eat processed food.  I feel gross and yuck all the rest of the day and sometimes into the next.  I feel sluggish when I try to exercise, and I feel like I have to drink even more water than I normally do to try and flush all the toxins out of my system.  All of it could be easily remedied by eating right from the beginning.  We need to stop and make a change.  I know it is hard because you are used to doing things one way and anything different can be scary, but if we do it together, it will be much easier. 

If you want to learn more about eating non processed, healthy food, or if you just want to know how in the world you're supposed to get your kids to like fresh veggies instead of mac and cheese and chicken nuggets, check out www.100daysofrealfood.com Let them know Girl in Asics sent you!

Fight the good fight of longevity for your health and wellness, and I will touch base with you hopefully tomorrow!

Can I Come Back from This?

Last week I was watching Extreme Makeover Weight loss Edition, and it was the episode with Jami.  I love shows like this and The Biggest Loser because of how inspirational they are.  I love watching people in all the stages of their journey of not only changing their body, but also finding and changing themselves on the inside. 

Jami's episode touched my heart in a new way.  There was a very impactful moment right after she had been weighed in for the first time, and she looked at Chris Powell with tears in her eyes and asked, "Can I come back from that?"  Obviously she was referring to the weight and how much damage she had put on her body, but it resonated so much more with me. 

We've all asked ourselves that question because everyone has had a point in your life when you feel you have hit rock bottom, and there absolutely cannot be any way out of the hole you've dug for yourself.  I'm here to tell you that's never the case.  There is ALWAYS a way out.  Until you are dead, you can always come back from anything.  I don't ever want anyone to feel like you are so far gone that, like Jami, you make a plan and intend to follow through with killing yourself.  There is always someone to help even if it's a stranger on the other end of a phone (suicide hotline) or a nurse at a hospital.  Please, please, please seek help before you think it is too late. 

I encourage you to reach out for help, prayers, opinions, information, and whatever you feel like you need to keep yourself afloat in the raging river we call life.  If something is wrong please don't hesitate to reach out to me, and I will do my best to find someone who I can connect you with who will be able to help you.  Just remember it is NEVER too late.

You can come back from this!

Back in the Game

For the past week, I've been sidelined from running due to a random pain in my leg.  It has been AWFUL to have to sit on the couch and ice my leg multiple times a day when I should be out running.  There were so many times I thought about going for a run, but as long as my leg was still hurting when I was just walking around, I knew it would be better if I gave it time to heal.  I limited myself to only doing TRX, and I even had to adjust some of the things I was doing there to compensate for my leg injury.  I am proud to say all those annoying days of sitting back and not running paid off!

Sunday night, I ran a mile just to see how everything felt.  I was so happy to find that I had no pain in my leg!  YAY!  I made sure to ice it that night as usual, so I wouldn't wake up in pain the next morning.  Everything worked out so well that last night, I actually ran 3.1 miles!  It was hard, and my time wasn't anything worth getting excited about, but I pushed myself past the 2 miles I had been running when the pain started.  I am so proud of myself and my body for going the distance and getting it done. 

I'm ready to get back into training for my 3rd half marathon.  I have a goal to run a race in every state and so far I have conquered Georgia, Alabama, Missouri, and Louisiana.  If you know of a good half marathon that I should do let me know!  Even if it's in one of the above mentioned states, that's okay too!

Look out world, I'm back in the game!

Getting Paid to Get Healthy...Why the Heck Not?

So I found this cool deal with Omron Fitness where you work as a travel ambassador.  I would have to agree to walk 10,000 steps a day with their new product, the tri-axis pedometer.  It allows you to upload the data from your walks, and it doesn't count steps from movement in the car and other things like that. 

This is what Omron Fitness is saying about it in their own words, "Omron wants to test out a new product, the Tri-Axis Pedometer, which connects to OmronFitness.com where you can upload your data, set goals & track your progress. The pedometer track steps, including brisk aerobic steps, calories and distance. It also counts steps accurately when positioned flat, vertically or horizontally. But it doesn’t count your “steps” when you are jolting around in the car like other pedometers do. (This isn’t good in case you were wondering.) The Tri-Axis pedometer also automatically reset daily and stores up to 22 days in memory and 7 days on display."

Sounds pretty cool right!  I've only been blogging a short while, but I think this would be a really awesome opportunity.  It would be interesting to know how many steps I walk in a day, and I wouldn't mind keeping y'all updated on my progress and posting results. 

I know people have been seeing my blog posts, so if you can help me out and leave a little shout out or just some encouraging words in the comment field below just to let me know you're there, that would be awesome! 

Thanks for letting me know you care and the things I post mean something to you!

It's all Greek to me!

We're going to an annual summer barbecue tonight, and I wouldn't feel right about going without taking something healthy and fresh.  I've been going crazy trying to come up with the best side dish to prepare and take that would go with everything the hosts are preparing.  I was watching re-runs of the Barefoot Contessa, and she was making a greek salad.  It looked so bright and delicious that I knew that's what I would be making.

 It has chopped red and yellow bell peppers, cherry tomatoes cut in half, half slices of a hot house cucumber, kalamata olives (which I forgot to buy...shhh!), feta cheese, and a homemade dressing made from minced garlic, olive oil, red wine vinegar, Dijon mustard, dried oregano, salt, and pepper.

I think it turned out beautifully!  It might even be too pretty to eat :)  We will have to see what everyone at the party thinks of it.  I like that it isn't a traditional salad with lettuce.  This way, it becomes almost more of marinated veggies than a salad.  I will post pictures of the other food later, but for now, feast your eyes!

find the recipe for Ina Garten's Greek salad at http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/ina-garten/greek-salad-recipe/index.html