Going to the pub on a school night

Yes, yes, I've still been training, despite all the food posts! Check out dailymile for last week's runs.

Although...I did skip training tonight to catch up with friends. Our friends (who are a couple) bought a place recently and we went to check it out. Had pre-dinner nibblies - crackers, potato chips, cheese, dips, olives - all the party foods I haven't had in a while (eek!)

We went to the Tower Hotel for dinner. Again, I haven't had a pub meal in ages. Decided to share a seafood plate (prawns, mussels, fish, salt n' pepper squid, chips and salad) as I was quite full from the nibblies beforehand. Not to mention we got more bowls of chips (and Burger Rings) to tide us over until the food came!

Sharing was a good idea - I was pretty full when the meals came! It could be just me, and it could be psychological, but I could feel the difference that eating greasy pub food makes. To add to it, I just remembered that I had fried chicken with rice for lunch (Yummy nasi ayam - chicken rice - at this little Indonesian place in Carlton, called Es Teler 77). Luckily not everything on the seafood plate was fried, or I would've probably felt worse.

Well, there's yoga tomorrow (thank goodness, need to burn this off!), plus running on Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday. The plan on Thursday is to check out the Run for the Kids 5.2k course. And I need to throw in a morning run in there somewhere - still struggling to wake up before 9am on weekends!

And...I have two assignments due in two weeks. Don't I just love my life right now!

Forgotten Fruits high tea at Southpaw Bar, Fitzroy

You've all read (hopefully) about my pastry making (and winning at life!) adventures last week, but did you know that, only the week before, the lovely Sarah M and I had a different kind of encounter with baked goods? Ha, bet you didn't, cuz lazy me forgots to blogs abouts its.

Oh yes. Sarah M and I did have a different kind of encounter with a variety of baked goods on Friday 11 March - the eating kind.

We had tix to the Forgotten Fruits High Tea at a bar/eating place called Southpaw on Gertrude Street in Fitzroy, as part of the Melbourne Food and Wine Festival. The description on the MFWF website said:

"A Fitzroy take on the classic High Tea. Our chefs have sourced the forgotten fruits of bygone years, virtually unknown in this day and age, from independent growers in Daylesford. Experience traditional techniques with delicacies such as rosehip jelly, medlar marmalade, shadberry chutney and more, washed down with a pot of tea or a Pimms cocktail – Tally-ho."

How to say "Om nom nom" in the language of bygone years?

It was a lovely warm afternoon (I was in shorts!) and the perfect weather for taking tea. Or a big jug of cold, cold Pimms. We turned up at the respectable tea-taking/Pimms-chugging hour of 4pm, and were shown to our table, tastefully set in decor from bygone years.

P.S. These photos were shamelessly stolen from the lovely Miss M's Facebook album, hence their smaller size and perhaps lesser quality.

 Nanna rang. She wants her doilies back.

Mismatched china FTW

Here was what the afternoon had in store for us. For $35 per person, we got all that was on this menu, PLUS a jug of Pimms. And tea. This was awesome value - we checked out their drinks menu and normally a jug of Pimms itself is 35 bucks!

The menu

Oh Pimms, how I love thee.

First, the appetiser - ode to a smoked salmon sandwich. Kind of like a glorified canape, but luckily the elderflower and lemon creme made it a bit special. I couldn't really taste the vodka in the vodka-cure salmon, but that could be due in part to me just scoffing it down because I was hungry.

For the omnivores

Sarah M had the vegetarian version, minus the salmon.

For the vegos

Next up, a plate of thinly-sliced, all-kinds-of-smoked-and-cured oink-oinks. From Daylesford (oh how I love that place!)

Mmm...charcuterie.

Miss M, of course, had the vegetarian option: peaches stuffed with goats cheese and roasted red capsicums drizzled in honey.

Not quite the same as smallgoods.

Now, for the main event. Our three-tiered platter of goodness:

Doesn't look like much but we could barely move after all this.

From the top: two types of scones - plain, and pumpkin with toasted almond.
In the middle: gooseberry and coffee tartlette, white chocolate and silvenberry mousse, and the Southpaw Tim Tam - a spiced Medlar biscuit and dark chocolate marquise (no, I don't know what that is either).
At the bottom: ribbon sandwiches. 'Nuff said.

The scones came with three types of jam, and some cream whipped through with vanilla beans. It had a rich vanilla sweetness to it and a light, fluffy, vanilla cream-verging-on-ice-cream texture - if there is such a thing.

Scones and jams and cream and Earl Grey tea.

Up close and personal.

By now we had seen the bottom of our jug of Pimms and had started on the Earl Grey tea. And, while it didn't look like much, we were quite, quite full by the time we were halfway through the scones and sandwiches.

But we had to persevere. Must. Eat. Scones. And jam. And cream.

It was fun trying to identify which of three of the four jams they served us that day - we suspect that maybe the cherry laurel one was missing, but were too full to ask.

The sandwiches were probably the least special of them all. The tea-smoked chicken, while not your typical sandwich filling, was pretty good with the crab apple chutney, but the bread itself was a bit soggy in parts which made it kinda bleh.

We struggled through the desserts, which is saying a lot because I usually just inhale them. The white chocolate and silvenberry mousse was exceptional - the tartness of the silvenberry plus the sweet white chocolate seriously had a party in my mouth. The tartlette pastry cracked quite easily but wasn't soft and yucky, and the Southpaw Tim Tam was an interesting take on the original, although not quite similar for them to actually call it a Tim Tam.

By this time we couldn't really move.

Lopsided from too much food.

The final touch was the palate cleanser - a take on the Eton mess, perhaps? Given that it was called the drunken Eton. The Grand Marnier and brandy jam lent an extra dimension to the cream and marionberry, while the meringue was a clever textural addition.

I'm writing like a wanky food critic.

I could eat a big bowl of this.

All in all, an exceptional afternoon spent with awesome food and delightful company. Sarah M and I are now inspired - we want to try all the various high teas Melbourne has to offer, and report back with uncomfortably full bellies and many colourful pictures. If you know of a good one, tell us!

Results!

Got my official race time today from the folks at the Brooks River Run.

30 minutes 22 seconds!

Can you actually see anything here?!

You can't quite see anything unless you click on the picture, and I can't be bothered posting a better one right now.

I win at life Part 2

So, after winning at life Part 1, I ran my first ever race fun run race! (I keep telling myself it's a fun run, but the competitive bitch in me won't believe it).

The Brooks River Run is probably the best introduction to racing, in my humble rookie opinion. Firstly, it's in the evening (+1!) , not at some godforsaken early morning hour. And we all know that lazy, couch-blobbing blobs like me are almost always not morning persons. It's bad enough not knowing what to expect at your first race without being less than awake for  it. Evening races FTW!

With my cheer squad of two, we made our way down to Coulson Gardens, next to the Maribyrnong River near the Angler's Tavern. I totally didn't know what to expect. As we walked towards the start line and registration table, I saw all these runners doing practice laps and/or warm-ups going by. So this is what serious runners do. I started to feel horribly under-prepared and intimidated.

But...it was a beautiful sunny afternoon and I was getting pretty excited about the race. Got my number and timing chip, fixed them on and did some warm-up stretching. There was a pre-race aerobics warm-up on stage and 5.10pm which was quite fun, although my thighs would say otherwise (damn you, squats!)

Pinning on my race number!

The nerves were slowly building all this while, evidenced by my two toilet trips before the race (my dragon boating coach said being nervous puts pressure on your bladder, hence the need to pee!). I managed to sneak a final toilet trip in about 3 minutes before the start of the 4k. I grabbed a drink from the water station, and placed myself towards the back of the pack, in front of the walkers and pram pushers.

I had a quick chat with the lady next to me who was also running her first race (she overtook me in like the first 1k). The excitement (tension?) was building up. The start was called. I plugged in my earphones, and as the start went off I shuffled along to the start line.

And off I went. Started at what I thought was a reasonable pace. My plan for this race was to start off slow, build up over the next few kilometres and finish strong. That didn't quite work out as well as I hoped. I started getting distracted by the other runners and all these little kids who were running about all over the place. I overtook some people, got overtaken, and tried not to trip over some kiddies who decided they had enough and just stopped in the middle of the track.

The adrenalin and other faster runners made me pick up my pace, and I started to fade a little bit. It was also quite warm, and afternoon sun was in my face pretty much the whole time. Towards the middle of the race I was breathing really heavily and started to drop my stride. Rather than shuffle pathetically and drag my feet, I decided to walk for a minute to recover at about the 3k mark. At this point I learnt my first lesson.

Lesson 1: Stay focused. Don't get distracted by faster pacers, you gotta just focus on your own pace and race plan.

That seemed to work, and I picked it up again for the final 2k. I started to get into the swing of it and managed to overtake a couple of runners who had overtook me earlier (woohoo!). As I neared the end of the course, I was suddenly awash with excitement. The prospect of finishing my first ever race overwhelmed me, and my heart started pounding against my chest. This of course affected my breathing and I had to walk a few steps to recollect myself. I told myself to pull it together - "Stay calm! Breathe!" - and continued. In the last 150m I could hear my cheer squad of two yelling my name, and I sprinted the rest of the way towards the finish line.

Lesson 2: Stay calm. Don't get overexcited when you're 300m out from the finish line like I did, and have your heart nearly explode with excitement that you almost couldn't breathe!

So yeah. I survived. Made a few rookie mistakes, and learnt a couple of valuable lessons for my next race - the Run for the Kids 5k on 17 April (yups! I signed up for that one!). I'm so glad I made it through, although I am disappointed with my time. Still waiting for the results, but unofficially it was about 30 minutes, which was 3 minutes under my time trial :(

Still, I'm happy with myself for making it through, and *insert self-motivating fist pump* it can only get better from here!

I win at life Part 1

Today was a day for winning at life.

In the morning, I made French pastries. In the evening, I ran a 4k race. Both for the first time!

I'll talk about the pastries first. The very lovely and very ladylike (cuz she dresses nice and takes tea) Sarah M and I went to a French dessert cooking class that we found on the Melbourne Food and Wine Festival website. She to further explore her passion for baking and making nommy food, me mostly for sh1ts and giggles.

Well, not JUST for sh1ts and giggles. I like eating nommy food, so thought it would be nice to actually learn how to make them, and also, it was something  I had never done before.

The class was run by Sandra from Chateau Cuisine. She does regular cooking classes - like macarons, croquemboche, French regional cuisine - at the Sandybeach Centre in Sandringham. Due to a bout of wrestling with the antiquated parking machine (why won't you take my coins?! Damn you! $*!@$%^^@#%) and a game of 'Let's Try Not to Get Killed by Cars and the Lycra Brigade on Beach Road', we were about 10 minutes late.

No matter. We got straight into it. Today's attempt is to make four desserts: chocolate eclairs, mille feuilles, and two types of cakes. Can't remember what cakes they are because I left the class folder in...class. Hmmph.

Getting into it.

First we had to make the crème pâtissière for the eclairs and mille feuilles. We made a chocolate one and a vanilla one. Here's Sarah M mixing the eggs and sugar for one of 'em.

Whip whip whip, whisk whisk whisk

Then we made the batter for this cake thing. We put the mixture into cute little camembert boxes. Sandra had a heap of those boxes. Q: How much camembert must one eat to keep supplying a class with camembert cake tins? A: There is no such thing as too much camembert.

I liked how Sandra had already divvied up the ingredients into little containers and bags, so that we don't have to measure anything ourselves. If we did, I've a feeling we would still be in class.

Two volunteers (Sarah M included) cut up puff pastry (quality homemade stuff that came in a massive sheet) for the mille feuilles. I poked holes in them with a fork *stabby stab stab*

We also made the choux pastry for the chocolate eclairs, which was a workout in itself. Ours didn't turn out so well because some of our flour ended up on the stove :(  So it was rather eggy and slightly runny. But we piped them out anyway.

Whipping up choux pastry. Requires big guns.

Glazing our eclairs

This is what they should look like:

Another team's eclairs

Yet another team's eclairs. Damn professionals.

This is what ours looked like:

Slightly sad little baby eclairs

Eclairs in the oven!

The closest I'll come to having a bun in the oven.

Here are the results. Again, this is what they should look like:

Light, puffy, golden brown babies

This is what they shouldn't look like - ours:

Rejects from eclair school.

Runts of the litter, hang together.

At least they looked light and puffy (I think this one shat itself)!

Shiny egg glaze makes everything look better. Unless it's on your face.

They're ugly, but like a deluded proud new mother I can't stop taking photos of my fugly babies.

Now on to the fun part. We assembled the mille feuilles - pastry, top with copious amounts of cream, pastry, cream and pastry. Slap more cream on the sides, top with icing sugar. Nom nom.

They might look like infected snot blocks but I assure you they are delicious.

View from above. Snot blocks covered in dandruff. Mwahaha.

Then to fill the eclairs with the chocolate pastry cream and top them with a chocolate fondant.

We impregnated our eclairs with chocolate

Then covered them in mud.

Our eclairs look a bit very retarded and deformed.

Baby eclairs, with faces only a mother could love.

Focus FAIL.

Now, to dress our little Camembert box cakes. We glazed them with a bit of jam, then added various berries as topping. Glaze with more jam.

Naked babycake.

To dress your babycake first glaze it with jam

Me about to glaze my babycake

Paint, paint, glaze.

Then, add berries and pistachios.

My dressed up babycake!

At the end we got to take home what we hadn't already stuffed into our faces. We didn't have time to do the fourth dessert, but that's okay. I had already seen enough eggs and sugar to last me a week. Some people's cake thing didn't cook properly, which made them sad. Apparently the ovens in the kitchen aren't the best.

I couldn't fit any more eclairs into my boxes (And I had two boxes) so I stuffed it in my face. And nearly fell into a sugar-induced coma. Nearly.

Box o' pastries!

Bringing home our babies.

And the taste verdict?

The eclairs were a bit too chocolatey - we were afraid that there wasn't enough chocolate cream to fill each eclair so we went a bit overboard with the icing - but they were still delicious. Some would argue that as long as there is sugar and cream (and chocolate), all will be good.

The mille feuilles were delicious! If I do say so myself. Haven't tried the cake yet, will do so tomorrow with a cuppa. While watching Fringe (That's when I'll win at life Part 3, I know it).

Well, that was my morning. After all the excitement and sugar, I got ready for the Brooks River Run. Which is where I win at life Part 2.

Running

Takes my breath away. Literally.

Makes me feel like I wanna die, sometimes. Or at least stop and lie down.

Gives me sore legs.

Makes people I'm running up to from behind think that I'm some kind of perve, with my heavy panting breathing. Until they turn around and try not to laugh at this red-faced gal who's not even going all that fast.

Is like being in a relationship. You can't go away, neglect it, then come back and expect it to be as good as before.

BUT!

Running also...

Makes me feel good.

Keeps me fit. And healthy.

Gives me confidence.

Disciplines me (and not in a naughty way!).

Gives me a sense of achievement.

Makes me happy.

Race this weekend!

Or rather, a fun run. Only four more sleeps til the Brooks River Run this Saturday at Coulson Gardens, Maribyrnong.

Started the week off on a slightly bad note. It was Labour Day yesterday. But did we get a public holiday, us poor little wage slaves at a certain university in Melbourne? Nope. We had to go to work. Granted, classes were on and academics had to turn up, but at my old work (another uni) we got Vic public holidays off. Not so here. Luckily I got up early and managed to miss the Moomba crowds. Another downside? PT was on a Saturday timetable. And my train was not running through the loop. So not happy.

Towards the end of the day I started feeling really tired and the backs of my eyes were burning (y'know the feeling). Took me an hour to get home (no thanks, Saturday timetable!), and once I hit the couch I could barely move. Was supposed to meet up with friends in Carnegie for dumplings but nope, even the thought of those yummy pan-fried pork parcels could not move me.

NO! I was thinking. I can't be sick, not now! Have got a race this Saturday! ARGH!

Anyway. Dramatic hysterics aside, I was fully horizontal until Jam came home and brought me some hot and sour soup. Which I ate and promptly went back to bed. Slept til 8.30am this morning, woke up, called in sick (blergghh), and went back to sleep again.

Didn't wake up til noon. Luckily, the rest made everything better. Clearer, and less fuzzy in the head. Had a sandwich and blobbed on the couch with Fringe. Felt well enough for a run in the evening so off I went after walking the dog.

Well, did a steady 5k today. Or at least I hope I did! In any case, there's Mary Poppins tomorrow, then a 4k time trial on Thursday, rest on Friday and woohoo pastry class and BRR on Saturday! Week is looking better already.

Sunday morning run, or lack of.

You know (or perhaps, have heard of) those people who can get up first thing in the morning, at the crack of dawn, pull on their clothes, slip on their running shoes and are out the door in five minutes? And they do something crazy, like a 14k run or something, then come home, shower, have breakfast AND be at work before 9am?

Well, I tried to be one of those people today. And failed. Miserably.

Firstly, it was Sunday. And I didn't get up at the crack of dawn. More like 9.45am. Then, in an effort to actually drag my mind and body out of their groggy, semi-conscious states, I took the dog for a 1k walk around the block. While walking the dog I kept trying to talk myself out of going for a run - it was already getting quite hot (about 28 degrees), there were hardly any clouds in the sky and I could already feel the sun burning on my arms. And I'm so not a morning person.

But no, I tell myself. No excuses. Better to get this session out of the way so that I could have the rest of the Sunday doing what I wanted i.e blob on the couch and watch Fringe.

So I ran. Went home, put on my gear, ate a few dried mango slices and ran. No breakfast, just water.

What a bad idea.

I had a 4k time trial planned for this session. I barely made it 1.5k before I had to stop and physically try not to die. I was already soaked in sweat, and gasping for air. The heat made it harder to breathe and I was light-headed, sweat and sunscreen running into my eyes. What a sad sight. How do people do this?!?!

I walked for a bit, ran for a bit and after about 2.5k decided to cut my losses and go home. I wasn't getting the most out of my workout, I felt really sick and my mind couldn't get into the zone.

So what did I learn? I learnt that I'm not one of those people who can run first thing in the morning. Not yet anyway. And definitely not on an empty stomach.

But I need to be able to run first thing in the morning, as most races start between 8am-9am. So from now on I'll need to build in morning runs into my training schedule.

Now that I'm no longer groggy from sleep or trying not to die from heat exhaustion, I remember that when I was paddling dragon boats we used to have Sunday training sessions at 8.30am. Before training I'd have an Up n Go and a couple of nectarines on the drive there, which served me well throughout the session. I think that's what I need to do with running too. Eat something, walk the dog then go for a run.

Stay tuned for progress (or lack thereof).

Yoga + wine

I'm loving my Ashtanga yoga class - you always get a good, hot and sweaty workout. One that leaves you feeling utterly stretched out and blissful afterwards (hmmm...much like that other type of hot-sweaty-blissful workout, no?). And I especially love that bit at the end where you get to just lie down in the darkness and let yourself sink into the floor.

On that note, I found this awesome video on Ben Does Life today, thought it rather apt! Although, instead of wine we went for pho (Vietnamese noodle soup) after yoga tonight. Now I want a glass of red after watching this video.



Video from haroldsplanet.com. Totally brilliant.

Goal (un)officially achieved

It's been about six weeks (going into seven) since I've taken up running, and oh yes baby it's starting to pay off.

Yup. Ran a 5k today, that's what. Yeah. Five. Kilometres. The magic 5k barrier. The goal I set myself when I decided to put on my beat-up old runners on 26 January 2011 and went outside and put one foot in front of the other and lo and behold I am running. Six weeks since I found the Couch to 5k plan and ambitiously started myself on Week 6 instead of Week 1. Somewhere in those six weeks I also signed up for a 4k fun run, which is happening on 19 March and which I'm kinda nervous about.

And today I finally made it 5k without stopping. Which is no big deal for some, but a big deal for me. Sure, I did it in 41 minutes, which is hardly world-stopping/record-breaking/earth-shattering, but the main thing is that I did it (and yes, I gotta write these cliche-sounding-motivational-things down, anything to keep me going)!

So yeah, today was another milestone. However, I'm not popping the champagne just yet. Before I can officially declare this goal of running 5k without stopping Officially Done And Achieved, I gotta actually run this distance in race conditions (they call them fun runs sometimes, but I'm sure there's an element of competitiveness in those events!). Just so I can say that me running this distance has been tried, and tested, and chip-timed, and witnessed by about a thousand other people in an Official Proper Race.

To 5k...and beyond!

Attention ladies and gentlemen!

If you look over to your right hand side, you will notice that yours truly has logged 101km of running and walking this year!

Wow. 101k! Woot woot! And it's only March!

The 101km consists of mostly running, with almost-daily 1k walks to work from the train station. I also walk the dog almost every evening, covering 1km too (but these I don't record because the dog stops waaay to often to pee and have a sniff at stuff). Amazing how fast the kilometres stack up!

So yes. That's me. Achievement of the month. Thank you, that is all. You may now go back to your daily lives.

:)

What not to do on a Saturday

Here's how not to do a race...or simulate race conditions:

• spend the day snacking on 'crap' food without eating a proper meal
• have a long nap in the middle of the day
• drink a glass of OJ and eat two nectarines
• walk the dog for 40 minutes
• then run a 4k as fast as you can

The result: stomach cramps and feelings of ohmigod-this-is-hard-I-want-to-stop-and-lie-down. 

Time clocked for the 4k - 29:52, including the 10 seconds wasted when my left shoelace came undone and I had to stop to do it up. 

Further what-not-to-dos for a Saturday:

• eat Turkish bread with dips and olives after the run instead of a proper meal
• go out for drinks with friends, have a glass of champagne (ok this isn't so bad) and Coke instead of water (now that's bad)
• feel hungry at the end of the night. Have a Filet o' Fish meal (at least it was a 'small'!) instead of just sucking it up and going to bed.

Regrets in the morning indeed!

Well, I shall be working extra-extra hard this week to undo the nastiness. Although I fear that the Melbourne Food and Wine Festival may not let me - gots this awesome-awesome high tea (with Pimms!) to go to on Friday, and a dessert making class ON THE DAY OF THE RUN. Yup. You can see I've got my priorities right.