The Life Ledger

Fitness is a way of life.

photo credit: AntonOlsen

It’s a fascinating thing - the less sugar I eat, the less I crave it. In fact, foods that used to be “just right” are now way too sweet. Take, for example, the bran muffins I make for breakfasts. The recipe calls for 1/2 cup of white sugar and 1/4 cup of brown sugar (makes about 12 small-ish muffins). Only by leaving out all the sugar without substituting anything (not even agave) do these muffins taste right now. Here’s the full recipe:

AllBran Bran Muffins
Makes approximately 12 muffins

Ingredients:
• 2 Cups AllBran cereal
• 1 1/4 cups milk
• 1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
• dash salt
• 1 tblsp baking powder
• 1 beaten egg
• 1/4 cup safflower/sunflower oil
• 1-2 mashed bananas
• Fruit and nuts to taste (I typically use cranberries, blueberries, walnutes, dates, plums and either peaches or pineapple)

Directions:
• Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
• Pour milk over bran cereal and let soak for 5 minutes.
• Add egg, banana, oil, fruit and nuts to milk/bran mixture.
• Separately, mix flour, baking powder and salt, then mix with milk/bran mixture. Mix together until well blended.
• (I skip this step and it works out OK) Grease muffin pan
• Bake for 25 minutes (time, of course, may vary with your oven and elevation)

Do you have a favorite bran muffin recipe, or have a suggestion for improving mine?

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I’ve been hearing a lot of hype about Joost lately, so I was anxious to give it a whirl. I received my invite (did you get yours?) and fired it up for the first time yesterday, fully expecting an underwhelming experience. Boy was I wrong - this is the future of TV.

First I tried running it on the laptop over the wireless network. I never properly negotiated a connection, but that makes since - Joost is P2P-based, and must be pushing a large amount of information both up and down. After installing it on my main machine, I selected a user name and password, and began experiencing the brave new world of video.

This is, after all, a fitness-related blog, so I began looking for fitness-related video content and found three of note - HealthiNation, The Fit Show and The Recipe Channel. You can see the entire lineup at Joost’s channel page.

HealthiNation is a collection of videos hosted by medical professionals (or, at least, claiming to be medical professionals) providing basic information on a wide range of topics, including asthma, blood pressure, cancer, diabetes, healthy eating and more. The videos are short enough to keep my attention, yet long enough to cover the basic information about a topic fairly thoroughly. I also appreciate the powerpoint-like timeline at the bottom showing upcoming topics within a video segment. I could see this becoming an excellent resource to accompany searches on Wikipedia or health-dedicated sites like MedlinePlus.

I didn’t spend much time watching The Fit Show, but I was intrigued with what I saw. The channel hosts a wide array of videos, spanning from training videos, event coverage, fitness news and topical instructional videos. Chapman Media Group, who runs this channel and the channel’s website at http://thefitshow.tv/ (where you can watch some episodes through a flash player), states “The Fitness Network’s mission is to provide fitness content in an entertaining, educational, and inspirational style who’s voice resonates with the diverse fitness enthusiast demographic.” Buzz-word-speak aside, I was impressed with the videos on offer - training videos were shot using live trainers demonstrating the use of equipment and exercises, individual episodes contained news and training segments, and the professional quality of all videos matched or exceeded what I would expect from a cable TV fitness show. I will definitely be exploring this channel more. Right after watching another episode of GI Joe.

I have to admit, I had high expectations after watching the first two channels. Unfortunately, The Recipe Channel was a little disappointing - I expected a cooking show like something I’d see on the Food network, with a host cooking and talking during the show. Instead, this channel hosts several videos (not yet the hundreds claimed in the description) that appear to be hand-held cameras swooping over ingredients, hovering over cooking bowls and accompanied by new-agey hokie music. While I don’t personally care for the videos, I do appreciate the thoroughness of the video example and the short video lengths. I see this channel being a great accompanying resource for a searchable recipe directory website, but not a channel I would regularly browse.

All in all, I’m pretty impressed with what Joost has to offer so far. It can only get better from here - as Joost adds channels and interactive widgets (which add features like chatting with others viewing the same channel, channel ratings and more), TV will move from a static armchair channel-surfing affair to a serious web2.0-esque overhaul. I can’t wait to see what Joost has up its sleeves.

Now, for more Transformers.

I mentioned previously my wife and I were cooking dinner together for Valentine’s.  The dinner was a success, so I thought I’d share my recipes.  The dinner consisted of a salad and a mojo-style fondue.

Salad: wilted spinach & raspberry (thanks Dave for help on this one)
Ingredients
One bunch fresh spinach
Large-leaf green lettuce
Crumbled Gargonzola or Bleu cheese
Nuts (I used maple-crusted pecans, but walnuts have worked fine too)
Fresh raspberries
Tomato (I prefer vine-ripened)
Avocado
Balsamic vinaigrette
Raspberry vinaigrette

Assembly
Wilt the spinach - I clipped the spinach and put in a saucepan, added one tablespoon each of balsamic and raspberry vinaigrette, covered the pan and put it on low heat for a few minutes.  Unfortunately, I didn’t keep track of how long (I was adding raspberry-jam hearts to her plate), but it shouldn’t take longer than 3-5 minutes or so.  The longer it stays in the saucepan, the more it resembles canned spinach.  I plated it by making a bowl out of one large leaf of lettuce, started with the spinach and added ingredients.  The sweetness of the raspberries, tomato and nuts went nicely with the saltiness of the cheese.  This salad was an absolute success, probably my favorite part of the meal.

Fondue: Mojo-style
Ingredients (I adapted this recipe.)
1 head garlic
1 teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon black peppercorns
Cayenne pepper
Lemon pepper
1/2 cup crushed pineapple
2 cups orange juice
1/2 cup lime juice
1/2 cup lemon juice
1 cup minced onion
2 teaspoons oregano
1/4 cup virgin olive oil

Assembly
Peel and press garlic, then mash with salt and pepper.  Stir in juice, onion and pineapple and put on low heat for at least 30 minutes.  Add oregano, lemon pepper and cayenne pepper to taste.   About ten minutes before transferring to the fondue pot, whisk in oil.

I bought a large chicken breast, some beef (it was some sort of blade cut, but I prefer tenderloin), mushrooms, broccoli, cauliflower, potatoes and raviolis.  I have made potstickers from scratch in the past, but dinner preparation was running long as it was and we were hungry.  When cooking the items, keep in mind to use separate fondue forks for meat (so the raw meat doesn’t touch the utensils and plates you eat with), leave the meat in long enough to thoroughly cook (I think it took between 3-5 minutes on 300), and be careful with raviolis and potstickers lest they burts and ooze cheese into the broth (I didn’t mind, but you might).

For sauces, we used a sweet sesame sauce, a BBQ sauce and a green goddess dip I made from scratch:

Dipping sauce: Green Goddess
Ingredients (I adapted these recipes here and here.)
3/4 cup fesh terragon
3/4 cup fresh chives
3/4 cup Italian parsley
3/4 cup green onion
3 tblsp lemon juice
3/4 cup light sour cream
3/4 cup white wine vinegar
salt, garlic, pepper to taste

Assembly
Throw it all in a blender and turn it on.  It didn’t quite taste right, so I added 2tblsp of yogurt; I wish I had added mayonnaise instead - I think that would have been perfect.  As it was, the vinegar and terragon really made this sauce.  After blending it all up, put it in a dish and stick it in the fridge for at least 20 minutes to let it thicken.

How about you - have a favorite Valentine or special meal to share?

Today’s the day when men comb the local Hallmark store, settling on that perfect sentiment for that perfect someone. Why we men can’t get our act together and shop ahead of time, instead of thumbing through the slim pickings left-behind, full of fart jokes and armpit hair (*chortle*), I’ll never know.

At any rate, today’s also a day when Whitman, Russell Stover and Godiva rake in millions from their chocolate sales.  As a recent convert from Sweet-tooth-ianity, I know how easy it is to justify a nice big box of chocolates that you’ll share with your sweetheart over the next week, and end up tossing the empty box the next day.  Maybe the dog ate them.

So, since this is the first Valentine’s I’ve celebrated since losing 70+ pounds and dedicating myself to a more fit lifestyle, I’ve been thinking about different ways to celebrate that don’t focus on candy and comfort food.  Here are some suggestions:

Plan a meal and cook together.  The entire process, from finding a recipe to enjoying a home-cooked meal together, can be a fun and romantic experience.  Flip through some cooking magazines together, folding down the corners of the ones you like.  Put together a meal using your favorite recipes, complete a shopping list (my wife and I love grocery shopping together - great people-watching!) and gather all your ingredients.  Play some Norah Jones in the background, assemble your meal, and enjoy a peaceful, romantic, candle-lit evening in.

Do something you’ve never done before.  Shake your routine up - take a yoga class together, take dancing lessons, go to a local play or operatic production, listen to a local band’s live performance, visit a museum exhibit or local art gallery together.  An evening out together doesn’t have to center around a meal at a restaurant.

Hold hands.  Ok, I have to admit, my love language is touch.  I tell you what though, there’s nothing as affirming as holding hands.  Do you know what your significant others’ love language is?  Do you know what yours is?  Communication is one of the most important things to having a healthy relationship, and you can’t communicate if you don’t speak each others’ languages or if you don’t know what language you speak to begin with.

There’s probably a few books on this, but in a nutshell - you can fairly effectively categorize love languages into 5 basic categories - touch, verbal, quality time, gifting and service.  Pay attention to how you seek affirmation, and how your SO affirms others.  Does your wife buy random little silly gifts for people who are having a bad day?  Does she frequently ask if you bought something for her when you run by Barnes & Noble after work?  That may be how she asks if you thought about her today - she may be asking if you love her.  Communication is important, and requires more than just talking.  Take some time to discover what your significant other’s love language is - then you can truly say “I love you.”

Look at your wedding video and old photo albums together.  Bring out those boxes of memories you keep tucked away and flip through them together.  Maybe start a new scrapbooking project together, or re-watch that wedding video.  Sharing pleasant memories together serves as a powerful reminder of how important that person you share your life with is to you - it’s easy to lose sight of that amidst the day-to-day drudgery.

Take the evening off.  Unplug from your phone, your computer, the Internet, the TV, whatever it is that diverts your attention from one another.  Remember, just because you’re in the same room does not mean you’re spending time with one another.

My wife and I are making dinner together tonight - a wilted spinach salad and mojo-style fondue with chicken and steak.  If it goes well, I’ll share the recipe tomorrow.

How about you - how do you plan on celebrating Valentine’s day?  What are some things you do to unhook food from celebration and special events?