Foody Friday: Homemade peppermint patties

Lasst Christmas my food gift boxes were a hit, so I'm repeating the gift this year. The box for 2012 includes homemade peppermint patties. It's an easy enough recipe that I'd thought I'd share it.

Making the patties was the easy part.
You just combine three ingredients, roll it out, and cut circles. I used a shot glass to cut the patties. I learned that leaving the patties to dry out a little makes a crisper patty and makes dipping easier, too.
You can easily dip the patties on a fork. I let mine dry on a lightly greased cookie sheet. Once they were fully set, we wrapped them in foil wrappers I bought from Wilton.

I see him chewing, little snitch.

David would only help if I plied him with wine.

Dark and milk chocolate on the left; white chocolate on the right. 

I tasted some, too! 

The recipe:
Mix a can of sweetened condensed milk with 5 cups powdered sugar and 1 TBS peppermint extract (or about 1/2 teaspoon of peppermint oil). Mix to form dough, adding an additional 1/2 to 1 cup of powdered sugar as you go. Roll out and cut out patties. Let them dry out for a day for best results. Then dip in melted chocolate. To melt chocolate, you can just put chocolate chips in the microwave, stirring every 30 seconds. Then add a tablespoon of crisco to thin the chocolate before you dip.
Place dipped candies on a lightly greased sheet to dry; when completely set wrap in foil candy wrappers.

Walmart running leggings

A few years ago I bought a pair of running tights from, of all places, Wal--mart online.
They were perfect.
They were thick, but not too hot. They were long enough. They had a key pocket. They fit like leggings, but were the material and feel of pants. They were $12.00.

I should have stocked up, but I didn't, and now Wal-mart doesn't make these tights anymore. But they do make running leggings.

Also available in gray.

They're also a steal at $12, but there are a couple of changes from the tights.

1. These are actually leggings, so the material is thinner. And they look like leggings. I wear mine without shorts or skirt over them, but then, I have no shame. I can see some people thinking they need a little more coverage, but you can't actually see through the fabric, so I think it's ok.
(The good thing about the fabric is that it is fake polyester stuff - no cotton-y feel like fashion leggings. I have a pair of running leggings with more cotton, and that does NOT work: the leggings get sweaty and stick to you and bunch up. Terrible. These don't do that.)
2. They aren't quite as warm (which is good for me, since I don't have that many freezing days here). If you get too hot in running tights you might try these.
3. No key pocket. Worst thing ever. But they have a doubled waist band, so I will sew a key pocket into mine.
4. Not flattering. What I mean by this is, these aren't "suck-your-rolls-in" tights like Lululemon or something. The fabric's thin, so they aren't sucking anything in. When you wear them, it looks like you wearing leggings. Period. Not you after lipo and 4 years of Body Pump and spin class daily wearing leggings.

So, there are a few drawbacks to these guys compared to true running tights. But I still really like them, and it's nice to have a lighter weight option. And for that price, it's hard to go wrong!
(PS - For sizing purposes: a few reviews say to size up on these leggings. I would not do that. They fit true to size on me. I have a super pear-shape so if I say they fit true to size, they fit true to size!)

Random things of interest

1. This. I love and adore that we cannot break the brave Brits code all these years later. Britain, you rock for saving the free world back in the '40s. In case I forgot to thank you earlier.
2. My little brother Joey is back in the USA! He was in Afghanistan for 9 months. He'll get some leave near Christmas. So glad he's home safe!
3. I'm seriously off running because I'm seriously injured. I ran the Turkey Day Race (poorly) as planned. Racing on one limping leg caused an imbalance that, I believe, strained my other hamstring. And now I can't even walk without pain. I feel a million years old. No more running for me. Catch you in late 2013, races.
4. Buying a pre-lit tree is a terrible idea. Once large sections of lights start dying you have to get all up in there with wire cutters and remove all 500 of them.

5. I love Christmas, but I hate the temporary mess. Dear boxes: please go mail yourselves. Dear ornaments: please go climb the tree and nestle amongst branches. Try to space yourselves out a little.
6. Football this year is giving me stomach ulcers.
7. I found a wine called Tisdale on sale for 3/$10 and it was actually good! So I drank three bottles.
8. I got my Ellimpic medal in the mail this week. It was awesome. Touch-screen gloves, knee socks, water bottle, fuel - great stuff. But no picture because I took it apart and wore/used/ate it already :) Thanks XLMIC!
9. I found some precious miniature pears at the grocery store last week. Popped into wine glasses they made a great mantle decoration!

10. My technician has jury duty and was selected for a jury. Lord help me. I can't function without her. I hope I tell her how awesome she is all the time, because she rocks. I was a pharmacy tech for 10 years before I was a pharmacist and I know it's a hard job - and I appreciate a good tech!

Paris: San Chapelle

It's hard to believe that the intricate glass work and soaring architecture of San Chapelle dates to the 15th century, but it does. In fact an original mural from the 1440's is still visible inside. While the church is beautiful, it is also small and is so often under work that not all the stained glass is visible. So if you are scrimping (it costs 9 Euros to enter) go to Notre Dame for free instead.

The motif for the church is very like a New Orleans motif!

Taking off

I'm taking time off of running.
There are three excellent reasons for this:
1. I mentioned a calf strain earlier. It's not going away and it HURTS. I can run through osteitis pubis because it isn't an impact injury, but a little old calf strain is killing me and needs rest.
2. I didn't go into detail because it's gross runner TMI, but when I was sick Saturday after the race I had some pretty serious GI bleeding. I bleed very easily (chronic nosebleeds, wounds that won't close, etc) which is related to hormone levels. It's not a big deal, but I felt very weak and faint that weekend. I'm still out of breath a lot - just stairs challenge me - so I need a real break to build blood volume.
3. I'm definitely doing the overtraining thing. This seems impossible to me: I'm not doing a ton of speedwork and my mileage is low to mid 60's per week, yet I guess for me this is too much. I have been feeling very tired and weak and simply cannot get any speed up at all. I tried to do the track workout on Monday, and I fell behind in the warm-up! And my races have me working hard for what used to be a training pace.

I jumped into this marathon plan after injury, and even though I built up to mileage in the 40's before starting, the increase was too much. And I've made several classic mistakes:
- Apparently my easy runs are too fast! I actually don't wear a Garmin or a watch for my easy runs, so it's hard to tell for sure, but that seems to be the consensus (My long runs, on the other hand, are not meant to be slow in this plan - however, they are slower than my long runs last year. Proof I'm slowing down). 
- I do too many hard workouts. When I do track with the Varsity Sports group on Mondays, I am skipping the plan's Monday speedwork. Sometimes I read the plan and like the workout so much I will run it on what should be an easy day. That's probably a bad idea.
- I tried to start at my prior fitness level. I got my paces off the McMillan calculator based on my marathon PR - pre-injury and many months ago. I'm just not there yet. A few weeks ago I ran a 15k race at a slower pace than my half-marathon! 

After Saturday's race and tummy disaster, I took a very easy day Sunday and off entirely Monday after dropping out of the track warm-up two miles in. Tuesday I did Bob Harper's hardest workout ever, which does not live up to its name, and today I am wondering if I should do yoga for runners (boo), nothing (yay!), or a short run (meh). Tomorrow is Thanksgiving, and I am already registered for the Turkey Day 5 mile race in its 105th year of running so I can't miss that, come hell or high ankle sprain.

When I return to marathon training, it will be:
- Without a goal except to run a strong race, hopefully 3:10 to 3:30 range, and ease back into distance running/training. I looked at how close the race is (January 20th) and I can't see myself recovering, building a base back up, getting faster, and PRing just like that.
- At lower mileage. I know I need the higher mileage, but since I'm going goalless anyway, I could really use a little extra free time to get my insane work-life in order.
- At lower intensity. One hard session a week will have to do for now. Kris Lawrence gave me some great advice - adding marathon pace miles to the end of a long run - that I will also incorporate. That will get me some race pace stuff with little extra stress.

After this race I will honestly assess my fitness and ability and set a real goal for the Rock n Roll New Orleans race in February!

Skinny bashing

This Sunday I went to the baby shower of a friend from pharmacy school.
(This baby shower, by the way, had me in frantic crochet mode. I put off starting her baby's sweater until this week, so the whole drive to Manchac and back I was speed-crocheting to get it done).

Baby showers don't generally rock my socks off, just because I find it very hard to feign interest in baby gifts. How many "awwww"s do I have to generate for decorative bottles and onesies with ponies on them? At least at bridal showers I can steal decorating ideas.
But it was good to see some pharmacy school friends I hadn't seen in awhile, especially as there was some super juicy gossip about one of our associates.

This gal...
- Got married to an ex-boyfriend and got pregnant while in pharmacy school.
- While pregnant, had an affair with her also-married boss. 
- Which caused bosses' wife to commit suicide
- Gal did not yet divorce husband, but
- Gal is now pregnant with bosses' child.

Good gosh. I'm speechless.
Anyway, back to the shower. Like many social events in Louisiana, this one had it's fair share of overweight and obese attendees. As in, most of them. Louisiana isn't doing so well as far as health and weight and diet go.
And something occurred that I've observed a lot at these events. As the cake was being cut, one guest - slender - declined cake. She was instantly showered with abuse. Actually, the verbal assaults started before she declined: When asking her if she wanted cake, the mother of the honoree called out, "Hey skinny! I know you could use some cake!"
When the girl said she didn't want any, all I could hear was sarcasm and insults.

What? Are you trying to lose weight?
Good grief, you need to eat some cake!
Oh brother, make us all look fat, go ahead!
You can eat it just this once, geeze, it won't kill you!
Yeah, you look like you never tasted cake in your life! 
Pfft, she probably just wants to lick the knife after you're done serving.

I don't know when this nonsense became acceptable, but it's downright commonplace in public. The poor girl was like, um, I just don't like white cake. Not only is it ok for her to pass up cake, it's ok to be skinny! It's not a crime! Yet it isn't just showers where I see this. Online forums claim that "All REAL women have cellulite" and praise companies who use overweight models, saying they are REAL women. When celebrities lose weight they're criticized, even if they are still a healthy weight. Choosing healthy options over sugary snacks is praised if it's done by someone trying to lose weight, but if you're already thin and skip the cake you get snide remarks.
When did we start condoning skinny bashing? Imagine if the situation at the shower was reversed. I can just see the reaction if an overweight guest accepted cake and everyone condemned her for it. If people told her, "You're already fat, have an apple for once!" or muttered, "Watch, she probably wants the piece with the most icing" - well, we'd be appalled. But we can do the exact same thing to our thin friends.
What gives?
Have you seen this? Have you responded?

Middendorf's Manchac 10 mile race

Welp, the slowness hasn't gone away. 1:08:32 I think for 10 miles.

In a bid for speed, I put on a Swift brand bandaid this morning.

Since I was turning this race into a long run, I came with a lot of fuel. And I don't know how a baggie of olives got into my stash of gels and gu. The only thing I took was the Gatorade prime.

I love this race - even though it's 50 miles away, we always try to run it, mostly for the catfish dinner served afterwards. We drove up early so David and I could get some miles in before the race. I did almost 5 before we started; he did four.

Thursday I developed a calf strain that was tender when I landed on it, so I smeared it with NSAID drops before leaving the house. It still hurt, but I know it will do away.

 I wormed up to the line before the start, but I could NOT get close and started pretty far back. That was my first mistake. My second was forgetting to clear my Garmin from the warm-up! I didn't know what time I had when I started running, so even though I finally had the presence of mind to hit lap at mile 2 I didn't know my total time at all.
It turns out it was plenty slower than I thought - between starting so far from the front and then dodging runners for a whole mile, I estimate based on my Garmin data that my first mile was a 7:48. Ouch.
For some reason this was a small field doing the 10 mile today (plenty in the 5k, though); I worked to try to keep my fast friend Celeste in my sight but never even got a glance at the lead female - Rachel Booth, of Disney half marathon fame. She's the top-ranked runner in the state and the only fastie who showed up today for the ladies.
I did see her at the turn-around, of course, light years in front. Celeste was #2, I was #3. Once we settled down after the 5k turn around I'd picked a few people off who looked like they were over-exerting themselves. By mile 5 I'd also passed one lady who worried me; she's the local professional triathlete who on a good day smokes me.
The last 5 miles were straight into the wind, and even though I though I was picking up pace I wasn't. Actually my splits are pretty even, minus the first mile. The wind was loud in my ears and I couldn't hear if anyone was behind me. I finally glanced back and couldn't even see another female! Then I relaxed. I was anxious to place because there was prize money, and yep, I'm greedy like that.
I wasn't thrilled to death to see a 1:08 on the clock when I finished. I'm not sure how to shake this slowness. I did a few more miles after finishing - I ran back along the course, found David, and ran back with him. He impressed me! He had a great run, 8:20 average pace, and his last 2 miles were both under 8.
I ended up with close to 19 for the day and David did 16.

Prizes! Glass, plaque, and check!

Then my day was ruined. I was thrilled to enjoy the beautiful weather and delicious catfish with friends and was ready for a nice Saturday, when my stomach decided it didn't like catfish, beer, and Gatorade Pro 01 Prime (a gel-like drink I took before the race since I'd added miles to my day). I spent the rest of the day in stomachache agony wishing I was dead.

Lessons learned today: Get closer to the front. Fight the headwind harder. Race the race, don't save energy for the miles after. Recover better - I do think I'm not sufficiently recovering; my legs felt sore close to mile 9. And biggest lesson? No Gatorade Pro 01 Prime. It was the only new thing I tried and I haven't felt this sick in years.