Poppycakes - Fancy cakes that are actually good

My sister-in-law Jen has started a company called Poppycakes, which makes high-end cakes, cupcakes, & other baked goods. She is based out of DC, but we occasionally get her to make a freebie batch here in Mississippi or at the in-laws in North Carolina. She has always been great with the tail end of a meal. But since 2004 when my first son was born, she has really focused on her craft and built up a set of tools & techniques that would make a mechanic proud. When she began branching out from family birthdays to showers and other larger events with cakes that knock the socks off of anything we can find here in Mississippi, the word started spreading.

If you're in the DC area and have a thousand calories to spare, get in touch with Jen (Poppycakes on Facebook) and let her bake your party into a creative realm that you won't find anywhere else with her quality and prices. Poppycakes makes me kick paleo to the curb quickly, only regaining control once icing and crumbs are all over my face.

Hard-to-kill Greens: Chickweed & Malabar Spinach

Yesterday I heard about 2 separate plants that are both edible and grow easily in my regional climate - Chickweed & Malabar Spinach. You don't need a green thumb to get these plants going or keep them producing. Having no doubt I could grow these weeds - I have extensive experience with successful weeds growing in my yard :) - I was curious about how to use these plants before trying out some as ground cover in an empty bed on the side of my house. So in a quick search, here's what I found that makes me want this stuff tonight:

Malabar Spinach - Here's a video (makes me H-U-N-G-R-Y) about malabar followed by a couple of recipes.

• Indonesian Style Malabar Spinach - Food.com
  
• Mok Toi & Mushroom Stir Fry - MeltingWok.com
  
• Salads from Rose Creek Farms
  
• Bachali Kura Pappu ~ Malabar Spinach Dal - Sailu's Kitchen
  
• Pui Charchari or Malabar Spinach from Rice-n-curry.com
  
• Tomato-Malabar Quiche - Charlotte Fresh

Chickweed - I was going to post a cool video of this stuff being used, but the really interesting videos were all hosted by folks who appeared to have accidentally used a different, less legal weed and I couldn't put them up here without laughing (nor could they stop laughing). Just do a google or youtube video search for chickweed recipes. But here is the PBS-style public service announcement version, which actually shows you what it looks like on the ground and explains how to use it.

• Chickweed Pate - Eatweeds UK
  
• Pakora & Hot Dressed Salad (+ a few more) - Carl Legge
  
• Chickweed Pesto - LearningHerbs.com
  
• Chickweed Salad - Food & Wine
  
• Chickweed Chimichurri & Tuna Poke - Fat of the Land

The last one makes my eat crazy stuff bell ring. I LOVE poke. When my little brother was stationed in Hawaii and I stayed with him during my two week Naval Reserve duty at Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard, we ate almost nothing else. Adding something local, prevalent, and free to something that is a lot more pricey in Mississippi (due to the large amount of saltwater fish) is a great idea to stretch it. Anyway, I'm stoked to try out the malabar this year.

Extreme Races: Warrior Dash & GORUCK Challenge

UPDATE: Run For Your Lives is another extreme race... basically a 5k with obstacles and, more importantly, zombies!!! This looks like a fun, less serious alternative to the GORUCK challenge and perhaps a little less physically challenging than the Warrior Dash. If anyone has participated in any of these and would like to leave a comment with some more info, please do.

Two different extreme races have come to my attention via completely separate ways in the last 4 days:

• The GORUCK Challenge - This weekend while researching a discount on a highly recommended pack (GORUCK) I ran across the GORUCK Challenge put on by a high-speed cadre of former operators from the special operations world. I was immediately intrigued by the challenge and started thinking of who I could recruit as the core of a team to do a custom event later this year or, more likely, next year since their schedule is pretty chockablock until then. The list of people who would think it is cool is relatively long. The list of people on my short list who would actually commit to do something that won't be fun but will be extremely rewarding... let's just say I didn't need my toes. I am scared of this thing and exhilarated at the same time. Can't wait to get down to brass tacks on this one.
  
  
• The Warrior Dash - A colleague is participating in Warrior Dash Mississippi which will raise funds for St Jude Children's Hospital. I can't think of a better reason to run myself into the ground regardless of how crazy or painful it might appear. The kids for whom the funds are being raised run headlong into the unknown every day and don't have a choice. But they keep fighting until they can't. If that isn't a warrior spirit, what is? I'll be working shift work, so can't participate this year. But the event organizers tell me they often do repeats as their events are very successful. I'm IN for 2012.

I can run a few miles without "having to" and I can push myself through some pretty hard work. I'm no hard core terminator cyborg like my little brother, but I think either of these two events would be awesome to participate in.

Weight loss, my diet and lifestyle

In 2002 I was 250 pounds with a BMI of >25. I got that way by transitioning from a 210-pound, muscular college athlete in May 2000 (a cheerleader at Mississippi State) to a sedentary tub-o-lard following a knee injury in the Navy. I continued eating like I was burning 3000 calories a day but relied on the knee-injury crutch to explain why I wasn't exercising at any level. My biochemistry didn't particularly care about my excuse as it prepared for hibernation accordingly.

In October of 2001, I finally failed the "rope-and-choke" measurement the Navy performs if you're above the height/weight standards (see Navy PRT). The standards are generous to say the least. The secondary "rope-and-choke" measurement gives you a better result if you have a fat neck. So as I became tubby, I stayed in standards for a while because my neck was matching my gut growth and I put a lot of the weight on in my legs/chest. As part of my continued denial that I WAS THE PROBLEM, I argued that the test was stupid and didn't give a good measure of body fat like hydrostatic weighing or other more accurate measures. In the end, I realized that Uncle Sam's method was more favorable to the fatty (that was ME for those who think I'm insensitive), but that realization came later.

So after failing to live up to the lowest common denominator in the service, Uncle Sam strongly encouraged me to get within standards - I had a year to reestablish myself to the standard or it was sayonara jobby-job. My wife & I both took this opportunity to make some lifestyle changes and I ended up at 175 pounds after approximately 6 months of dedicated effort and I'm sitting at 180lbs 10 years later. Many people have two reactions when they hear this factoid about me:
1. I don't believe you were EVER 250lb - it's true, unfortunately
2. PLEASE tell me HOW you did it. - let's see how to put this gently... DIET & EXCERCISE

We started out with the little book and a slider that you got in that time frame from Weight Watchers. That was all it took. We created and printed out a week-long journal in Excel to count points and keep up with what we were eating. While my wife said I was crazy, I always rounded up if it was a "half-point" situation. The 2-3 points I counted but didn't eat each day helped me cut another couple hundred calories just by mentally tricking myself. I also exercised 3-4 days per week for no more than an hour. Once we reached my goal weight and my wife's corresponding 10-15 pounds (she was already only 120 pounds and "smoking hot", so didn't have as far to go), we started to gradually increase the points to level out and eventually stopped formally counting/journaling. This way of life had become just that... second nature. With all of that weight loss, I gained some additional benefits that are sometimes strange to think about:

- Blood pressure improved to below 120 / 75-80 (<100 with a bit of relaxed breathing)

- Clothes fit right off the rack and I often find my size on sale since everyone else is buying the bigger stuff

- No more ingrown hairs, boils, and associated skin complications on fat inner thighs that never saw any space between them. This was a little-known complication of me becoming a fat polar bear.

- Improved ability to, ummm, perform.

Since 2002, my wife & I have continuously searched for healthy ways to feed ourselves. With the addition of 2 kids (recently a 3rd), our habits devolved a bit with an increase in nights where we would clean up the mac & cheese or chicken nuggets by eating their leftovers. Over the last 7 years I ended up gaining 20 pounds of the 75 pounds lost. Once we had our daughter, we both centered ourselves and recommitted to live a healthy lifestyle. We don't do "diets" and have continually warned my seriously overweight dad & stepmom that fill in the blank fad diet won't work and isn't meant to be a long-term lifestyle. They have tried Atkins, Glycemic Index, et cetera ad infinitum. I started hearing about the "paleo diet" and I was immediately skeptical. However, a little more research and hearing other people who I am beginning to trust explain it uncovered the point that the paleo "diet" is diet in the traditional sense - the sum of the food consumed by an organism or group. At it's core: eat simple food that was common in a paleolithic diet (meat, vegetables, leafy greens, et al) and avoid food that our evolved biochemistry may not be properly designed to deal with (grains). Various people have their on take on this diet and one who continues to be very popular is Robb Wolf. At our house we have started using leafy greens to deliver meats conveniently (think lettuce wrap). I also increased my egg intake to replace cereal in the morning. I plan to continue with dairy, though I have significantly decreased my intake just because I don't eat cereal every morning anymore (my family has dropped our milk intake by 75%). We have made very few changes from our already veggie/meat intensive diet, but dropping out the 2 slices of bread, cereal, and most milk have made about 15 pounds disappear over about 9 weeks.

This post is getting a bit wordy and I feel like I might be rambling. So I'm throwing it out there. I can always post a follow up. I hope this helps someone.