Archive for October, 2009
28
Oct
09
This week’s poll
Awesome, awesome trip!
Saturday October 17th, I woke up bright and early, lugged Jason (my cousin) out of bed and we made our way via the L train to the Grant Park in 45 degree weather for the Annual Men’s Health Urbanathlon! The race was a 12 mile adventure race including jumping over tires, monkey bar climbs, military hurdles, 4 sets of huge bleachers in SOLDIER STADIUM, leaping over 2 taxis and finally climbing an 8 foot wall! It was so much fun (I mean, tiring too, no lie!)
There were over 5500 racers this year. I came in 69th overall which I was really really happy with! I wanted to place top 3 in my age group (ended up 14th) but missed. What sucks is that my time was only about 5 minutes behind the guy in second place. I blame it on that final wall…a mere 10 yards from the finish line! I was stuck on the wall for a good 3-4 minutes, once again, as last year, killing my results! I vow next year to dominate it! Here is the link to the reults (my number was 650): http://www.menshealthurbanathlon.com/downloads/URBAN_CHICAGO_09_MALE_SOLO_RESULTS.pdf
Here are some pictures from the race:
And here’s how the wall F’d me up
Race injuries...Damn that wall
Lacerated bicep
And here are some pictures from Chicago: Top of the Sear’s tower and Pizzano’s deep dish pizza! What you know about that?!
28
Oct
09
Chicken Parmaesan
My mom used to make “quick chicken parmaesan”–it was chicken breast topped with some mozzarella cheese and tomato sauce served with angel hair pasta. I was thinking about this the other day…there was no parmaesan. Usually the parm is in the breading of the chicken, but since this didn’t have a breading: no parm. Here’s a version I made, much more Americanized than an Italian version.
- Chicken Breast
- Bran (for the breading)
- Parmaesan cheese (powdered- right out of the green Kraft container!)
- Garlic, onion, and ranch seasoning… haha I guess that would be “reasoning”
Bread the chicken and add seasonings. Then top with a tablespoon or so of the parmeasan cheese. Bake for 20-25 minutes at 375 degrees. Here was the result
Finally I served them with a side on home-made baked fries. Just slice a potato, season however you want (I used some ranch, garlic, onion, and chili powder) and give it a light spray of and olive oil non-stick cooking spray. Bake for 10 minutes, flip them and then bake for another 10 minutes. Don’t under-do these, but definitely don’t over-bake them either!
A tip for the chicken:
Baking the cheese on the chicken was good but made the cheese very dry. I haven’t tried this yet, but it might be better to add on immediately when it comes out the oven and then microwave for a minute or two so that the cheese heats using moisture and melts. If you try this, let me know!
Sunday night. As always, time to cook meals for the rest of the week. Yet, tonight I felt daring. I hadn’t had this for fear of the “evil fats” that would be in it but as I try to improve my diet and healthy I’m trying to focus on healthy fats. So I decided to make candied pecan chicken. I couldn’t find a recipe that really suited what I wanted–which is usually the case. For the most part I know what I want to do and thus realy don’t need a recipe. Here’s what I used:
- Chicken Breasts
- BBQ sauce (Budweiser bbq sauce? It was on sale…Not too bad either)
- Emeralds nuts candied Pecans (delicious)
I covered the trimmed chicken breast in the bbq sauce and then placed the pecans that I minced on top. The barbeque sauce is neccessary to help the pecans stick as well as create a sweet and salty taste for the pallette. Pecan are a fantastic source of healthy fats; the top nuts being Pecans, walnuts, and almonds. Peanuts are great too, but I think they’re not actually nuts, they’re legumes…you can check that though, still a great source of omega-3′s and protein.
I then baked them in the oven for 20-25 minutes somewhere between 370-400 degrees. Unlike those nice digital ovens, I have to “use my knob,” as Emeril would say.
This is how it came out…and it really was awesome!
A man can only eat a baked sweet potato and chicken breasts so many nights in a row. Ok, well, I could probably eat it every night, would be tough without ketchup though. Regardless, the problem here was I down to only one breast so I didn’t have enough for a complete meal. What I did have was a can of black beans and some salsa to pair with it. This made for a great combination and provide all aspects of a complete protein and healthy balanced carbohydrate. Here were the ingredients:
- One baked sweet potato
- Favorite cheese
- Black beans
- Chicken Breast
- Salsa
- Mexican seasonings
First bake the sweet potato. I did it 7-8 minutes in the microwave then let if crispy lightly in the oven while the rest cooked.
Sweet potato with slice of cheese
I used American cheese….haha I guess that doesn’t really make it Mexican chicken then…
Next I mixed the salsa, chicken, beans, and seasonings in a bowl and microwaved them.
Dump the delicous hot mix atop the potato and enjoy! “Ariba Ariba” before it gets cold!
