Monthly Archives: September 2015

Maui Part 1

Date: September 11, 2015

Author: astottler

Hello! I’m blogging from Maui, Hawaii! Lots of delicious food and scenery to share today!

Also-shoulder update-it’s feeling better each day but it’s definitely not near where it needs to be. I can now raise my arm above my head, but I have problems rotating backwards. I’m hoping I’m healed enough for Crossfit on Monday!

The plane ride here was pretty painless. I woke up early and ran 3 miles before leaving for the airport at 7, and had plenty of plane snacks, including my banana bread. I used guava syrup as the sweetener-there wasn’t much so I’m not sure it was noticeable but it felt festive!

When we stepped off the plane, this was the view:

However, it was HOT. 90 degrees and 80% humidity. Yuck. Our first stop was the local mall that we have gone to every time for many years. There was a mini farmer’s market going on on the ground floor and we picked up some tropical fruit and some avocado! Lunch was eaten at the food court-we went to a Korean place and I got BBQ chicken+sides.

After exploring a bit, we were able to check into our hotel.

But then it was time for ice cream. I had banana salted caramel.

Followed by exploring the property. My dad is here for a conference so we’re staying in a much nicer hotel than I’ve stayed in before!

Dinner was at the hotel restaurant. It was tapas style, so we ordered several dishes for the table-highlights for me were mahi mahi with mashed purple sweet potatoes and passion fruit, miso kale salad with dried figs, goat cheese balsamic beet salad, and gooey mozzarella tomato salad.

For dessert, we shared breadfruit lilikoi cake (breadfruit gives it a similar texture to cheesecake!) and a dish that was fruit with caramel sauce and chocolate that was then broiled and topped with ice cream.

The view over the infinity pool at dusk:

The next morning began with a slice of banana bread and a 5 mile treadmill run. Normally 4 is my treadmill limit but it was HOT so I just broke it up and did it. Post run, we ordered room service breakfast, and I got a beautiful fruit platter with maple yogurt. We also split gluten free pancakes, which were so, so good! I can’t remember the last time I had real pancakes!

Then it was beach time!

On the way back to our room, we stopped by the hotel’s water slides (!). When I was younger, we’d always pass the fancy hotels with water slides and wish we could go on them, so this was our chance!

After cleaning up, we headed out to lunch at O’Lei. I had blackened mahi mahi with papaya salsa, served with rice and caesar salad.

After lunch we headed to a nearby ice cream shop for some tropical ice cream. I had mango ice cream with mango sorbet swirls, and in the heat, this hit the spot perfectly!

After a grocery stop and some time to cool off in the room, we headed to the luau hosted by our hotel!

(Do you like my tan line? The sad thing is it’s not from wearing a t-shirt, it’s from only sunscreening my shoulders this morning…cute)

When we arrived, we grabbed drinks (piña colada for me) and got a glance at the pig they were pulling out of the emu pit. To cook the pork, an entire pig is buried underground and cooked all day.

After a bit of a wait, it was time to eat! I was pleasantly surprised at what there was for me to eat given my dietary restrictions!

Salad, pineapple coleslaw, roasted purple potatoes, fried rice, teriyaki chicken, lomi lomi salmon, and poi. The lomi lomi salmon is the salsa looking thing. It’s essentially pico with chunks of salmon (that look a lot like tomatoes!). Poi is a pudding like food that is made from taro. It has a bit of a sour flavor, and is often eaten with lomi lomi salmon. If you’re less legit like I am, you eat it topped with sugar!

For dessert-key lime squares, chocolate cake, a pineapple chunk, and haupia. Haupia is sort of like creamy coconut jello.

Then-the show began!

The fire dancer was especially impressive! I cannot imagine sticking a flaming stick in my mouth.

After a fun start to our trip, we have lots of adventures ahead!

Flashback: The Summer That May Have Changed My Life

Date: September 9, 2015

Author: astottler

Categories: Uncategorized

Hello! As you read this, I’m probably on my way to Maui! I wanted to get some posts up scheduled to keep the ol’ blog running. One post I’ve been meaning to do was life as a pre-vet/my summer job experience. I dug up this old post that I wrote 2 years ago-as a little foreshadowing. Because I would go back and forth many times and ultimately decide on my career path…only to change it this past winter, and since then I haven’t looked back. Enjoy!

Ok, to be fair, this title is a little overly dramatic. But let’s just get right into it, shall we?

It’s no secret I like cats. I feel like every survey I’ve done somehow ends up with every other answer being how much I love my kitty.

(Who just so happens to be sleeping purrily next to me as we speak.)

My phone pictures? Cats and food. And the food is a branch out from what my phone was like a year ago. I even made a calendar of my cats.

(Sidenote-apparently my Resident Fellows for my dorm have 3 cats! SO pumped!)

So volunteering in the kitten nursery this summer was an easy decision. Even if it was the early morning shift!

I mean, I knew they’d be freaking cute.

But I wasn’t prepared for the impact they would have on me.

I loved every minute of the kitten nursery- playing with the kitties, cleaning litter boxes, getting meowed at constantly, hand feeding them, leaving COVERED in cat food.

I learned how to syringe feed a kitten. I learned how frustrating kittens can be when they don’t feel like eating. I learned the impact one person can have on a kitten’s life.

I took this little guy under my wing.

I could tell he was kind of falling by the wayside, which really upset me. Black cats are usually the last to be adopted. This guy was underweight and not particularly receptive to being syringe fed. I could tell by his charts that the previous volunteers had just given up-he was not given anywhere near as much as he should have. He wasn’t that receptive to syringe feeding (a lot of kittens aren’t), but I spent an entire hour with just this one little kitten. His paper said he was “antisocial” but I think it was more of shy, because he eventually purred for me. This kitty ended up being fine, and a ball of energy a week later once his weight was back on track.

I also experienced the heartbreak of losing a kitten.

I fell in love with this little kitten the first week she came in. Her litter was so energetic and full of energy. 2 weeks later, she was so sick she couldn’t stand. She had lost a ton of weight-her whole litter was sick (and one of her sisters didn’t make it either) but she was the worst. I felt so helpless that day. This kitten had been a ball of energy 2 weeks before, and now was clearly suffering and not going to make it. I wanted so much to help them, but there was nothing I could do for them.

I’ve always loved animals, but believed I could never be a vet because it would be “too sad.” I even avoid books I know will have sad endings (Nicholas Sparks, anyone?). But you know what? Sometimes the hardest things are the most worthwhile.

My experience at the kitten nursery has me rethinking my whole career. I always thought I’d do nutritional research. But now, I’m seriously considering becoming a veterinarian. Because yes, when that little kitten died, it was sad. But you know what? They don’t all die. Most of them make it. What if I had an opportunity to save the life of an animal?

Wouldn’t that be worth the wave of emotions that came with losing one? Shouldn’t I put aside my OWN issues for somebody else? Sure, losing that kitten was unbelievably sad. But there are others out there that need help-that one loss shouldn’t stop me from saving the rest.

Have you ever completely rethought your career? Have you had an experience that changed your life?

Sweet Potato Bread Recipe

Date: September 8, 2015

Author: astottler

Categories: Uncategorized

Ok, I know I’ve been promising this bread for forever. Ok, like a week, but still. I’m finally ready to share it today!

First, I want to catch up a little bit. On food. On fitness. Life. Etc.

First of all-my sister is engaged! How crazy is that?? I’m the maid of honor and I’m so happy for the couple! We even broke out the good champagne to celebrate!

It happened on a hot air balloon in Napa-hwo perfect is that? They stopped by for congratulations and to partake in our grilled nectarine salad (because we got nectarines from Costco with only a few days to eat them…)

Recipe here.

Another meal I’ve been meaning to post were these beautiful parmesan and spinach soufflés.

Plus a delicious side salad with herbs, meyer lemon infused olive oil, and aged white balsamic vinegar.

In workout news, I messed up my shoulder today. I was weight lifting with my trainer. We did heavy snatches and I did pretty well-didn’t hit my max but made the lifts I should have made. Then, heavy deadlifts. After working my way up to heavy weights, I did a set of 5 at 210, a set of 3 at 220, and a set of 1 at 230, followed by max reps at 230 (I got 2-apparently my form was going and I wasn’t allowed to try a 3rd with my ‘cat back’). Then,I worked on behind the neck snatch grip presses and snatch balances. It was fine. So basically I spent a lot of time stabilizing heavy weights with my shoulders with no issues. Then since there was a bit of extra time, we did some core work-roll outs. You may have seen those ab wheels before, but I used a barbell with circular plates to roll out. I got a little too ambitious on the first one and roll out to far, and then got kind of stuck and ended up sort of face-planting and felt a pop in my shoulder. I was worried at first, but everything seems to be in the right place and it feels much better than it did initially. The pain is in the same area that my shoulders get creaky, especially this one, so I think it’s just a bit of a sprain/strain. I’m hoping it feels better soon!

In life news, I’m jetting off to Hawaii with my family! My dad has a conference so we’re tagging along and making a vacation of it. To be perfectly honest, I’m a bit worried about what I can eat but I’m sure we’ll make it work. Hawaii is full of nuts and coconut, and the last time I was there I ate both and ended up with a pretty bad allergic reaction to macadamia nuts (this is before I completely avoided them and was still in denial).

It’s actually looking to be a pretty active vacation for me. I have a 10 mile run scheduled this weekend, which will feel great in the heat and humidity I’m sure…Plus some other shorter runs. I’m also hoping my shoulder is ok to visit some of the Crossfit boxes I visited last time I was there! Other excitement includes another visit to see the piggies.

The biggest thing I’m excited about it visiting a goat dairy farm! We went many years ago and I remember trying delicious goat cheese. Plus-RUMINANTS. I think as part of the tour we get to milk them? So pumped!

In terms of my health-my stomach is mostly healed but not 100%. There are still times were I feel super dizzy and nauseous, and tums/pepto still has to come everywhere with me just in case. Luckily, at this point it seems these episodes are mostly linked to certain foods. Which can be frustrating, but I’m trying to be better about figuring out what foods and how to better avoid them The list of things that makes me sick includes dark chocolate, onions, mexican food, tortilla chips, wheat, too much sun butter, too much fatty food. The list goes on. I really do feel like some of this is temporary and won’t affect me in time when I’m fully healed, but we’ll see. In the meantime, I’m sticking to gluten free-all of these breads I make with gluten free flour, and you’d never know it. It seems to be even less noticeable with pumpkin bread than banana bread too.

Which FINALLY brings us to the recipe! I wanted to make sweet potato bread, but couldn’t find the recipe I used in the past so I figured, why not try my own hand at it? Like I’ve said before-I’ve tried very hard to screw up my basic banana bread recipe so I might was well try a little bit harder!

Sweet Potato Bread

Ingredients

1.5 cups mashed, cooked sweet potato or yam

1 c flour

1/3 c milk

2 bananas, mashed

2 T oil (I used avocado)

1 egg

1 T vanilla

1 t salt

1 t baking soda

1 t baking powder

1/4 c honey (can add more-to taste)

1 t cinnamon

1/4 t nutmeg

Optional: 1 T orange juice (I wanted to moisten it and in full honesty the only citrus we had was a tangerine so I just used the juice from that)

cinnamon sugar for sprinkling on top

Preheat oven to 350.
Mix wet ingredients well, then add dry ingredients.
Sprinkle cinnamon sugar on top (this just makes it pretty!)
Bake for about 50 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

This dense bread is the perfect segway between summer and fall. It’s a dense, warm bread but doesn’t quite have the kick of fall spices.

What is your favorite quick bread? What should I experiment with next?

Nike Women’s Half SF Preview

Date: September 7, 2015

Author: astottler

Categories: Uncategorized

Hello! Today, I had my first “real” long run of half marathon training. By real, I mean above what I might do while not training for a particular race. 6 miles is routine. 8 is half marathon training. Since school hasn’t starting and my puppy was going to be at her playgroup all day, I thought I would take the opportunity to go up to San Francisco and train on some hills.

When I ran this race 2 years ago (Nike Women’s Half), the course was different. The course this year is sort of like a backwards version of how it used to be.

If I had to guess why they changed it, it would be to not have to close the Great Highway and to make the hills a little better. Do you see that big downhill around mile 12? That 300 feet of fast elevation gain used to be a pretty brutal hill in the past. Just based on the course map, my experience today, and my experience in previous races, the hills should be not nearly as bad as in the past! I wanted to get at least one hill in from the race in my run today, so I started in Golden Gate Park and worked my way over to the Golden Gate bridge, taking the following route (about miles 5-10 of the race).

Granted I’ve been training on worse hills this summer, but the hills during this portion were not bad-I think running the reverse of this portion actually was worse.

I haven’t spent much time in Golden Gate Park besides during races, so I took lots of pictures. I was able to park on a side street right at the Western edge of the park, by the windmill.

It was an absolutely beautiful day in the city-75 and sunny! What?? I actually got to see the amazing views that I missed running this race the previous time because it was super foggy and you couldn’t even see the beach/ocean!

Golden Gate Park is nice. I should spend more time there.

First view of the bridge!

I ended up stoping regularly to make sure I was staying on track. I didn’t think I was, but I think I actually stuck to it pretty well until I reached Lincoln Highway, which I was supposed to run up, but there was no sidewalk. Instead, I cut down into a parking lot and got some good views of the bridge!

The return trip was actually better than expected, and I was surprised by how strong my legs felt with the increasing distance. I’ll take it!

Also-compression socks are magic. I put them on immediately and my legs felt great the next day. I mistakenly thought I was near Dynamo Donuts, and was thinking about them the entire second half of the run, so I decided to make the 20 minute drive there, especially since it was right by the freeway!

This time, I got a gluten free lemon buttermilk donut and a decaf iced latte.

Since my entire post-run lunch was sugar, I decided to stop for a hummus and avocado sandwich at the place across the street.

After leaving the city, I went to pick my puppy up from her play group and she was tired!

After a relaxing afternoon, my evening ended on a delicious note when we went to the Greek Festival down the street (it happens every year during Labor Day weekend) and picked up some Greek food for dinner. Spanikopita, or pastry with spinach and feta, is my favorite, but we also had Greek salad (traditional Greek salad doesn’t have lettuce) and chicken kebabs.

For dessert, I had my favorite-Galaktoboureko-which is phyllo dough filled with custard and soaked in honey. Plus, this is one of the only non-nut desserts!

Have you ever run a Nike Women’s Race?

Puppy Day

Date: September 5, 2015

Author: astottler

Categories: Uncategorized

Have I mentioned I’m obsessed with my cat? I think maybe once or twice.

Today is my first day on full time puppy duty. My parents are out of town, so we’ve spent all day together. Thankfully, she’s been an angel.

Luckily this morning, she was plenty sleepy and let me eat my breakfast while she slept in her crate. Breakfast was a handful of berries and sweet potato bread with soy milk. Sweet potato bread recipe to come!

Our only bump in the morning came when she ate a few bites of breakfast and then threw it all up. I gave her something to calm her stomach, and waited a bit before giving her her food in small increments-she was hungry! Also big news this morning-for the past week or two she’s had all her adult teeth with the exception of the canines. For the past few days, the canines have started to grow in, but the sharp baby teeth are still there so she’s had a double set of canines that are about the same height! This morning, one of the baby canines was gone! Yay! I’m ready to say good riddance to those needle-like puppy teeth.

I put her in her crate, and then went to Crossfit. We did bench presses, and then the following WOD:

10 minute AMRAP of 5 squat cleans and 5 dips. I didm the cleans at 95# and the dips assisted. I got through nearly 7 rounds, slowing a bit because I’ve spent all summer working on my cleans and I have no intention to reinforce bad technique because I am tired!

After Crossfit, I made myself an early lunch because I knew I’d never make it through a puppy walk without fuel, and I wanted to get our walk in before it got too hot. Lunch was a wrap, the same as lunch yesterday.

A veggie wrap, turkey, monterey jack, spinach, avocado, and garlic sauce. (Love that stuff, and love the ingredient list!)

Eaten with a side of puppy, as it should be.

I was trying to figure out what to do for our special day together, but in the end I decided to settle for a nice long walk for her and tanning time (LOL) for me, plus a trip to Petsmart. It was her first ride in my car, and she was really good!

Our walk was by the bay. I was hoping it wouldn’t be too warm, and I wanted a trail with minimal leaves. My puppy likes to put EVERYTHING in her mouth-leaves, acorns, rocks, and it’s a toss up what she’ll actually eat. Even still, there was a fair amount of dragging her from nature’s sweet bounty (aka rocks).

Overall, she was pretty good. I had planned to go for about an hour, but it was warm and she was starting to drag a bit so the walk only ended up being about 50 minutes. We stopped a few times for water, and during our break she laid down in the shade with no indication that she wanted to leave.

(I know everyone thinks they have the cutest dog ever but I actually do ;))

She was more than ready to get into the air conditioned car, and I got drooled all over in the process. With a puppy plus my job at the vet this summer, I’ve given in to the fact that I’m going to constantly be covered in some form of animal bodily fluids. We took some selfies while enjoying the air conditioning.

We then headed to Petsmart, and got 4 Halloween themed toys. Hey-it was buy 2 get 1 free-I couldn’t pass that up! With the edge taken off her from our walk, she was pretty good in the store, and enjoyed a treat from the woman who checked us out.

The aftermath?

She was 100% out all afternoon, so we stayed downstairs and watched Netflix. I woke her up to feed her dinner, and she scarfed it down and was suddenly reenergized. Around dusk, we headed out for walk #2. She was SO good for her walk. Very little dragging, very little attempting to eat things on the street. She surged forward like a puppy on a mission, and I had no idea where she thought she was going! On the way back, I couldn’t help but laugh at her. She was prancing ahead with purpose, with her little puppy booty swinging side to side and her ear totally inside out. I really enjoyed our time together. The puppy was so good, and despite the warm day, the night air had that bite of fall. I half expected to turn a corner and see the lighted face of a jack-o-lantern smiling back at me. We enjoyed views from above the entire Bay Area, and being out in the night also brought back memories from the summer before college, a summer to remember. It was my last time without responsibilities or worries but with freedom, and the anticipation of starting a new and exciting chapter of my life. At the same time, it felt like the victory lap of college and many nights like this one were spent with great friends doing what carefree teenagers do.

Another bonus? I avoided the mischief of a steadily reawakening puppy, and she is currently passed out by my feet. Not a bad day for the two of us!