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Murph+Chocolate Making 101

With another Memorial Day weekend come and gone, I completed my 7th annual Murph in honor of those who have bravely served our country.

I have completed Murph on Memorial Day every year since 2014, including with a broken foot in 2016, and while visiting DC for a wedding in 2018. This year was a little different in its own way. Quarantine Murph. Despite the circumstances, I was determined to complete the workout in whatever way I could. I haven’t run much since dealing with a nasty chronic ankle injury in December, but last week I finally worked up to running 2 miles for the first time. For my Murph this year, I did:

1 mile run

100 DB rows (in place of pull ups since I did not have a pull up bar)

200 push ups

300 squats

1 mile run

Murph is one of my favorite Crossfit workouts, and it has definitely evolved for me over the years. The first few times I did Murph, it was with banded pull ups and knee push ups. Last year, I did kipping pull ups and 100 push ups strict and 100 from my knees. This year, thanks to the 1000 push ups that have been programed for us in quarantine and all the work I’ve been doing on them the last year, I finally completed all 200 push ups from my toes. That was a big accomplishment for me! I have to say, it helps to not have the pull ups, but my post-Murph pain is definitely not as bad as it used to be. My shoulders are definitely super sore from the push ups though, but it’s crazy how much stronger I’ve gotten. Even when we feel like we aren’t making progress, there are metrics like this to remind us that we are. I believe I finished around 52 minutes.

The other reason I wanted to post today was that I finally completed my first batch of solo homemade chocolate! My sister makes the best chocolate, straight from the raw bean. After making it with my brother in law when I visited them in February, I’ve been wanting to try my hand at it. This ended up being the perfect quarantine hobby, although I’m not starting it until week 11 of quarantine. I’m going to go through my experience with the process here.

Because I don’t have quite the equipment or experience my sister does, I ordered bulk roasted cacao nibs from the supplier she uses for her raw beans. I used 2 1lb bags for this batch.

To make chocolate, a melanger is a piece of equipment that is absolutely necessary. I ordered one from Amazon and it came in a week!

The first step from the roasted nibs is to grind them up in a blender, and then slowly add them to the melanger.

I had to monitor it pretty closely for the first 30 minutes or so because it was still so thick that the wheels kept threatening to hurl it over the edge, so I had to tame them back into the machine. Once the chocolate progressed and became more liquidy, this was no longer an issue.

Then, the chocolate just hangs out in the melanger, and it grinds for 24-36 hours. I got really excited when my equipment arrived and started the chocolate immediately, so I opted for the 24 hour time because the 36 hour time would have involved me waking up at 4am to tend to the chocolate.

1.5-2 hours before it’s done, add the sugar. I added 8oz to my 2lbs of nibs, making this chocolate 80%. Next time, I think I’m going to add 10oz and make it closer to 76%. (My sweet spot for chocolate is 75-80%).

I added my sugar 2 hours before finishing (at the 22 hour mark). Once the time was up, I poured all the chocolate out into a chilled bowl and stirred. And stirred. The mixture needs to be an even 82 degrees. Once it reaches this point, it then needs to be heated up to 90 degrees, and then it can be poured into moulds. This is the tempering process. This is responsible for the crystal structure of the chocolate, and the texture. I accidentally heated by chocolate back up to 110 degrees instead of 90, which meant I had to cool it all the way back down to 82, and then heated back up to 90. The cool thing about this process is that if you mess it up, you can always remelt it or re-cool it and start again.

FINALLY I had it in the moulds.

Once it is in the moulds, shake out the bubbles and then immediately place it in the fridge until it is completely hardened. This took about 45 minutes for me.

So far, it looks like my tempering went well! The chocolate has a shine, and doesn’t have any discolorations. My kitchen and I may have ended up covered in chocolate, but it was all worth it!

DC Weekend: Wedding, Sweets, and Fitness

So. I finished my first year of vet school. A week and a half ago.

^officially 1/4 of a vet!

In the past week and a half I: went to a wedding in DC. Spent time at home in the Bay Area. Moved to Nashville. Whaaat? It’s been a crazy couple of weeks to say the least. So before I start with the Nashville posts, I wanted to recap my DC trip! It was a whirlwind for sure, but so fun!

I basically went straight from my final to the airport. I was traveling alone, but my friend had a flight out around the same time as I did so we got celebratory beers.

I didn’t get to DC until midnight thanks to the time change. I slept in Saturday morning (does it count as sleeping in if you’re on the wrong time zone?) and then headed out for a few of my favorite DC things: monument run and Sweetgreen. Can you believe it’s been 4 years already since I lived there?

I mostly stayed at a hotel nearish the airport, on the blue line of the metro (which was under construction all weekend so the delays were crazyyy). For my run, I took the metro to Arlington Cemetery, and then ran from there.

^ducklings!

It was really crowded so I definitely had to walk in some sections because of all the people.

It was also quite warm and humid! I definitely missed these sights though! I ended my run at the Sweetgreen in Foggy Bottom (the area I lived). I got a beet and goat cheese salad with chicken and wild rice, and balsamic dressing. SO good.

When I got back, I picked up a rental car to drive to Maryland for the wedding. It was held about 30 minutes outside of DC, and the drive was terrifying. Look, I’m a good driver. I’ve driven in Southern California. I’ve driven in San Francisco. But this drive….not fun. The roads were confusing and the drivers were so unpredictable! I had a terrifying moment when another car swerved into my lane, nearly into me, out of nowhere. Thankfully, I arrived at the hotel safe and sound, and got myself ready to go to the black tie wedding!

It was held at a beautiful mansion. It was supposed to be outside, but minutes before we were supposed to be seated, the skies fell and it started POURING. They had a wonderful back up indoor area, and it was a beautiful, intimate ceremony!

Congratulations Jenni! We went to undergrad together and I knew this couple from the very start!

Sunday morning, I packed everything into my backpack (yes, including my floor length dress), checked out of my hotel, and dropped off my car. I decided that Sunday afternoon would be my Georgetown time (read: cupcake time), so I took the metro into Rosslyn and had a quick lunch at The Little Beet. It’s similar to Sweetgreen, but different flavors. I got a bowl with chicken, brussels sprouts with cranberries,  pickled onions, avocado white bean spread, and chimichurri sauce. It was one of their suggested bowls, and while there were a lot of flavors going in, they worked together!

I then walked across the bridge into Georgetown, straight to Baked and Wired! The Georgetown Cupcake line wasn’t too long either, and I honestly probably should have stopped there too…

I got the one gluten free cupcake option, which was vanilla with chocolate chips!

So good!

Then, I walked along the waterfront and settled on some big steps to read my book for a little bit.

At this point, the sky was getting DARK and I thought for sure I would get poured on. Somehow though, it held out. I checked back into my original hotel and relaxed for a few hours before heading out into the drizzly weather to go to Alexandria. Old Town Alexandria is super cute, and wasn’t too long of a metro ride from where I was staying. I went to Le Pain Quotidien for dinner, another place on my “must gos” for my trip. I got a chicken and mozzarella tartine on their delicious seedy GF bread.

When i saw there was a Kilwin’s in Alexandria, I knew I needed to stop. I went to one in St Charles (near St. Louis) for ice cream and it left an impression! I got the salted caramel, which comes with chocolate covered pieces of caramel! I actually ate this outside in the rain because there wasn’t anywhere inside to sit. Worth it!

After dinner and dessert, I had a relaxing night in at the hotel. When planning this trip, it was tempting to try and fit in 101 things into the short 2.5 days, but I eventually decided that I was going to be exhausted post-finals so I decided to try and make it a little more relaxing.

Monday, my flight left in the afternoon so I didn’t have a ton of time to do things. Since it was Memorial Day and Murph is legitimately one of my favorite Crossfit workouts, I decided to drop back into Crossfit Foggy Bottom to do it. That was my box when I lived in DC, and although I don’t think any of the same people were there, it was good to be back! The interesting part of this Crossfit is that it’s in the basement of a fancy hotel! That made the running of Murph a little more interesting…we had to run through the locker room and then the hotel lobby, and up stairs to go outside! I wasn’t super concerned about my time, I just wanted to do the workout, so the time difference as a result was fine. This workout is a great reminder to remember those who have served and lost their lives.

The workout went well for me. it just doesn’t crush me in the same way it used to. Plus, my pull ups just get better every year. I maintained sets of 5 until the very last round. And my legs didn’t feel quite as heavy on the second run as they have in the past! I think one of the worst Murphs I had was when I did it with a semi-broken foot (the boot came off later that week)….I hadn’t squatted at all in a month or so, and 300 squats after all that time off….ouch.

Thanks to the humidity and 100 pull ups, I was a sweaty chalk monster at the end!

This Crossfit is part of a gym with fancy showers, so I was able to get cleaned up there before traveling!

I made a couple more stops before arriving at the airport. First off, Sweetgreen one more time! I got the Guacamole Greens and subbed sweet potatoes for the onions.

And the final stop? Shake Shack. Their frozen custard is SO good. When I was in Philadelphia in the middle of winter, I ventured into sub-freezing temperatures at night just to get some! I got the vanilla concrete with hot fudge.

Then, it was back home for 4 short days!

Nashville recap coming soon!

Spring Break 2018

Well, spring break is coming to a close. I figured I would share some fun and food from the past couple of days!

Thursday before spring break, my parents came to school to take Chloe to a behavior appointment (she has anxiety) so we went out for pizza afterwards. My mom and I shared a salad and a GF pizza with garlic and ricotta.

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Here’s a meal from Friday: salad with balsamic, turkey, goat cheese, and butternut squash seasoned with garlic, salt, and pepper.

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Saturday was St. Patrick’s Day.

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That morning, I did 18.4 and then drove home for break!

We celebrated St. Patrick’s Day with food. See’s has mint scotchmallows (mint marshmallow+ caramel) and they are amazing.

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We had an Irish meal. I skipped the corned beef and focused on sides!

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Cabbage, glazed carrots, potatoes with truffle salt, and a GF biscuit with dried cranberries (AKA a better version of Irish soda bread).

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…silly.

I have to share some animal pictures.

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Now food!

We tried a Chicken and Dill spring soup that was really good. Side of Brazilian cheese bites.IMG_8763

I also picked up a GF berry and peach pie from Whole Foods, since I missed pi day!

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Breakfast basically every day has been GF bread with sunbutter and a mango.

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On Monday, I decided this week should be like a “stay-cation,” so we had happy hour with Longboard Lager (my favorite Hawaiian beer). For dinner, we stayed with the theme and had a salad with grilled teriyaki chicken, papaya, parmesan, and poppyseed dressing. I also had a passion-guava juice drink mixed with sparking water.

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A Sweetgreen, my favorite DC place, just opened up super close to here so one night after spin (it’s right across the street from the spin studio I like), we went to dinner. I had the winter squash salad, but I added chicken and chose goat cheese instead of bleu cheese, so my salad has roasted winter squash, apples, raisins, chicken, goat cheese, and a balsamic vinaigrette. YUM.

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Wednesday, we had our big outing of the week. One of my best friends from back home works at a high quality chocolate company, so we went on a tour and visited her! The tour was great, and I learned a lot about both the chocolate making process, and tasting chocolate!

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SO MUCH good chocolate!

Afterwards, we went to Gilman brewing, which turned out to be a really awesome brewery.

They had like 15 beers on tap, and they were much more aligned with the style I like. I love saisons, and they had 4 types of saison, including a nectarine saison and a dark saison! Everything was fantastic!

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Thursday night, we celebrated my sister’s birthday…1 month late…with pineapple upside down cake. I made a little mini GF oat flour based one, and it was actually really delicious! Not quite good enough to share the recipe though. It was oat flour and applesauce based, and then I used vanilla pudding mix to flavor it.

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For lunch on Friday, I made a wrap with garlic and herb laughing cow, turkey, lettuce, and avocado sprinkled with salt, pepper, and garlic powder. On the side, I had a sale with aged blackberry balsamic and goat cheese.

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That evening was the final workout of the Crossfit Open, 18.5, for me! It was really fun to be able to do it at my home Crossfit.

18.5:

Complete as many reps as possible in 7 minutes of:
3 thrusters
3 chest-to-bar pull-ups
6 thrusters
6 chest-to-bar pull-ups
9 thrusters
9 chest-to-bar pull-ups
12 thrusters
12 chest-to-bar pull-ups
15 thrusters
15 chest-to-bar pull-ups
18 thrusters
18 chest-to-bar pull-ups

This is a timed workout. If you complete the round of 18, go on to 21. If you complete 21, go on to 24, etc.

Women use 65 lb.

So this in theory would be super cardio heavy, however, I had never been able to do a chest to bar pull up. I spent like 15 minutes before the workout trying everything to get a chest to bar, and nothing was working. I got advice from all the coaches but i couldn’t get it. Despite that, I got talked into Rxing the workout, and just planning on spending 6:45 attempting to do chest to bar. Well, I tried literally everything. Over 5 minutes in, I FINALLY GOT ONE! It wasn’t the prettiest. I knew I was getting high enough, but wasn’t able to touch my chest to the bar. My chest to bar ends dup being a reverse grip (like a chin up) and involved me pulling all the way up and pausing, confused, at the top, and then pulling into the bar. Once I had that technique figured out, I got another. And then another. And then I sprinted over and did 6 thrusters, and back for one more pull up. So I got a whopping 13, but I GOT CHEST TO BAR PULL UPS FINALLY! I think I could have redone this and gotten a lot more reps now that I figured that out!

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This is how you celebrate. Apparently that’s what I thought last year, check out what came up on my time hop:

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I hung around watching and judging the next heat, and then for a bit for the post-Open party. Then, I went home for Sweetgreen again, and got the same salad because it was so good.

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I also made flour less brownies again.

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I was up early on Saturday for a dog walk with friends, followed by a spin class. Check out this view!

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Also:

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I spent the rest of Saturday working on engineering a cat toy for a vet school contest. An engineer I am not, but it turned out really well!

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Sunday morning, I did a 5k that I’ve done the past 4ish years. I am still coming back from my ankle injury and have hardly run in the past 6 months, but the good news is that my ankle felt really good! It’s a little sore today, but it was fine during the race! Thanks to the small race, I managed to snag first in my age group.

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Sunday afternoon, I went to tea with my high school friends. It was so nice to see everyone! Also, their GF scones <3

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And now it’s back to reality!

18.3, 18.4, and Powerlifting Competition

Boy, do I have some things to catch up on! I’m currently on spring break, so I do want to get in a recap of recent athletic endeavors. Later I’ll do a post with a little more more food, and then one on what my powerlifting prep actually consisted of.

Let’s start off with a Crossfit Open recap: 18.3 and 18.4. These were the first workouts featuring movements I couldn’t do. Sidenote: 18.5 is announced tonight and apparently there will be voting; I’m really hoping it is movements I can do though! Chest to bar pull ups would be very questionable for me…

18.3:

Workout 18.3

2 rounds for time of:
100 double-unders
20 overhead squats
100 double-unders
12 ring muscle-ups
100 double-unders
20 dumbbell snatches
100 double-unders
12 bar muscle-ups

Women perform 80-lb. OHS, 35-lb. DB snatches

Time cap: 14 minutes

80# overhead squats are definitely not trivial. I was excited for the doubles because mine have been really strong lately. And ring muscle ups? Yeah, that wasn’t going to happen.

My first set of doubles was really strong. I think I managed to stringy together the first 50? The overhead squats were better than expected. I believe I did them in 2 sets, partly because sometimes it’s harder to put it down and have to get it up again! 80# snatches definitely felt harder after 100 doubles! I got through my second set of doubles in I think 6:21? So I had about 8 more minutes to play around on the rings. Suffice to say, I didn’t get my first muscle up. I did get closer than I was expecting though, so that’s something!

Workout 18.4

For time:
21 deadlifts, 155 lb.
21 handstand push-ups
15 deadlifts, 155 lb.
15 handstand push-ups
9 deadlifts, 155 lb.
9 handstand push-ups
21 deadlifts, 205 lb.
50-ft. handstand walk
15 deadlifts, 205 lb.
50-ft. handstand walk
9 deadlifts, 205 lb.
50-ft. handstand walk

Time cap: 9 min.

Now, I can’t do handstand push ups. I actually really don’t like handstands in general, so I haven’t ever had much desire to work on them. However, I was pretty confident I could bust out 21 deadlifts pretty fast, so I opted to Rx this workout and just do 21 deadlifts for time. I busted out my set of 21 in 45 seconds. I have to say, I have my powerlifting prep to thank for that. I never really do 155# deadlifts in workouts other than the Open because historically it is on the heavier side for a lot of reps for me. After deadlifting a lot, heavy, for my powerlifting prep, the 155# felt really easy. I ended up continuing on, with 155# and just doing the workout as the scaled, which was with hand release push ups. So I basically did 21-15-9 155# deadlifts and hand release push ups, plus 21 deadlifts, so I would actually get a workout in!

Now, for the powerlifting meet! Since I haven’t blogged a ton lately, I haven’t talked about it too much on here. My school hosted a friendly powerlifting competition, which I did about an 8 week prep for. Again, I’ll go into full details on the prep in another post. I do want to include food a bit here, because that was an interesting challenge. The competition was 6-9pm, and I am definitely a morning workout person so that was different.

I got super lucky with my schedule that day, in that I had the whole morning off and just had classes in the afternoon, so it was a restful day. I made myself my normal lunch: salad with grilled chicken, goat cheese, and pear, plus some GF crackers on the side.

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I had a granola bar mid-afternoon, per my usual routine. I had to be at an athlete’s meeting at 5, so in the 30 minutes between arriving home from class and leaving for the meeting, I whipped up a protein-and-carb-rich light dinner. I had egg whites with half a sweet potato (that I roasted earlier in the day—so fancy) and some reduced fat cheddar.

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Then, it was time to head over and hear about the rules!

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Powerlifting has certain commands you have to follow about when you can lift and rack the bar. I tried to practice these a little bit in training, but the command I was most nervous about is a command that tells you to lift, when you are at the bottom on a bench press. Basically, it means you have to pause at the bottom of a bench press until you get the command to lift. We were told we had to make our first attempts, so I actually dropped down my bench press initial attempt by a few pounds after that warning.

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I actually ended up eating another protein bar before the event started. I really didn’t want to go in hungry because I needed all of the strength!

Another challenge was warming up for the event. I was in the competitive division, which was the 2nd of 3 to go. The recreational/beginner division was the first to go, and it was the largest by far. When they started their squat attempts, I started warming up my squat. My initial attempt was 185, a slightly aggressive first attempt but also a number I was very confidant in. I actually warmed up to 195, which was my second attempt. I had a feeling I would be nervous, especially on squats, so it made me feel better knowing I hit those numbers. Then, before I knew it, it was go time!

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My first attempt went smoothly, although I do feel like I had waited a little long since warming up before I lifted. It was fine after the first attempt though. After each attempt, we had to tell the people in charge what our next attempt would be.

Then, I went for 195.

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It felt pretty easy, but I did get a warning about depth, meaning I had to make sure I went deep enough on the next rep (but my 195 was still accepted). I hit 200 in training on Friday, and my squat PR (from 2014….) was 205, so I went for 205 as my third attempt. I think I was a little overly concerned about going deep enough, and I got stuck at the bottom and failed the lift. As soon as you lose your core in squatting, the lift is just not going to happen. I think I had it in me though! I refueled with chocolate milk post-squats and then watched the heavy lifters go…someone squatted 500# which is so crazy to me.

Next up was bench. I warmed up to my initial attempt of 95#. Bench is by far my worst lift, and one I’ve hardly worked on in my many years of lifting. Actually, for that reason it was fun to train because I saw improvements and PRs. Again, I was nervous about the pause at the bottom.

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95 went up easily. My all time max was 115, from a few weeks ago, and it was UGLY. I went for an aggressive second attempt at 110 and didn’t know what to expect, but it also went up well. I went for 115# for my final attempt, and again, it went up super easily. Unfortunately, I missed the command to rack the bar after I successfully lifted it, so the lift didn’t count. Ah well. Annoying, but in the scheme of my total score it was only 5#, and for my own personal records, I know I hit it.

Last up was deadlift. It was around 8:30pm by this time and I was fading. Super tired. But I told myself, I literally only had to lift the bar 3 more times! Again, I warmed up to my first attempt of 225#. At this competition, we were not allowed to use powdered chalk, only liquid chalk. I’ve never used liquid chalk before. Honestly I don’t normally use chalk for deadlifting, but the bars at school are super slippery so that was always a problem. Luckily, I made friends with someone who had liquid chalk, and it seriously made all the difference! 225 was easy. My second attempt was 235, and that also went as planned. My PR (also from 2014…) was 245, so I decided to shoot for 250 for my final attempt….It went up fairly easily, and was my far the prettiest heavy deadlift I’ve done! Normally at near-max weights, the form breaks down (and the back rounds..), but that didn’t happen, I felt it completely in my hamstrings and not in my back. I was SUPER happy to finish with that lift and with a PR! Especially because when I started my powerlifting prep, I initially couldn’t get heavier than 225!

Overall, the meet was an amazing experience. It was so much fun, and everyone was so nice! I also LOVE lifting, especially powerlifting. I love getting stronger and watching things change. It was also fun to have a goal to work towards. 10/10 would do it again. I also had amazing friends who came out to support me!

I got home around 9:30 and ate the same egg/sweet potato meal I had prior to the competition, as well as a brownie with ice cream. I made these super amazing GF/vegan brownies and can’t say enough good things about them. They’re MOSTLY applesauce and chocolate, and the texture coming out of the oven was like the best fudgy brownie. They’r definitely best served hot, and I appreciate that the recipe makes a smaller batch.

Look out for more posts coming soon!

WIAW: In Vet School!

Hello from vet school! Here we have a rare mid-week post. That being said, it’s going to be a quick one. So why not do a WIAW for what I ate in a day, during my second week of vet school?

My morning started EARLY. My alarm went off at 5am, and Rina didn’t look like she was any more interested in getting up than I did. Often times she’s roaming around during the early hours, but I guess this was too early for my sleepy (loud) kitty!

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Before running out the door, I grabbed a handful of berry Cheerios.

I went to 5:45am Crossfit and it was a really tough one. We worked on some core strength, and then did a surprisingly difficult WOD. It was 5 rounds of a 3 minute AMRAP of power cleans, push jerks, and over the bar burpees, with a minute rest between rounds. I was DONE.

After quickly showering, I put a GF pumpkin spice waffle in the toaster, and then ate that while making the rest of my breakfast. That workout called for some serious post-workout carbs,

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Part 2 was a yogurt bowl with plain Greek yogurt, a nectarine, and sunbutter. Plus TONS of fluids. It’s been warm here for sure!

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For lunch, I packed a salad with nectarine, creamy goat cheese, and Trader Joe’s grilled lemon pepper chicken. Plus Quest chips, and a couple chocolates from a classmate.

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Today was 8-5 of sitting in lectures all day. For mid-lecture snack, I had a bar.

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As I’ve been mentioning before, I have a massive amount of zucchini. I took a couple of large zucchinis and spiralized them, and then sautéed them with garlic, salt, and pepper. I topped all that with marinara, more of the grilled chicken, and mozzarella. I munched on some snap pea crisps and dried mango while cooking.

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For dessert, I had fresh mango, one honey mint (I changed my mint about the other one), and half a piece of peppermint bark bread from the freezer.

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That’s probably it for food for the night. I might have kombucha later. Now I have to go do some research to prep for another full day tomorrow!