madcity girl

My work here is done.

Tommorrow morning marks the beginning of my long roadtrip to Louisville for the Kentucky Derby. I’m meeting friends in Ann Arbor, from which we are roadtripping to Louisville. Here is the schedule of events:

This past weekend, in celebration of Deena Kastor’s Olympic Trials victory, I decided to make her recipe for Avocado Enchiladas, which I found online. Apparently she references the recipe during the documentary, The Spirit of the Marathon, which I blogged about previously. The recipe was awesome. I served it with refried beans and Mexican rice. A great meal for vegetarians, too! It was, however, a time intensive recipe. So probably best saved for the weekend.

Ingredients:
Sauce:
2 Tbs vegetable oil
1/2 yellow onion, finely diced
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 Tbs sugar
4 Tbs cumin
3Tbs oregano
1 can beer
1 twenty-eight ounce can crushed tomatoes
1 cup chicken broth or water

Filling:
8 ripe avocados, peeled and seeded
1/2 red onion, finely diced
1 cup cilantro leaves, roughly chopped
Juice of one lime
1 jalapeno, seeded and diced
3/4 teaspoon salt
20 corn tortillas
1/3 cup grapeseed or canola oil
1 pound Monterey Jack Cheese, grated

Instructions: Here is the recipe many of you asked for. I made one of my favorite recipes while shooting the documentary Spirit of the Marathon. Heat 1 tsp oil in sauce pan. Add onion and saute for 5 minutes or until soft. Add garlic, sugar, cumin and oregano saute 2 more minutes. Add beer, tomatoes broth let simmer for 20 minutes. Can be made two days in advance cool, cover and refrigerate until used for enchiladas.

Chop avocado and toss with cilantro, red onion, jalapeno, lime juice and salt.Heat oven to 400 degrees. In saucepan, heat oil (grapeseed and canola oil tolerate high heat and do not become toxic at high temperatures) over medium flame for about 5 minutes. Once oil is hot, fry tortillas one at a time for one minute each side, or until lightly brown and blistered. Remove and blot on brown grocery bag or paper towel (if you skip frying the tortilla, the enchiladas will not hold form).

Spread 1/2 cup red sauce on bottom of casserole dish. Dip fried tortillas in pot of remaining red sauce, spoon 3 heaping tablespoon of avocado filling in each tortilla. Roll up and arrange rolled tortillas side by side in casserole dish. Pour remaining sauce over tortillas sprinkle with cheese.

Cover and bake for 25 minutes take foil off and bake for another five minutes. Serve two enchiladas on a plate with rice, black beans and a side salad.

Despite the fact that I have barely finished recovering from Boston, I’ve already selected and registered for my next marathon (September’s Ironman excluded). I have selected the 27th annual Medtronic Twin Cities Marathon, known as “the most beautiful urban marathon in America,” which will be held on Sunday, October 5. The field is capped at 11,000 participants and last year’s race filled in just 20 days. This created a bit of pressure and necessitated an immediate decision. So now I’m in. And I’m excited. I love trying new races in new places.

As always, my favorite part of vacation (and life) is discovering and sampling new culinary delights. Probably the most exciting stop during my time in Boston was exploring the historic North end of town, which is dominated by authentic Italian restaurants and mouth-watering pastry shops. On Saturday night, a local Bostonian pointed us to L’Osteria for a delicious Italian meal. Karen and I shared the Caesar salad and homemade lasagna, which might have been my all-time favorite. Afterwards, we made our way around the block to the legendary Mike’s Pastry Shop, which had a line of people waiting for tables that stretched all the way down the street. We opted for the much shorter “to go” line and I ordered chocolate chip cannoli, which definitely hit the spot after dinner and, I’d like to think, fueled me though my marathon.

Other favorites during the trip included Legal Seafoods “If it isn’t fresh, it isn’t legal,” a Boston chain, where I enjoyed the hot lump crab dip with seafood chips as an appetizer and the double stuffed baked shrimp (jumbo shrimp with buttery crabmeat stuffing) as an entree.

I also liked Z-Square, located in the heart of Harvard Square, which specializes in creative American home cooking. Although slightly more expensive prices than I like to see for lunch, the offerings were unique and tasty. I enjoyed the Italian Classico sandwich, with spicy cappocola, provolone cheese, roasted red pepper and balsamic vinaigrette on ciabatta. Karen opted for the Grilled cheese, a unique blend of roasted vegetables with blue, mozzarella, and Gruyere cheese.

I loved Herrell’s Ice Cream in Cambridge, which is known for their “smoosh-ins” (kind of like Cold Stone with a personality). Great ice cream, interesting college town vibe. And finally, the sandwiches at Deluca’s market were awesome, especially the award-winning roast beef. Definitely a great deli sandwich for $5.99. I love food.

I’m back!! Although a little stiff and quite unsteady on stairs following Monday’s 26.2 mile-adventure, I feel refreshed and alive, as only vacation can make one feel.

Boston was amazing. I loved exploring the city. It’s an incredibly walker-friendly city, and the public transportation (the “T”) was superb. I’ll detail my adventures in subsequent posts, but highlights included sampling the Italian restaurants and pastry shops of the North End, watching the Women’s Olympic Marathon Trials on Sunday morning, enjoying a post-race seafood feast, touring Paul Revere’s house and several stops along the Freedom Trail, taking in spring in Boston, and sticking a Badger flag in John Harvard’s hand.

The Boston Marathon was an experience of a lifetime. While the pre-race transportation and porta potty options were severely lacking, causing me to miss my Wave 1 start and lose my pouch of Cliff Blocks (energy gel blocks) in the woods, all went pretty smoothly once I actually started running. Even though I spent the first 30 minutes literally blocked by runners, I eventually broke out of the crowd and was able to start moving. While I’m definitely not a top runner in any race in which I partake, especially the Boston Marathon, I did find myself passing people the entire race because of my Wave 2 start. This, I’m sure, was a mental stimulus. And I was able to supplement my nutrition by picking up dropped (unopened) Gu gels along the way. Just gotta go with the flow sometimes

The course was beautiful–essentially one New England-ish small town after another, with only the last three miles actually taking place in Boston proper. The course was VERY hilly. The infamous heartbreak hill at mile-21 was certainly long, but didn’t actually stand out too much from the ten or so hills I hit beforehand. The crowd support on the course was incredible. People lined the streets the entire way. Definitely the best was the women of Wellesley College at mile 17. You could hear their screams a mile away. The students lined the streets with all sorts of posters, which included “Kiss me I’m graduating,” “Kiss me I’m a lacrosse player,” and “You’re sexy!” Of course, the male runners went crazy at this point, and definitely took many of them up on their offers.

I don’t think I’ve ever felt so good during a marathon. I never really “hit the wall,” as runners like to say, which is a feeling that typically occurs anywhere from mile 15-21. I felt great until maybe the last two miles. My time wasn’t a personal record, but I’m still very proud of my finishing time–a 3:37:30, which is my second fastest marathon to date. I very much enjoyed the experience, and it was a great race and vacation. Pics and more stories to follow.