What's Cookin' {Braised Beef Short Ribs}

Yesterday I attempted to make Braised Beef Short Ribs from Esquire's cookbook Eat Like a Man. Preston loves ribs. I wanted learn how to make ribs to please him {and to cut back our Chile's bill}. In our deep freeze I found a package of Lawson Angus short ribs. Baby Back Rips... Short Ribs, final conclusion must be similar and equally delicious.

Actually I don't like ribs. I don't know how to negotiate around the bone. I only eat boneless chicken for this reason as well. But I do like BBQ sauce. Instead of surfing the web for a short rib BBQ recipe I decided to go the old fashion route and find a recipe in one of my cookbooks. Ribs, Eat Like a Man, Esquire, dish for Preston = best place to start.

After I spent about 2 hours trying to track down the ingredients {and looking for the perfect flowers for the front yard}

{Love the Colors}

{Purple}

{Favorite, Pink!}

{Uproar Rose Zinnia}

I got down and dirty. I had never braised meat. It was super easy. Actually the entire cooking process was easy. The ingrediants were a little weird especially since the recipe was in a man's cookbook.

{Braising Meat}

{Braised Meat}

{Cooking the Vegetables}

{Picture from the cookbook}

{My Picture}

As you can tell, my picture is very different looking than Esquire's. Cooking time was bout 3 hours in all. The house smelled great and Preston came home after winning a pool tournament ready to chow down.

The dish was an epic fail. The meat fell off the bone, literally, like it was supposed to but the sauce was odd and out of place. I knew the cut of the meat was fatty, but it was extremely chewy. Too chewy. Preston was grateful for the attempt of a home cooked meal, but we ended up dumping out the sauce and saving the bones and meat for the dogs. 

Next time I am going to try cooking short ribs in a crock pot with Sweet Baby Rays BBQ sauce. My BFF tells me it's amazing.

The recipe was so bad, I'm not even going to share it with you.

Our Weekend Adventure

Preston and I decided we couldn't wait two whole weeks for the lake. We thought we would try out Lake Meredith. We got our fishing poles ready, bought a fishing license and packed a cooler full of beer. With the dogs in tow we left early Saturday morning.

Preston & I pulled up to Meredith and immediately became enticed by the water. A wake boarders dream- calm, clear and lots of it.

Without even thinking twice (or realizing that there were no other boats insight) we set out to put our boat on the water. Next thing we know our boat, trailer and diesel truck is stuck in the mud in some very shallow water. Luckily some Chevy men pulled us out, while having a chuckle at our expense I am most positive.

We hightailed it out of Meredith, a little embarrassed, and headed over to Lake Henry. This time we preceded with caution and actually got in the water to test the depth. If it had not been for our mishap at Meredith I am sure we would have been enjoying a day of fishing and wake boarding on Lake Henry with only 2 other boats.

Instead we headed on down the road to La Junta and visited Preston's brother and family and hung out by their pool.

The highlight of my day was this very fascinating bait shop in Ordway, Colorado. They sold everything from chickens, to quail, to lamas, to goats to gold fish. Very country. Any where else this bait/animal store might have seemed out of place but in Ordway, Colorado it fit right in.

What's Cookin' {Picante Fritatta}

Hey y'all. It's been awhile. I follow this blog called Bon Appetempt. It is so different from any other blog that I follow. It kinda reminds me of the movie Julie and Julia. Amelia, the blogger, writes about her experiences or attempts in recreating extravagant dishes from her collection of cookbooks.  

It's funny to me that what made me want to blog is this dish I made the other night. I loath cooking {baking is a different story}. However, ever since my family and I have started taking cooking classes from Grammie {we call this monthly gathering "Cooking with Grammie"} I have started to find myself in the kitchen thinking. "what can I make from scratch?"

{Cooking with Grammie: Lesson in Pie Making}

Last night I decided to make Picante Frittata out of Tosca Reno's The Eat-Clean Diet Recharged diet/cookbook. Preparing the ingredients for the dish was super easy and fast. I was pleasantly surprised that I didn't burn the bottom of the eggs or under-cook the middle of the dish; it came out perfect. I topped my Picante Frittata off with homemade guacamole and this wonder new salsa I found at the super market- Tostitos Simply Natural Black Bean & Corn Salsa . I love it because I can pronounce the ingredients and it has 0 calories like all salsa should. 

If you skim through Bon Appetempt's blog you will understand why I took these pictures. Actually I think I was more excited to try and recreate the actual picture in the cookbook than I was cooking the dish!

{Onions, Red Pepper, Spinach}

{Frittata cooking on the stove}

{My Finished Product}

Picante Frittata via Tosca Reno's The Eat-Clean Diet Recharged
1 serving

Ingredients
1 tsp evoo
1 Cipollino onion, peeled and minced {I have no idea what this is. I used a yellow onion}
1/2 red bell pepper, seeded and devened, cut into thin ribbons
1 cup baby spinach leaves, finely chopped
3 egg whites + 1 whole egg
1/4 cup skim milk
Pinch cumin
1/4 tsp freshly ground black pepper

Optional 
Salsa
Guacamole 

Method
Preheat ovent to 350 degrees. Make sure oven rack in the center of the oven. In a medium ovenproof skillet, heat olive oil over medium heat. Add vegetables to skillet and cook until soft, about 5 minutes. Wile vegetables are cooking, combine eggs, milk, salt, cumin and pepper. Whisk well. Pour egg mixture over cooking vegetables. Cook until edges are set and center is just beginning to set. Transfer to heated oven and bake another 5-8 minutes or until center is firm. Transfer cooked frittata to heated plate and serve.

Calories: 267
Protein: 24g

I FINISHED SOMETHING!!!

I have the most exciting news to share with you..... 

Are you prepared???? 

Erin and I completed the 12 week Jame Eason Livefit Workout Program!!!!

The J.E. workout program is perfect if you are looking to build muscle and trim fat. The program has 3 distinct phases; each transitioning to the next.

Phase 1: is all about lifting. Absolutely NO cardio. I know it sounds torturous, but you get used to it. Jamie really works on building muscle before adding in cardio and burning off the fat. This phase helped me feel comfortable and confident in the gym with the meat-heads.

Phase 2: basically intensifies the moves that you learned in phase 1 by adding in new sequences, upping the sets while lowering the reps. You also add in light cardio. The workouts are much longer as you are lifting for about an hour and then doing light cardio for 30 minutes.

Phase 3: pushes you to a whole new level. You really up the reps, while decreasing the number of moves. This is done in a circuit style. Jamie then so kindly adds in 30 second on/off sprints for 30 minutes. 

WHAT I LOVED

The sprints- sounds crazy, but true

Phase 2 lifting plan- this is the phase where my muscles started to pop

The easy to follow workout schedule- structure is good

The new crazy defined muscles that I now have- my upper body is ripped! 

The respect I get in the gym- I'm considered a regular and hard core

I've lost pounds- but more importantly inches 

WHAT DIDN'T JIVE WITH ME 

The length of time I spent in the gym in Phase 2

The circuit's in Phase 3- it was hard trying to "reserve" all the machines/weights needed

Legs- turns out I hate lifting legs

The eating- if I could have stuck to the meal plan I would be down another 5lbs

CHECK OUT JAMIE EASON'S WORKOUT PROGRAM:

http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/jamie-eason-livefit-trainer.html

 

{Currently}

I saw this post idea over at my friend Emily's blog {Trailerhood Aristocrats} who originally saw it at {Life at 7000 Feet}. It looked so much fun I just had to steal it.

Currently:

Current Book: I'm trying to read/start about 3 books- A Visit from the Goon Squad by Egan; Dear John by Sparks; Moloka'I by Brennert.  I recently reserved from the library Firefly Lane by Hannah on CD for the car.

Current Playlist: Adele and a random workout playlist made up of songs from like 2 years ago. I am in dire need of a new running playlist.

Current Color: Pink! I can't get enough of it.  

Current Drink: Vodka Tonic with a splash of Roses Lime Juice or water.

Current Food: Sweet Potato Fries.

Current Favorite Favorite: The steam room at Lifetime Fitness. The NBA commercial... EEENNT! Preston and I love when this commercial comes on so we can say EENNNTT over and over again. It's also a good message.  

Current Wishlist: Tattoo. I need one right now. But I have cold feet. It's about time for new jeans. 

Current Needs: Groceries, fridge water filter, car wash and vacuum. 

Current Triumph: I have made it to Phase 2 in the Jamie Eason LiveFit Program!  Only 7 more weeks to go.

Current Annoyances:  Inability to stick to a healthy eating lifestyle. Major gym crowd. 

Current Indulgence: Chocolate. I need all chocolate to GO AWAY!

Current Mood: Tired from a hard workout {I wrote this last night}

Current Blessing: Very grateful for the life that I have.   

Current Outfits: I have been going to the gym so much I feel like I live in workout cloths. I am also obsessed with these black suede short boots I got on clearance at Target.

Current Excitement: The Super Bowl! Snow!

Current Link: Elle at {Prior Fat Girl}. She is such an amazing writer and storyteller. Skinny Runner who is very sarcastic and pretty rootin-tootin funny.





 

Running for a Reason

E and I started Phase 2 of Jamie Eason's Live Fit Trainer. The main difference of Phase 2 is we finally get to add in cardio! Some days it's a relief and other days in annoyingly hard and frustrating. Right now we are working out a total of 6 days a week; lifting and then doing 30 minutes of cardio 4 times a week and doing the most crazy leg workout 2 times a week.

Our first run on Monday we were a little too excited and ran way too fast not paying attention to our heart rate. The second day we monitored our heart rate more, but struggled. It wasn't until we learned that there is a way to calculate the fat burning zone in which your heart rate should be at that it started to make sense.

I read that you take your age minus 226 (for women)  to get your maximum heart rate. Then you take that and multiple it by 60% to get the lower range of your fat burning heart rate zone and 70% to get the upper limit.

Finally, some reasoning on why we are running at the pace we are running at. I am looking forward to the cardio session tomorrow so I can closley monitor my heart rate to make sure I stay in the fat burning zone. There is not way I want to run 4 days a week for funzies. If I am going to run after a hard workout I want to make it count!

Exercising Augusta & Harley

Tonight I had the brilliant idea of training the dogs to run on the treadmill. I figure they like to run,  running on a treadmill is running, easy peasy. Right?

ENT WRONG!

The first session was horrific. Both dogs freaked out and could not understand what I was doing to them. I even tried to bribe them with carrots. No dice.

I was very close to giving up, but decided to Google how to train a dog to walk on a treadmill. After watching millions of You Tube videos and seeing all breeds of dogs mastering it, I decided to try it one more time.

This time around I was more relaxed as the trainer. And believe it or not they both did a millions times better. I still had to bend over {read quads burning like crazy for about 20 minutes after a crazy leg workout} and put my hands behind each of their front legs to keep them going, but their steps eventually become more natural.

At one point Harley come over to the treadmill and starting linking Augusta cause she was doing so good {obviously my human interpritation}. It was actually really sweat. :)

They haven't perfected it yet and we are still at a 1.0 speed, but we seem to be making progress. I can't wait to try it again tomorrow. This is going to be a good addition to their open space runs.

And the best part is, they are both worn out snoozing! Mission accomplished.