Pancake Day and Valentines Day

Pancake Day

Today is pancake day and I had a tasty cherry pancake for breakfast this morning that I had put in the freezer from the weekend.  Not quite the same heated in the microwaved rather than fresh off the skillet, but much faster and better that toast :)  

I make my vegan pancakes from this recipe by Parsley Soup but here is my Cherry Pancake version:

// Pancakes //

Ingredients

225g Self Raising Flour

pinch of salt
25g caster sugar
350ml soya milk

1/2 cup of jar or tinned cherries (I used left over filling from pies I was making)

Method

1. Put all dry ingredients in a food processor and pulse to mix.
2. Pour in milk with motor running until smooth.
3. Add cherries and pulse to combine, but not make too smooth
4. Transfer batter into a jug
5. Pour in small batches into a hot skillet
6. Wait until bubbles appear all over the surface of the pancakes, then flip them over and cook on the other side until browned. 

You can pop your oven on warm and then transfer the cooked pancakes into the oven while you continue making more.

This can make anywhere between 8 and 16 pancakes depending on how big you like them :)

Valentines Day

This is a super easy fun Valentines Day drink.  I actually found this idea years ago as a Christmas celebration drink.  The basic idea is that you freeze fruit juice and then add to champagne or fizzy wine.

I found these lovely heart shaped molds in IKEA and they are useful for ice cubes, melted chocolate etc.

Find a new fruit juice you like, dark coloured ones are more dramatic when they melt.  I went for pomegranate

// Valentines Drinks //

And now for my Valentines cookie fail!

With the leftover pasty from the cherry pies I made I cut them into hearts and added jam.  Well I should have made little wells in the pastry or something to contain the jam better because it spread in the heat of the oven and just went every where.  My hearts look more hallowe'en gruesome that valentines romantic!

// Massacre //

Happy Pancake Day & Valentines Day!

Race Recap: Albany Lakes Series Race 2

Race Website: Albany Lakes Series Website

I wore my bright pink tights, love heart sunglasses and ran a 10k for Valentines Day.  It was also my friends birthday and she did the 5k then we met up with others for a well deserved brunch.

Official Stats:

Distance: 10 km
Time: 1:11:20
Pace: 07:08 min/km

Pre-Race

Saturday night was spent hanging out with a good bunch of people.  We had a barbeque and then watched a movie so it was quite social but chilled.  Due to it being a barbeque, Kane and I had vegetable skewers and a salad for dinner followed by watermelon and a muffin.  It was very tasty but I don't think it was quite enough for racing the next day.

I was being careful to make sure I stayed hydrated, but I need to also watch the fuel intake for the next race.

On The Course

0 - 5 km

The first half of the course was pretty steady.  I felt really good and I was surprised at how quickly the first 5k went by.  I was deliberately taking my time because I knew I had another 5k to go, but I ended up doing this 5k 20 seconds faster than the 5k race 3 weeks ago - oops!

//Image of Kane from Running Events Facebook Page

5 - 10 km

I can't think of another race where I've had to do laps before so I think this is my time.  It didn't actually feel too terrible to run away from the finish line as I was mentally prepared for this.  However right on queue my sun glasses - which were love heart shaped glasses for Valentines day - started to fog up and I had little pools of sweat gathering around the points.  I gave them a quick wipe and considered taking them off but decided just to go with it.

Then as I climbed up a small incline away from the finish line I started to feel quite fatigued.  I struggled to get my breathing under control but then it was a nice long flattish downhill and I was able to gather myself.

The struggle truly began at the 7k point and I really really wanted to walk.  My legs felt tired and tight, my lower back started to hurt and my body just wanted to hunch over, breathing was difficult to control.  Alex (from Moxiee Running who I've blogged about before) was running the second half with me and he would not let me walk, not even for a second.  He kept me distracted, gave me good pointers about when to take on water and helped me get my breathing back under control when I needed to but there was no way he was letting me walk.  Walking is the enemy apparently.

Somehow I managed to keep going and get up the hill towards the end that seemed easy 4km ago and then it was a nice downhill and long flat to the end and I managed to get a tiny bit of power and speed back.  However, I made a mistake with how much I had left in me and gave a burst of speed that lasted about 10 seconds and then I felt like I was going to throw up and I still had 400 metres to go :(

I struggled on and managed to look smooth going down the finishing straight.

//Image of me from Running Events Facebook Page

Post Race

The last 2 km of the race felt so difficult and I felt so sore through my back and legs that I was really surprised at the finish how quickly I felt absolutely fine.  I felt like I could manage a few more k's!  Even the following day I didn't feel any soreness at all.

It was my friends birthday brunch and she had gone to cleaned up prior to the prize giving but I needed some time to stop sweating before getting cleaned up and then we went and had some good food and conversation which was a great way to finish up the morning.

What's Next

The third and final race of the series is another 10k with a slightly different route where we run inside the QBE stadium and through the Westfield shopping mall and that's in 2 weeks time.  I'm hoping to improve on my time, but more importantly I want to get the fuelling and race strategy right.

Also in the series: Albany Lakes Race 1

How was your weekend? Did you celebrate Valentines Day?

Friday the 13th and Valentines Day

Friday 13th

The weekend started with Friday the 13th and we thought it would be fun to note the date with a cheesy b horror flick and some take out Hell Pizza.  I had suggested a haunted corn maze but in truth I would be too terrified to do this and was counting on a unanimous no way!

A while ago when our local video store closed down we bought a few DVDs for practically peanuts and one of the ones I picked up was Loch Ness Terror.  I'm not much of a fan of horror movies but I've seen a couple of these SciFi (SyFy) channel ones now and they are quite funny and entertaining.  (See my post: Cinco De Mayo)

Images TL: Amazon,TR and BL: Pixgood, BR: Jennya'things

Kane and his parents had been at the liquor store and bought me some Budweiser and then Kane ordered pizza for delivery and then we all just relaxed with a beer or wine and once the pizza arrived we put on the movie.  This movie was just what we needed at the end of a long week and we laughed, jumped at times, and had a good time.  And we recognised a few of the main actors from other shows like Psych, Eureka, Star Gate SG1, and Charmed.

Valentines Day

The next day was Valentines day.  I've never really celebrated this day much before and when we got married our anniversary became the day to celebrate love.  However this year I wanted to give an outward expression of love, of platonic and neighbourly love, of familial love, and of romantic love.  Whilst our anniversary is a private celebration of our personal love story, Valentines day can be a way to express the sentiment "be the change you wish to see in the world" and maybe the world could use a little more affection.

I wanted to make a nice breakfast for everyone and had planned on heart shaped eggs and toast with rose and french vanilla tea or Irish cream coffee.  The heart shapes weren't very apparent on the toast and I only managed to make 1 successful heart shaped egg (which I gave to my husband of course!) but the tea and coffee made it to the table as planned though.

At least I had decorated nicely thanks to this simple craft tutorial I found on Strawberry Chic for vertical heart garlands.  I got some patterns from Mein Lila Park that I printed out and then cut hearts of various shapes and sizes and cut slits in them to thread string through.  I had trouble getting the string to go through so I threaded it onto a large wool darning needle and used that to make it easier.

I had also got all 4 of us special valentines day tickets for the rugby (Blues v Chiefs).  This included access to the Valentines lounge where there were pre-game games and post-game player socialisation, and a complimentary drink.  We were all given Blues flags and blue roses too.  It was the first game of the season and it was a roller coaster of a game that unfortunately the Blues lost but I think my in-laws enjoyed the experience.

All-in-all a successful weekend even though I came down with a cold on Sunday and spent the day watching TV and playing computer games!