by Sam Tackeff | Aug 22, 2013 | Barbecue, Blogging, Food Travel, Meal Planning, Travel
It’s Thursday already, and I feel like the week is escaping me. I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about writing and running – and how it helps to break up both into small increments, and it’s better if you only write a paragraph or run a single mile than none at all. On the running front, I’ve started a new 28 day streak to kick off the beginning of a long race season. At the beginning of summer I did a streak from Memorial Day to the Fourth of July, and I made it to the penultimate day, after which I pretty much sat on rear unapologetically. I find that it’s a heck of a lot easier to head out when I know that I “have to”. Before we discuss this week’s meal plan, here are some photos from a few weeks ago, from my trip out to North Conway. It was especially beautiful out there.
For nearly four days we were surrounded by mountains, rivers, and streams in Hale’s Location. (The smallest town in New Hampshire, and the first town to vote in the national election!) Alison and I hiked through the woods, headed up Cathedral Ledge, looked over to Echo Lake. We went on long drives, took photos of trains, visited popped into the wacky Zeb’s General Store, and browsed the shelves at White Birch Books. I had a great Cortado at Frontside Grind – a new coffee shop of note in the area. And we shopped at the outlets, which, I should let you know, includes a Brookstone outlet. I had to hold myself back from emptying my entire wallet. Those massage chairs at steep discounts? Mhmm? You know the ones. The men, on the other hand, were cooped up in the house recording all weekend. They did manage to accompany us one evening to the Ben & Jerry’s in North Conway, where we pulled up at the same time as a summer camp bus. The Coconut 7 Layer Bar Ice Cream was worth the annoyance. Also. Middle Schoolers these days. I think I’m old, because seriously the short length on those kids was scandalous.
And then, of course, there was food. Massive, massive amounts of food. I took very few photos of food, possibly because we were surrounded by it constantly, and health went out the window. At some point I became deeply ashamed at how many Trader Joe’s mushroom turnovers and mini pot pies I consumed. There was Sicilian pizza from Elvio’s, croissants for breakfast, and elaborate sandwich spreads for lunch. Saturday we made dinner on the grill – hamburgers, hot dogs, baby potatoes, asparagus and corn. We made s’mores in the fire pit, and then the next morning there was warm fresh cornbread, biscuits, bacon and eggs. Monday morning we had pancakes, waffles, more eggs, ham, and bacon. And then there were pounds of food left, and we ate leftovers for days.
Coming home, I was craving kale like nobody’s business, and I’ve been stuffing myself with nutrient-packed meals for the past few weeks to recover.
This week’s meal plan includes home cooked meals every day this week, in preparation for a weekend in New York for the wedding (including three separate events!). Of course, Monday, our “home cooked meal” ended up being takeout Vietnamese food from Pho So 1 Boston in Randolph, after having to make a late night trip to IKEA to purchase three ceiling lamps for the electrician to put in the kitchen. Wait, that’s right, I now have THREE lights in my kitchen. That, I swear, is momentous. Not only can I take photographs of food at night now that don’t look horrific… I can probably have guests. Before now, the table in the kitchen was pretty much in darkness past 6 p.m.
:: Turkey Kofte (Turkish meatballs), with a big green salad with tomato, cucumber and avocado. Usually Sunday night is my seafood night, but my planned crab salad went out the window when the grocery stores were seemingly out of everything.
:: Orange-Mustard Baked Chicken Thighs. Loosely adapted from ‘Dinner, a Love Story‘, by Jenny Rosenstrach. Chicken thighs baked with a sauce of marmalade and mustard. Served with steamed broccoli.
:: Cumin Lamb Chops with Carrot Salad and Stewed Zucchini. Well, it’ll be cumin if I feel like it. The other option will be just lightly seasoned with salt, and topped with a vibrant salsa verde.
:: Wednesday Beans and Greens. I like the idea of having stand-by theme nights such as “taco night”, or “fish night” (Sunday) to help take the stress out of constructing a meal.
:: Creamy Tomato Chicken with Basil. Another dinner adapted from ‘Dinner, a Love Story‘, by Jenny Rosenstrach.
:: Crab Salad with Avocado, Tomato, Basil and Lemon Vinaigrette. This was supposed to be Sunday’s dinner – I even got a perfectly ripe avocado for the occasion, but alas I was thwarted. We usually have Friday night dinner out, but we will be staying in this week.
And Fitness? This week I’m going to be kicking it up into gear. I have several fall races coming up, including a 200 mile relay in less than three weeks, and I haven’t been doing a lot of running in the past three weeks, so I’ll be adding back in my daily mile, at minimum. This is a good excuse to build on my running. [The three miles of walking on weekdays is my usual their and back commute walk.]
Monday: 3 mile walk + mile run
Tuesday: 3 mile walk + evening stroll/mile run
Wednesday: 3 mile walk, CrossFit Olympic Lifting Class + mile run
Thursday: 3 mile walk + mile run
Friday: 3 mile walk + running
Saturday: Off – Mike + Keren’s Wedding (although, I’ll be walking in New York)
Sunday: Off – Mike + Keren’s Wedding
by Sam Tackeff | Aug 12, 2013 | Books, Fitness, Meal Planning, Random
Meal planning again – I really do look so forward to this process. Usually, the beginning of my weekends are spent curled up with a new cookbook, reading it from cover to cover by Saturday afternoon, meal planning for the week, shopping and prep cooking on Sunday. This weekend I was totally swept up reading Naomi Duguid’s fabulous Burma: Rivers of Flavor – the ultimate armchair vacation cookbook.
On Saturday I set to work making a little list of what was left in my fridge that I wanted to use up: asparagus, baby spinach, ham, cucumbers, two zucchini, coconut milk, feta, bacon, beets, basil succotash, basil oil, brussels sprouts, Anson Mills rice, eggs, carrots, avocado and tomatoes. Of course there are plenty of bits and bobs, sauces, condiments, and probably things in the way back of the fridge that I just haven’t noticed for a while – all fair game too. And then my pantry is stocked for the apocalypse, so I like to build upon the fresh stuff, but sometimes pantry goods get the starring role in the meal.
When I went to the store, I tried to pick up some meat, some fruit for the week, things to round out my lunches, pantry staples I was running out of: sardines, Red Boat fish sauce, an extra avocado. And by store, well, that’s a lie, we all know that I have a problem. “Store” is more like, three or four or five stores. By choice. For pleasure. Sometimes I stop by Trader Joe’s just for the sample first, you know, to clear my mind. Then I’ll head to Russo’s in Watertown to see if they have Chip-In eggs (they didn’t), or interesting peak produce. Then to Whole Foods for Sunday night fish and an olive sample and a little cup of bionically filtered water, and Trader Joe’s again (to see if they have the free range organic chicken thighs that I eat a lot of (they did.) And another sample.
So here’s what I came up with, accounting for a few days that we’ll likely be eating out because of our super late schedule:
:: Grilled Blue Fish, Mashed Potatoes, and Asparagus with Mustard Vinaigrette. I try to do fish every Sunday if I can because I know that I’ll be able to cook it right when I get home, and usually it’s a quick bet after an afternoon of prep cooking.
:: Saucy Spiced Meat & Potato. This one is from the Burma cookbook. It’s sort of like a spiced stew with ground beef (actually, reminds me a lot of sloppy joe mix.) and I’m not quite sure what I’ll pair it with yet – a big mess of sautéed spinach, and likely a simple salad. I think it suggests an okra/shallot stir-fry in the book, which would be nice, but I don’t have okra.
:: B.L.A.T. Salad. Yep, bacon, lettuce, avocado and tomato salad. The feta might go in here too. And beets on the side.
:: Burmese Grilled Chicken. Also from Burma – chicken with an exciting! marinade of ginger, turmeric, garlic, chile, and fish sauce. I’d bathe myself in Red Boat fish sauce… I’ll probably pair this with a quick pickled cucumber salad.
:: Ham & Cheese Omelette. I have leftover ham. And leftover cheddar with hatch chiles (sucker purchase after eating a sample). And eggs that are a little old, but not too old, that I really want to use up. And I like to channel my French side in the summer time. On the side some stewed zucchini, tomato, and garlic, and a side salad. Ooh la la!
:: Coconut Rice Pudding. I have rice, coconut milk, and some delicious Nielsen–Massey Organic Fairtrade Madagascar Bourbon Vanilla Extract that was sent to me to try out for my blog. (Really good timing, P.R. folks – I usually make my own, and I’ve just run out of a large batch that had lasted for months.) I really love Thai mango sticky rice, so I might do some sort of play on that.
And fitness? There’s plenty of that too:
The three miles of walking on weekdays is my usual their and back commute walk. Our evening strolls are walks, although this week we’ve been adding in some running intervals. These aren’t always what I end up doing, but I find that if I schedule out my workouts, I’m more likely to commit to doing them.
Monday: 3 mile walk + 6 mile slow run
Tuesday: 3 mile walk + evening stroll
Wednesday: 3 mile walk, CrossFit Olympic Lifting Class
Thursday: 3 mile walk
Friday: 3 mile walk+ evening stroll
Saturday: CrossFit (or day off)
Sunday: CrossFit Class + Open Platform
What’s on your plate this week? Also, for those of you who have Burma, have you cooked from it? I have lots of notes, but I’m not sure what to tackle next…
by Sam Tackeff | Jul 26, 2013 | Holidays, Ice Cream, Photography, Travel
I’ve been thinking about what to post all week, and finally decided to pull together some photos from the fourth of July weekend. “Thinking about” is not “doing”, and lately I’ve tried to re-commit to “doing” in all aspects of my life.
This week my focus has been on photography. It was one of my summer to-do’s, and just the act of writing out that I wanted to improve launched me into doing something about it. I upgraded to the new Lightroom (I was working on version 3, and it was slow loading), and invested in two Creative Live courses (50% off sale!) Food Photography with Andrew Scrivani, and Food Photography with Penny De Los Santos. I watched the majority of these courses when they were free (Creative Live airs all of their courses free while live), and the amount I learned in less than a few days of class time was priceless. A few years ago I also had the incredible privilege of taking a real live in person class with Penny, and it was thrilling. I wish I had been even a tiny bit more knowledgable about manual shooting at the time – I would have gotten so much more out of it on top of the massive amount that I learned.
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A few weekends ago, Devon and I drove up to Byfield to spend the weekend with our friend Alison for the 4th of July. It was just the three of us – her family was in North Conway, mine was at a very crowded house in Maine, and we decided that we’d make a go at a bit of a quieter 4th. On Wednesday we drove up late, after getting in my mile run at 8:45 at night, the earliest that I found it bearable in the heat wave. We arrived to air conditioning, and promptly passed out. We spent the next two days eating, sitting, talking, laughing, and trying not to pass out from the heat. We went to Newburyport to the record store, and to Jabberwocky, and T.J.Maxx. Here are a few of my favorite shots from the weekend.
:: Stephanie’s Village Pancake House, in Rowley, for some down home comfort. I’m not quite what happened with the focus or the white balance in this photo. I’m evolving, but still trying to get a hang of my camera.
:: The Farm: after breakfast we headed over to Tendercrop Farm, to pick up some staples for dinner – hot dogs, potatoes, corn, green beans, tomato – and say hello to some farm friends. 
:: And then there was ice cream. As a teenager, Alison worked at Bensons, hulling buckets of strawberries every day for their famous native strawberry ice cream. We picked up a half gallon of strawberry, another of mint chip, and would have called it a day, but after stuffing ourselves to the gill at breakfast, we couldn’t help eating just a little bit more. I think it’s how it ends up going on vacation. I went with a New England classic – Grapenut ice cream. It’s what you think it is – cream infused with the classic cereal, and then studded with it. (The New England version of Momofuku’s cereal milk soft serve…)
:: Dinner. I wish I had a picture of dinner – but we ate it in the dark, on the porch, with the mosquitos, until the mosquitos drove us inside to sit around the table off the kitchen. After dinner we watched hours of Boston’s Finest, and followed it up with Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil.
:: Breakfast. Alison is a delightful hostess. Freshly baked beer bread muffins… and cornbread. Clearly I need to be on top of my breakfast game.
:: And sunset. I could deal with this view every day of my life.
Here’s to setting intentions, and doing more “doing” than “thinking”. What are you going to be doing the rest of this summer?
by Sam Tackeff | Jul 21, 2013 | Photography, Travel
Some very sad news sent us driving down the coast today in the afternoon, just any direction that the car would take us. Four hours later we ended up at the tip of the Cape, at Race Point Beach, right after the parks service had finished taking fees for the day, so parking was free. The ocean was so very blue I could barely believe it. I promised myself that I’d shoot something beautiful today, and I think this counts.
We fortified ourselves with Ben and Jerry’s in North Eastham (I had White Russian and Coconut Seven Layer Bar in a waffle cone), headed back north, and now we are home.
by Sam Tackeff | Jun 19, 2013 | Blogging, Breakfast, Writing
I spend a good deal of time wishing I were a morning person. Ideally, I need to wake up, make myself coffee, sit, think, walk, dream, and write before I’m a fully functional human being ready to start my work day. This would be a lot easier if I actually woke up at 6 a.m., but as it usually goes, I’m all too tempted to stay curled under the covers for another thirty minutes, and then my morning ends up being a tad rushed. Rushed or not, the days of breakfast-less living are over, and by day break, I’m hungry. Sometimes I start with some eggs, or leftovers from dinner topped with an egg, or a lately a green juice with chia depending on my mood. More and more, I’ve been grabbing something at the coffee shop because I’ve not planned well. On the weekend I try to make something special, but truthfully I’ve been in a rut with my mornings, so I’m not always so good at putting anything fancy together.
Today I woke up earlier than normal, and prepared a little bowl of Marge granola with blueberries and cream top whole milk. And then I sat for ten whole minutes just staring out the window at the cars and the lush green foliage from a few days worth of rain. It was what a morning should be like.
I mentioned that I was taking the Chookooloonks Pathfinder course on journaling – one of the best parts of the course is that we start the day with morning pages – twenty minutes or so to write freely, about anything that comes to mind, anything we want, without editing or censoring ourselves. Each morning, I pull out my pocket size moleskin, and write. It’s hard. I have to put my phone out of my line of site, because these days my attention wanders and searching on IMDB or Wikipedia in the middle of a sentence is habit. “Can’t… let…thought…escape.” But during my morning pages, I just break whatever sentence I’m writing, and make a note of the thing I’d like to look up, and keep on writing. I can address it later, I won’t forget, I won’t miss out. Having my journal with me throughout the day, I’ve been trying to extend this practice, and have noticed that I’m significantly less stressed that I’ll forget something.
Speaking about that, have you heard of ‘FOMO’? Without heading to Google? Neither had I. Well, every friend who has attended business school in the past decade knows this term, and maybe you do too, but for the rest of us: ‘FOMO’ stands for ‘Fear of missing out’ – and I’ve been thinking a lot about this lately. For me, this anxiety leads to two distinct and opposite responses – either I overextend myself, say yes too often, and exhaust myself, or I go the opposite route and say no to everything, purposefully avoiding life experiences so that I don’t get too used to adventure. It’s a bad habit, and one that I’ve been actively trying to change. I think, the key for me, is finding balance, choosing to say yes to the things that are more meaningful, making more time for the things that matter, and actually doing the things that I dream of doing.
Megan’s granola company, Marge, is wonderful. Find it here: http://margegranola.com
So here’s what I’ve been thinking about lately, while I try to find my own path. It’s crucial in this life to identify others with those dreams of doing, and support them in their pursuits. If you have friends who are creative, who make something with their hands, who write cookbooks, or sell baked goods at farmers markets, support them. Buy their book. Visit their store. Eat their granola. Help them build their project. These friends have succeeded in taking a dream and acting on it. Even if that company is small, or maybe if they’ve found success and are pushing to take things to the next level – this behavior is worth rewarding.
For me, it’s also a little bit selfish, and I’m okay with that – every time I’m reminded how talented the folks in my community are, I’m inspired to head one step closer to where I want to be when I grow up.
Do you make something? Have a book you’d like to share? A friend who you’d like to support? I’d love to hear about it in the comments!
