Yum, Asparagus…. Let me count thy ways

Upon entering my kitchen, one of the only small appliances on my counter is my beloved Oster Steamer (isn’t she pretty?) So typically all my veggies are steamed.  However when I’m not competing I enjoy experimenting with tasty, fresh, & healthy recipe ideas.  These are a few ideas from Edible Chicago http://www.ediblecommunities.com/chicago/recipes/

I chose Asparagus, because people always ask me how to cook it, my boring answer is usually steam it for 7 minutes!

DID YOU KNOW……

*Asparagus is an excellent source of  Vitamin C, Vitamin K, and folate (a B-complex vitamin).In fact, per one-half cup serving, asparagus has the highest content of folate of any vegetable.

*Ancient and medieval medicinal practices used crushed asparagus tips to reduce swelling and alleviate pains associated with bee stings, wounds and infections.

* A source of the antioxidants glutathione (see below) and rutin, precursors to Vitamin A.

*According to the National Cancer Institute, asparagus contains more glutathione than any other fruit or vegetable. This antioxidant plays an important role in the prevention of certain cancers and diseases, nutrient metabolism and regulating DNA and protein synthesis.

Now for the recipes! Enjoy!

WHITE BEAN CROSTINI WITH ASPARAGUS SALAD

1 recipe of the Shaved Asparagus Salad 1½cups of cooked white beans (canned is fine, rinse and drain well) ¼ cup olive oil 2 teaspoons kosher salt Pepper, to taste ½ teaspoon minced garlic 1 small baguette, sliced and lightly toasted Shaved pecorino or Parmesan cheese Sprig of fresh parsley or micro greens for garnish Place the beans in a food processor with the olive oil, garlic, salt, and pepper. Puree the beans until smooth and creamy. You may need to add a little water if themixture is too firm. Taste and add additional salt and pepper if needed. Brush the toasts lightly with olive oil and spread some of the white bean mixture on top. Add a few shavings of the cheese and top with the asparagus salad.Garnish with a single leaf of parsley or a micro-green from the farmers market such as a radish shoot.  Makes 8 to 10 crostini.

PAN-ROASTED ASPARAGUS

I like asparagus with roasted chicken, so i usually whip these up while the chicken is resting. Add a few sautéed mushrooms, and you have a lovely spring meal. 1 bunch of asparagus, stems trimmed (peeling is your decision) 2 teaspoons of good olive oil Salt and fresh ground pepper Heat a large non-stick skillet over medium low heat. The pan should be large enough to hold the asparagus in one layer.  When the skillet is hot, add the olive oil and the asparagus. Gently shake the skillet to coat the spears with the olive oil.  Season with salt and pepper and cook for 4 to 5minutes until the asparagus is crisp and tender. Give the pan a shake every once in a while to turn the spears. Remember that the texture is more important than the cooking time, which will vary according to the diameter of the spears you have selected.  Serve immediately or at room temperature. Serves 4.

SHAVED ASPARAGUS SALAD

This crisp, fresh salad is nice served on top of grilled meats, a grilled crostini, or as a topping for a tossed green salad. You will need a vegetable slicer or mandoline for this recipe in order to shave the asparagus into paper-thin slices. if you have expert knife skills, shave away!

1 large bunch of fresh purple or green asparagus, larger diameter spears works best

6 large radishes

2 teaspoons fresh parsley, finely chopped

1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

4 tablespoons good quality olive oil

½ teaspoon salt

¼ teaspoon fresh ground pepper

Trim off the bottom 2 inches of the asparagus. Shave the asparagus on a mandoline by placing the end of the spear upright against the slicer. Move the spear back and forth quickly to get thin diagonal slices. Place the slices in a bowl and continue slicing all of the spears.  Using a knife or mandoline shave the radishes as thinly as possible and add to the bowl with the parsley. Toss to combine.  In a small bowl, add the lemon juice, olive oil, salt, and pepper and whisk well. Drizzle the dressing over the asparagus and the radishes. Toss and season with salt and pepper as needed. Serve immediately.

Serves 4 as a side dish.

GRILLED ASPARAGUS

Grilled asparagus spears are delicious plain, wrapped in prosciutto or bacon, or served with any dip or salad dressing.  1 bunch of asparagus, trimmed (the larger diameter spears work well on the grill)

2 teaspoons of olive oil

Salt and fresh ground pepper

Heat a grill on high heat.

Place the asparagus on a baking sheet in a single layer and drizzle with the olive oil. Shake the sheet pan back and forth to coat each spear evenly with the oil.

Season with salt and pepper and lay the spears directly on the grill.Make sure you lay the spears perpendicular to the grilling grate so they do not fall through.

Give the spears a gentle roll with a spatula to cook both sides.  Cook until slightly charred – crisp yet tender (darn, more test eating). Remove and serve immediately or at room temperature.

Serves 4

Cause & Effect

Sorry this is not one of those writings about fitness, though there will be a correlation near the end if you can stand to hear me vent for a moment…. I should warn you I am going “there”!

Driving by a Planned Parenthood facility today, I saw a group of people standing outside (of course not without security), their sign stated “Praying to Stop Abortion”. With all due respect for everyone religious beliefs, I find this really aggravating! Is Abortion really the problem? In my opinion, unplanned pregnancy is the real problem, not abortion. I’m sure you would agree that if unplanned pregnancies were reduced the number of abortions would also be reduced.

This really has nothing to do with abortion, rather the backwards mentality of some people who choose to stand on a soapbox about one thing or another, yet they do NOTHING to try to change it.  Standing on a street corner isn’t going to change it.  Prayer along isn’t going to change it. Besides, wouldn’t those prayers have to lead to action at some point anyway?  Why then waist time in public praying to stop abortion, when you can be passing out condoms or being an activist to educate people on birth control? How about volunteering your time to mentor our youth or the underprivileged??? To me that’s taking a stand!

Of course I have to bring it back to fitness/life because the same is true for all of us.  You can stand around and complain about your situation or you can make things happen.  You can complain about how much weight you need to loose or you can change your behaviors and make it happen. Don’t be just a “picketer” take action and do something about it.

Now, go workout for goodness sake…. If not, at least go volunteer for a cause that you believe in!

Self-Sabotage

Stemming from a heartfelt conversation with a client this morning, I realized that she is not alone & that I was not alone; we both at one point or another have sabotaged an area of our life without knowing it.  Although the manifestation is different, the inner conflict is much the same.  Maybe you can agree that if you think about the areas in your life that you struggle or have inner conflict, you can see that you also may be sabotaging your own life or path.

I have found a common theme in people who struggle to lose weight, they don’t REALLY believe that they can.  That belief in itself is usually the limiting factor.  Many people don’t realize that they don’t believe until they stop and ask themselves the question. Do I really believe (not just say I believe, but can I picture it happening) that I can actually lose the weight, or make the change necessary to move forward in another area of my life?

Do you?

My eyes were opened when I was the one who was not allowing myself to grow or heal in certain areas.  Eating healthy and staying fit are not the areas of my life that I sabotage, so I really didn’t think to apply these principles to my own life until just recently I stopped and asked myself if I believed that my life could be different….. I was shocked that the answer was really No, I didn’t believe it in my heart.  Today I believe it, it took me a while to get there, but none the less, I have arrived.  I wanted to share with you a short article that I found to motivate me.  This is from www.dailyom.com and it comes to me daily, I’ve been getting it for years and have shared it with many people.  I hope you find it motivating.

Finding Encouragement
Your True Inner Voice

Within each of us, there are numerous voices often that compete for our attention. It can be difficult to decide which one to listen to, particularly when their messages are all quite different, sometimes conflicting, and even alluring. One voice, however, is the speaker of truth. Among all your inner voices, your true inner voice is the one which encourages you, gives you hope, and pushes you to trust and believe in yourself. Conflict within oneself is often caused by dueling voices inside of each one of us. As we move through life, we get mixed messages from the various aspects of ourselves. Some of our voices, such as the naysayer or saboteur, can speak so loudly that they drown out the voice of truth. Listening to your true inner voice, often the voice of understanding, support, and self-assurance – can help lessen and even resolve internal conflict.

If you’re looking toward the future but your faith in your ability to succeed in life is wavering, you will benefit from finding and listening to your true inner voice. You can connect with it by remaining relaxed and alert, while listening carefully. If you have trouble distinguishing your true voice from the others, meditation may be helpful. You may hear many voices as you meditate, but the one you should pay attention to is the one that speaks to you with love, understanding, and compassion. It will bolster your spirits and urge you to go after your dreams. And it will never cause confusion, remind you of past mistakes, or cause you to doubt yourself.

The more you listen to and believe in what your true inner voice is telling you about your value and your potential, the stronger that voice will become. And the more you disregard the voices that can interfere with your resolve to succeed, the quieter those voices will become. Saying no to the voices that are judgmental and make you feel ashamed will help you stop being critical of your failures and afraid of success. By finding and strengthening your true inner voice, you will be able to ignore internal conflict and pick out the one that speaks the truth.

Stretching….Time Waister?? You decide

Research is unconclusive……. one expert says it’s a must, another says don’t bother.  What is the truth?  Is there a benefit?

Maybe there is some benefit, This is one of those things that most people just don’t know enough about.  People claim to be experts in Fitness.  What truly would that be? According to RTS founder Tom Purvis (http://www.resistancetrainingspecialist.com) it would take several lifetimes for one to become an “Expert” on fitness, since fitness really is a conglomerate of may specialized professions stuffed in to one.  Those professions would be Anatomy, Biomechanics, Physiology, and Neurology, just to name a few.

If you follow me thus far, then you’ll begin to understand how my mind works (well, that may also be another conglomerate of professions….. & leaves the need for more blogging ).  We are in this egotistical & narcissistic day and age where everyone wants to have THE answer, and sometimes the fitness consumers demand that we have THE answer, because the other guy says he has THE answer.

So back to STRETCHING I don’t have THE answer, sorry.  What I do know is many people claim to know the answer to this debate because they want to be seen as intelligent or maybe as an “Expert” Truth is there isn’t an answer.  Most research that I have come across is completely INCONCLUSIVE.  It will be a sliding scale of benefits vs risks.  Most will clarify for who, at what time, what fitness level, hydration level, emotional stress level, intensity or type of stretch applied, etc……

Here is an example of some research findings.  These are highlights from the IDEA Fitness Journal composed by Len Kravitz, PhD

PRE-EXERCISE STRETCHING AND INJURY RISK

Perhaps one of the most exhaustive and comprehensive research reviews on this topic was completed by Thacker et al. (2004). The authors conclude that pre-exercise stretching does not prevent injury among competitive or recreational athletes. Thacker and colleagues support the proposal that this is due to an alteration in joint connective-tissue compliance (ability of the tissue to extend appropriately in response to applied pressure). In some cases, this alteration may lead to greater joint instability. They point out that studies incorporating a pre-exercise combination of resistance exercise, body conditioning and warm-up show promise for better injury prevention. Perhaps this will be a new direction for fitness professionals to pursue.

PREVENTING OR REDUCING MUSCLE SORENESS

Summarizing their findings, Herbert and de Noronha (2009) state that stretching before and after exercise has not been shown to impart any additional protection from muscle soreness. Therefore, stretching does not reduce some of the mechanisms of muscle soreness, including damage to the ultrastructure of muscle, accumulation of calcium ions, cell inflammation, swelling and activation of pain receptors.

IMPACT ON MUSCULAR STRENGTH

When viewing the acute (immediate) effects of stretching before strength training, Rubini, Costa and Gomes (2007) note that static and PNF stretching have shown decreases in maximal strength ranging from 4.5% to 28%. Yet most of this research used more than one stretching exercise for the same muscle group, with total stretching times of 120–3,600 seconds, which is much more than the recommended four stretches of 30 seconds, totaling 120 seconds, for optimal flexibility increases (ACSM 2006). Rubini, Costa and Gomes add that when the total flexibility session is shorter (30–480 seconds), the research shows little or no compromise from stretching right before maximal force production. Importantly (and practically), exercisers do not train daily to their maximal voluntary contraction, where compromises in strength are observed. Interestingly, Rubini and colleagues highlight that there is no scientific consensus in the research for the underlying mechanism explaining the force production loss in muscle after stretching.

IMPACT ON PERFORMANCE

The studies center attention on the areas of jumping ability, torque (rotary force), running economy and maximal force production. Shrier (2004) reviewed 23 studies, which combined have included static, PNF and ballistic stretching techniques with both genders (from children through adults and untrained individuals through highly competitive athletes). The findings, supported by other reviews (Haff 2006), reveal that regular stretching, when performed at times other than before performance, may elicit positive long-term performance outcomes. However, preperformance stretching may educe (bring out; elicit) insignificant or negative performance outcomes.

WHAT DO YOU THINK, Time waister or not?  On Twitter? @chelseafitpro with your comments.

What if the shoe doesn’t “FIT”

Hmm when it comes to shoes…. more wobble to tone and make your legs “fit”, more support to… well, give you more support and apparently limit joint motion where someone thinks it needs to be limited, and finally no support for a more barefoot feel.

What is a consumer/part-time fitness buff to do?? Thankfully I’m in the industry and lets just say that I’ve done some studying to make the right choice for me.  But for those of you that have not, what do you do, who do you believe?  It’s tough to contend with million dollar ad campaigns that promise you a simple stroll in these shoes will tone and tighten  you backside.  Personally this make almost as much sense as a hat that can make your hair grow back!

Here it is…. Of course in my opinion or educated guess.  I’m sure for some people the “wobble technology” of these fancy shoes might help to increase strength in the muscles of the feet.  In others it may do much more damage than good, ever heard of an “over use injury”! Just a thought, but a serious possibility if your feet can not handle the new “unstable” environment that you are trying to walk on.  Being unstable is not a good thing folks!!! Just to clarify, being able to maintain your “balance” on an unstable surface, does not render you “stable”.  They are two different entities.

There is still no way around calories in and calories out to reduce weight and body fat.  The amount of extra calories you will now burn with an over active flexor hallucis longus (muscle that assists in toe & ankle flexion) are probably comparable to those that you might burn by parking a bit further from the door at the grocery store.  In short neither of these approaches are an effective solution for weigh loss or tight and tone legs.  I hate to be the bearer of bad news again, but there are no shortcuts!

It’s Relative

So often clients, friends, acquaintances ask me the proverbial question…….. what do you think about (insert random fitness related topic or tv show here)? Truth is, I don’t…. and my typical response is “what do I think about it for who?”

I don’t think about Jillian, workout, kettlebells, yoga, the biggest loser, none of it!  I don’t really think about it because it’s all relative.  I have learned over the years in both my fitness life (and personal life for that matter) not to judge.  It’s not always easy, but it’s a learned practice.  For some people suffering from a disability or a life altering crisis, Pilates may be all they can do to be active.  In that case, Pilates is awesome! However a client suffering from joint instability or neuromuscular dysfunction may want to hold off before trying a pilates class unless under supervision of a trained professional who knows of their specific concerns. (unfortunately not the norm for group instructors) So it’s not good or bad, It’s relative!

When deciding to do or not do a certain class, fad, new workout, etc.  ask yourself a few questions first? Such as; Why am I doing this, What am I really expecting, Are my expectations realistic, Is this safe for me…..

Of course if you just can’t decide, feel free to ask me.  Do expect me to ask a few questions first, not just give a blanket statement of my opinion, because in most cases I don’t yet have one

Happy training!