Cavegirl in the kitchen

As I no longer have the use of my arms or legs after Tuesday and Wednesday's WODs (and my shoulder is distinctly unhappy, so I am heeding the physio's advice and slacking off the Crossfit) I thought I would prepare for the weekend's camping at Tribal Clash.  We will be camped by the beach on Blackpool Sands near Dartmouth  with 100 Crossfit teams (hopefully crammed full of hotties!) and as I have been inspired by last weekend's camping trip I headed off to purchase a camping stove, table and other camping accessories.  As I everyone is likely to be fairly hardcore healthy I thought I had better play along.

 Soooo here is what a cavegirl takes camping:  Chicken kebabs from Sainsburys (or any other supermarket, or make your own), I can fry them on the stove and eat them with grated carrot salad, guacamole and courgette fritters.   I have bacon and eggs that I can fry for brekkie with a courgette fritter and readymade kofta kebabs that I can have for lunch with some homemade mayo, carrot salad and guacamole.  Supper on Saturday will be Ruby & White's awesome hamburgers with carrot salad and guacamole and fritters.  Same brekkie and lunch on Sunday as Saturday.  I am going to take some greek yogurt and blueberries along for sweet snacks along with some almonds.  I might also take some pork scratchings from the fab Mexican shop in Clifton - they are fully gluten free with no additives and they are a brilliant paleo alternative to crisps.
As will be very obvious the staples of my travelling menu are carrot salad, guacamole and courgette fritters.

 Carrot salad (this costs about 50p, maybe £1 with the olive oil and lemon juice)
4 carrots grated (I have a food processor and along with my hand blender, mandolin and slow cooker, it is a paleo necessity) - mixed with a big, big glug (no add a bit more) of your favourite extra virgin olive oil, salt, pepper, toasted cumin seeds, half a lemon or lime, maybe some crushed garlic and grated ginger if you fancy it.  That's it!  It really is beautifully sweet and fresh and I don't tire of it.

Guacamole
There are loads of different ways of making guacamole and mine often depends on what is in the fridge, but with my food processor I can make it in a few minutes.  As it is so quick to make I only make small batches unless I am feeding more than me.   Blitz half a red onion and then soak in water for a few minutes so it isn't so tangy on the breathe (I often don't bother doing this if I'm by myself and there are no hotties around), then put onion (without water) back in the processor with a tomato (or about 4 cherry tomatoes), half a finely chopped chilli (or chilli flakes if you don't have fresh), salt and pepper, juice of half a lime (or lemon), 1 avocado without skin or stone.  Blitz. Eat.

Courgette Fritters
These take a little longer to make as I make them in larger batches and I only have a very small non-stick frying pan [note to self, get bigger non-stick frying pan].  I grate 1 or 2 courgettes, mix with 2 eggs and a cup of almond flour or a couple of tablespoons of coconut flout.  Season to taste - I like spiciness so I add smoked paprika, salt and pepper, chilli flakes and freshly ground cumin.  Then I fry dollops in coconut oil for a couple of minutes on each side, squishing them flat to make sure they cook through.

One other thing that is a joy to eat is homemade mayonnaise and it's absolutely encouraged on both paleo and wholefood 30.  I have found a really quick way to make it that avoids the endless drizzling but you need a hand blender.  Check this video for the full instructions, but basically you get the hand blender beaker and add an egg yolk, 1tbsp water, 1 cup olive oil (not extra virgin as it's too strong, you could use avocado or walnut oil - don't use canola or other bad oils), salt and pepper (I add a bit of mustard and juice of 1/4-1/2 lemon)  Then put the blender in the beaker to the bottom and turn it on.  Mayonnaise appears before your eyes - keep going until you have a beaker of mayo.  Should take less than 2 minutes.  You can add flavourings such as garlic for aioli or a dash of smoked paprika or some chopped capers or anything really that suits your taste.

Oooooosh!

I know, I know, it's been aaaaages. I am a bad person.  However I have been a busy bee trying to shed some lard!  I started wholefood30 having been inspired by the lovely Stubz who has lost about 6 stone doing wholefood for various periods of time - he's just started 120 days which is amazing.  Wholefood 30 is strict paleo; no grains, no dairy, no legumes, no soy, no sugar, no alcohol.   I know- NO ALCOHOL!  Oh my goodness it was hard, but I was horrified about how huge I looked in photographs from a weekend in Snowdon so I kept at it...AND I lost a stone (with a little help from a colonic!)
However after my first, ever festival and Cowes Week and no Crossfit for 3 weeks I have piled on a bit (not sure how much as I've been to scared to step on the scales).  Therefore I am going to do a mini wholefood until I go sailing with my Sandhurst girlies (no way I will manage avoiding the wine that weekend!).  I've also  got some friends who are looking at paleo/wholefood so I shall be posting the recipes that help keep me away from the cake aisle in Sainsbury's.
I've just come back from bog snorkelling in Wales and as you can see from the photo I've been wasting away ;-)

I spent the weekend with the lovely Nina and the fabulous couple Jules and Rich.  Jules is on a ketogenic (no carb) diet and appears to be thriving so apart from the booze my diet was pretty healthy.  Nina produced some fabulous sweet potato fritters which are a great mini carb boost for post-training energy dips.


Sweet potato fritters (should make 4 or 5)
1 sweet potato grated, 2 eggs, 2 tablespoons coconut flour plus seasoning (I use salt, pepper, freshly ground cumin, smoked paprika, some chilli flakes.  Mash it all up and fry in coconut oil for about three minutes on each side.  Super duper - we had them with half an avocado and a fried egg for breakfast.

As well as being a good girl in the kitchen (I've just whipped up a batch of courgette fritters to take away camping for next weekend) I have dragged myself back to crossfit.  Oh my goodness I currently can't move my arms from doing Fran but with ring rows instead of pull ups (my rotator cuff is still not healed).  Today's WOD was totally bonkers and I expect I won't be able to walk tomorrow - 7 minute AMRAP 8 russian swings and 24 double unders, followed by 3 x400m runs with 60 seconds in between, followed by 7 minute AMRAP 10 wall balls 10 box jumps.  Filthy...really!

Posh gyms don't sweat

Bloody hell!  I can't believe how long it's been since my last post.  Bad Bridget!  But it's been a whirlwind of activity. In the week running up to the European Masters I couldn't do any last minute panic training at the box because I was in Macclesfield on a case.  So I pack my PE kit and my skipping rope and downloaded a tabata timer onto my phone.  The gym had no free weights and loads of weird machines for working on one muscle at a time BUT there were kettlebells although bugger all space to use them (maybe they were just there for show?!)   So I did some skipping to warm up, which caused some consternation and then did a kettlebell Tabata which caused more consternation - I don't think they'd ever seen anyone sweat before!  Then I tried a power lunge/pressup WOD and finished my whole workout in 30 minutes.  Day 2 I found a barbell and worked on my clean technique - a girl sat down onto a weird thigh squeezing machine and carefully draped her long blonde hair over the back of the seat, then sat there for about 5 minutes checking herself out in the mirror before doing 10 squeezes and then a bit more mirror gazing....and no one batted an eyelid, while they looked at me as if I was a freak!
Soooo the work managed to take my mind off my nerves about the Raising the Bar competition and I suddenly found myself cooking a paleo breakfast pie  and packing all kinds of paleo treats for the next day...THE NEXT DAY aaaaggh! The only solution was chocolate (probably not the best preparation for a day of intense physical activity).   However the crazy early start and the 30 minute walk to the box was great preparation, at least it woke me up and took my mind off the impending ordeal.   The lovely Cathie Smith was competing alongside me and drove us to Dragon Crossfit in Cardiff along with her daughter and son and his friend who were acting as cheerleaders for the day.  The box was buzzing when we arrived and we met up with the dashing Hugh Thomas who was the third Master from Crossfit Avon

We got marked up with our numbers and wandered nervously around checking out the opposition.  I have to say I was ready to call for a stewards' inquiry into the age of some of the girls as I was hard pushed to believe some of them were over 40.  I jealously watched the tiny pert bottoms and the six pack abs and wondered what the hell I was doing there, but then the boys started taking their tops off and all was well with the world :-D.

The first WOD was a clean ladder, girls first and the weights looked epic, the over 55s started and it was truly inspiring to see ladies in their 60s and 70s with the most amazing figures shifting weights that I couldn't manage (well actually that bit was a bit humiliating!).  I managed 35kg which is fairly rubbish and was the joint lowest lifted in our age category although I  managed to do more bar hops in the tie breaker so I didn't finish last.  Some of the weights lifted were enormous and Cathie got a great personal best lift at 60kg.  I just had to make a vow to work on my oly lifting technique.

WOD 2 (50kg deadlifts followed by burpee barbell hops)was horrific and left me gasping so badly that I thought I'd bruised my lungs - I couldn't stop wheezing for an hour.  My thanks to Amelia who shouted at me so loudly to make me get over the bar exactly at the cut off point so I could earn another 2 minutes.

Then WOD 3 left me having to have a serious word with myself as my bottom lip started to wobble at the prospect of shoulders to overhead with a weight that I just couldn't lift, followed by box step ups with a 10kg plate.  I hate being a hobbit - that box was soooooo high.

 Luckily the lovely coach Caz gave me a pep talk and I pulled myself together and scaled the weight so I could complete the workout.  Unsurprisingly I didn't make the semi-finals but I didn't finish last (read into that what you will!)  and I got to watch some truly inspiring women (and men) workout for the rest of the day.  I avoided semi-permanent disability by warming down on a bike and went home for a very warm shower and a very long sleep with the intention of doing loads more training and coming back next year.