Thai Green Mango Salad Thai Basil Chicken with noodles

I have just made a great discovery. I am starting to gear up to the race on 21st June and thinking about increasing the carbohydrate in my diet. While searching (still in vain) for some cassava to make some sweet potato and cassava patties (a recipe from Yasmin Alhibi-Brown I want to try), I nipped into Wai Lee Hong, our local Asian supermarket and found something else I had been looking for since my holiday in Thailand - green mangoes. Green mangoes have a firmer flesh and are not as sweet as the ones we are used to eating here in the UK. Unripe mangoes are prized in many South-East Asian countries and in Thailand they are often used to make the most delicious salads. You can probably buy them quite easily in London, but this is the first time I have seen them here in Bristol, even in the Asian supermarket. I bought some immediately to make a green mango salad as a starter before our Thai basil chicken. If you have the ingredients, this meal really takes no time at all to prepare. It is fresh and healthy and provides a really good balance of carbohydrate, protein, vitamins and minerals - great for running, great for anything really!

Green Mango Salad followed by Thai Basil Chicken with noodles - A delicious and healthy way to carbo-load...

Green Mango Salad - serves 2

Mango is one of those fruits which seem to have everything! Rich in dietary fiber and carbohydrate, it also contains antioxidants like vitamins A, C and E, B vitamins, potassium, copper and amino acids. It is a pain to peel and ripe mangoes can be really very messy to eat, but it is definitely worth the effort... Don't worry too much about exact quantities, just throw it all together. if you want to make this salad more substantial, you could mix in some prawns or thin slices of roast duck or serve with a fresh tuna steak.

2 green mangoes

1 tbsp lime juice

1 tsp thai shrimp paste

1 tbsp finely ground roasted peanuts (you can use peanut butter or satay sauce for the sake of speed)

2 tbsp thai fish sauce

1 tbsp sugar (palm sugar or soft brown sugar)

1 tbsp chilli paste

a little finely chopped fresh ginger

bunch of mint, chopped

bunch of coriander, chopped

small fresh chilli, chopped finely

2 finely chopped spring onions

Crisp green salad leaves (Romaine or Cos for instance) to serve

1. Peel and core the mangoes and slice very finely into thin shreds.
2. Gently combine all the ingredients and tasted to see if you need a little more sugar, lime juice, fish sauce or chilli to balance the flavours.
3. Serve on the salad leaves and sprinkle with chopped peanuts.

Thai Basil Chicken with Noodles - serves 2

Our Asian supermarket sells two different varieties of basil - Holy Basil and Thai Sweet Basil - both are delicious and have a more aniseed flavour than the mediterranean variety. You could use either in this recipe. If you use the med. variety, you will not get an authentic flavour but it will taste nice all the same! As a vegetable, you could use green beans, or chinese greens. I used Heen Choi, which is very much like spinach.

2 tbs oil

5 tbs fresh thai sweet basil leaves

2 cloves garlic, sliced finely

1 tsp freshly chopped red chilli (add more, plus some whole chillis, if you want it hot)

2 inch piece of fresh ginger, cut into very thin strips

4 chicken thigh fillets or 2 chicken breasts (I pefer to use thigh, as the meat is darker, more juicy and contains more iron)

1-2 tablespoon fish sauce

1 tablespoon oyster sauce

1 tsp sugar (palm sugar if you have some)

50g chopped peanuts or tbsp satay sauce

2 handfuls of green beans, cut into pieces, or a couple of bunches of chinese greens

125 g noodles - amoy bean strip is good- cooked according to pack intructions

1. Heat in oil in a frying pan or wok. Add the chilli, ginger and garlic and fry for 20-30 seconds.
2. Add the chicken and stir-fry for a minute or so until sealed.
3. Stir in the sugar, satay sauce or peanuts and the fish sauce and then fry the meat until it is cooked through. Add a little water or stock if it looks a bit dry.
4. Add the vegetables and cook for a couple of minutes.
5. Stir in the oyster sauce and the noodles and then add the basil leaves. Taste for seasoning. You may want to add more chilli, fish sauce, sugar
6. Serve garnished with basil leaves and a wedge of lime.

If you are stuck for the ingredients, my local oriental supermarket has a website - http://www.waiyeehong.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=blogsection&id=9&Itemid=59. - and does home delivery nationally. Take a look at the website - there are cooking tips and really useful information about all the different exotic ingreadients.

Pork and Apricot Tagine

It has been hot and circumstances have been such that even doing a short run has been a bit of a struggle...yes, my children have caught some kind of sick virus and I have been stuck in the house for a couple of days.

However, this weekend they made a swift and magical recovery (!?) and were suddenly up for a trip to Devon to my sister-in-law Sally's wonderful house in Salcombe. It is a former hotel/guesthouse which they have converted into a most beautiful holiday home (it sleeps about 17, plus there is an annex for the staff, or more guests!). And luckily for us, my sister-in-law lives in the States and is incredibly generous - we can basically have use of the place whenever we want.






For me, the best thing about Salcombe is the kitchen - it has everything...space, loads of worksurface, every gadget under the sun, an aga, a conventional oven, a big fridge etc etc. And while you are cooking, you can look out at what must be one of the world's the best views. There is a herb garden to die for, with every herb you could possible want. Yesterday, we caught some pollack (my heart always sinks when I see pollack on the line, rather than mackerel) which I livened up with a mixture of fennel fronds and lemon grass from the garden.

We were chased off the beach on Saturday by a thunder storm, so I delayed my long run until the evening. The coast path around Devon really is one of the most perfect places for training. What could be more delightful than running along a cliff top with the sweet smell of gorse mixed with the freshness of the sea air, wild rabbits hopping out of the way as you take them by surprise. Before you know it, you have clocked off miles of hard, uneven and hilly terrain. I was running along writing my blog in my head like this when suddenly....BUMPPP...SPLATTT...I had fallen on the ground, still slippy from the thunder storm - straight down, headfirst, catching my left knee and chin. It is a bad feeling when you fall during a run, especially when you are on your own. There is always that fear that you might have injured yourself. I sat on the ground feeling rather sorry for myself for a while, until I caught sight of another runner in the distance and immediately pulled myself together, jumped up and continued, too embarassed to be seen in my misery! In fact I was fine, just a little shaken.

Back in the super-duper Salcombe kitchen, my mother-in-law had been preparing supper for the whole extended family (I think there were 20 of us). Little did she know it but she had put together a perfect runners meal - a simple but so very tasty stew of pork with apricots which she served up with some fusilli pasta and a delicious green salad. All I had to do was to make the salad dressing! It is great being a guest sometimes!


Pork and Apricot Stew
This is a hearty sweet and sour stew which goes very well with a fresh green salad and pasta, couscous or even mashed potato. It tastes nicer the next day. If you make it in advance, leave adding the fresh herbs and almonds until you serve it up.
1 tbsp Olive Oil
½ tsp Ground Turmeric
½ tsp Ground Black Pepper
½ tsp Ground Ginger
½ tsp Cayenne Pepper
1/2 tsp ground cumin

pinch of ground cloves

2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 kg boned shoulder of pork, cut into cubes
2 Onions, sliced
Chicken stock , cider or water
300g Dried Apricots
1 tsp Honey
splash of Orange blossom water
1-inch Cinnamon Stick
2 tbsp toasted Almonds
Bunch of fresh parsley or coriander, roughly chopped

1. In a plastic bag combine meat with some seasoned flour and shake about to cover the meat.
2. Heat up a tagine or casserole dish, add a splash of olive oil and brown the meat.
3. Remove the meat and set aside. Add a splash of brandy if you like, to deglaze the pan.
4. Add some more oil and then gently saute the onion until it is nice and golden. Add the spices, the garlic and the pork and then top up with enough chicken stock to cover the meat.
5. Bring to the boil, cover and then simmer gently for about 45 minutes, until the meat is tender.
6. Add the apricots and the cinnamon stick and cook for 10 minutes or so until the fruit is tender. If the sauce is too runny you may have to add a little flour to thicken it slightly.Ad
7. d the orange flower , the honey and the herbs and toasted almonds. Taste for seasoning. If you think it is too sweet, try to add something sour like a spoon of dijon mustard, worcester sauce or some lemon juice.
8. Serve with some plain pasta shapes or couscous and a green salad, dressed with lemon and some tasty olive oil.

Health Tips For Your Good Lifestyle: The 10 Nutrition Rules of Weight Loss#links

Health Tips For Your Good Lifestyle: The 10 Nutrition Rules of Weight Loss#links

Warm salad of seared tuna steak with butter beans then 14 hilly miles

The great advantage of hosting a dinner when you are training is that you can be sociable but you get the opportunity to decide on the menu - ie. you can choose food that is going to help, rather than hinder, your Sunday morning run. The disadvantage is that you cannot dictate when your guests leave and you have to clear up. Also, no matter how hard I try to be virtuous, I always end up having a few glasses of wine and going to bed in the early hours.

This Saturday night was an exception, as one of our guests slipped on the way down the hill to our house, broke his arm and smashed up his elbow and the rather nice bottle of wine he was carrying. Mark, my husband, fetched him in the car and took him to casualty, where he was kept in overnight and then operated on in the morning. So, no guests to eat all the food!

When Mark finally returned from casualty at about 10pm, we decided to eat the food anyway, as it was too tempting to leave and would not have frozen well. The kids ate the leftovers the next day, much to their delight!

Fresh local asparagus with some delicious italian cured ham, pecorino shavings in a lemon/white balsamic dressing
Seared tuna on a warm salad of butter beans, preserved lemon dressing(see below, very good running food) Lovely plate of cheese including a prize winning caerphilly cheese - gorwyyn I think?
Seville orange tart (recipe to follow)
Homemade almond biscotti with Vin Santo (not so good for running!)

Warm salad of seared Tuna with butter beans
My husband refuses to eat canned tuna and refers to it as cat food, but fresh tuna is in a totally different league. It is really delicious and is particularly high in omega-3 fatty acids, vitamins, protein and minerals. It is very important to buy it really fresh and use it on the day you buy it. Also don’t overcook it as it will turn into a tasteless rubber lump! Wait until the pan is really, really hot (I start to heat it up at least 10 minutes before cooking) and just sear it on both sides for a minute or so. If you can’t get hold of fresh tuna, a piece of salmon fillet is a good alternative. The white beans (use butter beans or canellini beans) are a nice summery alternative low G.I. carbohydrate to rice and pasta, high in low G.I. carbohydrate, and are also a good source of fibre, protein, potassium, iron and other minerals…all good stuff for running.

Serves 4
4 thick tuna steaks
160g butter beans, soaked over night and boiled for about 30 minutes or 3 cans butter beans, drained
small pack of pancetta cubes
2 cloves garlic, crushed
large handful fresh chopped parsley
1 preserved lemon, sliced very finely, pulp removed, plus a little of the brine for the dressing
Bunch of rocket, watercress or spinach
Tbsp extra virgin olive oil for the bean mixture plus 2 tbsp for the dressing
8-10 sunblush sun-dried tomatoes, chopped
salt and pepper to taste
juice of ½ lemon
1 tbsp balsamic vinegar

1. Saute the pancetta gently in a little oil for five minutes until cooked. Add the garlic, butter beans, tomatoes, lemon juice and half of the parsley and heat through. Season with salt and pepper.
2. Make the dressing by mixing together the balsamic vinegar, olive oil, the preserved lemon the rest of the parsely, salt, pepper and the preserved lemon brine (1tsp) to taste.
3. Arrange the rocket or watercress on 4 plates (it looks good in really large flat-bottomed pasta bowls) and spoon on the white bean mixture.
4. Lightly brush the tuna with oil and heat the griddle pan or frying pan. When it is really hot, fry the steaks for a couple of minutes on each side. Don’t overcook them. They should be pink inside and they will continue to cook slightly after you have removed them from the pan.
5. Place a steak on top of each bed of white beans and generously drizzle over the dressing.
   

14 mile hilly run

This wasn't too bad until the last 2 miles, when I really started to run out of steam. I was running with my "fast" buddy, who was luckily not in the mood for hill reps, so we only had to go up the hills the once! I think after 12 miles, the earlier hills, the Vin Santo and the late night started to rear their ugly heads. Also, I had not managed much of a breakfast - just two weetabix, so enough for an hour's run, but not for any longer. Anyway, that's one long run out of the way for the training for the Brecon Beacons run on 21st June. I'll do one next weekend and then start to taper.

Sunday Times

What to eat when you're training for a run
When you are training, give your body the food it deserves
I am very pleased to have finally had my article printed in the Sunday Times Style Section (page 41). Let's hope there are more to come like this, as this has increased the clicks on my website enormously. The editor has changed the wording slightly on the piece which is mostly fine, but I was disappointed to see that it states that you should up your protein intake the night before a run - this should read carbohydrate! They have used a fantastic photograph, though, and some nice recipe suggestions...

Welsh Cawl

It has been a week or so since my last blog. Sorry about that, but the half-term week has been spent on a very wet and windy campsite in Pembrokeshire, no mobile connection, definitely no internet, and to add insult to injury, no showers. However, if you are going to camp, you may as well do it properly and get "away from it all". Pembrokeshire is a very beautiful place, even in the rain....

My running has taken a nose-dive over the past week also. I had had romantic plans of doing my 12 mile training run along the Pembrokeshire coastal path in my new Salomon shoes, but I could not face returning to a damp tent, soaked through the the skin, tired and windswept with no hot bath in which to recover and my shoes still have not arrived because they are completely out of stock of my size. A hardy walk with the kids, finishing in the cosy local pub for a bowl of Cawl was much more enticing. Cawl is a delicious traditional welsh soup/stew, made with best end of lamb or shin of beef , leeks and other root vegetables, guaranteed to warm the cockles after being out in the wild welsh weather. I think it is the sort of dish for which every welsh housewife has her secret recipe, but I have just found a fun blog recipe for cawl with recipes from a local welsh WI cawl supper meeting- see distractedhousewife.blogspot.com/2008/03/dydd... for some ideas. If I had done my run, I think this soup would have been a perfect recovery dish...

We have also had plenty of fresh mackerel, which I reckon to be one of the most healthy fish around, packed with omega-3 fatty acids for a healthy heart, brain, skin, eyes, the list goes on and on. It is just so delicious eaten plain, straight from the grill or barbecue. We ate some like this one pleasant evening when we didn't have to resort to the pub, with chunks of fresh bread and some salad. Then I bought some more when we got home (from my fish man Barry) which we ate with lemon and parsley, jersey new potatoes and broccoli. It is most certainly the kids favorite fish of the month. It is cheap and very good brain food as well to help them with their end of year exams!

Fragrant Tom Yam Goong with Noodles

Fragrant Thai Hot and Sour Prawn Soup (Tom Yam Goong) with Noodles

Tom Yam Goong is a wonderfully chilli-hot soup which combines the sweet, sour, salty and hot characteristics of Thai cooking perfectly. I make a higher carb. ‘runner’s version’ of this soup by adding rice or buckwheat noodles. The asian stock I made from my two duck carcasses (see yesterday's post ) was just perfect for this soup...and there is some left over for another time. I ate a version of this soup almost every lunchtime when I was in Thailand - it is refreshing and surprisingly easy to digest. It is quick to make yet exotic in taste, the noodles are high in low slow-burning carbohydrate, and the broth is full of antioxidants. If you have had a sweaty, hot workout, you will find this soup a good option as the broth will replace lost salts. The prawns are en excellent source of protein and minerals such as selenium, iron, zinc and magnesium. You can add extra vegetables such as peppers or mange tout if you like. I used haricots verts, fennel and mushrooms last night.


Serves 4
500g raw, unpeeled prawns (pack of raw frozen prawns is a good alternative)
1 ½ litres stock - chicken, duck.
2 stalks lemongrass, outer layers removed, inner parts bashed with a rolling pin to release the flavour
2 cm piece of fresh ginger or galangal, sliced very finely
6 kaffir lime leaves
2-3 tbs Thai fish sauce
6 spring onions, sliced diagonally
150g finely sliced mushrooms
1 tomato chopped (optional)
2 tsp palm sugar or brown sugar
1 tsp chilli paste
2-4 red chillis, chopped finely, seeds removed if very hot
3 tbs freshly squeezed lime juice
large bunch fresh coriander, roughly chopped
250g noodles (such as Thai rice noodles, soba or buckwheat noodles)

1. Peel the prawns, remove the dark vein and set aside. Place the shells and heads in a pan with the stock. Bring to the boil and simmer for 10 minutes. Strain the stock and discard the shells. (If you used peeled frozen prawns you will have to omit this stage)
2. Bring the stock to the boil again and add the lime leaves, ginger and lemon grass. Boil rapidly for several minutes and then turn down to a low heat.
3. Add the mushrooms, tomato, spring onions and chilli paste and chillis.
4. Cook the noodles according to the pack instructions in a separate pan and drain.
5. Add the prawns to the stock pan, then the lime juice, sugar and fish sauce and simmer for a couple of minutes until the prawns turn pink. Adjust the flavour with more chilli sauce, fish sauce, sugar or lime juice if necessary. Remove the lemon grass, as this is not nice to eat, and then add the noodles.
6. Stir in the fresh coriander and serve. You could serve some extra chillis on the side for the brave…

It's worth the effort - Ashton Court, Bristol

I have just handed in my notice at our local David Lloyd Centre as I have come to realise that I use the gym so rarely that the vast sums of money taken out of my account each month could be spent much more usefully elsewhere. And really, what's the point of going to the gym if you can get your exercise outside in the fresh air. Running in Bristol's Ashton Park (just above the David Lloyd gym) sometimes gives you that added feel-good factor that you really cannot get from staring at a TV screen on a step machine. This is the reward that you get once you have climbed the gruelling zig-zag and then come back down towards Bristol. Fields of wild flowers, a view of the city and it's downhill all the way home.And these photos (taken by my husband Mark, who's much better than me at that sort of thing...and also a fantastic runner, swimmer, cyclist) were taken on a grotty day.



I am feeling a bit guilty about this weekend - it has been slightly decadent. It was Mark's birthday on Saturday and I drank far too much champagne (very nice, but not good for hill training the next day) and on Sunday we had the family around for a big roast dinner (roast duck, roast potatoes, fresh organic local veg, apple sauce from apples in my garden...) and lots of delicious red wine. I suppose it was good poison, but running it out of the system was hard work. Also the weekend has not seen very many carbs (the kids demolished the roast potatoes before I got to them!), so tonight I am going to make a hot and sour soup with noodles - ginger in a soup always makes me feel better. At this moment in time, I have the duck carcasses bubbling away on the stove to make a delicious asian stock, with onion, celery, bay, ginger, star anis, kaffir lime leaves, coriander root and lemon grass. The house smells lovely!

Mad Mave

Things have been very busy this week. I have not had much time to run since Tuesday, and I had to cut short yesterday's run because the weather was so awful and I needed to get back to work. My mother-in-law's best buddy Mavis Patterson, or Mad Mave, as we call her, is off on Sunday to cycle across Canada - at the age of 70!

Mavis is the most wonderful person and is a truly remarkable lady. She has outstanding strength and determination and is incredibly brave. She is also great fun and makes delicious scotch pancakes. I have spent time cycling with her while she was cycling the whole of the UK Sustrans route a few years ago and I have to say that she has a god-like status in my eyes! She has done tons of things for charity, including cyling across Uganda, climbing Kilimanjaro; she's cycled from Sydney to Cairns, she's abseiled off enormous cliffs in Scotland. I remember having to coax her to jump off a building in Cardiff, down which we were abseiling for charity. When she finally did jump, she abseiled down, squealing with delight and talking about the gin and tonic she was going to enjoy afterward! Anyway, her website is http://www.grannymave.co.uk/ - take a look at it and sponsor her if you like.

I made some fruity fingers last night - a cross between malt loaf and a fruit cake, so I'll pop down the recipe next posting.

Hill training

According to Runners World - http://www.runnersworld.co.uk/news/article.asp?uan=159 - hill training is good for you. Yes, I know that, and I suppose if I am going to survive my Brecon Beacons run I must show some willpower and hit the hills. I have found the ideal place to train near my home - Leigh Woods and Ashton Court in Bristol. There are lots of ups and downs, some steady and some steep, and the area is generally shady. Running has been pretty hot this week, so shade is one of my priorities in this beautiful weather.

I have done 2 sessions so far this week - one with my 32-year old ex-army PT trainer marathon buddy, which of course involved some very strenuous hill reps - a number of them starting at 80% effort, increasing to 95% and then tapering down again. I think it must have worked, because my run up the same hill today was quite manageable. Either that or it seemed easier because I was on my own!

Anyway, back to the important things in life - food. Last night was a simple supper of barbecued cumberland sausages (decent ones, not those ones in the packets that seem to taste unbelievably salty to me) and a very fresh-tasting 'green' couscous salad. I bought the most enormous bunch of parsley and some delicious tender courgettes from Reg the Veg. I sliced the courgettes lengthways, chargrilled them and added them to some couscous which I had soaked in chicken stock. I threw in tons of chopped parsley, the juice and zest of a lemon, some olive oil and some black pepper. A fresh, delicious and healthy accompaniment for the sausages and put together in a flash!