Run Swim Bike Cook: Week 3

Run Swim Bike Cook has me so busy moving that there's not much time left for blogging. Overall, this venture has been rough on housecleaning but good for my soul.

Here are the exercise totals:

Run: 5 miles (21 total)
Swim: 1 mile (1 total)
Bike: 28 miles (94 total)

I'm glad that I finally got in the pool in this week. My Mom came into town for the weekend (hooray!), giving hubby and me a chance to swim together. The pool was really full, so we ended up sharing a narrow lane. Normally, this would have been annoying, but bumping into my sweetheart every time we crossed paths was mildly romantic. I guess that's what happens when you combine two novice swimmers without goggles. What can I say? Love is blind.

As for the biking, I'm still slogging along. While spin class is torture, I had a great outing with the kids in the trailer. We picnicked at the sand dunes, dodged ducks at the park, and checked out games at the library, all before heading back home to take care of a stinky diaper.

And running? While I only had time for one run across town this week, I'm hoping to start logging more miles soon. I'm toying with the idea of the Utah Valley marathon in June. I don't know much about this race though, so feel free to share an opinion if you're familiar with it.

Now for the citrus for supper cooking challenge (drumroll, please). After getting some unfamiliar produce in our Bountiful Basket, we branched out with Middle Eastern Lemon Chicken with Jerusalem Artichokes.



When I first saw these knobby vegetables in my fresh produce basket, I thought someone had gone a little happy with the ginger. It turns out that these Jerusalem artichokes are actually the tuber from a species of sunflower. Challenging to peel, but a rather tasty little root.

We adapted a recipe found on this website, substituting chicken breast for the chicken thighs. I loved the strong lemon flavor combined with simmering garlic cloves. The real splurge, however, was the saffron. It cost me $12.99 for a gram! Apparently saffron is so expensive because the delicate red stigma from the saffron crocus must be harvested by hand. When Talia wanted to smell it, I jokingly told her not to spill it because it was worth more than she was. This got me thinking--at $13,000 a kilo, Talia's saffron weight is worth over $200,000. What can I say? My children really are priceless.

I'm not certain how much the saffron enhanced our recipe's flavor--it would have been fun to do a comparison--but it certainly gave everything a gorgeous lemon color. The result was a citrus-y supper to celebrate!

And, just for kicks, here are a few pictures of a recent lunchtime adventure with hummus. In the last RSBC challenge, I mentioned that our kids like to play with their food.

Can't imagine where they learned it from...

Happy eating!