dessert - AnnaTheApple

April 7, 2015

Easter fun – part 1

Happy Easter everyone! Hope you had an egg-cellent time (sorry, couldn’t resist). Mine was jam-packed, which was brilliant but means I don’t feel that rested for work!

I had Friday and Monday off of work, which I suppose is the norm but I know a lot of people still had to work (I would never work in retail for these reasons!). On Friday I popped to the gym in the morning to do my strength training, though thankfully not having to get up at 5am! I was there for the more reasonable time of 8am. Though this did mean it was far more busy than I’m used to. People all over the place!

Then after breakfast my mum popped over and we headed out, with Alfie, for a lovely walk in Queen Vitoria Country Park which is where my local parkrun is held. Though the weather was a bit grisly, it was nice to walk and chat. And Alfie just loves to walk straight through all those muddy puddles! Walking is helping my mum’s back and she’s trying to swim a bit more too but she’s still off of work and will hopefully have her MRI booked in soon 🙁

We dropped Alfie back off at home, de-wellied ourselves and headed out for lunch at Gunwharf Quays. But the traffic was dreadful. The queue to get to Portsmouth was just chock-a-block so we made the most sensible decision to come off at Port Solent instead and have lunch there. Obviously this meant Zippers (which I’ve been to a fair few times I must admit). Sadly there was no salad bar anymore! Apparently people weren’t fussed with it? This does not compute with me.

But I still got a very tasty chicken, avocado and bacon salad (with a side of chips…). I absolutely couldn’t resist their fantastic chocolate fudge cake either. I’ve had it every single time I’ve been there and it’s consistently amazing. I would go back to Zippers purely for that cake.

Saturday was finally my 50th parkrun! It’s been a long time coming as I’ve been going to parkrun for two years. I baked some double chocolate chip cookies (a very standard recipe, nothing crazy) and they actually turned out OK which is something for me as usually I’m a terrible baker.

I went down early as normal to help set up and as I stood waiting for the others to come I saw my dad pull up. He had said he might come down to watch (he loves supporting races and seeing me run, bless him, and he’s never been to a parkrun before so my 50th seemed an ideal one to watch) but I didn’t know for certain if he’d come. I’d told him to come for 8.30-45am if he was coming so I was quite surprised to see him so early. So I dragged him into setting-up as well. hHe didn’t mind and found it quite interesting.

He was my own personal photographer as well which was cool, as well as a brilliant cheerer.

Annoyingly I hadn’t charged my earphones and hadn’t realised till I got there so I had to run music-less. I wanted to push it and find without music it’s so much harder. Probably need to work on this I suppose as it’s such a mental crutch. Though it was nice to not have music for once and enjoy the atmosphere.I ran it in 21:14 which is slower by 10 seconds or so than last week but I felt strong so I’m happy with that! I feel like I’m being consistent which is good.

The rest of Saturday I spent with my mum again and Di, my mother-in-law. We went to Lymington for a mosey around some shops and lunch.

Lovely violinist setting the tone

There was a market which was cool but it was very busy. The weather was nice, it was Easter weekend…not surprising really! It was lovely to mooch around little independent shops and the market.

For lunch we stopped in a lovely little pub called The Hobler Inn.

I had a lamb kofta for my starter, followed by a mango Cajun chicken salad. Both were delicious and I’d really recommend this pub. It felt very food-focused and the staff were lovely.

Sunday morning was long run time again. This time 14 miles was on the plan and the wind was practically non-existent thank goodness as I was running along the beach again.

It was a good run; I felt comfortable and my legs felt strong (how long will this last??). 7:47mins/mile average.

The only annoying thing was that I got really bad stitch about four times during the run (probably nine miles onwards) and I had to stop a few seconds to try and get rid of it. I wasn’t running fast so I wasn’t sure what was wrong (though I had eaten a lot the night before in the shape of an Indian take-away…but this has never been a problem before?). Though it was annoying it was strangely a good thing because as it kept creeping back I worked out a way to get rid of it while running so didn’t have to stop anymore. I held myself up taller and took big breaths whenever I felt it starting. And it died away! So actually quite good to have happened during a training run to work out how to get rid of it.

After the run I blasted up a beasty smoothie at my parent’s house after showering.

This contained half a banana, loads of strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, blackberries, semi-skimmed milk, orange juice, the Superfood power (<– not an affiliate link!) and kale. Very tasty and it made two lots so my dad got a superfood boost as well.

Right this post is getting too long so I’ll leave it there for now and recap the rest in another post.

How was your Easter?

How do you motivate yourself to run fast?

What is your perfect pudding? Fairly boring but mine is probably a brownie/chocolate cake with ice cream. But if there’s no ice cream I won’t have it as it’s too rich and I don’t like cream!

March 30, 2015

Almost there…!

I can’t believe I’ve done 49 parkruns! Next week is my 50th, whoop whoop! If you’re not well acquainted with parkrun check out the website for more info – it’s a free 5k event every Saturday all around the UK, and indeed the world. And getting to 50 parkruns is a milestone achievement. They even send you a parkrun T-shirt with ‘50’ printed on the back. The next milestone is 100 which is just amazing (I think you then get a jacket).

When I woke up on Saturday to go to parkrun I was disappointed with the weather: cold and wet. I wasn’t really feeling it like I was last weekend so I thought I might just plod round. Surprisingly though after I warmed up I felt more alive and ready to go. Even more surprisingly I was only two seconds slower than last week: 21:07.

What was lovely to see as well was a younger guy, Robson, from our running club getting a PB. He’s literally on fire smashing every PB in sight. It’s phenomenal the improvements he’s made since last year. To put it into perspective, a bunch of us from the club had helped pace him last year on parkrun. Now he’s blowing everyone out of the water – minutes ahead in his half marathon and 10k times (times I dream of!). What’s really lovely is he’s such a nice person with a big heart so he truly deserves it. Couldn’t happen to a nicer chap.

I caught up with some friends later for a good old chinwag and then headed to my parents to, er, maybe have another Indian takeaway (bit déjà vu to last week I’m afraid). It was lovely though, even if I did have to suffer through The Voice again…damn that Rita Ora making me like her. 😉 And seriously, what is Will I am on?! He’s mental!

The next morning I woke up and walked Alfie. The weather was awful. The wind was just incredible and it was cold and wet. I did not foresee a pleasant run! I had 13 miles planned and I almost backed out as a lot of it was along the sea front. I knew I’d regret it all day though if I didn’t so I put on my capris (not shorts, ohhh no!) and my windproof jacket and got out there.

I had big plans of sticking to a strict 8.15-20min/mile pace but as I set off I just knew this would be impossible. When the wind blew behind me I sailed along effortlessly, but then when it blew at me it was like running through treacle. So I just did what I could without pushing too hard.

Because I had eaten a lot of salty tandoori chicken the night before I had been thirsty all night, meaning I drank an entire pint of water and then more in the morning. Unfortunately this resulted in my needing a pee stop two miles in. Luckily along the beach there were public toilets that were open so I was OK (despite it requiring a huge amount of force to open the damn door because of the wind).

My pace is all over the place purely because of the wind. It was definitely a tough run and I felt exhausted at the end. But I felt strong at the same time and let my mind just float away listening to a podcast, leaving me mentally refreshed and free. My hair though is another story; windswept doesn’t quite cover it.

Because I hadn’t eaten breakfast before I went (I never really do before a long run) and it was almost 11am by the time I got home I realised I needed to be sensible. For lunch we were going to head to Jamie’s Italian and the table was booked for 1.30pm and I knew I couldn’t eat breakfast straight away as I never can straight after a run. So I decided to have a shower and get ready and then have a smoothie to tide me over until lunch, rather than fill up on breakfast and not fancy lunch. I never have smoothies but as my parents have a Nutrbullet and have been spouting the wonders of it to me I was tempted.

Unfortunate placement of daffodils there…

In the mix were strawberries, blueberries, blackberries and raspberries, with almond milk, natural yogurt, a whole lot of kale and that Nutriblast Superboost stuff in the photo (it’s a blend of cacao, macha, goji and hemp).

It wasn’t overly sweet but it was tasty and it definitely filled a hole until I got something proper. My dad was chuffed as he got a glassful as well. I love that my parents drink smoothies! It makes me proud 😉

Gunwharf Quays in Portsmouth was unbelievably windy but ducking into shops helped! Then we got to Jamie’s Italian ready for lunch. And I was definitely ready for food!

Yes I know I have a slight obsession with this restaurant (I can’t count how many times I’ve been there) but I just love it. And as a tip if you’re a fellow lover, get a Gold Card. It costs nothing (just register on the website) because you get lots of freebies when you show them your card before you order. Over the years I’ve had £10 off meals, free drinks, a free side, free little appetisers to try – it’s so worth it!

This time we had a free tester of a risotto meal.

It was only a very small portion (on a saucer really) but it’s lovely to have a taste of something random. It was so tasty and rich – though I’m not sure I could have had a full meal of it.

For main…oh I know I’m so predictable. But this is literally one of my favourite meals in the whole world (aside from ribs obviously). I don’t even know why! I just love the Turkey Milanese.

It’s such a huge portion that I need nothing else with it. Though we did get a free side of polenta chips as part of being a Gold member so a couple of those helped 😉 And it tasted just as good as usual (well, better as 13 miles really heightens the taste of everything!)

And for pudding I had the Epic Brownie.

A delicious warm brownie with caramelised popcorn and vanilla ice cream. Heavenly. I was beyond stuffed, but so very satisfied.

A bit more shopping commenced (hello Nike shop – outlet prices with a 30% off on women’s clothes!) and then time for home. I gave Alfie a walk (to also help with digestion…) and then plonked myself on my sofa and watched Masterchef (love that programme) and some horrific show called Rich Kids of Beverley Hills. Car crash telly but for my tired body and brain it was all I needed! 😉

How was your weekend?

What’s your TV guilty pleasure?

Are you a smoothie fan? I’m pretty sure I’m in the minority with not being that big a smoothie fan, but I did enjoy it on Saturday so who knows!

January 19, 2015January 19, 2015

Am I mad??

I’m trying not to get ahead of myself just yet and go into full on holiday mode. I still have four days left. But that sounds pretty good to me!

This weekend was a busy one as we had a lot to get done, being the last weekend before we go to the States. Friday night I was a lonely spinster while Ben went off with some friends to our local pub for a ‘boy’s night’. I stayed in watching trashy telly and going to bed at 9pm. What a rock and roll lifestyle I have! I was just so tired. I’d been to the gym four times that week (getting up at 5am each time) so I was worn out.

Saturday morning, after a blissful night’s sleep, I was up ready to go help set up parkrun and also run it. This wasn’t my first run back. I’ve been gently getting back into running with some Garmin-less runs, all kept nice and easy (well it felt easy, I have no idea of pace) and short. I’m not going to blog too much about this running as at the moment it’s all very relaxed, no pressures, no goals, just running when I fancy. And I fancied parkrun so decided to make an appearance.

It was very chilly setting up in the morning (about 8am) and we noticed some black ice on the course as we were putting the markers out so we diverted the route slightly onto the grass (which later turned into an absolute mud bath). And then it started to rain icy rain!! I didn’t mind the crisp, dry coldness but icy rain is awful. After setting everything up I did a warm up as I was just SO cold. I didn’t even take my ski jacket off until the last minute!

The run went fine. I won’t lie, I’ve lost a lot of endurance and speed since not running for so many weeks so my easy pace is not what my easy pace used to. But it was just nice to be out in the fresh air seeing familiar, friendly faces. Without any real running goals it means I’m not panicking about hitting paces or mileage. At the moment it’s purely supplementary to my gym goings. I finished in just under 24 minutes which I was happy with and managed to negative split the miles with a nice push of 7.38 on the last mile. I’ll take that!

After clearing everything away and catching up with people, I headed home to Ben. He was somewhat hung over bless him. We got the housework done and then he headed out for bike ride with a friend. The first bike ride since being told to stop all exercise (all OK’ed with the physio). I think it went well and he was happy to feel the rush of endorphins again.

In the evening we headed to Brasserie Blanc in Gunwharf Quays with Ben’s mum to have a superb meal. We were celebrating her birthday and decided to splash out on a rather posh meal. It’s not the most expensive restaurant in the world but it’s fairly pricy!

I had a selection of salads to start, a coquelet for my main and an amazing chocolate soufflé for pudding.

It was so good! Definitely a winner. The soufflé was unbelievably light (not as in less calories as hello it’s pudding, but as in the texture). It wasn’t a heavy chocolate pudding and the pistachio ice cream it came with balanced it perfectly.

Sunday was all about chilling for me. No gym, no running, just nice Alfie walks and a trip into Southampton to take back clothes that we’d ordered online that either looked awful or didn’t fit. I got annoyed in Top Shop as all the jeans that they were selling were either skinny, high-waisted skinny or ‘mom’ jeans. They had so many pairs of bloody skinny jeans. *sighs* So annoying as Top Shop is normally a perfect place for me to get jeans but skinny jeans are not my thing (wrong for my body shape and bloody uncomfortable). But we did managed to exchange a few items for both Ben and me so it was a success.

And now back to the grind. Got some gym visits planned for this week and perhaps a couple of runs. I’m considering running very early on Friday before we get picked up by the taxi at 6.30am as I know I’ll feel crazy antsy on the plane for ten hours otherwise! Am I mad???

Would you run really early when you’re going to fly on a plane later? It’s just such a long time to be sat not moving much…

Do you enjoy going to slightly more posh restaurants occasionally and spending a bit more on a meal that you might do normally?

Did you do any workouts this weekend? Any parkruns?

December 15, 2014

So excited

The weekend has just flow by. I can’t believe how close to Christmas we are now! And how close to Ben and my next holiday – wooo wooo!

At the end of January we’re off to Florida to go and do some theme park craziness (though missing out Disney World as it didn’t rock our world at all the last time we went) for 8 days, and then travelling to Dallas for 6 days. The first part of the holiday we’re going with a couple friend of ours, Kate and Jamie, and they are literally obsessed with theme parks and Florida. They’re going for two weeks which was just too hardcore for us, which is why we’re then going to Dallas.

So this weekend gone we went up to Bristol to stay over at Kate and Jamie’s house on Saturday to get down to the Holiday Master Plan, i.e. where we want to go, what we want to do and more importantly what kind of restaurants and food we like and want to go to. Jamie is a HUGE food enthusiast and loves all the American-style food and, well, food in general. Jamie is like the male version of me basically. Food is important to us!

They cooked an amazing feast of food. Honestly it was incredible.

There were tortilla chips with dips, oven-roasted hot and plain chicken wings, corn on the cobs, home-made burgers, crispy bacon, ranch dressed slaw and regular salad and my personal favourite RIBS.

Ribs are one of my favourite meals in the entire world. I adore them. It was such a good spread, but it didn’t end there.

Pudding!

Home-made brownie, hot fudge sauce and Hagen Daaz vanilla ice cream. Oh my life. All in a special Mickey Mouse bowl (sink?). The photo above really doesn’t do it justice but as you can see there was a HEFTY amount of ice cream there – a slab I would say.

We all stumbled to the finish line in states of absolute fullness and severe feelings of sick. We literally sat there in silence (I’d like to say a satisfied silence, but it was more a silence of necessity as movement in general was painful at that point). I regret nothing though 😉

What was really fun was we took Alfie with us and he got to meet their pug, Doug. They seemed to get on well – though Alfie refused to allow Doug to sniff his bottom. Not sure what that means in Dog Code. But Doug didn’t mind Alfie having a sniff. I like to think that this is Alfie asserting his Alfa male status 😉 Or just being grumpy!

We had such a fun evening, ending in a random Harry Potter quiz to get us ready for the mayhem ahead. We’re all huge fans of Harry Potter, roller coasters and general silliness that it will just be like being a kid again I think. And we’re staying in the same hotel which is a walk or a short bus ride from Universal Studios so it’s perfect. And we’ve got tickets to an ice hockey game!! It should be mental 😀

The next morning we all went for a walk with Alfie and Doug to their nearby park and had a nice long walk – the conversation never veering far from the impending holiday. We are all SO excited.

We got back and Jamie did a fabulous pancake breakfast for Ben and Kate. I brought my porridge (what did you expect?). My friends know what I’m like (apple obsessed, porridge lover…) so they didn’t mind. Ben was in chocolate chip, cream and syrup heaven though.

He stacked up his three pancakes (first batch) with white and milk chocolate chips in between each layer, coated with golden syrup and then finished with cream. He loved it. I’m actually not a massive pancake fan (or crepes for that matter) so America in that respect is a little disappointing at breakfast for me. I’d much prefer just my regular porridge as the idea of lots of sweet stuff in the morning doesn’t do it for me. When we last went to Florida we had a villa so I could satisfy my porridge need by making it myself but this time we’re in a hotel. It might be time for me to branch out. Watch this space…

And then we were on our merry way back home. It was such good fun and I now have a list of restaurants that I’m subsequently going to peruse through. Does anyone else do that? Find restaurants beforehand and then look through their menus? It gets me really excited about what’s to come!

And so we drove back home, Alfie on my lap. He hates travelling in the car but when he got to look out of the window he was more impressed.

What do you eat for breakfast on holiday? Do you branch out and have something different? Any recommendations for a pancake un-enthusiast?

What’s the most exciting part about going on holiday for you? For me a big part if trying new foods. But going with friends now is going to add a brilliant new element – and we’re all similar to each other in different ways so it makes things very easy.

Do you enjoy roller coasters?

December 9, 2014December 9, 2014

Berlin Christmas markets

Well that’s my second Berlin trip this year done and dusted. And I must say I don’t feel quite as in pieces as I did after my last one, having not run 26.2 miles this time!

Though I’m still shattered. I left for Gatwick Friday afternoon and met up with two of my friends before flying into Berlin to meet the other two. We were staying in my friend Charlotte’s parents house so the whole trip was very cheap (let’s not talk about how my taxi there and back from the airport cost more than the flight itself…). We got to her house late that evening.

The next day was a whirlwind of Christmas markets, Starbucks, SO much food and lots of girlie chatting, as you can imagine. It was cold but thankfully we had no rain so we wrapped up warm and did lots of walking so it was fine.

The first Christmas markets we went to were on the grounds of a beautiful German palace in Schloss Charlottenberg.

Charlotte is German so having someone there who can fluently speak the language is just perfect. She knew how to get everywhere and where was good to go. Like our own personal tour guide 😉

There were so many Christmas markets all over the city and they were all such good value for money. The food and drink was very well priced and not extortionate like it can be in the UK for this sort of thing.

The food on offer was just incredible. Chocolate covered fruit, gingerbread, stollen, marzipan everything, cookies, biscuits, bread, cheese, meat, chocolate, sweets…I could go on. I tried as much as my stomach would allow. I shared a skewer of chocolate grapes with one of my friends (surprisingly refreshing) and later had what I can only describe as a marzipan teacake (bottom left). It was marzipan-flavoured marshmallow fluff covered in dark chocolate. Lovely but messy! Top left was a big blob of sponge filled with plum jam (sauce?) and covered in vanilla custard. I shared that with two of my friends but I only had a couple of bites as, disappointingly, it did nothing for me. A bit bland and not that sweet for my tastes!

One of my friends had a waffle with Nutella on it and it looked AMAZING.

We then enjoyed a nice walk around the palace grounds and then hopped off to the Postdamer Platz area for a bit of normal shopping and sushi lunch.

Berlin has so many sushi restaurants and we all love it so it was the obvious place to go. I do love a conveyor belt as well – you can be very choosey! 😉

There were a few markets here as well to mooch around which were also very good.

As evening was drawing in we headed to our final market in Ku’Damm, where the broken church is (I ran past this in the marathon as well). It was beautiful with all the lights. It did get busier as it got darker but it was still very pleasant. My friend and I decided to share a ginormous cheese pretzel and a ginormous sweet pretzel (covered in sugar and chocolate – words cannot describe jut how bloody delicious this was).

Cheese pretzel heaven right there

We later also shared a meat skewer. She was my partner in crime in trying different foods. We managed to get lost from our other friends when we became distracted by large meat skewers. These things happen 😉

Though we did find the problem with wandering off… we lost our German translator and struggled to work out what kind of meat it actually was. Turns out the guy just didn’t understand the English word “pork”. It was very tasty though.

We then spent the evening in PJs with our duvets and hot chocolates watching Love Actually. I think I’m pretty set on Love Actually being my favourite Christmas film now. It’s just perfect.

The next morning we left before eating breakfast so we could have a late breakfast/brunch out. Though it turned out we didn’t actually start eating until about 1pm due to the length of time it took to get somewhere good for restaurants and then the service was so slow! But it was worth it in the end.

We then did some more shopping and moseying around the sights and then headed for an early dinner (we had to leave for the airport at around dinner time).

I think my favourite sushi are the ones with butternut squash (the dark brown filling ones) and the egg ones. SO good. With miso soup I was literally STUFFED.

Then we headed back to Charlotte’s to pack and get ready to go. But first Charlotte’s mum had made an epically amazing sticky toffee pudding (funny to eat such a British pudding considering how Germany everything else had been!)

Just to tide us over for the flight, you know? 😉 As you can probably tell, it was delicious.

A perfect weekend of fun, catching up with friends and indulgent food. I fully recommend Berlin for the Christmas markets. Very cheap, lovely atmosphere, lots of home-made items in stalls selling clothes, jewellery, decorations, etc. and all the food and drink was to die for!

Have you ever been to Berlin? Or Germany?

Do you enjoy Christmas markets? What do you look out for the most? For me it’s all about the sweet treats!