White Chicken Chili with Hominy

It’s time for another Eating the Alphabet recipe link-up where each month we make a recipe featuring a fruit, vegetable, legume, or whole grain from a different set of letters of the alphabet.

So far I’ve done:

(A or B): Buttercup Squash and Artichoke Pasta
(C or D): Grenadian Oil Down with Cassava (Favourite)
(E or F): Homemade Fig Newtons (Favourite)

This month we look at G or H. I’m going with hominy.

WTF is Hominy?

I picked hominy because I didn’t really know what it was but I know that I’ve eaten it before. Chances are good that you’ve had it too.

Hominy is used primarily in Latin American cooking where it is, most commonly, ground up into masa harina, the flour that is the basis for corn tortillas. If it’s ground a little coarser then it becomes white hominy grits.

Hominy looks like mutant-sized corn kernels and that is essentially what it is.

Regular old corn is prepared using a process called nixtamalization where it is heated in lye and ash until the outer germ of the kernel falls off.

This process was crucial to the survival of the ancient Latin American people in a couple of ways. Nixtamalization is a method of preserving the corn beyond harvest time and, more importantly, the process exposes the inner kernel of corn making it is easier to digest and also releasing vitamin B3 which allowed the Latin Americans to avoid deficiency.

Hominy is the primary ingredient in a popular Mexican meat stew called pozole. It is also often used to make chili, which is what I decided to do with it.

Because of all the hominy in it, this chili tastes a lot like tortilla chips. I liked the taste of the hominy overall, but I found this chili to be just okay. Matt was a big fan of it though, but he loves anything with chicken in it.I wish I would have tried my hand at a traditional pozole instead.

White Chicken Chili with Hominy

From Ellie Krieger

Ingredients

1 T olive oil
1 medium onion, diced (~1 1/2 cups)
2 stalks celery, diced (~1/2 cup)
3 poblano peppers, seeded and diced (~1 1/2 cups)
1 clove garlic, minced
1 t ground cumin
1/2 t ground coriander
1/4 t cayenne pepper, more to taste
1lb ground chicken
1 can white beans, drained and rinsed
3 c water
1 cube chicken bouillon
1 t dried oregano
1 dried bay leaf
1 (19-ounce) can hominy, drained and rinsed
Salt

1/4 c nonfat plain Greek-style yogurt
fresh cilantro leaves
1 Lime

Directions

Heat the oil in large pot over medium heat. Add the onion, celery, poblanos, and cook for 8-10 minutes until the vegetables are soft.

Stir in the garlic, cumin, coriander and cayenne for 30 seconds to 1 minute or until fragrant.

Add the ground chicken and break it up with a spoon. When it is no longer pink add in the white beans, water, bouillon, bay, and oregano. Cook, partially covered, stirring occasionally, for 25 minutes.

Add the hominy and salt and more cayenne pepper, to taste, and continue cooking, partially covered, 10 minutes longer. Ladle into individual bowls and top each serving with 1 tablespoon of yogurt a sprinkle of cilantro and a squeeze of lime juice.

Beach Volleyball Again

My Friday night beach volleyball league has been cancelled before it even started. I honestly couldn’t be happier. Between my pathetic skills, sand in my ass, and my general aversion to team sports, I find beach volleyball less appealing than cleaning the toilet. I’m not exaggerating– I actually do spend my Friday nights cleaning the bathroom (along with all the other rooms in the house) and I was upset that my routine was going to be disrupted for something like volleyball.

I was angry at Matt for agreeing to it on my behalf. He was angry at me for not wanting to go out and socialize. I told him that I personally find it difficult to socialize when balls are flying at my head, and couldn’t we do something that required less hand-eye coordination and less sand? Apparently ‘no’ was the appropriate answer to that question and I’ve been stewing about it ever since. Not so much ‘stewing’, I guess, as telling everyone who would listen about how much I was dreading beach volleyball.

This isn’t something new. If you know me then you know how I feel about it. Apparently I even posted about it before. Here is a re-post from July 2010 because my feelings haven’t changes and I’m sure a lot of my current readers never saw it the first time around:

Image by opart on Etsy.com

Sometimes I have moments of partial memory loss where I forgot how terrible my coordination is. Moments where I can only remember my fitness level but completely forgot my lack of hand-eye coordination. That’s when I do something stupid like sign up for a sport league or a dance class. I generally steer clear of such activities, except in these moments of weakness, lured by the pretence of it being fun. It never is.

I am coordinated enough to put one foot in front of the other and run, but ask me to do something with my hands simultaneously and you’ll get a blank stare. Even worse is something like soccer where I have to use my legs for 2 things at once (gasp!) while my arms flail wildly in confusion. I once played pick-up soccer with friends and after repeated taunts of “you suck!” during the game, I refused to return.

Then there was that one time that I was misguided enough to take a reggaeton dance class, unaware that reggaeton requires you move your shoulders and hips in different directions at the same time.

Coordination: It’s all a bit too much for my brain to take.

In a fleeting moment of insanity I signed up for a beach volleyball league with friends. Our first game was on Wednesday. Before the games started I became really nervous as memories of volleyball season in high school gym class came to mind. All I remember was being teased by the good players and watching my P.E. grades plummet.

I suck at volleyball. I’m basically a spectator on the court. If I make any contact with the ball at all, it’s a miracle. I try to go for the ball most of the time, but sometimes I panic when I see it coming my way. I think “You’re going to fuck this up” and move just out of the way.

The worst part of playing is the words of encouragement. I know they’re well-meaning, but do I really need to hear “Good try Sam!” as the ball flies over my head in my attempt at an easy volley? It’s like reinforcing the fact that I’m just not good enough. I want to scream: “It wasn’t a good try! It was a terrible try! If I got the ball over the net but failed to get a point, that would be a good try. You and I both know that sucked, so lets just all shut up, okay?” But instead I grind my teeth and try not to have an outburst.

Our team is not very competitive, and none of us are really that good (we lost 5 out of 6 games), but I still seem remarkably bothered by my own poor performance. It’s a metaphor for life, really: me being dejected by things I can’t accomplish. I want to be good at everything, or at least average, and when I’m not– when I watch myself fail– I get upset. Even if I’m failing at something I care little about. It’s tough to be good at volleyball but I think it’s even tougher to accept the fact that I’m not good and just have fun.

Because when it comes down to it, it’s really just playing in the sand. And who wouldn’t love to play in a giant 16m x 8m sandbox?

Southwest Stuffed Peppers Recipe

I actually got my easy run in last night. Granted, it was after doing hill repeat with conditioning drills, but still I took it easy and enjoyed it!

So I’ve been doing the cleanse this week and it has been going pretty well.

. . . Except for maybe those milkfuls that I stole from the candy bowl on my way into work this morning.

. . . and then there’s the the vanilla soy milk that Matt bought when he was entrusted to the grocery shopping this weekend which would have been more of a surprise treat if he got it for me any other week. It does make Chia Seed Pudding especially delicious, I’ll admit.

. . . and, oh yeah, I’m going to have to cut this thing short because I’m going to a friend’s cottage this weekend and sausage is on the dinner menu and I do love a good sausage! …hang on, that sounded dirtier than I intended.

So I guess by going “pretty well” I mean “mediocre”. Remember back when I did the Master Cleanse? How the hell did I have the willpower for that?!? Oh yeah, I promised to wear a bikini in public. Evidently, I am highly motivated by fear and embarrassment.

I find that I have been eating my weight in dates. Especially in the form of homemade larabars which I may or may not have hidden from my husband to keep them all to myself. I guess it’s better than chocolate and cookies though right?

On the plus side, my dinners have been cleanse-compliant … except the fact that most of the ingredients aren’t organic when they should be (so I guess they’re more ‘friendly’ than ‘compliant’).

The other night I made stuffed peppers with a Southwest flair that were quite good. I made my version with chicken but you could easily make them vegetarian (any maybe even more delicious) with black beans instead. And if you don’t care about cleansing then I think these would be awesome with shredded cheese sprinkled on top before baking.

Southwest Stuffed Peppers

Ingredients

5 bell peppers, cut in half seeds removed
2 c. cooked rice
2 T olive oil
1 large onion, diced fine
1 jalapeno pepper, diced fine
1 t cumin
1 t paprika
2 t chili powder
1/8 t ground cloves
1-1/2 c marinara sauce
1 lb ground chicken
1/2 t salt
1/2 bunch cilantro, chopped

Directions

Preheat the oven to 375F

In a large pan heat the oil over medium heat. Add the onion and jalapeno pepper. Cook until the onion starts to soften (about 5-8 minutes depending on the temperature), don’t let it brown.

Add in the spices and stir for one minute until you can start to smell the aromas of the spices.

Add the marinara sauce and the ground chicken to the pan, breaking up the chicken with a spoon. Allow the sauce to come to a simmer, reduce the heat to medium-low, and simmer for 15 minutes.

Stir in the cooked rice until heated through. Add the 1/2 tsp of salt, or add according to taste.

Place the pepper halves inside-up in a barge baking dish (you may need 2 depending on the size of your peppers). Spoon the rice mixture into each pepper half, filling it up as much as you can. Pour water into the bottom of the baking dish(es) about 1″ deep to help steam the peppers in the oven.

Put the peppers in the oven and bake for 25-35 minutes (depending on your oven) or until the the peppers are very tender. The rice filling with have a nice, lightly browned crunchy layer on top (that’s my favourite part!). Sprinkle with cilantro and serve.

Easy Run

Saturday afternoon between cleaning the bathroom and baking cookies I was looking for something to do so I decided to go for an 3 mile Easy Run.

Easy runs are short runs performed at a long distance pace, so you should feel pretty comfortable when you do them. You can use them to build aerobic fitness and help condition your muscles to be able to handle long distance running. They are also a good way to recover from hard workouts while helping you maintain your weekly mileage.

People (and by people I mean non-runners) can get really annoyed when you throw around the term ‘easy run’, like you’re rubbing it in their face or something– “Look at me, I can run 5 miles and it’s soooo easy!” –which really isn’t the case at all. I never actually find running ‘easy’.

My kind of easy run is about getting outside on a gorgeous day, pumping out endorphins, and feeling good. I’m not looking to struggle or speed or run my PR, I just want to have a good time.

My typical easy run is:
– 10:00/mi or slower (but I’m not sure because I don’t time it)
– 3-5 miles
– outside in good weather

Doing sprint intervals or tough loooooong distance runs makes running feel a bit like a chore at times, and I find that an easy run is a good reminder of why I enjoy running in the first place.

So back to my run on Saturday. . .

I was a bit tired that afternoon and I had no excuse to be. All I did in the morning was go see the awesome private screening of my friend’s first feature movie called Riot (I was in it for 2 seconds! I’m famous! No autographs, please.)

I headed out for the run anyway and even though I was keeping the pace slow I was sluggish in my first 1/4 mile or so. I couldn’t get into the groove and my easy run pace meant I would have to endure the distance for even longer than normal.

I wasn’t feeling good. I wasn’t high on endorphins. I was struggling and it wasn’t fun. I wanted it to be over with.

So I completely abandoned the easy run ideal, since it wasn’t feeling very easy anyway, and picked up the pace. I finished a 5K loop in 25 minutes which has been my typical speed lately for this distance, but is about 5minutes faster than I had intended.

Some days you just have to motor through it I guess.

Windsor Essex County Community Wide Cleanse 2012

This Sunday kicks off the week-long Annual Essex County Community Wide Spring Cleanse that focuses on healthy eating, avoiding chemicals in your environment, and yoga to detoxify the body.

The benefits of participating in the cleanse include: improved energy levels, an increased ability to cope with stress, improved recovery time after strenuous exercise, improved physical performance and stamina, a strengthened immune system, improved concentration and focus, enhanced weight loss, and feeling healthy!

I’m going to be taking part again this year for at least one week. The first time I did this cleanse was for 3 weeks. I did it to clear out my system and then I slowly reintroduced foods one at a time to determine if there was a dietary cause to my acne.

There was. In fact there were 2: dairy and seafood. Now have to I moderate my intake of dairy (particularly cheese) and seafood because otherwise my face breaks out terribly.

While I was on the cleansing diet for those 3 weeks I really did feel fantastic. I felt light and full of energy, so I’m obviously looking forward to doing it again.

If you are interested in taking part you can sign up for the cleanse on their website and get a pdf booklet with all the information about what foods to avoid during cleanse week, a meal plan, and a bunch of recipes for the week as well.

Here is a quick outline of the foods that are allowed and to be avoided during the cleanse. To your health!

Cleanse Diet:

Vegetables

Allowed – all fresh vegetables (especially cruciferous veggies) except . . .

Avoid – canned vegetables, white mushrooms, corn/corn products

Fruit

Allowed – fresh and frozen fruit (especially organic)

Avoid – grapefruits and their juices, dried fruit containing sulphites

Grains

Allowed – rice, millet, buckwheat, quinoa, tapioca, teff, amaranth, oats

Avoid – gluten (incl. wheat, spelt, rye, barley)

Legumes:

Allowed — legumes and peas

Avoid – soy products that are not organic, processed soy

Nuts/Seeds:

Allowed – Raw nuts and seeds including almonds, walnuts, hemp, flax, chia, sesame, pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds, brazil nuts, hazelnuts

Avoid – peanuts; any roasted/salted/flavoured nuts

Animal Products

Allowed – organic chicken, turkey, and lamb; wild game; low mercury fish (Clam, Ocean perch,
Alaskan salmon, tilapia, flounder, sole, catfish, sardines, herring, and anchovies)

Avoid – red meat, processed meat, dairy, eggs, seafood, high-mercury fish (shark, swordfish, king mackerel, tuna, orange roughy, marlin, Chilean bass, lobster, halibut, and snapper), Farmed or Atlantic salmon, fish from the Great Lakes.

Oils

Allowed – EVOO, coconut, grape seed, sesame, walnut, hemp, almond, flax

Avoid – canola, sunflower, safflower, peanut, corn, refined oils, margarine, shortening, salad dressing, mayonnaise

Condiments

Allowed – sea salt, herbs and spices, nut butters, bean dips, apple cider vinegar, Sweeteners: honey, maple syrup, stevia, and agave

Avoid – table salt, MSG, food additivies, preservatives, colouring, Sweeteners: corn syrup, brown rice syrup, molasses, brown sugar, white sugar, glucose, maltose, maltodextrose

Beverages

Allowed – 6-8 glasses water daily, 100% fresh fruit/vegetable juices, Herbal and Green teas, Unsweetened rice, soy, or almond milk

Avoid – Caffeinated beverages including coffee, black tea, and pop, alcohol, dairy, fruit juices high in sugar, vegetables drinks high in salt.

FYI: I did a Google image search of “cleanse” to find a picture to include here. Word to the wise, don’t to a google image search of cleanse. It’s revolting. I think I’ve been scarred by the images that have seared into my brain.

For relief here’s an overly cute picture

and another one for good measure

(images via cuteoverload.com)

Conditioning Drills: Terrible Twenties

In keeping with the theme of crazy conditioning drills last night I decided to bust out Terrible 20s.

Terrible Twenties – a sprinting drill sandwiched between a shit tonne of push-ups and sit-ups.

You need a space of at least 50 metres to do this drill, so I jogged over to a portion of the trail near my house that’s a bit quieter so people wouldn’t see the crazy girl running back & forth a million times.
I guesstimated and marked off a distance of 50m which, due to my poor distance perception, I later discovered was actually 150 metres. Blast! I worked harder than I had to (no wonder the sprints were so tough!).

Here’s how the drill goes:

It took me about 50 minutes or so to finish the whole thing for a total of:

2000m of sprints (6000m in my case)
210* push-ups
210* sit-ups

Intense.

*Math Nerd Alert: It is exciting that my knowledge of the ‘sum of consecutive integers’ formula finally could be put to use in the real world.

Stuff I’ve Made Lately

Here’s what I’ve been up to in my kitchen lately:

Detox Salad with Broccoli and Currants

from Oh She Glows

I’ve made this recipe more times than I can count in the last several months and it is probably one of my favourite salads. I can eat it in massive proportions, so it’s a good thing that the recipe makes a huge batch.

I like to put a little more currants than the recipe calls for.

I also use lime juice instead of lemon and cilantro in place of parsley. Thumbs up.

(Image Source)

Spring Egg Salad

from Green Kitchen Stories

The yoghurt curry dressing used on this mix of boiled eggs and fresh vegetables is very tasty. I like that this recipe comes off as light and fresh yet decadent at the same time.

Though the recipe doesn’t call for it, I blanched my veggies before mixing them in the salad. Also, I left out the grapes and the sprouts. I think there are a lot of variations that you can do with this recipe.

(Image Source, left. That’s my version on the right)

Chicken with Creamy Chive Sauce

from PreventionRD

I have made this dish several times since I first tried it, including once for Matt’s birthday in January. I pretty much buckle at the knees for anything ‘creamy’, and I especially like this recipe because it’s a bit on the healthier side since it uses yoghurt instead of cream. The sauce is honestly to die for.

I’ve made this with both chicken and pork and they are both very good. I even made it one time using red wine instead of white and it came out burgundy in colour and just as delicious. This has been one of my top meat recipes as of late.

(Image Source)

Pasteli

from Leftover Queen

This is the Greek version of sesame candies. It’s rich with honey, has a deep sesame flavour, and is very very sweet. Unlike the sesame bars I’m used to, these are soft and chewy because they use honey instead of sugar (which hardens the candy).

I have only made these once and found them to be a bit on the sweet side, so I would probably not cut them into squares any larger than 1”. I only made half the recipe and it still made quite a large batch.

(Image Source)

Mushroom Ragout 

from David Tani via TheKitchn

So far I’ve made this mushroom sauce twice. It’s fantastic and very deep in umami taste. It makes a really good substitute for a meat-based dish. I’ve made the recipe as written and once with water in place of the mushroom broth (which, to be honest, I didn’t notice was missing). It’s very very good.

(Image Source)

Norwegian Apple Cake 

from Rosa’s Yummy Yums

I was first drawn to this recipe because of Norway in the title and I’ve been all over anything Norwegian since I came back from visiting the country. Then I was intrigued by the high apple-to-flour ratio and the lack of any fat (outside from the 1 egg in the recipe).

I made it this week and it is already half gone. I like that it is light, soft, and moist from all the apples packed in there. It isn’t too sweet or too decadent but is full of flavour from the spices.

It’s the perfect not-so-guilty dessert (I calculated 1/8th of the cake at only 110cals) that could easily double as a breakfast.

(Image Source)

Garbage Can Pizza Oven

Last July Matt called me at the office, to ask me a very important question after spending much of the morning with Zack digging up our crab grass infested lawn:

“Umm… I got a whole bunch of dirt here, you want to make a garbage can pizza oven?”

DO I EVER!

Let’s back up though. How did I know what the hell Matt was talking about?

Well, a few years ago my friend Daniel went to South Africa for an internship with an architectural firm. He returned to Canada with a bunch of terrifying stories of how dangerous and corrupt Cape Town is. . . and some good stories too about cool things that he did (though those ones seem to escape me). Anyway, he also came back with a cookbook for me:

Cooked in Africa by Justin Bonello (which I talked about here)

I’ve only tried a handful of recipes from it, but one that I had been wanting to do since I got the cookbook was the Dustbin Pizza, not just to piss off the neighbours by building a hideous hobo oven in my backyard but also because wood oven pizza is probably the best food in the world.

So I swung by Canadian Tire and picked up a metal trash can and Matt, Zack, and I got to building the oven when I got home.

How to Build a Garbage Can Pizza Oven:

1) Lay some soil down as a base for the metal garbage can.

Clay soil apparently has the best insulating properties, but we just used whatever we dug up out of our lawn.

2) Lay the garbage can (on its side) on top of the base soil and pack more soil around and on top of the garbage can. Again, the soil will help insulate the fire.

3) Acquire a square pizza stone for baking the pizza on.

Ours is actually rectangular measuring 14”x16”. We originally tried using a stone that was longer than 16”, but it was impeding oxygen flow to the fire so the fire wouldn’t stay lit. It might take some trial and error to figure out what size is best for the trash can.

So we made the oven last summer, but didn’t actually get a chance to cook anything on it until last night! I finally bought a new, appropriately sized pizza stone this weekend so we were able to make our first home made wood-fired pizzas.

How to Make Pizza in the Garbage Can Pizza Oven:

1) Start a fire at the back of the oven.

We set up 2 logs and some small kindling branches and got the fire started with a bit of newspaper. It didn’t take long to catch with the newspaper and the kindling.

The flames were pretty intense: I realized this later when I rubbed my forehead and found that I had actually singed off some of my hair, eyebrows, and eyelashes! That’s intense. Maybe just 1 log next time?

2) Place the stone in front of the fire and allow it to heat up.

We definitely didn’t let our stone heat up for long enough so the bottoms of the pizza didn’t get as crispy as I would have liked. It could probably use a good 10 minutes or so before putting the pizza on it.

3) Slide the pizza onto the stone using a pizza peel thoroughly dusted with semolina or cornmeal.

If you don’t have a pizza peel, you can use the back of a baking sheet instead. It works relatively well as a substitute. We put in two pizzas at a time because they were only about 6”. If you make a larger pizza you’ll probably cook one at a time.

4) Keep oven mitts and a set of tongs handy to rotate the pizzas as necessary.

Obviously, this oven is hot, so oven mitts are a must.
Keep an eye on the pizzas and make sure you don’t burn them like we did with this first batch. Woopsie!

Batch 2: Much better

5) Enjoy your hard earned pizza!

I’m thoroughly excited about the success of this wood oven. Not gonna lie, it’s way cooler than a barbecue. I’m planning on baking some bread in here too this summer.

Next project:

 
Justin Bonello’s Tarzan Roast – a leg of lamb cooked over a fire built in a wheelbarrow. Genius!

Sled Push Substitutes

Friday was a cardio day for me but I wasn’t in the mood for a run or a spinning class or a forgettable elliptical experience, so I tried busting out some crazy conditioning moves instead.

In addition to jumps and hops and swings and some other heart-pumping moves that have escaped my memory I did these two amazing exercises: Plate Pushes and Treadmill Sled Push which are both good sled push substitutes if you don’t have a sled or prowler.

They were both exhausting and they brutalized my quadriceps. So, naturally I can’t wait to do them again.

(source)

Treadmill Sled Push

I did this exercise in Tabata intervals– 20 sec work + 10 sec recovery –for 16 intervals and resting for a full minute after 8 intervals (so a total of 9 minutes: 4 minutes Tabata, 1 minute rest, 4 minutes Tabata)

I was exhausted and thought my quads were going to fall off. If you drive more with your heels you can work you hamstrings, but I found this to be really awkward.

How to do it:

- With the treadmill OFF, hold the dashboard or front handles and keep your spine neutral

- Use your legs to drive the belt of the treadmill and work up the speed as fast as you can manage.

- Push for 20 seconds then rest 10 seconds. Repeat 7-15 times.

(source)

Plate Pushes

I got a lot of “‘the fuck she doing?” looks for being on all fours and pushing a weight across the gym floor.

I used a 45lber and pushed about 20metres. On every set I was forcing myself not to fall to my knees in exhaustion for the last few metres.

How to do ‘em:

- Lay a towel or frictionless mat on the ground and place a weight plate flat on top. Use anything from 25lb to 45lbs. (I tried stacking a couple of plates, but I found that they moved around too much when I pushed so I just used one.)

- Position yourself behind the plate in a low sprinter’s start position

- Place your hands on the plate and push, driving the motion with your legs and trying to keep your butt from sticking up in the air. You want to keep it as parallel to the ground as you can.

- Push as fast as you can for about 20-30 metres then rest 15-30 seconds and repeat 4 or 5 times.

WWF CN Tower Climb

Saturday April 21 marks the date of the 22nd Annual CN Tower Climb for the World Wildlife Fund of Canada.

In 2008 I was unwed and was working and living in Toronto. Coming from a very small city myself, here were a lot of things that I disliked about living in the big city. But I did appreciate a lot of things about it too—the holiday window display at Holt Renfrew, the eggplant sandwiches at the St. Lawrence market, Hallowe’en in the gay village (and the neighbourhood in general, for that matter), getting free swag daily at the corner of Yonge & Dundas Square, and seeing Dallas Green on my walk home from work to name a few.

One thing I especially loved about living in Toronto was having access to so many different events all year round. There was always something going on. Things that I wouldn’t necessarily travel all the way to Toronto to do, but that I took full advantage of while I lived there.

The CN Tower Climb was one of them.

1,776 steps (144 flights of stairs) to the observation deck of a Canadian landmark and the world’s second tallest building.

I took part in the challenge in 2008 after about 30 minutes of undemanding and lax training on the gym’s stairclimber. So with my only experience based on a set of stairs that rotated on a belt under my feet and daily practice in my fourth floor walk-up apartment, I hadn’t the slightest idea of how long it would take for me to climb 144 flights of stairs.

Getting Started

I gave myself a general goal of 30 minutes and hoped for the best.

When I got to the event I learned that you’re not allowed to carry anything while you climb. Nothing. At all. No cell phone, cameras, iPods. Not even water!

I was determined to bring my camera up with me though because I did the climb by myself and I wanted a picture at the top to prove I did so I hid it in one of the millions of pockets in my cargo pants and figured I’d be okay if it were hidden.

Once I finally finished the trek from the event check-in to the start of the climb I discovered that we had to go through a security checkpoint and guards with metal detector wands. This was not going to bode well for me. I contemplated turning around and heading all the way back to check my camera, but I decided I would take the risk.

When it was my turn to be wanded, a combination of sleight-of-hand, misdirection, and my irresistible charm miraculously keep the guard from noticing the camera in my pocket. Phew! I was in the clear.

I made it to the stairwell and got started.

The Climb

The stairwell leading to the observation deck was dark, narrow, and windowless with a dampness from the sweat of the climbers that made me feel like I was climbing the General Brock Monument, except this stairwell never seemed to end.

The number on each flight of stairs was stencilled on the wall so you could keep track as you went up. For the life of me I couldn’t remember how many flights there were, so I tried not to pay too much attention to how many I completed because I had no idea how many were left to go.

I had a solid pace going. One step behind me the entire way was a very fit woman whose own pace was the keeping me motoring. I wanted to be fast enough so she wouldn’t have to bother going around me and that she wouldn’t step on my heels. And I didn’t want to let her down since she spent much of the climb cheering on the people that we passed on the way up (and frankly we passed a lot of people).

When it got to flight 135 I was starting to tire. I called out to everyone around and no one in particular

“135! How many more flights?!”

“30!” Some woman responded.

30?!? I couldn’t keep this pace for 30 more flights, I knew that much so I let my partner pass even though she encouraged me to “keep my pace, almost there!”

In 9 more flights I was at the top. Only 9. Bitch! I cursed the girl that told me I had 30 to go. I could have kept my pace for 9 flights of stairs.

But I made it in 18:32. Not too shabby I daresay and well under my ambiguous 30 minute goal.

And I got a picture of myself at the top of the tower in all my sweaty glory!

Would I do it again?

I can’t decide.

I found the stairwell itself to be uncomfortably hot and dark, and very confined.

When finally you get to the observation deck there are a million people there which makes it tough to appreciate.

It was nice to do once, but I don’t know that I would care to take part in the event again. Maybe for the sole purpose of improving my finishing time.

Notes:

1) I apologize if it is arrogant of me to post an event recap 4 years after the fact. I guess I should take it as a cue to do something fun and exciting now in 2012.

2) I cannot believe how small my arms were in 2008. I still have that climb t-shirt and it is much tighter on the biceps these days. I can’t decide if that’s a good thing or a bad thing.

3) The fact that my ass is also bigger than version2008 is definitely a good thing.