Coach Kirstin

My Dad makes the best salsa.  I grew up in New Mexico.  We are a bit picky about our salsa.  It is hands down my favorite.  And not just because he is my Dad.  Its actually brilliant in in its simplicity.  The ingredients are: Green Chiles Onions Canned diced tomatoes (petite if you ask his opinion) Cumin Salt Olive oil (for cooking the onions The important thing is to start with good roasted chile's.  The roasting is what gives them their flavor and allows the skin to blister and peel off.  I was lazy when I put up my chile the last time and just bagged everything with the skin on.  It actually tends to be a little easier to get the skin off once its been frozen.  For this batch I used 2 quart bags frozen chile's, 6 - 14.5 oz cans of diced tomatoes, 2 onions and seasonings to taste.   First step is to clean the chile's and chop them.  I could probably normally tolerate the chile's but now I have a little perso...

The struggle is real.  Between working and them finding time to eat some thing other than takeout pizza, do my physical therapy, spend time with the baby and the husband it is seriously hard to fit it all in. Oh and sleep.  The older I get, the more sleep becomes non negotiable. We are also trying to eat with McKenna so she sees us eat and follows suit. It also allows me to give her things off my plate, which she definitely is more interested by.  This has actually been a huge struggle as our window in the evening is so limited with her, I don't want to spend it cooking and not spending time with her.  So the goal is to keep our meals simple and do as much ahead of time as possible. The downside to this is the Husband and I usually spend time chatting and relaxing during our meals as it’s always been our alone time together. But sleep. So I came up with a plan for the week and cooked the majority of our food on Sunday.  I really only made salsa because my freez...

There is just something about pot roast.  It so many things.  It smells amazing the second you walk through the door.  It tastes even better than it smells.  And its that stick to your ribs kind of filling food that you love.   And all the ingredients you cook it with end up tasting just as good as the roast you cook it with.  I'm not sure which part I like better. Except the part that has every recipe saying sear in a pan and then put it in your crock pot.  Thats why I use a crock pot, so I don't do any other work.  Or dirty any other dishes. So here is what I started with celery, chicken stock, sweet yellow onion, 2 lbs beef rump roast, 16 oz baby bella mushrooms, carrots, potatoes and garlic.  I forgot to put the red wine in the picture.  I used a bottle the at I had sitting around that had gone bad and we were waiting to use in cooking.  I try to use all organic veggies and meats and with the exception of the mushrooms I thi...

I love coleslaw.   I hate coleslaw drowning in mayo, I actually hate most things drowning in mayo.   The other weekend we went to chain restaurant. GASP! The most horrible of all food atrocities.   But we live in the suburbs, options are thin.   Any how.   The fiancé ordered a side of peanut coleslaw.   Its was fucking amazing.   I don’t know why I had never thought of that.   I love vinegar coleslaw, so I feel a creative food block that I never considered other sauces….wheels spinning.      I guess I have officially transitioned to becoming a crossfitter…I went to a 16.1 viewing party.   For those uninitiated, that means you watch the announcement of the first workout of the Crossfit Open with other people (who are in great anticipation) and then you watch super freak athletes perform it.   Yeah its weird.   But it was a food party.   I wasn’t sure what people would bring and it was going to be our dinner so...

I have been experimenting with a lot of foods lately but I have not been good about posting on them.  This week I was checking in with a client and said I would give her a recipe for the brisket I had just made that I thought she might like.  I am a huge brisket fan.  I think it also is nostalgic for me as it was what we had every year at the FFA banquet in high school.  Yes I was in Future Farmers of America, even an officer.  But the way they cooked it was very savory and smokey.  I have been trying to make my own but all the recipes I found were sweet using brown sugar and ketchup.  I finally paired together somethings I thought would be the right combo and it came out perfectly.  Of course I was experimenting and didn't measure.  I intended to recreate it this week but when I searched the freezer all I had was London broil, so its been ordered from the farmer for next week!  On to the recipe! I dry rubbed the brisket the night befo...

So dinner tonight came about because one night I had chicken and I really didn't have a very good plan.  I decided to scan my cabinets and see what I had.  Diced tomatoes and tomato paste it was.  Here is what I ended up using 3 cans diced tomatoes (I'm a nerd and had organic) 1 can tomato sauce (because I'm paranoid its going to burn while I'm gone) 1 small can tomato paste 4 cloves garlic ~ 1 tbsp basil ~1  tbsp oregano few dash's of salt, I prefer to add this after I tossed it all in the crock pot the night before and went to bed.  Not pretty but this was my masterpiece. Plugged it in and went to work.  Of course the can of tomato sauce was completely unnecessary but I'm paranoid.  Came home and all I had to do was cook a veggie.  I was really craving Kale with Bacon and with my boyfriend out of town, I can cook it with even more apple cider vinegar than usual.  Its my favorite side to cook because its easy and quick. ...

So I might the only person on the planet that doesn't like mango. And I was trying to broaden the types of fish we eat and I decided we needed to eat mahi mahi, we every damn recipe has mango in it...horay!  So I finally found something else and it was spicy.  I have tried it a few times and I had to tone it down a bit so I could handle it.  Chris loved it, I not so much.  Here is the colors of the spices that tells you how this is about to go down. The spices above are: 1 tsp sea salt 2 tsp garlic powder 2 tsp cumin 2 tsp paprika 2 tsp cayenne pepper The original recipe only used 3 pieces of mahi mahi but I have used up to 6 and had plenty of mixture.   You will need some olive oil to cook the fish in, I tried grape seed oil and it just got soaked up too fast by the fish.  Start off with the fish  dried off and the mixture all prepped. Then add some of the dry rub to each side Go ahead and do this for all of your fillets...

So I have a recent affair to confess to...my crockpot. It has made my life exponentially simpler. I come home and he has a hot meal prepared and waiting, what's not to love? Except every recipe I google is cook this and that and then put it in the crock pot....I'm using the crock pot so I can just dump it in an forget it, why would I want to cook anything before I put it in the crock pot. I get it, you can make some pretty amazing stuff. But lets think about my life...its planned out in 15 minute increments still and I'm not even fighting anymore, the prep work involved in that is not my style. Sooo I am working on a new section of my blog of no prep crock pot recipes. I am sure to have a few fails. So this was my first experiment. We were short on time and had a lot of chicken thighs in the freezer. So into the bottom of the crock pot went 6 chicken thighs On top of that I added: 2, 14 oz cans of diced tomatoes 6 oz can tomato paste 1/2 onion coarsely chopped ...

Maybe I'm lazy or just always short on time.  Either way I decided that it's easier to make a big batch of my breakfast for the week on Sunday's and the warm it up throughout the week.  It started when I started fighting.  I used to be really neurotic and I would measure out each portion in a pan cook it individually to ensure I got the same amount in each serving....time and life has gotten my neurosis to calm down a bit.  I now just cook in a bit batch.  I also have learned some ways to make save time and money.  I like to keep my veggies extra fresh, well dead of winter that is always possible so I use frozen, also saves me from having to chop all that up.  I just dump the bag in and voila!  I also use Trader Joe's Bacon Ends & Pieces.  Its about $2.99 here which is about $5 less than a package of bacon of the same size (1 lbs) since I just chop it anyhow, I don't need pretty strips of bacon for frying up with my eggs and laying on pla...

This weeks Green Grocer  delivery had a few things I wasn't sure what to do with.  Namely eggplant and butter lettuce.  Off to the interwebs I went and found a recipe for Eggplant Bolognese .  I added a few extras like the bell peppers and onions to my delivery so I didnt have to pick them up and then got the meats from the grocery store.  My boyfriend also had the great idea to add bacon, which gave us some bacon grease and extra goodness in the Bolognese.  Below is my ingredients and steps modified from the above recipe. Left over bacon fat 2 tablespoons butter 1 large eggplant peeled and cubed (approximately 2-3 cups) 1 red bell pepper cut into bite size pieces 1 small red onion, sliced (should have cut smaller) 1 pound ground beef 1 pound ground pork 1 pacakge bacon 1 teaspoon sea salt + more to taste 2 tablespoons  balsamic vinegar  5 garlic cloves minced 1 ½ cups tomato sauce  1 tablespoon dried oregano ...

So I will whole heartedly admit when I come off a training cycle, I go all off.  Like an alcoholic falling off the wagon going on a bender.  Eventually I get disgusted with myself and get my act together.  It took 3 weeks of this nonsense.  But today I "turned over a new rock" as my friend says it.  So today I spent cooking.  Which I think is also part of my slothful phase post training cycle.  I have spent 6-8 weeks cooking every meal, very few are cooked for me, so all I want to do is eat and not have to prepare it.  Or think about it.  Enough of my complaining.  So in last weeks veggie box I had green cabbage, stupid Irish holiday.  I didn't know what to do with it, so was googling away.  Came up with Kimchi...only to find out after I had searched 4 stores with no luck for my ingredients, I had the wrong cabbage.  So back to the drawing board and found Martha Stewarts recipe for roasted green cabbage .  It turned o...

So I like kale.   But I can only eat so many kale chips.  I received a bunch of kale in my veggie box this week and was at my limit for kale chips.  So I goggled recipes and found a couple but needed something quick.  There was a recipe for braised kale, that I decided to modify.  I took 6 pieces of bacon, chopped them up and cooked them in a big frying pan .  Then I took the bacon out, leaving the grease.  I tossed in the kale and added a few splashes of red wine vinegar.  Tossed it around a few times to get the kale to soften a bit and then added the bacon back in.  Rather simple.  And probably the tast iest kale I have ever had.    

I love salty foods.  But for some reason Im not that into potato chips.  As I picked out the veggies for our box, I initially removed the Kale.  I had it stripped down to mostly mushrooms, heirloom tomatoes, zucchini and green beans.  I usually leave the creativity up to Jenn.  But she is in Cali with Dave.  So I had to be brave and I added it to the box.  Its not that interesting but is pretty good for you . Google away and pretty much everyone says add a little olive oil, garlic and salt.  Then bake until crispy.  It was pretty simple.  I might have got a little carried away with tearing it into small pieces but there are worse things.  The most annoying part was spreading it out evenly on the baking sheet.  I had three batches so it should last us most of the week.  Despite being super tasty, Kale is very full of fiber and should be spread out over the course of the week.  Lesson learned.

So Im stubborn to the point of stupidity.  And then I usually even pass that.  I was deciding what to get in the veggie box this week and I decided why not go with tons of zucchini.  I fell back to the house favorite of using the zucchini as spaghetti .  But I have this problem when I cook, it tastes great but looks awful.  Especially with this stupid recipe.  So I changed the setting on my handy mandoline to the french fry size.  I also have this conundrum of how to mix it in my frying pan because its usually over flowing until it cooks down.  So this time as I sliced up the zucchini I put them in a pot and then added the sausage mixture over that.  I cooked the sausage with the right leeks, onions and coconut oil, remove the onions and leeks then added the tomatoes, garlic and salt to simmer while I sliced up zucchini. Once the zucchini was mixed and cooked down a bit, it went back in the frying pan.  Yes I create way too many dirty di...

I have had a cold pretty much since I came back from Vegas.  I thought I had turned the corner but this weekend it got worse.  I spent most of the weekend coughing and because of that not sleeping so much.  I always find it ironic that the thing you need most when you are sick is the hardest thing to do.  Being a little more than fed up with this, I went to the dr this morning.  Sinus infection.  And a chest x-ray just for fun because Im now a sinus infection regular.  So wanting something a little easy and warm today, I decided to make my first soup...how hard can it be right.  I love soups with veggies but every soup has corn in it.  And I have a mild allergy to corn.  Trying not to agitate my sore (sore really doesn't describe, its more like raw) throat anymore I wanted to make my own soup.  So into the crockpot went chicken broth, 2 cans of diced tomatoes and 3 chicken breasts.  I found potatoes, a red pepper and broccoli i...