A Spicy Twist On An Old Classic

This week's sandwich, in similar style to last week's sandwich, was lazy. To many who don't take the art of the sandwich seriously, my sandwich this week was far more than they would want to attempt, but for me I found my efforts this week laughable.

When I started this blog roughly 2 months ago, the initial purpose of it was to track my progress towards the eventual century ride. What actually ended up happening was I got super pumped about bragging about my sandwich creations. I found myself getting totally geeked over the thought of what next week's sandwich was going to be, and I was sort of losing a sense of what I set out for initially by starting this blog.

Sometime in the past couple of weeks, this viewpoint changed. As I'm creeping closer to the date of my century ride, my focus has been getting clearer. I'm not all of a sudden making terrible sandwiches, but I'm not as consumed by thinking about potential sandwich combinations as I was several weeks ago. I'd argue that this is a great thing, because it gives me hope that I'm actually focusing on the right thing.

The turkey club is a classic on almost any menu you'll ever see -- turkey, bacon, lettuce, tomato, mayo, toast. It may not be the most exciting sandwich ever, but I find it hard to believe that there's a human being out there that, when presented with a turkey club sandwich, will respond with 'don't poison me with this garbage' (or something along those lines). My sandwich this week was my own personal spin on this popular sandwich.

The personal flair in this sandwich is it's spiciness. I bought some Wegman's Cajun Turkey, which has quite the kick to it, and topped that with jalepeno pepperjack cheese and then some chipotle mayo. I topped that all with fresh tomato and lettuce (no bacon, tried to keep some idea of health to this sandwich), and added some pickles and stuffed all of this in between 2 slightly toasted slices of bread. Great sandwich, but not legendary... Which is probably what almost everybody would say of a turkey club sandwich. It's never going to be in the Hall of Fame, but turkey clubs will always be a solid starting right fielder. I give this sandwich an 8.0/10.0.

60 Mile Holiday Ride

This past weekend we went out on what will turn out to be our third to last endurance training ride. Amazingly enough, we are winding down to the actual century ride, which will be taking place less than a month from now. What is amazing about the whole thing is that while it seems like we've come so far, we still have so much further to go. After this weekend's ride though, I tend to lean more towards the former than the latter when considering our progress.

Ben and I had Friday off for Good Friday, so we ended up with a 3-day weekend. This is a nice thing to have when you're just working a 40-hour a week job, but when you're biking upwards of 50+ miles every weekend, having an extra day off in essence gives you your weekend back. It changed my life, if for only a couple of days. It should go without saying that an extra weekend day means another day of rest after a long ride, and 60 miles of biking is an awesome amount of physical effort -- The extra rest was a big deal this weekend.

Our aim in creating this week's route was to try out some new roads and keep things interesting. We recently purchased a bike rack so we can transport our bikes by car, meaning we no longer have to be limited by routes that start and end at our apartments in Silver Spring. We met at 6:30, drove north into Rockville and parked our cars at work. We headed north on the start of our 62.8 mile jaunt around Gaithersburg.

The trip can be split into three legs -- The first leg of the trip was plagued by stop lights, crummy roads, and was just generally a crappy route. We made awful time, probably taking about 2 1/2 hours to go less than 20 miles.

The second leg of the trip was arguably the best biking I've experienced around here. We were out on country roads spanning rolling green rural pastures. It was gorgeous. The temperature was on the cool side, but by no means was it cold. The hills were manageable, the traffic was close to non-existant... It was a great time. If the entire century ride in WV is like that, we could probably knock it out in like 5 or 5 1/2 hours... We were cruising, and enjoying every minute of it.

The final leg, which unfortunately ended up being the longest leg by far, was brutal. We stopped for a snack (Nutrition Granola Bars), and it began to rain. Like real rain, not a drizzle. For the last 25 miles or so of the trip we were soaked, freezing, and somehow constantly going uphill. To say it was miserable would be a vast understatement. The only consolation in having done that is to say that we (fingers crossed) will never have to deal with those sort of conditions again. It was awful, and unfortunately put a major damper on what had to that point been a great ride. Here's hoping the 70 mile ride we tackle this Saturday turns out to be a lot more like the 2nd leg than the 3rd (We're actually doing the 70 miler on the course of the century ride, so it'll be very telling on how prepared we are for the actual race).

Back to Basics/Lazy Man's Sandwich

Over the course of the past few weeks, and throughout the course of my sandwich making experimentation, I have challenged myself to make sandwich concoctions that I had never expected, never thought of, or had just never tried before. I used this exercise as more of a way of broadening my sandwich landscape, a way of thinking outside the lunch-time box. To say I have been successful up to this point would be a drastic under-shot.

So why, I found myself asking, am I reverting back to a solid go-to sandwich for this week? (That was both a hypothetical question, and also an internal question) I'm not sure there is an answer to the question, but the fact remained that the sandwich of the week this time around was awesomely uninspiring, uncreative, and unimpressive.

Not only did I create a sandwich that I knew for a fact I would like, but I actually directly ripped off a standard Wegman's sub, which I'm a common purchaser of. I took a baguette, threw in some roast beef, swiss cheese, roasted red peppers and spinach, and touched it off with a little chipotle mayo. I found myself disliking this sandwich mainly because of how easy it was to make. It's almost like how you always feel better when you work out. It's not that you actually enjoyed the act of working out, but you feel better about yourself. This sandwich was the equivalent of blowing off running a 5K and instead ordering a pizza. While it ended up as a pretty tasty lunch, I'm almost embarrassed at the fact that I made it this week.

Truth be told, however, this was a quite tasty sandwich. Although the roasted red peppers were canned, and I think had actually gone bad a bit ago, and the chipotle mayo wasn't as solid an addition to the sandwich as I had hoped it would be, this sandwich gets an 8.0/10 for me. With a few tweaks (toasting the baguette, maybe some oil instead of mayo, possibly replacing the roast beef with prosciutto, remaking the whole thing, essentially) this could be the best sandwich ever. With Easter coming up this weekend, my ambition may be just as weak this coming week, we'll see what happens -- I'm yet to be inspired for next week's sandwich.

50 Miler

On Sunday we hit the halfway mark in our training... This may seem like not that big deal to a lot of people, or it may seem like an enormous deal. The size of the deal of this is somewhere in the middle. On one hand, we will never again do a training ride that is less than half of the eventual total distance that we're training for... On the other hand, it means that this week's ride was only half of where we ultimately need to be. So I guess it's a mixed bag in that regard, but that is why we're training in the first place.

Sunday was by far and away the easiest ride for Ben, and by far and away the most difficult for me. It was unfortunate that the two occurrences happened to coincide with each other, because it only compounded my issues on the bike. I can't be 100% sure what exactly it was that made me struggle so much this week. My diet in the day and a half leading up Sunday was certainly poor (Five Guys, pancakes, and Ruby Tuesday's), and I was also still tired from a Friday-night CAKE concert, but it's possible that I was also just having a bad day. This is bound to happen when you're doing long endurance rides -- I'm glad it's over, and I'm looking forward to the coming long ride (which we'll be doing Friday morning to accomodate for Easter weekend... Holiday ride!).

My position as a biking failure on Sunday gave me a better perspective on how Ben is progressing on these endurance rides. He's gotten a lot stronger and a lot faster. This is good, because I'm assuming that I'm making similar strides. If his performance on Sunday is any indication of where we can be at when we're both firing on all cylinders, than it's great news.

One final thing... When we go out on these long bike rides, there are, naturally, many other bikers (they almost always pass us). These guys/gals always look so professional, and I feel like Ben and I look like a couple of scrubs, with our long sleeve/short sleeve combo. With that, I decided to snazz up my look a bit, with a more professional looking getup to be debuted the day of the race... Or before... Really, it just depends on when I get  my new biking threads in the mail.

Hawaiian Sandwich Week

Since beginning this sandwich experiment several weeks ago, many of the ingredients and concepts have changed. What I've tried to stay pretty consistant on, however, is looking at sandwiches in a different light. I've tried to challenge myself on what I can put into sandwiches, and I've tried in many cases to actually re-consider what I believe a sandwich to actually be. This may sound like a bunch of sandwich nerd talk, but it's really helped me become more creative when it comes to inventing new sandwich creations.

My questioning of what ingredients constitute a good sandwich ultimately lead me to this week's invention. While trying to brainstorm new ideas for sandwiches, I found myself always gravitating towards the same ingredients -- Lettuce, Tomato, Onions, Peppers... I recognized that there was an entire food group (fruits) that I instantly disregarded. Whether for a reason or not, it's what was happening, and so because of that, I chose to incorporate this forgotten part of the food pyramid into my sandwich for the week.

The highlight of this sandwich is the pineapple salsa. I cut up some pineapple, and added red, green, and jalepeno peppers along with red onion, lime juice, and some cilantro. The salsa turned out quite amazing, if I do say so myself, and it's been a hit around the office this week. The actual sandwich has been a very solid performer all week. I toast a white kaiser roll, and then put ham on one side. I then melt mozzarella cheese on top of the ham and them put a generous portion of the pineapple salsa on the other side. After that, it's just a matter of mashing both sides into a harmonious Hawaiian marriage.

After a week of this sandwich, I've decided that the sandwich itself leaves a bit to be desired. Although tasty, it's not miraculous, and there are probably things that I could do to it to make it better. I would give the sandwich a 7.5/10 on my scale. HOWEVER, the pineapple salsa is in fact a 10/10. This is almost certainly a dish I would serve at any dinner party I would be hosting in my imaginary world where I host dinner parties. This stuff is great, and I will totally consider making it again in the future.

The First Snag in Training

This week we planned on doing a 48 Mile ride down into Washington DC, and then out towards Potomac, MD. The route was mapped, sandwiches and granola bars were made, the bike was lubed up, and we were outside my apartment at 7:30 ready to go... And Ben's brakes weren't working. This was an inevitability. Not the brakes part, but the part about something holding us up unexpectedly. It was bound to happen, at some point in the training we were going to get hung up on something that we could not predict, and it happened yesterday.

My initial thought was 'great, I didn't really want to go biking almost 50 miles today anyway, cause that's a lot of work to do, and it'll make my legs hurt.' However, I pushed through that and decided, with the suggestion of my beautiful fiancee, to take this opportunity and do something a little different. Colleen suggested that I do a 'tempo run', where I go a shorter distance but push myself to focus on my speed, and that's exactly what I did. I took my normal route to work + about 5 more miles out, but instead of leisurely riding, I pushed myself harder than normal. I average generally between 10-12 MPH when riding to and from work, but I made it a goal of myself to ride 14+ as much as possible yesterday. The result was covering just over 31 miles in exactly 2 hours. That's an average of over 15 MPH, which is quite impressive, especially on the bike path.

My Big Fat Greek Pita

My entire life, I've lived under the blind assumption that whether it's whole grain or white, toasted or untoasted, a sandwich can only be a sandwich if the ingredients are placed between two slices of bread. This sandwich prejudice has existed my entire life, and I'm not entirely sure where it originated. I grew up in a very diverse sandwich environment, and I was most certainly taught to embrace all different sandwiches, regardless of cultural background. So I'm not sure where this thought came from initially, but suffice to say, it's existed. I've only recently discovered that in changing what my concept of a sandwich is that I'm capable of opening up an entirely new world of sandwiches in my life. This is my bread awakening.

In previous stabs at sandwich making in the last several weeks, I have certainly been incorporating the previously mentioned bread experimentation into my sandwiches. Bagels, and English Muffins, while sounding totally normal and run-of-the-mill to some, are scary and intimidating ideas to me, the sandwich bread virgin. This week I totally turn that fear upside down.

My sandwich this week is a self-conceived greek inspired pita. Chicken Souvlaki is something I have only recently (within the last 4 years or so) discovered, not only as something I love, but also as something that just plain exists -- I'll give the credit to my wonderful fiancee for introducing me to it.

My pita consists of some chicken marinated in Wegman's Greek Marinade (grilled ahead of time), fresh lettuce, tomato, onion, and some really great Feta Cheese. I mix everything together in a bowl before placing it into the pita. I also chose to garnish the sandwich with some pepperoncinis. They add a little kick to the entire meal, and go very well with the sandwich, I feel.

This sandwich has been overall a great success. It's delicious, filling, and actually quite healthy, with the majority of what I'm eating being veggies. The construction of this sandwich is difficult, as the pita tends to fall apart at the sheer amount of stuffing that I feel I have to put into it, and so it's a super sloppy sandwich. Luckily I'm not trying to win a sandwich aesthetics competition, and so I'm going to look past that fact. The sandwich ends up being probably the most difficult of the 3 thus far to make, and tends to be pretty time consuming for me and my 30 minute lunch, but in the end the effort is totally worth it. I'm giving this Greek-inspired sandwich an 8.0/10. I would certainly consider making this sandwich in the future, with almost no changes.

40 Miles... Down.

Today we set out on our 2nd week of training. According to our training log, we were supposed to bike a good 35 miles today. We instead ended up going closer to 40 miles, which I don't have a problem with. When given the option of going well over or well under the predetermined mileage, I will always take the over. That's what I did when developing this week's route.

Ben and I both felt great today. We made great time (About 3 1/2 hours of actual riding time to cover about 39 miles worth of road), and it's nice to feel like progress is actually being made. Last week was our first ride, and I didn't really have any sense of accomplishment. But considering we biked almost 40 miles this week compared to the 24 miles we biked last week, I really feel as though things are happening... That we are actually improving on where we've already been.

One thing that I've been noticing (digression alert) that I find mildly humorous... We tend to ride down a lot of roads that are home to extremely wealthy people. I mean like super rich; The Washington DC metro regional area is home to some of the most astronomically expensive real estate prices in the country, and we're driving by places with acres of land and giant equestrian pens. These bitches be rich. So anyway, I noticed on 3 separate occasions today (and I have noticed this in the past when I've been biking) homes that have both Hummers/Excursions/Giant Gas Guzzling SUVs and tiny hybrid cars (mainly a Prius) in the driveways. I don't want to make this blog into some obnoxious political thing, but let's just say I find that to be extremely funny, and surprisingly common among the elite upper class around this area.

One other thing, that's slightly less amusing, but may be slightly more interesting. Today we saw a fox. It was a regular red fox, nothing too special, except for the fact that this was found really close to Wisconsin Ave. in Bethesda, a super busy road populated by a lot of weekend foot and car traffic. This on it's own is a strange occurrence. When you take into account the fact that last year while training for a different century ride (didn't happen, broke my collarbone) I saw a spider monkey (this actually happened, maybe I'll write about it later in the blog... That's called a teaser!), these become two very strange sightings.

We're getting stronger. The century ride is still a ways away, but I feel as though every day that we ride, the reality of the century race becomes clearer... Things are definitely happening.