Whey-hey!

My morning runs have morphed into evening runs. So instead of waking up in the dark to run 3 miles, I get home from work in the dark to run 5 miles. I actually rather enjoyed starting my day with a brief jaunt around the marina; by 8:30 am last Friday, I was ready to start my workday having already run 3 miles and found a new place to live (leaky ceiling, long story) but I cannot justify waking up even earlier to permit for the increased mileage.

My long weekend runs are still slated for a morning start but I almost always faff about for ages to the point that I am terribly annoyed when I get to Tower Bridge and it is chock-a-block with people and their selfie-sticks mid afternoon. One might think I am nuts for crossing at Tower Bridge but I really do love the loop down to the Greenwich Foot Tunnel and back home - with added loops around Southwark Park. My only other crossing option is Rotherhithe Tunnel, which is a carbon-monoxide deathtrap.

There has not been much on the gluten-free baking front, save for the fact that I started adding plain yoghurt to my bread mix as a substitute for about a third of the required water and the texture is remarkably better; the whey protein must truly help.

Canadian Gluten-Free Beer

Home to Montreal for a gluten-free Christmas.

Health food and dietary foods in particular are shocklingly expensive in North America, be it for lactose/dairy intolerance, veganism or coeliacs. I wouldn't mind paying a premium for the alternative flours, baked goods and gluten-free tourtiere if it strictly came down to the attributed manufacturing cost (ensuring there is no cross-contamination in the production and packaging process for example) but it does seem as though there is a mark-up to take advantage of North Americans lurking in the free from aisle for a fad diet.

Glutenberg's IPA, Red Ale, APA and
Double Belgian

That being said, the gluten-free beer on offer in Quebec was not outrageously priced in comparison to food, and certainly not in in relation to Estrella Damm's gluten-free beer, Daura, which is the only brew available to coeliacs at even the largest of Tesco stores I've visited in the UK. Bless Quebec and their love for beer and microbrewing culture. The local IGA grocery store I visited in my suburb of Montreal had two brands, canned Glutenberg and bottled La Messagère, offering 7 varieties of gluten-free beer at this particular store.

I only had two hands so I picked up a case of Glutenberg IPA and La Messagere Rousse (and had to forego the milk).

The IPA I had with dinner was not great. It was almost unbearably carbonated, sharp, and dry with very little flavour. To be fair, I have yet to try a gluten-free pale ale or even lager that I didn't struggle to finish and perhaps going for the strong ale for my first beer since a so-so citrus-infused gluten-free lager in Amsterdam was ambitious. I'm still keen to try Glutenberg's other flavours, some of which are award winning (which I didn't notice in my rush of euphoria at the grocery store).

La Messagère's Rousse red ale, was woody and flavoursome with hints of caramelization and spice, yet still robust, which worked well on its own and with a feast. I am quite pleased to be spoiled for choice by two respectable microbrasseries whenever I will visit home. Get brewing to keep up, Europe.

La Messagère's Rousse, Millet and Blonde

Reload

Millet, you are one thirsty grain! My new favourite weekend breakfast, and a brilliant substitute for anyone on the fence about oats. Toasted slightly to lend a wonderully smoked, nutty flavour, and then simmered in a 3:1 ratio of liquid to grains. I certainly don't have the patience to keep a mindful eye on the stove top for half an hour on a week day; it's amazing enough that I (aim to) make it out for three 5K runs at 6:00 a.m during the week. But I take the time over the weekend as it's effectively filling after a long run, being high in energy and iron. I'm probably not hydrating properly if the millet is drinking up more than I am.

Next step: brewing with millet!

Americana

A 12 mould mini doughnut tray has proved to be investment of the season! There is a bit of a production line feel to making mini doughnuts: dispense, bake, butter, roll in sugar, repeat. Take 1 was gluten-free cider doughnuts using reduced cloudy, pressed apple juice. The recipe used generated a staggering 4 dozen mini-doughnuts so they were unleashed onto colleagues and quite a hit. It'll be an asset for the fundraising.

#Glutenfree cider doughnuts

While my appetite for savoury, spicy, and aromatic foods trounces my sweet tooth, attempt two will be to make something without cinnamon to cater to the odd few who have an aversion to the spice. Vanilla buttermilk with a frosting of some sort, I'm thinking, which in turn means I'm thinking of icing sugar on every imagineable surface.

The half to the whole

With the Ealing Half Marathon under my belt, I feel confident about the 26.2 mile run in Brighton. The Ealing Half was such good fun, with tremendous local support and a jaunt through quaint, somewhat rural bits of London like Perivale Park that I never quite realised were there. I ran the half at an arguably safe pace in light of the fact that it was much hotter than anyone could have hoped for but it's fun to look at the GPS data and see that the sign near the 2-mile mark before Aston Road warning of zombies behind me and safety ahead well and truly gave me a boost.

Having run the half and been quoted as uttering "I could do that again", I concede that I am aware that running a full marathon is not just a matter of adding a multiplier. The inevitable, infamous "wall" when your body is depleted of stored energy, for one, is an obstacle to prepare for, both physically and mentally. I do think the fact that I regularly consume as much as a bear going into hibernation is a good start. I've had the vague objective of hitting an average pace of 9 minute miles since I started running. I currently sit at about 10 minutes on long runs. I have been advised that focusing on the distance itself rather than time should be my motivation as a first timer so the pacing is more of a long term goal. My username holds no relation to pacing, but rather an obscure sci-fi reference and nod to a comment my sister made one night playing Rock Band. The fact that I can now use it as a drive to live up to my own name, as a runner as well as a nerd, is all the better.

Brighton Marathon 2015

I will officially be running the Brighton Marathon for Coeliac UK in 2015! A cause quite obviously dear to me, I will be raising funds to help Coeliac UK conduct research into this auto-immune disease and raise awareness in the community, food manufacturing industry, grocery stores, and commercial kitchens across the UK. In the two years since my diagnosis, I have seen impressive and reassuring developments in the manufacturing industry, with better labelling amd availability in shops but I do think there is room for improvement in the way of awareness in commercial kitchens and restaurants, which is part of what Coealiac UK strive to do.

Running the Brighton Marathon by the sea will be a great challenge. It will be nice to have a fonder memory of Brighton than the time a seagull knicked my ice cream; a right ninja it was, but I'd let my guard down. Brighton also has a wealth of gluten-free restaurants I am eager to try, and having recently watched Nick Cave's biopic 20,000 Days on Earth, in which Brighton features prominently, I have a comforting, albeit unconventional, soundtrack for the broadening training regime. On the calmer front, more gluten-free baking is on the horizon for fundraising ventures. If you'd like to donate, please do click through; you have my thanks in the form of words, sentiment and gluten-free baking samples if you so choose - provided you're within commuting distance of London, or Montreal over Christmas!

Halloween 2014

Another Halloween, another late night, science fiction picture show and a warm-up pumpkin carving session before we rocked London in Rocky Horror fancy dress. A solid 3 hour carving session. Pumpkin acquired from the new fruit and veg stand outside Canada Water station with a few pieces of fruit thrown in for free to sample. I'll be back. But that's another franchise altogether.