Jersey to Ptown to Jersey

It's been a busy few weeks!

Three weekends ago, some Front Runner friends and I went to New Jersey for the New Jersey Marathon and Long Branch Half Marathon. I just did the half. It was supposed to be an easy run for me. It's my third year doing this race (read last year's race report here), but I've never really raced it since it's always right after a marathon. This year, of course, it was two weeks after Boston, and I wasn't fully recovered yet.  So it was just going to be fun.

So I made myself not think about time. In fact, Daniel and Jonathan almost convinced me to run without my watch, but I wasn't quite able to do that.  Still, my primary goal when I was in the starting corral was just to finish and have fun. And when the starting horn sounded, that's exactly what I did, starting out at an easy pace. About two minutes into the race, I realized that I should have peed one last time beforehand, because I kind of had to go. As luck would have it, there was a porta-potty about 3/4 of a mile into it. I decided, in keeping with my goal of just doing a fun run, I would use the porta-potty and then I really wouldn't care about my time.

When I came out, I saw the 1:30 pace group was couple hundred yards ahead of me. And then, just like that, what started out as a fun run quickly turned into a run with the 1:30 pace group. It just pulled me in. I didn't want to do it, but I felt compelled to join them. Well, the rest is history.  I ran with them for the next 10 miles or so, until I realized that they were at least a minute, maybe 90 seconds, behind pace. And then miles 11-13 I started to speed up.

I dropped the pace group. Once I left them, it actually started to feel like a race. The field was very thin (out of 6,000 runners, there were less than 100 in front of me). I started to pick people off, one by one and try to pass them. I also knew that I had to run some really fast final miles if I wanted to make up for the deficit I was in. But my legs were tired by this point, and I couldn't push as hard as I wanted. My final time: 1:30:04.  Ughh! To miss by a mere 4 seconds! If only I didn't make that bathroom break. If only the pace group had been more on pace. Argh, so frustrating.  But after a few moments of being annoyed, in the end, I was very happy. My second fastest half marathon time ever, and I wasn't even trying that hard to race it. I was pleased, and excited about the chance to really race my next half marathon, in Brooklyn, three weeks later.

That race wouldn't have been possible without the yummy carby dinner we made the night before.  Farfalle with chicken, broccoi rabe, tomatoes and mushrooms. It was so easy and so yummy. The perfect meal before a big race.

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The following weekend, seven Front Runner friends and I went up to Massachusetts to run the 2nd annual Cape Relay, a 184-mile run from outside Boston to the tip of Cape Cod. It was a great experience, so much fun! I ended up running about 27 miles with some of my best friends, and I'll never forget what a great time we had. All this, despite the fact that the race itself was extremely unorganized and poorly managed, and I definitely will not be doing it again.

The weekend started out with a nice carby chicken parm and pasta dinner at the Post Road Diner in Norwalk, CT, where we met up with the other FRNY relay team.

And after a night at the Mansfield, Mass. Red Roof Inn, the FRNY Ultragays had breakfast at the charming Cafe on the Common, where we enjoyed what would be our last proper meal for the next 24 hours.

The relay started in Borderland State Park in Massachusetts, about 30 miles south of Boston, and headed almost the entire length of Cape Cod, to end in Truro, Mass, about eight miles shy of Provincetown. Our team was seeded to start the relay at 12 noon, in the very last wave. I was to run a total of 27.6 miles over six legs, and my legs ranged in length from 2.9 to 6.7 miles. My goal was to average around a 6:45-7:00 pace for the entire course.

At the start, we met some of the other teams who were seeded with us. There was another gay Ultra team, the "Fanny Packs," from Boston. And there were two college Ultra teams, the Dartmouth Endurance Racing Team, and "We Is Fast" from Northeastern University--they looked like they were going to be our toughest competition.

Jonathan was the first runner on our team. The first leg was run on trails that sounded pretty technical, which is Jonathan's expertise. When we met him at the transition area six miles later, he was several minutes ahead of every other team. After that point, we pretty much never saw any of the other teams who started with us again.

Jonathan was followed by Josh, Mike, Drew, Me and Kelsey. Peter and John were our drivers. My first leg was 4.68 miles, mostly flat. It was not too memorable. I ended up passing two or three people. But I was running a little faster than I planned on running, mostly because I didn't want to be the one on my team that let one of the other teams pass us. So every few hundred yards, I looked back to see if anyone was behind me. But sure 'nuff, there was no one.

My second leg was 6.35 miles, again mostly flat. It wasn't quite dark yet, but I wore my reflective vest. This time I passed at least a dozen or so runners. Each time I passed someone, I would say to them, "Good job, keep it up." But it would actually give me a little energy boost. I finished in 42:23, or 6:40 pace.

So with two sets of legs done (or one-third of the race), the FRNY Ultragays were well in first place. None of the teams we started with were anywhere near us. And that's when the race started to fall apart. We noticed on our third set of legs that we weren't passing any runners anymore. That seemed a little odd. Could it be that we were in first place? Apparently we were! We had somehow passed every single other team in the first third of the relay, and were already leading all of the other racers! That seemed really cool--for a moment, until we realized that the race organizers were just not prepared for us.

We started arriving at transition areas before they were set up. At one transition, the porta-potties were still all tied shut. The volunteers didn't know what to do with us. And then we learned, the awful, awful news. Transition 18 was not ready to open. It would not be opening until 11:45pm. But we were on pace to get there an hour earlier. So what would that mean...? Apparently our team would be held, for an hour, until the race organizers got their sh-t together. Meanwhile, all of the other teams would catch up to us, and there would be a mass start of all of the teams at 11:45. And would they deduct the HOUR we would have to wait? According to the race official, "This isn't a Boston Qualifier; we're not serious about times here."

Are you F-cking kidding me?! I was ripsh-t. Why the f-ck would you organize a RACE if you're not going to give a sh-t about people's times?!?! Don't tell people it's a race, and charge a thousand dollars a team if you're going to f-cking SCREW OVER the fastest teams. WTF are they thinking?!?!  I was so pissed off and felt completely deflated and used. Basically, the 11 miles that I had run at 6:35-6:40 pace were completely wasted. I could have run 10 minute miles and been in the exact same situation. What a f-cking joke.

So the experience of running my third leg was pretty much ruined. It would have been a wonderful run--2.73 miles across the Sagamore Bridge onto Cape Cod. Finally reaching the Cape after about 100 miles of running. It would be quite a dramatic moment. But I wasn't racing. There was no point to running fast, since we would just be stopped after reaching Transition 18. So Peter joined me, and we jogged the leg together--in 21:31, or 7:52 pace. By this time, the race had just about lost its excitement for me.

As if to make up for the fact that we'd have to wait at Transition 18 for an hour, the race officials kept promoting the "pasta dinner" there. We'd get delicious hot food, blah blah blah. And here's the difference between the organizers of the Cape Relay and the organizers of a quality race like Reach the Beach. Whereas RTB invited members of the community to sell food and raise money for community groups (the Girl Scouts, little league teams, schools...  remember my picture of Transition 13 here?) the Cape Relay charges you for sh-tty food so they can continue to profit off of runners' exhaustion and lack of choice. The whole thing just made me feel like some corporate race organizer was getting rich by cheating the runners out of a quality (or even just passable) race experience. I've never before participated in a race where I felt completely duped, until now.

11:45 came, and the race officials said they still weren't ready for us. Then midnight came, and they said 15 more minutes. Finally, at 12:15, the race officials said that the first 5 teams that had come in could start, and then they would let the other teams go, 5 at a time, in 5 minute intervals. Of course, another team that had just come into the transition at 12:14 also left with us at 12:15, so by this point it was pretty much a sh-tshow.  Whatever.

We were told they would maybe hold us at Transition 24 too. So frankly, I didn't know how fast to run. If I ran it fast, the effort could be wasted again, if we were all going to just have another mass start later. I asked Peter to run with me again, since it was dark and it was my longest run--6.72 miles at around 3:00 in the morning. This was the leg where I discovered another huge difference between the Cape Relay and Reach the Beach. When you are running at RTB, there are signs--reflective signs--that tell you, the runner, where to go, and that tell DRIVERS to be careful of runners on the road. At the Cape Relay, there was completely inadequate signage for runners, and the few that they did have were NON-REFLECTIVE, save for a little two-inch piece of tape that was stuck on them. Even worse, there was NOTHING to tell oncoming traffic that there was a race going on. Trust me, you don't want to be the runner leading a race at 3:00 in the morning  when oncoming traffic has no idea anyone is there. Just another example of how the race organizers had no regard for safety, let alone the runners' enjoyment of the race. Miraculously, Peter and I ended up not getting hit by a car and finishing the 6.72 mile leg in 46:09, or 6:52 pace.

By my 5th and 6th legs, we were so far ahead of the other teams that there was pretty much no reason to run fast anymore. We got to most of the transitions before even the volunteers checking in the runners arrived. At this point, I decided to just have fun with it. There was no point killing myself when we were going to win anyway and the time was going to be wrong anyway.

Thank goodness, though, that my last two legs were both under 4 miles. My very last leg had about a quarter mile start in the sand dunes, which was not fun. But I enjoyed the scenery, and tried to take in the sights.

While it was nice not having to run that fast for my last two legs, to be honest, I wish it was more of a race. I remember that my last leg at Reach the Beach last year was one of my faster legs, because I was neck-and-neck with another runner. It would have been fun to push myself a little more and see how fast I could go.

But in the end, I did have fun. Some of the best fun I've ever had while running. Despite a poorly organized race, the eight of us had an amazing time together. I got to spend the weekend with some of my best friends in the world, and we were all doing what we loved to do. That's the real reason why I run these relays, not for the competition or the medal or even the bragging rights, but to have fun with a wonderful group of people. And the Cape Relay organizers, no matter how bad a job they did, could not take that away from me.

After the race, the eight of us celebrated our victory and recovered our bodies with a night in Provincetown. For dinner, we went to the Lobster Pot. Of course, I couldn't resist the lobster clambake. After all, we ran nearly 200 miles!

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Finally, this past weekend, I kicked off Triathlon Season with a sprint triathlon and an Olympic tri relay.

On Saturday, Timmy and I went to Toms River, NJ for the Jersey Shore Kickoff Tri. You may recall that we both did it last year. Since this was just a little Sprint Tri, I didn't really give it much thought before the race. However, Friday evening, as we were driving down to Jersey, I realized for the first time that I had never actually ridden my brand new tri bike outdoors before. The bike that I got in December, I've only used in Computrainer sessions. So I had no idea how to use the aerobars. And I had no idea whether the bike would fall apart if it hit a bump. Uh oh...  I called Rachel, hoping she would reassure me by telling me that aerobars were easy to use and I had nothing to worry about. But she made me feel like I was nuts to even consider riding the bike for the first time in a race. I didn't really have any choice, though; we were on our way to Jersey and I had no other bike to use...

So at 6:50am Saturday morning, we started the race. The swim wasn't particularly eventful. It was just 400 meters, and seemed to be over almost as soon as it started. One thing I remember was that it was a bit of a zoo at the start. I guess because the swim was so short, people were fighting more than normal to get a good start. So pretty much the first half of the swim felt like people were kicking and clawing all over me.

The bike is where I got nervous. And once again, I forget to set my bike computer so during the whole race, I was fidgeting with it. The aerobars, however, didn't pose a problem for me. I pretty quickly got the hang of them, and I actually felt quite comfortable in the aero position. And switching from the aerobars to the outer handlebars to brake and turn, while a little scary at first, turned out not to be that big of a deal. 

There was, however, one problem. When I got my bike in the mail in December, it came in a few pieces, and I had to screw everything together and tighten the bolts. Well, apparently I didn't tighten the bolt to the handlebar setup enough, because every time I went over a bump, the whole front assembly would shift downward, and I had to pull it back up. Not by a huge amount, but just enough to make it annoying. I'm glad it wasn't any worse, because otherwise the aerobars could have come completely unattached. Oyyy, that would have been bad. Note to self: tighten all screws on my bike.

Finally, the run came. Since the bike was so short, my legs felt strong. I must have passed 20-30 people on my run, and it was a great feeling. The only issue was that for some reason I thought the run was a 5k (that's what it was last year, and that's what it usually is for a sprint tri), but it was 3.55 miles. So I was not really prepared for that last little bit. (I am, however, a little skeptical that it was really a full 3.55 miles; it didn't feel like I was running a 6:25 pace. Maybe more like 6:45 or so...).

In the end, I finished in 1:12:46, or 11th out of 18 in my age group. OK, I guess, for my first tri of the season. But I'd like to finally get to be in the top half of my age group at some point. I guess that means I have to work on my biking. And swimming. Ugh...

Place.......48/131  [11/18 AG]

Name........David Lin

Bib.........78

Sex.........M

Age.........35

Swim Rank...58  [13/18 AG]

Swim Time...12:49.1

Swim Rate...1.87

T1 Time.....2:21.4

Bike Rank...72  [14/18 AG]

Bike Time...33:57.0

Bike Rate...17.7

T2 Time.....0:53.7

Run Rank....16  [5/18 AG]

Run Time....22:45.2

Run Rate....6:25

Total Time..1:12:46.4

Dinner Saturday night was dumplings with homemade dough for the wrappers, sauteed broccoli rabe, and scallion pancakes made with the leftover dumpling dough. It took a bit of effort to make the dough from scratch, but it was worth it. And we got plenty of carbs for the next day...

Sunday morning, we did it all over again. This time, Daniel, Paul and I did the tri as a relay, and Timmy was our cheerleader.  I did the 1.5k swim, Daniel biked 40k, and Paul ran 10k.

I think my swim went really well. I was pretty much in a zone the whole time and able to just focus on my stroke. My one problem was that I forgot to look at the course beforehand and count the buoys and figure out the difference between the yellow and orange buoys that I saw. So, when I was in the water, I had no idea how far I had gone until I was almost at the finish. I'm sure I'll remember the next time I do an open water swim to look at the course beforehand....

The official time for my swim was 27:32. I didn't wear a watch, but based on the race pictures, I suspect that time was 5 minutes off. I think they gave me the wrong color swim cap so I started 5 minutes earlier. So, with a time of 32:32, I would have placed 134th out of 238 swimmers, somewhere in the middle. Daniel finished the bike in 1:19:46, and Paul ran in 45:12, so we came in 2nd place in the relay division (even with 5 minutes added on). Pretty good for team FRNY!

I enjoyed the race, but I do have one big complaint. The race directors made a point of telling us in email communications that there were going to be "ample porta-potties." Well, there were FOUR of them. Four porta-potties for about 300 athletes. I ended up waiting in line for about 40 minutes, and that's why I didn't have a chance to look at the swim course beforehand. Hopefully next year they'll plan it better, because it was a good race otherwise.

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My whirlwind month of racing craziness is not yet over.  I was planning on running the Brooklyn Half this coming weekend, and finally getting a sub-1:30 time for an NYRR half marathon. But Monday, I got word that a runner on one of the Spring Reach the Beach teams is injured and can't run. So I was asked to fill in. I feel so honored to have been asked, especially since the rest of the team is, like, much much MUCH faster than me. I'm pretty nervous, since I really don't want to let them down. But I'm also excited. I've been running really well recently, and this is my chance to help out my friends who need a last minute replacement. Also, I didn't really get to run as hard as I wanted to at the Cape Relay, so here's my chance to push myself a little harder in a relay race that's a bit more amenable to faster runners. The team is me, Kelsey, John, Josh, Gabe, and John's friend Tyler. Rich will be our driver. This is gonna be fun!!!

Foam rolling, running pants and dumplings

After Thanksgiving, I was eager to begin running again.  The Front Runners indoor track season started the week before Thanksgiving, and I was just starting to get into it.  Front Runners meets on Tuesdays and Thursday evenings at the Armory Track, a 200 meter indoor track in Washington Heights

Tuesday's workout was 6 x 800 meters, with 400 meters of jogging after each set.  Koach Kelsey divides the group into three or four smaller groups, roughly based on speed.  Although last year I generally ran in the "fast" group, I've been self-selecting the second group this year so as not to get sucked into the fast people's vortex and overstress my butt and ankle.  Plus, I think the fast group this year is quite a bit faster than the fast group last year (and I'm slower, haha). 

My first four 800s went pretty well.  I was wearing my brand-new racing flats that I had just bought earlier that day (the Brooks Racer ST 4).  It was my first time ever running in racing flats and my feet felt so light.  Peter and Stephan were in my group and we took the front of the group, taking turns at who among us would be in the lead.  First four sets: 3:14, 3:09, 3:09, 3:06.  On the third lap of the fifth set, I began to feel my left ankle acting up.  I let up a little bit on my last lap, finishing in 3:09.  As I started my recovery jog, I realized that I was limping.  After one loop, when the pain in my ankle didn't let up, I decided to call it a day.

I didn't really think much of it.  Having completed five of the six sets, I felt I had a pretty decent workout.  But as I sat and watched the rest of the group do their last set, I couldn't help but feel a bit left out.  It turned out, Peter and Stephan were probably holding back for the first five sets, and flew through their last set at around 2:50.  It looked so fun to be running that fast, and I really wished that I could have joined them.

I know it was a good idea, no matter how difficult, to sit out that last set.  The next night, I went to the Wednesday night fun run.  Two miles in, I got the pain in my ankle again.  I ended up just jogging/walking around the top of the reservoir--another disappointing four miles.  It's starting to get discouraging.

And because I was unwilling to admit defeat, I went to the Armory workout on Thursday too.  I actually did not feel any serious ankle or butt pain at all.  Then again, the workout was really short, and I was not running nearly as fast as I would have liked considering the distance--12 x 200.  My 39-41 second splits were fine, but I knew I could go quite a bit faster.  I started to wonder whether I needed to take some more time off.

I had scheduled an appointment on Friday morning to meet with a new sports medicine doctor.  I liked Dr. Metzl, but I just wanted someone else to take a look at me and tell me if anything was wrong.  I pretty much picked a new doctor at random, typing in "sports medicine new york 10011" into Google.  The first result was walking distance to my apartment, took my insurance, and could fit me in within a few days.  So I booked a date with Dr. Marina Babiy.

First off, Dr. Babiy spent at least 20-25 minutes analyzing me, compared with about five minutes for Dr. Metzl.  She she asked me 20 different questions about the pain I was experiencing, made me walk in front of her, tested my reflexes, had me press my leg against her hand in different directions in order to pinpoint the pain, and observed my back to see if the butt issue was linked to my spine (since the sciatic nerve going down the leg originates in the spine).  Dr. Metzl didn't do any of this.

At the end of the exam, she told me that although the pins and needles sensation that I felt could be indicative of sciatica, it was more likely that I had a muscle or tendon strain in my butt.  She scheduled me for an electromyogram (EMG) to rule out the sciatica.  Regarding the ankle, she said she did not see any major inflammation, so that it was probably a sprain as opposed to a stress fracture.  I didn't tell her that I had seen Dr. Metzl a few weeks earilier and he didn't see anything bone-related or serious.  Nonetheless, she ordered x-rays on my ankle.  She said that based on the EMG and x-rays, she will determine if more imaging is necessary.

In the meantime, she prescribed 800mg of ibuprofen twice a day, physical therapy, and lots of icing.  She also said no running for two weeks, at the end of which we will reassess the situation.  I am bummed, but two weeks is not that long, and it's somewhat comforting to know that additional testing will be done.

The convenient thing about Dr. Babiy's office is that not only is it close to my house, but she also has a number of physical therapists on staff.  So I was able to go to physical therapy right after my doctor's appointment (and I only paid one copayment!).  The PT that I saw, Steven, taught me some stretches for my butt and had me use a foam roller.  He was surprised to hear that I don't own a foam roller, nor have I ever really used one.  I have to say, after trying it in physical therapy, I wondered how I could possibly have gone for so long without it.  It felt so good...like it was simultaneously soothing and intensifying my pain at the same time...  I had to buy my own the very next day at Jackrabbit.

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A few weeks ago was John's MacConnell's birthday, so I had him and a small group of runners over for dumplings.  By the way, John's working of a new website, http://www.runningpantsinc.com/.  It's still a work in progress, but right now he's using it to show off his new running pants man / lightning bolt character.  Here he is:

The website also has an ever-changing running haiku of the day, and you can submit your own running haiku.  You can also request a running pants man temporary tattoo.  And my favorite part of the site is the area where readers post pictures of their body parts adorned with the running pants man tattoo.  Can you guess which body part is mine?

For John's birthday, I made chive-and-pork, and napa-cabbage-and-pork dumplings.  Both fillings also included shitake mushrooms, ginger, scallion, little dried shrimps, soy sauce, sesame oil and Franzia.  Here are the fillings:

I always have a good time stuffing dumplings with friends.  I think it's more fun to have a dinner party where everyone is helping out, rather than having one person stuck in the kitchen the whole time.  The dumplings below were made by me and John.  He made the fancy crimped ones in the midde, and mine were the pleated ones on the sides.  They tasted even better than they looked.  :-)

So this is what it feels like to run into a truck.

I am somewhat embarrassed to report that my run this morning turned out to be another dud.  On a positive note, it was not because of any injuries or soreness, but rather a pain of a different sort, stemming from last night's festivities.

It began with dinner at Kati, a new Thai restaurant on East 14th Street.  I generally avoid the new trendy Thai places that are popping up everywhere in Manhattan because they all seem to be more concerned about their martini menus than their food.  But Fatai, who lives next door to Kati, had eaten there before and suggested we go.  I relented, and was immediately comforted when I saw posted on the door a (presumably favorable) review of the place from a Japanese newspaper--I figured if the Asians liked it, it can't be that bad.

We learned as we were being served that the restaurant did not yet have a liquor license, which meant for us...BYOB!  I love a good BYOB restaurant (see here, third item down).  Fatai, upon hearing the news, ran home and brought back a six pack of delicious Pabst Blue Ribbon, which had been sitting in his fridge since the last time I went over for dinner.  Classy.

To go with our PBR, we ordered a green papaya salad, pak mor (steamed little chicken dumplings in a rice flour wrapper), chicken green curry, and a ginger beef.  One thing I could not understand about this place was that they did not have pork as an option in any of their entrees.  That just seemed a little odd.  Is pork going out of fashion?  In any event, the food that we ordered was decent for trendy Thai, although I wasn't a huge fan of the dumplings--a little too peanutty/salty for my taste.  The curry could have had a little more spice to it, too.  Definitely can't compare to my favorite Thai place in the city, Pam Real.

The PBRs soon gave way to some stronger stuff at a birthday party we went to in Queens, and then to Sugarland in Brooklyn.  Needless to say, this morning I was not exactly enthusiastic about a run.  I surprised myself by waking up and making it to the fun run in time.  However, I quickly realized that perhaps it would have been better to have slept in. Within the first mile, I knew it was going to be rough.  I negotiated with myself in my head, lowering my planned four mile run to three.  As I neared East 72nd Street at the end of the lower loop, I made a split second decision and ended up bagging the run, choosing to save my energy for tomorrow's 10-miler.  I was too lazy even to run across the 72nd Street transverse.  So all that for 1.4 miles.  Counting the run from the church to the park, I'm logging this as 2 miles, dammit.

Back at the church, I was able to get some runners together to go to the Dumpling Festival, so we went down to the Sara Roosevelt Park in the Lower East Side.  It was a zoo there.  There were like ten tents where they were serving everything from gnocchi to potstickers to Filipino palitaws.  Each tent had like 50 people in line waiting to get their dumplings.  And in the back, this crazy loud woman with a microphone was emceeing the dumpling eating contest.  While we were there, some guy ate 53 dumplings in two minutes.  Apparently he had soaked them in water first, and then shoved them by the handful into his face.  It was a bit disturbing.

Our dumpling of choice was pierogies.  They had potato, sauerkraut and mushroom, and meat.  They were OK, although I'm not a huge fan of pierogies in the first place, and these weren't served with any kind of sauce at all.  And at $5 for a plate of three (the proceeds benefited the Food Bank for New York City), we thought we could do better.

So we went to my favorite dumpling place in the city, Vanessa's Dumpling House.  It's my favorite because you get four dumplings for a dollar.  And it's tasty.  They come in either pork and chives or pork and cabbage, and they're perfectly pan fried--crispy on the bottom and moist on top.  We each got some, except Mike, who got something I had never noticed on the menu before, a sesame pancake filled with Peking duck and veggies.  I had a bite and it was super tasty (and only $2.25!).  I think I might have to get it next time. 

Continuing on our whirlwind walking tour of Lower East Side cheap food, we next hit a cupcake place that Derek has been raving about for several weeks now, Sugar Sweet Sunshine.  Personally, I don't really understand this cupcake craze which is taking over New York and the world.  It also seems pretty outrageous that some places are charging $4 or more for a cupcake.  (The cupcakes at Sugar Sweet Sunshine were a relatively affordable $1.50).  Thinking that the cupcake would not mix well with the remaining effects of last night's festivities, I passed on it, although I did have a small bite of Chris's "Sunshine" cupcake (yellow cake with vanilla buttercream).  I have to say, the buttercream was light and wonderfully sweet, and the cake was moist and delicious.  A tasty cupcake?  Yes.  But something that I would go out of my way for to get again?  Probably not.

For an only-in-New York story that touches on cupcakes, sex change, lawyers and real estate, click here.

Heinz Ketchup Shrimp and Other Authentic Chinese Dishes

My first food-related blog entry is about a dinner that I cooked last Friday.  It's only first because my friend Serenity who came over took some pictures with her iPhone, and I think it's good to include pictures with my blog entries.  (Note to self, from now on, take pictures of everything I eat).

On the menu for that night were my world famous ketchup shrimp, Chinese long beans with ground pork, and jalapeno beef with Chinese sacha sauce.  Dinner wasn't ready yet when Serenity and J. came over, and they wanted to help out, so I put them to work assembling some vegetarian dumplings (I had some filling and store-bought wrappers left over from dinner the night before; my friend Maggie is a vegetarian).  As you can see, they did a pretty good job with the dumplings:

I, however, was having a hard time in the kitchen.  I was stir-frying the jalapenos for my beef dish, and I wanted to get them really caramelized so they could be eaten and not be too spicy (I had taken out the seeds and membranes before stir-frying).  Apparently, I got them a little over-caramelized (ie, burnt) because spicy pepper smoke started permiating the air.  I have no ventilation in my kitchen, so the smoke just lingered there for a while.  I opened the door to try to air out my apartment a bit, but it didn't really do much good.  J. started having a coughing fit and had to stick his head out the window in order to breathe.

The smoke eventually settled, and I was able to work on my other two dishes.  It was my first time cooking with Chinese long beans, which I love but for some reason have never used.  They're similar to green beans except they're about 12-18 inches long and have a slightly dryer texture.  One reason I like them over regular green beans is that, because they're so long, you use fewer of them, which means you save time because you don't have to cut the stems off a million little green beans.  They're also tastier, I think, especially since the dryer texture means they can absorb more of the delicious sauce that they're cooked in.

The last dish I made was one of my favorite dishes.  It's a sweet and tangy shrimp dish.  I put lots of garlic, ginger and scallions in it, along with soy sauce and sesame oil.  But the secret ingredient that makes the dish is Heinz ketchup.  It adds a sweet Chinese flavor that you can't get from anything else.  My grandmother made this dish.  (She also taught me to use ketchup in my fried rice, which I think is pure genius).  BTW, Laurent Tourondel uses Heinz ketchup in his cooking too.  Oh, I usually add some Concord Grape Manischewitz to it, for some extra sweetness (something tells me that ketchup shrimp isn't exactly Kosher for passover).  But I was out so I made do with Franzia instead.

All in all, a pretty tasty meal.