Dear Diary,

Sry that I have not written for a while but I have tried to find my motivation. It is very common in Finland that October and November are very dark and these months impact on people’s mental health as well.  But not mine ;)

Anyway after worlds I got a two week break. Because I got a holiday from training I decided to concentrate on working.

And that part of my life is very boring ( I do not really know if the training part is more interesting :) )

But anyway! After my WC I visited in Rovaniemi and then, a week after good friends of mine came to see me to Helsinki. This two weeks and especially the weekend was the time  I really needed. I do not even remember the last time when I was eating out and hanging out with my Uni friends.

The same Saturday I was in Crossfit Vantaa where I was supposed to have clean training for x-fitters. Note to myself: There is a huge number of female lifters in the crossfit centers.. I am not surprised anymore why all the  owners are guys :)

One of the best things about lifting and coaching is to coach women. I have gotten used to being the only woman in our training group, so it’s nice to have “soulmates” . And thank you Jonna for the nice words in your blog:)  And Jonna’s thoughts about our lesson you can read here. More about female lifters below.

I have started to coach much more during this year. Now I am still at the point where coaching increases my own motivation.  The thing is that during coaching  I learn something new everytime. Solving others’ problems helps me with my owns. When I am trying to explain secrets behind lifts I very often understand it better myself as well. And I have a very good mentor, because Mika is helping me on my way to understand different types of lifters and to be a better coach. But anyway in addition to my own tours I will be a part of Finland Weightlifting Federation’s Instructor courses (click here to see more information)

Last weekend I visited again in crossfit center – this time in Porvoo (No worries, I do not have any WODs yet ;) ). I was telling there secrets behind squat and it was so nice to see that 75% of attenders were women! ! ! Squatting is now very trendy (because of crossfit I think) so does it mean I could be in the swim as well? :D

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I have concentrated on my technique (again) now and my main goal is to learn how to lift my maximum lifts. That means a lot of training now with Mika. Again I have an extra reason why I am waiting for my summer holiday so much. When my holiday will start I have time to train two times every day. :)

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I work now in Kalajoki a lot and at the site I told our workers my secret passion for meat dishes and suddenly last Thursday one of the guys came to me with 1 kilo of moose roast. (Maybe the best present ever! ) That is why I will end my blog now with a recipe for handling moose :)

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 I took the meat from the freezer in the morning and seasoned it with some pepper and sea salt. But because it would be great to have some extra flavor I did a marinade for that (normally it would be better to marinate meat overnight but I was lazy).

 

Then I covered the moose with this sauce and every time when I remembered I repeated this :) I left my moose to wait for me (I did not put it to the freezer anymore) and went to train.

After two hours I started to work with the moose. First I seared it a bit in a kettle and then I put it into the oven. First the oven was 5 minutes in 280 degrees and then I dropped it to the 120 degrees. I used thermometer because it is easier and secondly I wanted to clean in peace  meanwhile the moose was in the oven. The moose spent there a total of 1,5 hour and it was around 62 degrees then.

After I took them away from the oven I covered both pieces with folio and towels. It is good for the meat to stay an hour before slicing.

I had planned to do mushroom sauce and mushed potato but Jemina and Joni were coming as well and I knew Joni doesn’t like mushrooms. I needed to make something else…

I bought couple of “bataatti in Finnish” sweet potatos, normal potatos and carrots and chopped them up.

I used the same sauce that I used with the moose. In addition I put some garlic, olive oil and extra spices there and covered my vegetables with it.

It took around one hour and vegetables needed around 200 degrees to be ready. During that time I managed to finish my cleaning process and get the red wine sauce ready.

So for this special red wine sauce ( it is not the traditional one because I am using cream for that :) ) I needed the liquids from the moose. I used the one that I got when I roasted it before putting the moose to the oven and also the liquids that came out during the oven time. I put a lot of salt and pepper to the pan as well and then I just added 1,5 dl of red wine.

After that the sauce needs to cook until all the liquids are gone

Then just add the cream and little bit balsamico and the sauce is ready. SIMPLE!

It was easy to make but took some time.

In the end I will add a video. But as long as I am a better cook than I am a lifter I will continue to update only my recipes :D

BR

Anni