531PL Cycle 3, Bench 3

Went fairly well, albeit not as well as I'd've liked.

Bench - 45, 95
130x3
150x3
165x7
185x1, 1, 1
Need to work on pausing.
I've been getting an unpleasant sensation in my left shoulder when I'm trying to let the bar settle.

DB Bench:
45lbs - 5x10

DB Row:
45lbs - 4x10, 28

531PL Cycle 3, Squat 3

This went better than expected.

Squat - 45, 95, 135, 185
215lbs - 3
245lbs - 3
275lbs - 8
315lbs - 1, 1, 1
Stopped at 8 because doing more felt gratuitous. Guess the bar's set high for next cycle.
Form felt somewhat off; need to take videos and work on figuring out what's wrong. I'm fairly sure this has been happening a lot recently.

GHR, arms at sides and medium stance -
5x10
Not sure if I should work back to close stance on these or stick with a more squat-related stance. Need to get my feet straight either way, but I explicitly remember closer being harder than wider.
Stretched calves very aggressively between sets. Actually fixed the "pulling" sensation in the back of my knee, which was nice.

531PL Cycle 3, Press 3

Started working on getting another ortho appointment to get my shoulder checked out (+re-script for PT).

Press - 45, 65

90x3

105x3

117.5x7

105x5

Found my microplates in the car. Handy.

Blast Strap Pushup:

8, 7, 8, 6, 7

Working on proper upper body position with these - important consider the shoulder situation.

Barbell Row:

100lbs - 5x10

May take the weight up a bit faster on these. That's pretty tentative for now thanks to the shoulder, but the probability will go up a fair bit once the shoulder's better.

Oh, right, the shoulder - I had a mildly torn labrum a year ago. It responded well to physical therapy but I've reinjured it, probably with a combination of too much studying and pool in recent months and not enough prehab. I may start doing band face pulls on my off days (...and possibly on days) to help combat this, particularly once it's better.

Meat - Miscellaneous

I'm probably going to just get a journal of some sort (and a recipe binder, perhaps) to start doing this more formally and scientifically, but for now:

EDIT: New Note:
Chicken dishes should also be rested. Everything should rest for a few minutes, basically.

Entrees
Grilled English-cut short ribs are excellent. Lightly salt and pepper (I think the salt amount can increase in proportion with time until they go on the grill - I may try salting mine an hour or more in advance in future), then medium heat for about 2 minutes per side on all sides. This seems to get them to around medium/medium-rare. The meat itself is very flavorful and tender if you cut it across the grain (pain in the ass otherwise). I'm still getting the hang of the "across the grain" part, which is really rather sad considering how simple it probably is.

Short Ribs Specifically:

0) Dry in at least 1-2 layers of thick paper towels for a few minutes
1) Salt lightly 2-3 hours before cooking. Do all four sides. Rest fat-side down on paper towels.
2) Heat grill pan to medium-high for about 10 minutes (for my current stove this is about 7 oclock on the largest burner)
3) Grill, starting on fat side. 3 minutes for the fat side, 2 each for the remainder.
4) Tent in foil and rest for 10 minutes.
5) Cut across the grain and serve.


Grilled asparagus is nice.

Desserts
Strawberries and plain goat milk kefir tastes awesome (noticeably better than strawberries and cream, presumably because the kefir actually has some complexity of flavor) and is VERY easy to make photogenic. I don't currently have a nice bowl, a camera, a decent photography background, or immediate access to people who do, but I got something pretty photogenic by filling the bottom of a bowl with a fairly thin layer of kefir, then arranging halved strawberries in the bottom. Put a whole one in the middle for good measure, though I think I'll do it as two halves next time for symmetry.
(Fun note: You preserve strawberry mass if you cut them in half and THEN cut out the green. My lack of experience is showing)

---

Future ideas -
Berkeley Bowl stock beef ribs at $3/lb; not ideal but doable, particularly since they're grass-fed.
Really want to roast a chicken.
Really want to do a leg of lamb, though unfortunately the result of this is large enough that I'd need to throw some kind of dinner party to make it worthwhile.

Meat - Curries

This one's a work in progress because I really, really suck at making curry without the aid of pastes (e.g. Patak's). Thus far, major notes:

1) Onions should be finely diced and very, very thoroughly sweated.

2) Don't overcook the garlic. Pasted/finely diced garlic should be cooked for ~30 seconds (definitely no more than 2-3 minutes) to get the flavor out; longer will impart an unpleasant bitterness to the sauce.

Meat - Roast Chicken

I prefer to roast my chicken Thomas Keller-style and suspended on a bed of coarsely-sliced mirepoix (onions, celery, carrots). Today I omitted the carrots and put some butter off to the side of the chicken to give the vegetables some extra fat; the overall result was good. I assume the extra fat content was very important for this.

I also sauteed the vegetables after I removed the chicken to rest. This softened the celery more and gave the onions some extra caramelization, ultimately making an orgasmic side to the breasts. Legs are amazing as-is, though this time was dramatically better than most (see below).

Further notes:
1) Celery on the bottom, then onions. Haven't figured out where the carrots should go if I'm doing specific layering (probably next to the celery if they're included at all). The onions will cook nicely regardless of where they are, and the celery seems to benefit more from being on the bottom. Sauteeing everything afterward should caramelize the onions enough without much risk of burning (definite problem with them this time).

2) Use more salt than you think you need. This run was dramatically better than usual, and a huge part of that was that I dried the skin with paper towels for longer than usual (left it sitting with the towels on while I trained) and accidentally used a fair bit more salt. The skin crisped out much more than usual and was significantly more delicious.
I also put a few sprigs of thyme in the cavity. I think these helped a bit too, but not with the skin texture.

3) Cut the tendons at the ends of the drumsticks. I go all the way around to remove the skin as well, but the tendons are the really important part.

4) Truss...at least for now. I may try not trussing one soon to see what happens (Heston Blumenthal seems opposed to it, but his way of roasting chickens mirrors my way of doing sous vide steaks - if we're not concerned about the time commitment I guess his may have some advantages. I'll actually try this tomorrow).

5) Remove the wishbone. It makes presentable carving easier (in this case taking it from "Beyond Jon's meager abilities" to "Viable for three of the four quarters"*).

*I'm very good at removing the right breast, terrible at the left. Getting better, though - after sufficient resting you can almost pull the breast off straight up.

6) Consider doing the mirepoix while the chicken itself rests (and ideally suspend the chicken above the bottom of the pan). The vegetables (probably) give off a fairly large amount of steam and negatively impact the quality of the chicken itself (e.g. as far as I can tell, Keller himself keeps everything separate). Celery and onions can be sauteed in the fat leavings (plus any butter or duck fat) afterwards.

I cooked this one at 450 for 50 minutes; the legs were suspiciously juicy (and some of the flesh looked a tad rare), so I may bump this up a bit. The chicken itself was a 4lb regular chicken from Trader Joe's; I'd like to cook the Poulet Rouge and Cornish birds that Riverdog Farm sell at the Berkeley Farmer's Market, but...well, this one ran me something like $1.50/lb, and those are up at $5/lb and $4.50/lb respectively (I'm more interesting the Cornish Hens, personally, but either way).

I finished it one sitting, which is a pretty good sign considering how bad my appetite has been. As noted, the (truncated) mirepoix worked VERY well as a means of making the breasts more edible.

531PL Cycle 3, Dead 3

I've decided I'm going to consolidate the cooking and lifting segments onto this one and keep Hallowed for more intellectual stuff (...so in other words, update this one with everything important and that one twice a century). The food side may wind up falling a bit once I get a recipe binder (...or a tablet), though*.

*In case of tablet, I'll probably back everything up here, though.

Thanksgiving was fairly good; lots of rest and some decent food. Next year I'm cooking it.

Also I got stronger. Like, dramatically stronger.

Deadlift - 135, 185

225x3

260x3

295x7

330x1, 1, 1

Definitely took a bit longer between reps on these than I have in the past (extra breaths between setting my feet and setting the rest up), but the improved performance is pretty nice regardless.

Borrowed some chalk for the singles. Also stuck to a strict 2 minute rest for everything but the 295 set, which I gave more of the 3-4 range.

My weight's still falling forward a bit on these; I'm not sure if I actually had my upper back rounded forward properly for most of them. Working on it.

Deadlift Negative -

145lbs - 5x10

Still having grip issues.

Good Morning:

145lbs - 5x10

Nothing to report.

Had two donuts and a tub of strawberry icecream post-workout. I question the nutritional wisdom of this decision and intend to push more towards the rice/potatoes side of things in future.

531PL Cycle 2, Bench Deload

Bench - 45
70x5
90x5
110x5
Considering that I've trained four days straight (with no sleep between the first two) I'd say this actually went pretty damn well. Nice and fast.

DB Bench:
45s - 5x10

DB Row:
45s - 5x10ea
No Kroc set this week. Deloading.

531PL Cycle 2, Squat Deload

Squat - 45, 95
120x5
150x5
180x5
Ridiculously easy. Which makes sense, since it's a deload.

GHR (arms at sides):
5x10
Need to work on keeping my calves loose. Probably do another cycle of 5x10 and then graduate to the Vampire style.

Pistol:
5x5ea
Moving to 5x6ea or something for next cycle.

531PL Cycle 2, Press Deload

I actually haven't slept since the Dead deload.

Press:
50x5
60x5
75x5
The worrying part is that my shoulder didn't seem entirely on board with this idea.

Barbell Row:
95lbs - 5x10

Blast Strap Pushup:
9, 6, 5, 5, 5

531PL Cycle 2, Dead Deload

Deadlift -
135x5
155x5
195x5
Easy. Mild shoulder complaints; should probably get back into PT.

Slow DL Negative:
140lbs - 5x10
Very taxing on grip.

Dead Stance GM:
140lbs - 5x10
Working on keeping my knees close to locked out and following the various squat-style cues to recruit different parts of my hamstrings.

531PL Bench 1

Cut this one short; forgot the blast straps and helped some guys out with deadlift form. Don't feel particularly bad. About this. Rearranging training to reflect some new discoveries (mainly that benching the day after deads probably isn't a good idea).

Bench: 45, 95

135x5

150x3

170x3

180x1, 1

Much weaker off the chest.

Using the benches in the annex now; I've figured out the rack settings that let me perform properly.

Still need to figure out the actual dimensions of the bars at the RSF.

New Schedule (somewhat tentative pending conditioning schedule):

Sunday - Deadlift

Monday - Press

Wednesday - Squat

Thursday - Bench

I plan to add in some conditioning work after a few cycles, at which point the actual day order will probably reverse. For now I'm good, though.

Not sure if I'm keeping the heavy front squat holds; may remove them in favor of glute-hams, since I need to be fucking doing those.

531PL Cycle 2, Deadlift 1

Forcing myself to get back into it.

Working on putting together a meal plan; the rest of this month will be a bit odd because I'm already out of money. I don't know how this happened but I intend to find out and ensure it never does again, partly by developing a meal plan that puts me sufficiently in the green that I can start actually saving again.

Also got the rumble roller back, which was...surprising.

Deadlift - 135, 185
235x5
265x3
300x5
315x1, 1
Did my best to switch up the overhand grips between sets. 300 was fairly easy. I'm not entirely sure why my numbers went up after three weeks of no training and a bad (i.e. anemic) diet but I'm not complaining.

DL Negative:
140lbs - 4x10
The looks I get doing these are interesting.
Grip was giving out during the last few sets.

DL Stance Good Morning:
140lbs - 4x10
But not quite as good as the ones I get doing these.
I may start explaining the movement to people once I'm back to squatting 4 plates.

531PL Cycle 2, Press 1

I've been very bad about actually recording numbers here for the last few months; the first half because I wasn't "in the mood" to update and the second because the root cause of that got so bad that I stopped training. Back now, though, and hoping to maintain some accountability. I will be training alone late at night, as I used to - seems that if I can't train in a team, I will train in isolation (...or as close to it as I can manage).

No rolling or real warmup today - strapped for time and I left the rumble roller at the gym and haven't been able to reclaim it yet.

Press: 45x5, 70x5
95x5 (4c)
105x3 (2c)
120x5 (3c)
105x5 (2c)

DB Bench:
45lbs - 5x10
Some extra chins in here

DB Row:
45lbs - 4x10, 27

For now I'm going to handle the chins situation by doing extras on two of my off-days. I'll probably start doing conditioning on those days as well.