Kitchen Gadgets: Love and Lust

As I currently have fairly limited kitchen space, I can't just let any old gadget onto the kitchen worktop. The kitchen gadgets I love using at the moment have earned their place through their sheer versatility and functionality. What I look for in a gadget is something to save me time in the kitchen, make it a little bit easier for me to create healthy meals, and to encourage creativity and fun. In this post I've highlighted three gadgets that I currently love to use, and three gadgets that would undoubtedly feature in my dream kitchen.

Kitchen Gadgets: Love

NutriBullet

I finally got my hands on a NutriBullet last Christmas, after several months of lusting over photos of other people's colourful smoothies on instagram! The Nutribullet is essentially a high-powered blender. The best thing about this gadget is that you blend your smoothie in the cup you then drink it out of, meaning that the washing up takes literally seconds: so there's no excuse not to kick start your day with a healthy smoothie! A breakfast smoothie is a great way of making sure you've made a start on your 5 a day before you've even left the house. My NutriBlasts usually follow this recipe template: a couple of handfuls of greens (e.g. spinach), one or two pieces of fruit (one of which is usually a banana), a source of healthy fats (nut butter, avocado, milled flaxseeds) plus a superfood powder (I love Organic Burst for these).

The NutriBullet isn't just for smoothies though - I've recently made savoury recipes such as beetroot hummus and spinach pesto using it. This gadget is so versatile that I'm sure it will never be relegated to the back of the cupboard!

Spiralizer

The GEFU Spirelli Spiral Slicer

This is a really fun little gadget - it turns firm vegetables (courgettes, carrots, sweet potatoes) into noodle-like shapes! I like to spiralize courgettes to create courgetti (or zoodles as they're known in the US!) to create a lighter alternative to noodles. Spiralized carrots are a fantastic addition to salads, as they create a different texture to your standard grated carrot. You can do a similar thing with vegetables using a julienne peeler (or just a regular vegetable peeler) but a spiralizer gives a more professional finish and is easier to use. I eat a lot of vegetables, so it's nice to find a gadget that makes it so easy to get creative with vegetables and perhaps serve them in a way you've not had before.

I have a fairly basic spiralizer at the moment - the Gefu Spirelli - but would love to upgrade to an easier-to-use version at some point, as this one can be quite fiddly to use. I think the one Hemsley + Hemsley have released looks fantastic.


Slow Cooker

Tesco 3 Litre Slow Cooker

I'm a big fan of batch cooking. I love to eat good food, but I'm just too busy to cook from scratch every single day, so making a big batch of a one-pot dish on a Sunday is a great way to get me set up for the week ahead. What's so great about the slow cooker is you can throw all your ingredients in, carry on with your day, and come back 6 to 8 hours later and you have a fantastic meal ready, that anyone who didn't know better would think you'd spent hours slaving away over a hot stove to create.

Slow cookers are far more versatile than they look, and are capable of whipping up more than just casseroles. You can cook a whole chicken or joint of meat in it, use it to make stock, and even create cakes!

I have this Tesco slow cooker, which at £12 is undoubtedly the best value gadget I've ever bought. But if you want to splash some cash, you can also get fancier versions, that may have a larger capacity than 3 litres, and a timer so that you can set the slow cooker to turn itself off after a certain number of hours.

Kitchen Gadgets: Lust

Even though I already have quite a number of gadgets, I do still have a wish list for my dream kitchen. Below are some of the items I'm currently lusting after.

Le Creuset
Signature Round Casserole Dish

Le Creuset signature round casserole dish, cool mint

I know, I know, a casserole dish isn't strictly a gadget - but a Le Creuset casserole dish is an essential piece of kit for any kitchen that wants to be taken seriously. Le Creuset make beautiful, hand-crafted cast iron dishes. What I love about these is how versatile they are: you can start off the cooking of your dish on the hob, then put it in the oven to finish cooking, and then serve your dinner straight from the dish at the table. We had an orange Le Creuset dish in my kitchen when I was growing up so the brand is very nostalgic for me: which is part of the reason I'd love to get one for my kitchen now. I'm currently loving the elegance of the new Cool Mint Collection - isn't it just sublime?


Vitamix
Total Nutrition Centre

Vitamix Total Nutrition Centre

I watched a demo of the Vitamix at the BBC Good Food Eat Well Show recently, and quickly realised that these things are just amazing! The Total Nutrition Centre can make everything from frozen desserts to hot soups really quickly. It also works as your usual high-powered blender would, making it perfect for creating smoothies and dips, as well as things you may not usually consider making in a blender, such as nut butters and bread dough. Even though I already have a NutriBullet, it's the prospect of being able to come home after a day's hard graft and make a hot soup in minutes that makes the Vitamix really stand out for me.


Bialetti
Moka Express

Bialetti Moka Express (3 cup)

Bialetti make beautiful stove-top espresso makers that create fantastic coffee (provided of course, that you've put some top quality ground coffee in it!). There's something truly delightful about the way the room slowly fills with the heady aroma of coffee as it brews away. It's the old-fashioned way to brew coffee, but sometimes the tried and tested ways are the best.

Which kitchen gadgets could you not live without? And what gadget is currently topping your most wanted list?

Race Report: Geneva Half Marathon 2015

London. New York. Tokyo. Those are some of the names that spring to mind straight away when you think of big city marathons. However, there are loads of other great, less well known (and less expensive!) city marathons aside from the World Marathon Majors; and if you're in Europe you're spoilt for choice. I pretty much always see travelling as a way to squeeze in a run (either organised or solo) somewhere new, and that's how I came to sign up for Geneva Half Marathon. My parents moved to Switzerland last year, which has been a great excuse to check out some Swiss races. Switzerland is an amazing destination for outdoor holidays in general, so when I heard my parents were moving there, I immediately had visions of me training like the Brownlees in St. Moritz. Yes, just like that. But much more slowly and far less elegantly.

The Geneva Marathon festival, which took place on the weekend of 2 and 3 May, has the marathon as its key race, as well as other races including the half marathon and a 10km, making up a weekend of races. Over 16,000 runners took part in the 8 events over the weekend, so the city was full of runners. I flew in to Geneva on Saturday as the half marathon was on Sunday morning. Upon arrival at the airport, I grabbed my free train ticket from the machine in the baggage collection area, and then jumped on a train for Geneva city. I wanted to check into the hotel and dump my bags before heading to the race expo in the Jardin Anglais to pick up my race number.

We (I'd roped my Dad in to run too - his first half marathon!) stayed in the Hotel Royal, which was located really near the race expo and finish line. It was also super accommodating to all the runners staying in it. The hotel was offering an extra-early breakfast for runners on the Sunday of the race, which was at a lower cost than the regular breakfast buffet (which is only fair, given you're not going to stuff your face before a race!). They also put aside empty rooms for runners to use the showers in afterwards (as check out time was before most people would finish their race and arrive back at the hotel).They obviously understood the issues facing travelling runners and offered what they could to make the stay as comfortable as possible, and ensure people didn't have to worry about things such as where you could get breakfast that early or where to shower afterwards - so I'd definitely recommend the hotel for that alone.

After checking in, we wandered over to the expo, which was located at the finishing line of the race, just by the shore of the lake. It was a fairly small expo, with some exhibitors selling race kit and advertising other local races. We collected our race numbers, race bags (they give you a specific bag to put your check-in gear in) and our t shirts. You ordered your shirt size in advance, and I opted for small because in the UK even the smallest size is usually about the size of a tent. However, the ladies small here was actually genuinely quite small, so I don't think I'll be wearing mine too often!

We had our race evening supper at Luigia. You can't really go wrong with Italian the night before a race. Unfortunately they didn't take reservations which worried me slightly, as pasta places are always full of runners the night before a marathon. But when you arrive they give you one of those buzzers that lets you know when your table's ready, and you can just wait in the bar in the meantime, so we didn't have to queue outside or anything like you have to in London sometimes! I had a glass of white wine while we waited for our table. I wasn't planning on having a drink, but as we had time to spare and I quite fancied one I thought why not. The night before a marathon I wouldn't drink, but I've done so many halves now (about seven I think) that I'm quite relaxed about them and worry less about getting my preparation 100% right. 

I would usually opt for pasta the night before a race, but the pizza looked so good that I had to go for that. I went for a Stromboli, which had peppers and neopolitan sausage on it. It was delicious, and even the crust was amazing (I hate a bland crust). The restaurant wasn't too far from the hotel so we managed to get back and have a fairly early night before the very early race start the next day - 8.30am!

We got up to have our breakfast around 6.30am the next morning, leaving a good couple of hours to digest before the race start. When I'm staying away from home the night before a race I always bring my own breakfast. Partly so I know I can eat early enough, and partly so that I can eat something I'm familiar with and have eaten during training. My go to is an instant porridge pot, because all you need to do is add hot water from a kettle, so you can make it in even the most basic hotel room or apartment.

It took us about 45 mins to get to the race start. We must have gotten on the tram fairly near its starting point, as we were able to get on easily, but we ended up passing many tram stops that were full of runners who simply couldn't get on because it was so packed. I dread to think how all those runners finally managed to make it to the race. The start was quite far out of the city, and not really running distance before a race. I even saw a couple of runners with their thumbs out, trying to hitchhike to the start! The city really needs to learn from these mistakes and put on extra transport the morning of the marathon.

As forewarned by the weather forecast, it was a rainy day - so waiting around after the obligatory baggage check and toilet stop wasn't much fun, but luckily it wasn't cold. At around 8.15am we made our way to the start line.

The race started on time (as you would expect in Switzerland!). We were in the 2 hour pen, which was quite near the back. The last pen was > 2.10. The cut off time for this race is 3 hours, which is quite tight! It's never taken me 3 hours to run a half, but I think most races are slightly more generous with their time allowance to accommodate for slower runners.

Soon we were running through the countryside, surrounded by fields. I hadn't studied the route map too much so this was a nice surprise, as I expected to be running though a lot of residential areas. There were fields of wheat and canola, and some vineyards too! Some of the paths were dirt paths that had gotten pretty muddy with the rain, so getting wet and muddy was unavoidable.

The water stations were evenly spread out, and I think there were 5 in total, which was plenty. Most offered water and an isotonic drink. There were gels at some stations (I always bring my own so I didn't try them). There were also cut up bananas and oranges to take which was a nice touch! It was great to have real food at the stations as well as 'sports nutrition'.

The last third or so of the race was along Lake Geneva, which was the most scenic part of the route, and by that point the rain had started to subside a little bit. With just 5km to go I realised we could dip in just under 2 hours if we picked up the pace a bit -  so we did just that. The last couple of km take you right past the race finish to do a loop back through part of the city - it was a bit cruel to have the route pass the finish so late in the race, only to continue on into the city. However, the crowds were at their densest in these last few km, which definitely helped keep everyone going. Everyone had their name written their race bib, so it was a great boost to hear people cheering your name!

At last we crossed the line, with an official time of 01:59:57 - just narrowly dipping under that 2 hour mark!

Despite the huge number of runners, moving through the finishing tunnel, grabbing water and a snack (fruit, crackers, cake) and being awarded with a medal was quick and easy, as was our collection of bags, which were located in the underground carpark. It was great the baggage collection was indoors as it meant people could get out of their soaking race kit in the dry, and slip on some fresh layers!

We celebrated with a post-race beer at Les Brasseurs.

And a burger at Holy Cow.

I went for the Smokey Big Cheese and Bacon: Swiss beef, cheese, bacon, BBQ sauce, red onion relish and lettuce. It was incredible, and just what I needed after the race. The chips were also amazing - crisp on the outside, fluffy inside, skin on, and not too skinny!

Once I'd had time to look at the race data (geek that I am), I realised that I'd actually run a negative split, which I've never managed for a half marathon before! I've posted the strava link for those who love a statistic as much as I do.



Have you ever been on a running holiday? Which big city race is at the top of your wish list?