If you have read Born to Run then you may be aware of the use of Chia seeds and Pinole by the Tarahumara tribe, who are the part of the main focus of the book. These people think nothing of getting up and running hundreds of miles of fun, seemingly with no effort at all.

So, given all the running I am doing I wanted to look into trying to find an alternative to the energy gels that are commonly used, 1) to find something more healthy and balanced and 2) to save money! Not really being sure where to start I did a bit of googling and came across this website with a basic ingredient list to work from: http://www.nomeatathlete.com/tarahumara-pinole-chia-recipes/

• 1/2 cup cornmeal, ground as fine as possible
• 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1 Tbsp brown sugar, honey, or agave nectar
• chia seeds (optional)

The basic ingredients I got from the supermarket, having to substitute cornmeal with maizemeal and I ordered the Chia seeds from Amazon.

Now, I have taken some pictures of the process and I have found that I deviated from the quantitys described as I couldn’t quite get the right consistancy with the instructions on the nomeatathlete.

How did it taste, well better than it looks but this batch seemed very dry and I wanted to have a stickier consitancy which would form a more solid bar which would be easier to eat on the run.

It was back to the drawing board (and in some way still is) and the second attempt is better, but still not perfect for eating on the go, more of a pre-run snack.

So with the final amounts worked out, below is the ingredient list and nutritional value per serving (mixed with 6 tbsp of water):

Ingredients	Calories	Carbs	Fat	Protein
Tesco – Light Brown Muscovado Cane Sugar, 25 grams	100	25	0	0
Rowse Australian Honey – Honey, 15 g	10	0	0	0
Generic – Maize Meal, 1 cup cooked	177	38	2	4
Whole Foods Organic – Chia Seeds, 2 Tbsp.	140	12	9	4

Divided into 9 servings this works out at: 47 cal, 8gram Carb, 1 gram fat and 1 gram protein. It still needs work but its a good starting point.

I am going to keep updating the ingredient list and will post any changes I make. I also have been working on an Iskiate recepie, also from the nomeatathlete site but with my own tweak which I will post in the future.