The barre bro recently had a realization – he has access to large, open spaces with built-in dance floors and great sound systems. Sure, these spaces are currently used for barre and yoga classes, but why stop there? Also, our clientele tends to skew towards white girls who like to dance but don’t necessarily dance… well, see for yourself.

So, why not open a nightclub where our teachers and clients can practice their dance moves?!? Enter tuck 3, aka tuck barre & yoga Washington Square West.

First things first – everyone knows, no nightclub is complete without an imposing, unmarked steel door behind an intimidating steel grate on a random side street located on 7th street between South St. and Lombard St. Continue reading “The Barre Bro Gets Into the Nightclub Business” →

Hi! Meet Kate. Kate is one of our barre teachers. She’s also the reigning Tuck Nintendo Just Dance Champion 2019, having vanquished Meg, and Ann in the annual dance-off fourteen straight songs in a row. (Meg’s appeal is still under review).

When we first opened tuck, we had a really hard time finding good barre teachers. We must have auditioned over fifty barre teachers during our first year of operation, and we hired… two. This is a big part of the reason why Callie started doing barre teacher trainings – we had such a shortage of great barre teachers that Callie decided to start training them herself. Continue reading “The Barre Bro Takes the “Best” Barre Class in Philly” →

The barre bro has exactly one favorite class at tuck barre & yoga, and it’s FreeBuild Flow (FBF) with Megan.

What exactly is FreeBuild Flow? Well, it’s not what it sounds like, because it kind of sounds like we’ll be playing with lego blocks or something while doing yoga.

It’s impossible to succinctly describe what this class is, because there is so much involved. It’s part-vinyasa yoga, part-being a little kid and swinging your arms around like you just don’t care, and part-being a back up dancer to Beyonce, all with plenty of cardio, feel-good stretches and twists, and plyometrics, all set to some bangin’ beats. Continue reading “The Barre Bro’s Favorite Class at tuck barre & yoga” →

The barre bro may not be very good at barre, but he’s excellent at sitting at tables. He actually sits at a desk professionally. So when tuck barre & yoga decided to participate in Phillymag’s Be Well Philly Boot Camp 2019 and needed someone to table, they turned to the most accomplished desk-sitter on the tuck roster to represent the tuck team – yours truly.

Now when you’re really, really, ridiculously good at something, it’s impolite to show off too much and make others look bad, so here I am in tadasana, also known as standing mountain pose. Most yoga pose names make zero sense, but tadasana makes perfect sense because you’re standing straight up like, “ta da!”

I’m not usually one to toot my own horn, but I was truly in my element at this event. Most of the people in attendance thought they were killing it if they went to one or two 60-minute classes. But what the barre bro accomplished was truly not for the feint of heart – for 4 straight uninterrupted hours, I alternated between circuits of high intensity standing and chair-assisted utkatasana. Meanwhile, my slacker wife Callie taught some barre class that didn’t even last an hour. I mean, they weren’t even standing up! Here they are all laying down in Netflix pose with a glorified rubber band around their legs. Continue reading “The Barre Bro Goes to the Be Well Philly Boot Camp 2019” →

Lately, the barre bro’s been more of a blob bro – skipping barre classes to eat McDonald’s and cook really unhealthy food. And, well, none of that changed this past weekend.

I grew up in Virginia Beach which, if you’re unfamiliar, is a sprawling suburban place with an economy supported mostly by tourism and the Navy. I didn’t realize it at the time, but the Mexican restaurants in the area there serve a peculiar but delicious white sauce that I didn’t realize was unusual for Mexican restaurants, and recently this story about that white sauce has been all over my Facebook.

So, remembering how delicious it was, I decided to try making it and see if it was actually delicious like I remembered, or if it was one of those childhood nostalgia things that you realize as a grown-up is actually kind of mediocre (I’m looking at you Famous Dave’s). Continue reading “Virginia Beach “Mexican” White Sauce and Spicy Fried Chicken Sandwiches” →

I’ve been able to keep my yearly weight gain under 2 lbs. a year for most of my twenties and early thirties, but man, something changed in 2018 and I gained over 20 lbs. So, now that it is 2019, I decided that this is the year that I would start experimenting with putting more than mental effort into losing weight. And everyone knows that the best way to lose weight is to eat all of the protein and fat you want, as long as you don’t eat any carbs! Let’s do this!

But first, one last farewell to beloved noodles, in the form of bun bo hue. And if you’re at a Viet joint, you can’t start without some summer rolls –

Then the main course! If you’re not familiar, bun bo hue is a spicier, north Vietnamese noodle soup. It’s like pho with an Infinity gauntlet. Most places in America, you’ll get it “American-style” with normal cuts of meat, which is fine by me. More authentic places will add blood cubes, which I am NOT into. And the super authentic places (where you can’t even read the menu, if there is one) will add ox penis, which I’m definitely not into. Continue reading “The Barre Bro Goes Low Carb” →

Callie was gone this past weekend, which means the dogs and I ate whatever we wanted all weekend long. Really from Thursday to Sunday. It was finally nice enough to grill so I grilled cheeseburgers for myself and the pups.

Mmm.. melty American cheese, double cheese for Bodie and Bunny because they’re big dogs. Continue reading “The Joy of Julia: Gentle Barre??” →

Callie is away this weekend, which makes the barre bro sad. But, no Callie means there’s no one to stop me from cooking/eating whatever I want! Especially because last weekend, I did the tuck University City double (barre followed by barre bounce), and I have yet to “spend” the calories I burned that day on any extra meals this week. Doing back to backs isn’t normally a barre bro thing, but I did my best (ended up quitting with 10 minutes left in the barre class).

It was a fun pair of classes with lots of regulars, and this jerk of a teacher showing off for the camera. Continue reading “The Barre Bro Gets (Slightly) Serious Talkin ‘Bout Cultural Appropriation” →

Sunday means meal prepping, so let’s get this party started! Above is a $55 haul from HMart. This post is dedicated to Rachelle, who bought me a bangin new cutting board. Continue reading “The Barre Bro Babysits Some Barre Babes (And Meal Preps Too)” →

Callie’s as good at cooking as the barre bro is at dieting. So, she sucks at it. But, she needs to eat! A lot. And since I can cook a little bit, we’ve started playing this game called “Married Life” where Callie says, “I’m hungry!” whenever she’s hungry. And I’m supposed to respond with, “What do you want?” And then Callie just… orders something, whatever comes to her mind, as if I know how to cook all 874 items on The Cheesecake Factory’s menu.

The Barre Bro’s wife doesn’t eat quite as many calories as Michael Phelps does, but she’s not far behind. With multiple days a week where she teaches doubles (and sometimes even triples), it’s important for the barre bro to keep his wife fed. Mostly because she doesn’t really know how to feed herself.

Unlike the barre bro, who is always thinking at least three meals in advance, Callie lives in the present and doesn’t even think a single meal ahead. If she suddenly gets a hunger pang while in the car, she’ll grab the nearest edible item, and suddenly she’s having an entire pack of tic tac breath mints for lunch. Or, if that hunger pang happens to occur in a candy store, she’ll stuff her face with 2 lbs. of rolos. None of which is conducive to fueling her athlete-level energy expenditure. So, I started meal prepping for her on Sundays! And this past Sunday, I took some pictures to document the process. Warning: this post will have, like, fifty pictures.

Continue reading “How to Feed a Barre Teacher Who Wants Bibimbap Three Times a Week, aka, The Barre Bro’s Sunday Meal Prep” →