Monday, April 25, 2011

A Great Run and an Even Better Recipe


Today was one of those days that reminds you it’s always better to just get out and run, no matter what you have going on around you. I felt stuffed up and run down all day, but I’d still been looking forward to running outside after work since I’d shunned the treadmill in favor of the pool this morning. Just my luck, it started to rain the instant I walked out the door of the office. I was in no mood to face the crowds at the Y and the 30-minute time limit on the treadmills, so I headed home.

After some Matzoh Ball Soup (Jewish penicillin) I looked outside to see it had stopped raining :). So I laced up my sneakers and headed out for a run. Yes, my shins hurt and my nose was like a leaky faucet, but as I headed down the last hill for home it occurred to me what a great run it had really been. It wasn’t my fastest, it wasn’t magically pain free (I keep hoping), and the sun wasn’t shining. But the temperature was just about perfect, the rain had washed away most of the pollen and was nice enough to hold off long enough for me to get my whole 45 minutes in. It was one of those shiny, running makes everything better moments. It’s like one of my favorite people always says, “just run it out.” Consider me convinced you can run out almost anything :) I’m not really sure what made it so good, but maybe since I wasn’t expecting much, it was able to surpass my expectations and that was enough?

Anyway, it was a great way to start the week. The Mountain Goat is 5 days away! But for the 6th run in a row, I was able to get in more than 5 miles in my allotted 45 minutes, so I’m feeling really good about the possibility of finishing this race in under 90 minutes.

Now for that even better recipe. This is going to be one of those no recipe recipes, so bear with me. It came out fantastic and was really easy to throw together. The idea I had in my head was a baked, breading-free Eggplant Parmesean. So I bought some eggplant and a few other vegetables and got to work. Bear with me, I’ve never written a recipe!

Rough ingredients:
1-lb. 99% fat free ground turkey breast
1 jar tomato sauce
2 graffiti eggplants, sliced ¼-inch thick
2 small zucchini, thinly sliced or shredded
1 medium yellow onion, diced
1 clove garlic, minced
1 bag baby spinach
Shredded Cheese
Spices, to taste

Turn the oven on to broil (high)
Spread the eggplant slices on a tray and put them under the broiler for 5 minutes. Flip and broil 5 more minutes.
Brown the turkey over medium-high heat, then add turkey and sauce to a sauce pan.
In the same pan you browned the turkey in, sauté the onion in a little bit of olive oil with the garlic.
Add the onion and garlic mixture to the turkey and sauce mixture.
Sauté the spinach with a little more olive oil (plus I used some red pepper flakes).
Switch the oven to bake @ 350 degrees
Spread the spinach across the bottom of a 9x13 baking dish.
Spread ½ the sauce on top.
Layer the eggplant on top of the sauce.
Then a layer of zucchini.
Add the rest of the sauce and cover lightly with cheese (I had some shredded mozzarella and a mixture of parmesan / asiago so I used both)
Bake 40 minutes, covered.
The last five minutes, uncover so the cheese gets nice and brown.

Let me know what you think!

2 comments:

  1. This recipe sounds so good, I want to try it!

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  2. Yayaya for being my first comment ever :)
    Thanks, let me know how it comes out!

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