Running & Cooking... week 2

Another great Sunday... involving running, cooking and a lot of relaxing! This week was my 8-miler. And thankfully, despite the rain and hailstorm yesterday, today was dry and nice enough for my run. I had my breakfast of oatmeal and a snack of half a banana with peanut butter and then headed out. In preparation for the long run today I also took a GU pack with me. I had heard they were good for long runs... and also that they are a tiny bit disgusting. :)

Upon recommendation from my friend Catherine, I went with Espresso Love and Vanilla Bean. I tried the Vanilla Bean today. They are kinda strange... taste a little like syrup, but this flavor wasn't so bad. The run felt pretty good today and I even clocked my average pace two seconds under my normal nine minute mile. So I was pretty happy! The best part though was when I was done and I got to hear Lance Armstrong (on my ipod) congratulate me on my longest run yet!


Since I had some leftover ricotta cheese from last weeks lemon cookies... I asked "the chef" aka Ashley for a recipe. She suggested Lasagna. But not just a regular lasagna... cupcake lasagna! Ashley is the Queen for making things in cupcake pans (one of my favorites is cupcake meatloaf). So I attempted it... and it was so easy! You use wonton wrappers instead of noodles (square-shaped, fit nicely into the large cupcake pan). And the rest of the layers were pretty typical - turkey burger in a red sauce and ricotta cheese mixture (I actually used part ricotta, part cottage cheese, and then an egg, basil, salt and pepper). Then another layer of everything, another wonton wrapper and topped with mozzarella cheese. Then I baked them for about 12 minutes.

They were delicious!Thank you Ashley for the wonderful idea and thank you Mirra for being my guinea pig and trying them!


Then Mirra and I watched "Burlesque" and now we're watching "Dexter" which she is watching for the first time and I can't wait to see her reaction to the season 4 finale. :)

Another great Sunday!