Cooking with Cherese

When Cherese helped me make fudge for last month's holiday food extravaganza, we had a lot of chatting time in the CE2 kitchen. I learned that the high school senior doesn't really know how to cook, so I thought I'd show her an easy recipe or two she can whip up at home.

One standard in our house is Spicy Black Beans and Rice from BHG.com. It's very quick, healthy, cheap and yummy! Perfect. We set the table and then sat down as a family and enjoyed the homemade lunch. She liked it! I bought the ingredients for a double batch for just a couple dollars at WinCo. And Cherese seemed impressed at how quick and easy it was.

She did most of the work, including showing ME how to make perfect rice. Thanks, Cherese, for making us a special lunch treat! Let's cook again soon :)

1/2 c chopped onion
4 cloves garlic, minced
2 T cooking oil
1 15-oz can of black beans, rinsed and drained
1 14.5-oz can of Mexican-style stewed tomatoes
1/2 c salsa
1/4 t salt
1/8 - 1/4 t cayenne pepper
2 c cooked rice
1/2 c shredded cheddar cheese

1. In a medium saucepan, cook the onion and garlic in hot oil until tender but not brown. Carefully stir in beans, undrained tomatoes, salsa, salt and cayenne pepper. Bring to boiling and then reduce heat. Simmer, uncovered, for 15 minutes.

2. To serve, mound rice on serving plates and make a well in each mound. Spoon the black bean mixture into wells. If desired, sprinkle with shredded cheese.

:)

Muffin Wednesday: Green Chili

Back to work means the return of the ever-popular Muffin Wednesday!

I've had this Green Chili Muffin recipe filed away for a bit, and since Cherese and I were making Spicy Black Beans and Rice for lunch, I thought it might be a good pairing.
2 c flour
1/4 c sugar
2 t baking powder
1/4 - 1/2 t salt
2 eggs
1 c milk
1/4 c butter or margarine, melter
1 4-oz can diced green chili peppers, rinsed and drained

In a small mixing bowl, stir together flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt.

In another mixing bowl, stir eggs slightly with a spatula; stir in milk, melted butter or margarine, and green chili peppers.

Add flour mixture all at once to egg mixture. Stir just until moistened.

Lightly grease muffin cups and fill two-thirds full. Bake in 400-degree oven for 20 to 25 minutes or until golden. Remove from pan. Serve warm or cool on a wire rack.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The recipe was really simple and required nothing unusual except a little 50-cent can of green chiles.

The muffins were not overly sweet and weren't at all spicy - just a hint of chiles. The students seemed scared (they are used to super sugary treats), but when I suggested they were sort of like corn muffins, they decided they liked them. A couple people really liked them, but most testers weren't super excited.

I thought they were a nice compliment to our Mexican-style lunch :)

Track Thursday: a bike and a run

My day started with a treat: riding bikes to work with Mom!

Inspired by our bicycling friend Bill, Mom decided to try the two-wheel commute. For Christmas, Dad hooked her up with all the necessary gear.

I peddled to her house and then we rode together to THS, stashing our stuff in CE2.
Before I knew it, it was time to bundle up for Track Thursday. (Time sure flies when you have lots to do at work!)

I was short on time because Eryn, Mom and I had to drive to Portland to buy a Garmin GPS watch off Craigslist for her half-marathon training. Got her a slightly used Forerunner 405CX, which retails for $270, for just $100 - score!!
I set out right after work to run 800s, and while I hoped to complete five sets (up from the four I've been doing), I had time for four. I cut my recovery short and kept the speed up, so I definitely feel worked.

Here's how it looked:

warmup - 400m

400m: 7:56 pace
400m: 7:54

200m recovery

400m: 7:55
400m: 7:50

200m recovery

400m: 7:55
400m: 7:56

200m recovery

400m: 7:59
walked 200 feet
400m: 7:35

cool down

In all, 2.89 miles in 28:39 - a 9:55 average, including warmup, recoveries and cool down.
But each interval was under a 7:59-minute mile - I'm very happy about that :)

Now I'm wearing my CEP compression sleeves, a Christmas gift from my honey. Hoping my calves will recover quick, because they are tired after a week of hard workouts!

Rest day tomorrow and then a long run Saturday with Eryn and her new Garmin!

:)

No. 1

First book of 2012... in the books!
This was a good mystery! Kept me guessing until the end.

Now on to "O" :)

No-TV Tuesday: burp!

To celebrate my 500-mile running milestone, Brad took me out to Round Table for Italian Garlic Supreme pizza (no meat) - my favorite!
That night, we learned about Round Table's Tuesday family buffet: $6.99 for unlimited salad bar, pizza bar and breadstick and cinnamon twists. We planned to return the next week to celebrate Brad's milestone of 700 miles.

But then I got sidelined by that stomach bug. There was no pizza for me that week.

I was feeling great Tuesday, so we headed over to Lake Grove for all we could eat!
The salad bar was very fresh and good. Some of the pizza was not as fresh, probably because there weren't a million people there fueling lots of turnover. But it was very tasty... especially the cinnamon twists!
We both ate a little more than we should have but were very happy with our meal.

I like celebrating with pizza! :)

Stunning

I want to introduce you to a friend of mine. My parents and Tiffany's parents were really close back in the day, and we grew up playing together. While we don't hang out anymore, we do stay connected on Facebook.

In May 2010, Tiffany began a weight-loss journey. Now a year and a half later, she's down 105 pounds - almost to her goal weight.

Check out the before-and-after photos she just posted on FB:
Absolutely amazing!!

I am so proud of her hard work to get fit and be the person she wants to be. She looks stunning, and best of all, she's strong and healthy for her family, including her twins.

Tiffany is an inspiration, and I just wanted to show her off :)

Congrats, Tiff!!!!!!!

A Sunriver birthday

As is becoming tradition, aunts Kari and Vicki generously allowed us to spend Brad's birthday weekend at their Sunriver home. (it's available for rent if you're looking for a nice getaway)

Such a nice treat! (My fingers stumbled when I typed "treat" and it almost came out as "retreat" - also very fitting!!)

We laid pretty low for a couple reasons: there was NO snow and I was recovering from a bout with the stomach flu (major yucky).

There was some of this:
And a lot of these (banana splits requested by the birthday boy):
And some birthday burritos and presents:
We also watched a couple movies and some trashy cable TV, stayed up too late and slept in too long.

Oh, and we took out the Jeep, which used to be Brad's baby:
It was super fun to drive around - and I was thrilled that I remembered how to drive a stick!

Brad found a forest service road covered in a couple inches of snow that we HAD to explore. We drove in about a mile before it narrowed more than we were comfortable with - in another person's car.

Brad tried to wash off the mud splatters, but that's challenging when it's below freezing and there's no car-wash soap or rag :) Thankfully, a muddy Jeep is a happy Jeep.

Fortunately, we did have the energy to take advantage of the nice weather and get out a bit.

I managed two runs at the resort - one with Brad and one without. We ran from the house to the village mall and back for 3.52 miles:
Look - NO snow :(
And I went out before we left Sunday to explore paths on the south end of the resort. 5 miles, stopping and starting a lot as I tried to find my way:
And on Saturday, we laced up our snow boots and hiked up Vista Butte, a nice trail we explored last year.
It was a very nice, relaxing birthday weekend! Thanks so much, K & V, for inviting us to your home :)