Fuel

Enough about me. About how many miles run (though for the record it was 61.7 last week - my first 60+ mile week since March 2011...and it felt WONDERFUL), about how many yards swam (*gulp - zero), about how many minutes biked (*cough zilch cough*). This week's post (which I realize is five days late as per the New Year's Res) is dedicated to what I've been relying on (and enjoying in the process) to fuel the miles. And soon, I assure you, to fuel swim yardage, and cycling minutes in a serious way as well.

Granola

3 C oats

1 C almonds

1/2 C maple syrup

1/4 C coconut oil

1/4 C honey

1/2 C sunflower seeds

....because that's what I had in my cupboard.

* makes 20 servings of 1/4 C each at 120 cal

I toasted it for close to an hour at 200, stirring it every 10 - 15 minutes. It is delicious. The coconut oil gives it wonderful flavor. I'd eat it plain with milk six times a day, but granola, while nutritious, is calorie packed. So I've been using it as a garnish atop my yogurt and blueberries (I picked and froze about a million blueberries this summer...or at least I hope as many as I need to get us through until next July:). I may occasionally (while cooking dinner, or just before bed) pop dry handfuls of it in my mouth because it's so tasty. Possibly.

Cookies I made up! And they taste good!

1/4 C butter

1/4 C coconut oil

2/3 C brown sugar

1 egg

1 C wheat flour

1/4 C cocoa

baking soda (sprinkle)

vanilla (quick pour)...in my opinion, why dirty the cute the tsp/Tbsp measurer thingy?...

1 C slivered almonds (because I found them in the back of my cupboard when I cleaned it out)

1 C semi-sweet chocolate chips (...in the same cleaning I found a half used bag).

*recipe makes 30 cookies @ 90 calories each

Bake on 375 for 8 minutes. They are tasty and wonderful. Don't get me wrong, they're still atrocious for you...they're cookies;) But I feel a little better about them, and even if there's nothing astoundingly more nutritionally sound about them, I made them up and we (yes, even Mike, who is a tough guy to please in cookie world when you're not his mother:), enjoy them.

Quiche

8 eggs

1 C skim milk

4 oz shredded cheese - whatever kind is in the fridge

vegetables - again, whatever is on hand. This week it was broccoli that needed to be used.

jiffy pie crust.

* makes 4 servings at 300 cal each

I make mine in 4 mini souffle dishes. Line each w/ pie crust, sprinkle 1 oz of cheese and the pre-cooked vegetable to the bottom and cover with 1/4 of the milk/egg mixture. Baked for 35 - 40 min at 400, the two of us have dinner that night, and lunch the next day. I completely realize that my take on "quiche" is incredibly generic, but what a fun word to call "eggs and other stuff in a cute little crust" that provides good protein punch.

Those have been my favorite three things recently, though there's been a lot of kitchen creation going on here in Camptown. Winter always gives me the cooking and baking bug, but unfortunately this fall gifted me five pounds I'd like to shed. *sigh. What a terrible, horrible, unthinkable realization it is to come to that it is possible to run 50, 55, 60 mile weeks for weeks on end and still need to watch calories. I only started running five years ago as a means to lose weight, and as strongly as the running stuck to me, the weight shed off. That said, this isn't the first time I've had the scale wake up call and it will unfortunately not be the last. And so I've been calorie watching, and actually remember how much healthier it makes me to keep myself accountable to portion sizes and nutritional information.

Okay, this post still ended up being all about me. Sorry. But we're 30 from the Martha's Vineyard 20 miler (my FAVORITE event of the year, and our two year wedding anniversary) and I'm up 3 lbs (the calorie awareness has shed 2 of autumn's nasty little buggers so far) from wedding day weight. I'm thinking that with a little food conscientiousness, and a few more good weeks of running mileage, I can hopefully do my joints the favor of a little less weight baring down with every step by then. And I intend to enjoy every step and bite along the way!