Dinner Challenge: Week 2, continued

Yesterday I worked both jobs and worked a total of 14.5 hours. I worked from 7:15am til 9:45 at night.... so needless to say, home cooking did not happen. 

Today it almost didn't happen either. I was all ready to make tequila lime chicken. Maybe try to make my own rice. Then.... I never made it to the store to get limes. Kind of hard to make lime chicken with no limes. And I took a nap and wound up groggily half asleep from 3:30p until almost 7. Once again the temptation to order pizza was strong. 

Instead lady luck was on our side. I had chicken breasts in the fridge that were thawed. Thanks to the new gas grill, I was able to fire it up and know we could have dinner within 1/2 an hour. So it was Tomato Garlic Pesto marinaded chicken breasts on the grill and a creamy chicken rice side. 

I'm looking forward to after our wedding when I can start testing out the new rice cooker!

Dinner Challenge Week 2!

I'm on week two of my dinner challenge. So far I've had home cooked meals 9 nights in a row! (I'm including easter at my fiance's parents as home cooked because it was in fact home cooked... just not by me)

Monday was Week 2, Day 1: Hamburgers on the grill with pepperjack cheese, sesame seed buns and onion rings on the side

Tuesday (today): W2, D2: Baked salmon with Emeril's fish rub and lemon with a loaded baked potato.

Note: Baked potatoes really should be a weekend thing. They take too long to actually bake (1hr) which I don't really have if I want to eat earlier than 7pm.

I'm really excited to see if I can make it a whole month with only 4 non-home cooked dinners or less! I've definitely noticed I'm motivated by the challenge! There has already been 1-2 nights when I almost defaulted to pizza. Pretty sad that in 1 week, 2 days I've almost caved and ordered pizza twice. This is why I need this challenge!

Did you quit running or something?

No. Of course not!

I had, though, taken a 2 week hiatus from it. I will say, mother nature has not been kind to us this April. It's been very grey, cold, windy and snowy/drizzly. I found that hardcore attitude that kept me running all winter crumble a bit by the repeated snowfalls and all around yucky days that plagued us the past couple weeks.

So, I did what should be done: I rested. I admitted to myself that for the first time in a long time, I was not feeling the whole running thing. Took the signal from my body that it was just a bit tired and actually listened to it instead of pushing it onward. Listening to your body when it tells you something is not right for you at the moment is a hard skill to develop. It is, of course, not to be confused with feelings of laziness which can creep in and turn what started as listening to your body into full out abandonment of exercise in general. So as a rule, if the hiatus is longer than 1 week, you're drifting into abandonment territory.

I didn't completely abandon exercise. Instead, I got my yoga on. I was able to do it 3 times last week and 2x this week. Just 20 minutes of it and I can tell that my body was tight and my lack of stretching before and after running is NOT doing me any favors. Having such tight quads does help me realize how strong my legs are in fact getting. They may not be shrinking to give me those gracefull runner legs, but they are powerhouses for sure. I think that's just what they're meant to be: strong, big and powerful. I can deal with that. In fact, I'm rather proud of just how much muscle is already there.

Ok, I bunny trailed it off into a tangent, didn't I???? Sorry for the complete descent into basking in my own awesomeness.... ha ha. I broke the running hiatus today. WHOO HOO! The sun finally made its return to Minnesota along with a gorgeous 60 degree, light breeze quintessential spring day. I only worked 5 hrs, too, so I knew this run was meant to happen. It had to happen. I've been struggling to turn that itch into actual running so before I could talk myself out of it, I put on the running clothes and set out on my way, unsure of what direction or even how far I wanted to go. My plan: to run until I felt done. Today that turned out to be 4.7 miles.... ok... well about 4.2 miles. At about 4.2 my legs said "F-U for not running in 2 weeks and then trying to make us go 5 miles. We're done!" So I did walking jaunts over the last 1/2 mile.

It was so wonderful to get back out there! I've missed the conversations I have with myself. The feel of the breeze grazing across my slightly sweaty skin. The sun warming and bouncing off my skin. The mysterious phantom aches that try to make me stop and then pushing through them. Running along with any other endurance sport is a complete mental game as well as a physical one. I can't imagine how I would have dealt with the tumult of the past couple years without the lessons running teaches me. I am stronger both physically and mentally as a result. And truly grateful.

Dinner Challenge: Days 4-6

Wow! I'm almost through a week of this dinner challenge!?!?

Day 4: Tortelloni with ground italian sausage and prego garden combo pasta sauce with garlic bread.

• This is a great fall back meal for me. As long as I have a bag of frozen tortelloni or ravioli, dinner takes less than 15 minutes which is great on those nights I get home at 6 and have an event at 7. I buy pre-made pasta sauce most of the time but try to spruce it up with more herbs and garlic. Sometimes I make my own arrabiata sauce and freeze it in jars when I'm feeling extra gourmet.

Day 5: This was a tough one. My parents were en route and my plan for tequila lime chicken fell through when I realized there was no chicken in the house. These are the nights the Dominos or Sarpinos orders are most often placed. But I was determined not to fall into the trap. I ran down to the freezer and grabbed some pork chops and quickly thawed them. I seasoned them and browned them and let them simmer for 20 minutes on the stovetop in chicken broth. Meanwhile I made a cheesy rice packet and some roasted broccoli parmesan (thanks to the Barefoot Contessa on the Food Network!). 

Day 6: Kraft Mac n Cheese and grilled tenderloin steaks and grilled new york strip steaks. 

• Once again, nothing special, but we got to try out our new gas grill (!!!!) and the steaks, minimally seasoned were great! The tenderloin was thicker and turned out the best, but both were really good. The meat was about as fresh as you can get without being right on the farm and butchering it yourself. My parents, as a gift, gave my dear B and I half of a cow's worth of meat from my uncle's farm. Freshly butchered, barely frozen a couple days. Awesome! I find it funny that I used to be embarrased our meat came in white parchment paper and not fancy packages. Now I welcome the idea of eating meat that I know the farmer of.....

Day 7: Will be a homecooked meal as well at B's parents. 

So there you go... I made it a whole week without eating fast food. .... 

** Note: The Twins game was today I did have a hotdog, but that's tradition so I'm letting myself have that as an exemption! **

I still have many recipes to try out so I really feel that it is not such a foreign/weird/bad idea to aim for 6/7 days a week for a month of eating at home. So my goal is to keep this going for the next 3 weeks!

Dinner Challenge Day 3:

Tonights wonderful dinner was pretty much waiting for me when I got home. No, I didn't cheat and have it delivered... I didn't cheat and pick it up at the grocery store all done. It was a slow roasted lemon herb garlic whole chicken in the crock pot. Just knowing that the dinner decision was made and cooking all day lifted this huge weight off my shoulders. I was actually excited to come home and savor the results. I spent all day thinking about how it was going to turn out; fearful it would dry out or taste horrible, excited that it would taste awesome and I'd have found a new dinner to work into the rotation.

Alas there also would have been loaded baked potatoes, but B did not understand my directions to preheat the oven AND get the potatoes baking, so I caved and went the instant route because the chicken was beyond done when I got home. It was so done it was sliding off the bones.

This recipe was easy!  The hardest part was probably turning the chicken whilst browning it on the stove. I really could have used some string to seal the end of the chicken because my onion kept falling out during turning, but overall, a pretty minor snafu to encounter.

Drawbacks: I accidentally added a few too many dried herbs. It was a little too herby. Otherwise, it was AMAZING! The lemon wasn't overpowering, nor was the onion.

Best thing: it was so moist and flavorful and a whole chicken means I have mucho leftovers! I used the juices to make a nice chicken gravy so tomorrow's lunch will be open faced chicken sandwhiches with gravy. The rest of the chicken will be used to make actual chicken salad -- hopefully restaurant style chicken salad. YUM!

I'd highly recommend this recipe. I cooked it for 5 hrs on high and 1 hr on low to get it to the current done-ness. I also added slightly more water and used 1/2 of it as vegetable stock (which is my new best cooking friend).

Crock pots are the best thing ever created and I can't believe I don't use it more often!!!!

Dinner

We finally went grocery shopping for the first time in a month. And by grocery shopping, I mean real "make a list, cut the coupons, meal plan" grocery shopping, not the maintenance "I need bread and milk and veggies" shopping we usually do. I'm really motivated right now to cook at home and not order pizza or eat at a restaurant.

I know I'm busy, but I'm going to give myself a challenge: I will cook at home 6/7 days for the next 2 months.

Some meals I'm excited to make:

1) Seared Mahi Mahi with a knorr creamy chicken pasta side; salad with light raspberry vinagrette
2) Zatarains Jambalaya with sauteed chicken and onion mixed in; side salad
3) Homemade teriyaki chicken stir fry with baby corn, broccoli, carrots, bok choy and snow peas (this one is just for me to have many days as lunch as dear fiance hates asian food)
4) Tortelloni with italian sausage and marinara sauce with garlic bread and a salad
5) Tequila Lime Chicken
6) Lemon Garlic herb roasted chicken with loaded baked potatoes
7) Soba noodles and green beans -- for just myself.

So here's to my new challenge. I'm hoping I can keep this up and introduce B to new foods and spice up our dinners a bit!