scallop lo mein

Tonight for dinner I made myself Scallop Lo Mein.  The recipe had lots of delicious vegetables, including asparagus and red pepper.  The sauce called for "red pepper sauce" which I cannot find anywhere... so instead I put in a little bit of red pepper along with the other ingredients - soy sauce, lemon juice, etc.  After cooking the veggies and sauce, I added in the bay scallops for a few minutes.

Then lastly I added the (already cooked) ramen noodles! This recipe turned out quite delicious and didn't take much time at all.  It definitely hit the spot for my Asian food craving, too.

It was my first time working with bay scallops vs. sea scallops, and I don't know what to think.  I probably cooked them a few minutes longer than I should have - which made them chewier than I would have liked.  Or, maybe bay scallops just ARE more chewy than sea scallops.  I have another recipe using bay scallops later this week, so I'll be sure to not overcook them and then we'll know for sure :-)

running update

So, I haven't cooked any new food since Friday's crab cakes, but I'm hoping to change that today!  I wanted to update you on the runs I have been doing, though!

Friday I went out of town, and I knew that it probably wouldn't be feasible for me to go running on either Saturday and Sunday.  So, after checking into my hotel on Friday evening I went down to the hotel gym.  They had really fancy treadmills - the kind with your own personal TV.  So, I spent my run catching up on the newest season of the Jersey Shore.  I love the Jersey Shore.  My TV has been out for about a week so I've been missing all my trashy TV!  Haha.  Anyway, I really tried to challenge myself on the treadmill, and let me tell you, it was HARD.  I had 3.5 miles to go, and I started off at a 10 minute mile pace.  I tried to increase my pace to 6.5 (9:13 min/miles) for part of the time, but also had to slow down to 5.5 (10:54 min/miles) for part of the time.  I also had to press the pause once to get some water, I was parched!  But, overall I made it 3.5 miles in 34:33, for an overall pace of 9:53!  I was sooo proud of myself for running faster than a 10 minute pace, I immediately went up to the room to brag to Susan.  Who proceeded to tell me how fast she ran her 15 miles earlier that day, but that's ok :-)

The rest of the weekend was NOT well suited for running, so I'm glad I ran when I did!  This morning M and I set out to run 2.5 miles bright and early.  I didn't sleep particularly well, and I woke up with my leg already hurting... yikes.  M was also hurting a bit, so we were not feeling terribly optimistic.  Luckily for us, we hit a red light 5 minutes and 10 minutes into our run, so we got two short (20 second-ish) breaks to catch our breath and stretch.  After that, we managed to push through and finish our 2.5 miles in 27:51 - an 11:09 pace.  This was just a smidgen faster than last week's 2.5 mile run which was at 11:22 ... so I'm pretty proud of us!

Now I'm waiting for the Direct TV guy to fix my TV so I can resume my normal trashy TV habits ... oh, and maybe go into the office at a reasonable hour today, haha.  I'll hopefully make it to the grocery store soon as well, so I can have a nice full week of delicious meals to share with you!

crab cakes and football, that's what maryland DOES.

No, I'm not headed to Maryland this weekend... but I did have crab cakes for lunch!  Corn 'n Crab Cakes, to be specific.  I don't think I used enough mayo because they didn't hold together well... but that's ok.  First you mix up the crab cake part and shape it into balls...

Freeze for 15 minutes, then dip in egg and coat with bread crumbs.

Bake for about 15 minutes, flip over, bake for 10 more..

Top with salsa and enjoy!

Being from Maryland, I have very high standards for crab cakes.  So, I wouldn't say these were awesome, but considering they are my first attempt at home made crab cakes, I'm pleased.

Happy weekend everyone!

slow run, quick post

This morning (err technically yesterday now) M & I ran 2.04 miles in 23:26 - which is an 11:28 pace.  It was humid!  I am going to continue to use that as my excuse for at least another month.  Anyway, this run definitely felt slow and actually I wasn't 100% worn out when I was done, which makes me think I maybe could have pushed it a bit more.  Next time!

Both lunch and dinner today were delicious!  The chicken-tortilla casserole wasn't quite as soupy after it got to sit out, so that was good.  I think it could have used more tomato flavor, though.  The baked asparagus with couscous was fantastic... The combo of couscous and cream of chicken soup is spectacular.

I actually couldn't fall asleep last night (which is common for me, I'm a bit of an insomniac sometimes!) and only slept 5 hours... so I was pretty shocked when I managed to make it through a solid work day (I was at my office til 7pm!), drinks with a friend, and a Project Runway viewing / hanging out with a friend til late ... all with only one cup of coffee all day!  I guess when you have lots to do, it's not so hard to stay up.  I am just getting home and to bed now... crazy!

I'm headed out of town this weekend, but I'll make lunch tomorrow before I go and  be sure to share.  I'll be trying to run 3.5 miles with K this weekend... wish me luck!

more cooking!

Since I had some time this evening, I decided to also cook my lunch AND dinner for tomorrow.  I have plans after work at 7 tomorrow right near my office, so I figured packing lunch and dinner would work out well!  For lunch tomorrow, I'm having Baked Asparagus and Couscous.  This recipe was beyond simple.  Throw everything in a casserole dish, toss it in the oven, and that's it!  The only snag: I couldn't find cream of asparagus soup!  So, I had to substitute cream of chicken soup.
I forgot to take a picture before I started covering this in the bread crumbs, so in this photo you can see it half covered, half uncovered!

I also decided to have a little taste test, and I can report that this is quite good!  Baked asparagus is so yummy, and the couscous and bread crumbs make it very savory.

The second meal I cooked tonight was Chicken-Tortilla Casserole.  Can you tell I had been craving Mexican flavors when I made my grocery list? :-)  First, I mixed together soup, chiles, sour cream, and milk.  Then I added in chicken, torn-up tortillas, bell pepper, tomato, and shredded cheese.  I substituted whole-wheat tortillas for corn tortillas, since that's what I bought for the enchilada and quesadilla I made earlir this week.  The pictures didn't turn out great but the creamy goodness looked tasty in person, I swear!

After mixing this up, I put it in a pan and baked it for about 40 minute, covered.

Then I uncovered the casserole, topped it with cheese, and baked it about 8 minutes longer.  Looks so cheesy and delicious!

I mixed it up and took a bite.

Verdict: Very cheesy! (I heart cheese).  Great flavors - I think I can thank the chopped green chiles for that.  But, this casserole is quite soupy!  Maybe it needed more time in the oven, maybe it needed less milk/etc.  Who knows.  Won't stop me from enjoying it this time around :-)  Early morning run with M tomorrow - so it's time to clean up and get ready for bed!

bean enchiladas

For those of you who might be curious, my Tuna-Feta Salad was delicious!  I loved the flavor combo of red onion and red wine vinegar... and I'm definitely a fan of white beans!

Tonight for dinner I made myself Bean Enchiladas.  I got to use my blender to make the sauce:

... which is still new and exciting to me!  Then, I chopped up green pepper:

to mix with ricotta cheese, beans, and a few other things for the filling:

Next, I put half of the sauce in the bottom of the pan.  I put the filling into tortillas, wrapped them up, and put them into the pan.  I covered them with the remaining half of the sauce, and then topped it with shredded cheese.

Baked for about twenty minutes, and that's it!

Turned out delicious!  The only thing I would think about changing in the future is mashing up the pinto beans.  Maybe it's just because the refried beans were so delicious, but I think I like mashed up beans better when they are in dishes like enchiladas.  Otherwise, yum!!

smoothie fail, curry win.

I woke up bright and early for a run with M this morning, and the heat was OPPRESSIVE.  I forgot how bad the humidity is here.  We were scheduled for 2.5 miles, which we managed to do without walking... but thank goodness for the two stop lights we got stuck at!  I needed those seconds to catch my breath.  I think towards the end of the run, I said something the effect of "it feels like my heart is in my stomach."  M had similar sentiments.

Since it was ridiculously hot, we didn't run terribly fast: we averaged 11:22 minute miles for the 2.5 miles.  I miss feeling speedy at the end of my runs already, but with this much heat, I'll just have to be satisfied with finishing a run, and leave the speedy parts for when the weather cools down or I'm on a treadmill!

I will say that after a less-than-awesome day yesterday, a morning run has really put me in a better mood!  After I cooled down, I made myself a smoothie for breakfast.  Round two is... not as good as round one.  I put in: 1 cup of milk, 1 1/2 handfuls of spinach, and 8 frozen strawberries. 

I wasn't loving the taste, so I added 2 tsp. of Splenda, but even still... I'm not digging it quite as much this morning.  My new classmate/friend Ilana, who is also new to the blog world, makes smoothies regularly... so I might have to hit her up for some tips!

 Tonight for dinner, I made Vegetable Curry with Couscous.  I was in a curry kind of mood and a little short on time, so this 20 minute recipe was a perfect choice!  The book recipe doesn't say specifically red pepper (as the website does), so I went with green pepper.  Mostly because they were $0.99 and the other colors were $3.49 or something ridiculous like that.  Can you believe that?  Why are the other color peppers so much more money?  Probably because I like them better.  So, step one was just to prepare couscous as usual:

After that, I started on the veggies/sauce.

 Then, half way through making this I realized I never bought the chutney.  So I did a quick google search and found that marmalade or mango salsa can be used as a substitution.  Luckily I had some marmalade in the fridge!  I think the marmalade made this dish sweeter than it would have normally been.  I also probably put a few too many raisins in the dish - or rather, I had too many raisins vs. vegetables. 

So, the dish was overall quite a bit sweeter than it probably should of been, but I just added some extra curry powder to compensate!  I definitely want to try this again so that I can see how it tastes with chutney and more vegetables.

In conjunction with making dinner, I also prepared myself lunch for tomorrow.  I'll be enjoying Tuna-Feta Salad.  This recipe was ridiculously simple... no cooking involved!  Just mixing up a bunch of stuff and letting it sit, at least for an hour, or in this case, overnight.

I'm pretty excited to have this tomorrow - I have recently become fairly obsessed with red onion, and one bite of Cannellini beans tell me I should be excited about them as well!