Lentil Tortilla Soup

It's the week after Thanksgiving and I'm still thinking about all the delicious food I ate last week.  I have no regrets, but I'm certainly looking forward to healthier (but still delicious) food this week.  And given the chilly weather we've been having, soup is on my mind again.  We made this lentil tortilla soup last week, and it ticks all the boxes... easy, quick, healthy, and delicious!

In addition to being easy, I loved how versatile the recipe is.  There are instructions for it in a pressure cooker, in a slow cooker, or on the stove top.  We did it in an instant pot using the pressure cooker setting and it worked perfectly.  And depending on the toppings you choose, it can be vegan and gluten free too.  Here's what we did

6 Servings

Ingredients

• 1/2 medium onion diced
• 1 tsp olive oil
• 1 bell pepper diced
• 1 jalapeno pepper diced
• 2.5 cups vegetable broth 
• 15 oz can crushed tomatoes
• 1/2 cup salsa
• 1 TBSP tomato paste
• 15 oz can black beans 
• 15 oz can pinto beans 
• 1 cup corn (fresh, canned, or frozen)
• 3/4 cup dried red lentils
• 1/2 tsp chili powder
• 1/2 tsp garlic powder
• 1/2 tsp cumin
• 1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
• salt and pepper to taste
• Optional Toppings (1/2 cup milk (dairy or non-dairy), crushed tortilla chips, sliced avocado, shredded cheese, sour cream, etc.) 

Directions

 So easy for the instant pot!  Chop up the veggies, add everything to the pot except the optional toppings, high pressure for 15 minutes and natural release (we got impatient and manually released after 15 minutes of natural release).  That's it!  Serve it up and everyone can add whatever toppings they want.  We had some leftover milk we needed to use up so we added that to the soup to make it a bit creamier.  I had tortilla chips and avocado on mine, Mike had cheese on his.

It was so good!  The lentils kind of melted into the soup and thickened it up so this felt really hearty and a great dinner on a cold evening.

I'm linking up with Deborah and Sarah for Meatless Monday.

 

Race 13.1 Baltimore Training - Week 4

I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving!  We had a wonderful week, with mostly smooth travel and a lot of fun time with family.  The work outs were mostly as planned, though there was an extra rest day.  But I'm not going to stress about that on Thanksgiving week, especially since it was a cut back week too.  Here are the details.

Monday - Unplanned rest day.  I was supposed to go to body pump but just ended up being tired after work.

Tuesday - 3 miles at an easy pace before work

Wednesday - 3 miles at an easy pace in the afternoon

Thursday - Rest day and flying to Atlanta.

Friday - Strength training with body weight exercises (squats, crunches, glute bridges, clam shells, planks, push ups, and lunges x2 sets)

Plus craft time with my niece :)

Saturday - 4.5 miles in my brother-in-law's neighborhood, .5 mile warm up, 3.5 miles tempo, .5 mile cool down.

Sunday - 6 miles back home in my neighborhood.  It was a beautiful Fall morning and perfect for running.

We also went to the Kennedy Center in the afternoon for a concert where the National Symphony Orchestra was playing music from various Disney movies.  We really enjoyed it!

This week is race week! Here's the plan.

Monday - Rest day
Tuesday - Speed work (.5 mile warm up, 3 miles half marathon pace, .5 mile cool down)
Wednesday - Body Pump
Thursday - 3.5 miles easy pace
Friday - 5.5 miles easy pace plus packet pick up in the evening
Saturday - Race 13.1 Baltimore
Sunday - 2 mile recovery run

I'm linking up with with HoHoRuns and Taking the Long Way Home for the Weekly Wrap.

 

Thankful

I have so many things to be thankful for, and Thanksgiving week seems like the perfect week to reflect on it!  I realized that I haven't really done a Thanksgiving post since 2014, the first year I blogged.  That one covered the big things like family, friends, and kitties :)  Of course, those continue to be the big things I'm thankful for.  But here are a couple more things that I'm especially thankful for at the moment.

1.  Travel - I've been able to travel and run in some new places this year.  The travel has been both for fun and for work, and I'm so thankful that I've had the chance to gather these memories.

View from a run in Napa Valley

2.  A new family member - my brother got married this year!

3.  Running and being outside - Having tendinitis and being unable to run in the Spring weather was a real downer.  It made me really appreciate being able to run again and enjoy the time outside.  I even enjoyed the hot weather over the Summer and I'm going to do my best to appreciate the cold runs in the Winter :)

 

Sunrise from yesterday's run

4.  Trying new things - I've been more politically active this year and I really enjoyed it.  It gave me the opportunity to meet a lot of cool people and get involved with some interesting projects.  I'm taking a bit of a break for the end of the year but look forward to continuing this next year.

 So those are some things that really stick out for me as I look back over the year.  I hope that you all have plenty to be thankful for as well and that everyone has a great Thanksgiving!

Race 13.1 Baltimore Training - Week 3

I hope everyone had a great week!  My week went pretty well.  I was able to get in all my runs and 1 strength training session.  I was also pretty good about recovery this week with 3 sessions foam rolling and an epsom salt bath.  I had hoped to get in a yoga session but that didn't happen.  Here are the details.

Monday - Planned rest day

Tuesday - Strength training.  I had planned to run on the track but for some reason it wasn't open :(  I waited there for a while to see if someone showed up but I eventually gave up and went home.  I tried a new strength training video on You Tube and really liked it!  I was definitely feeling it the next day but not so much that it interfered with running.

Wednesday - 3 miles on the treadmill

Thursday - 50 minutes on the elliptical.  We had snow during the morning but it changed to rain by the afternoon so I was able to get to the gym and use the elliptical.

Friday - 4 mile run - saw deer in the neighborhood toward the end of the run.

Saturday - 5 mile run

Sunday - 10 mile run with 5 miles at an easy pace, 3 miles at marathon pace, 1 mile at half marathon pace, and then a cool down.  I felt pretty good during this run!  My tempo miles were all on target except the last mile was way too fast.  I was aiming for 13:30 and ended up with 12:17.  But that mile was also mostly downhill.

So that was last week.  I also played around with my shoes a bit.  I laced them differently for the Wednesday and Friday runs.  That helped a little but they were still too tight in the toes.  So I went to the running store and it turns out my feet have changed a bit and I have higher arches than I used to.  They were pretty flat before.  So I tried out some new shoes and ended up with Brooks Adrenalines.  I tried them on my Saturday run and work them for my long run on Sunday. 

This week is a little complicated with Thanksgiving travel. Here's the plan.

Monday - Body pump
Tuesday - Speed work (1 mile warm up, 3.5 miles tempo)
Wednesday - 3 easy miles
Thursday - Rest day and fly to Atlanta
Friday - 4 miles
Saturday - 3 miles + yoga and fly back home in the afternoon
Sunday - 6 miles

I'm linking up with with HoHoRuns and Taking the Long Way Home for the Weekly Wrap.

 

AfterShokz Trekz Air

I hope you all had a great week!  We had a bit of snowy weather here but thankfully I was able to work from home and stay warm.  I thought I'd take this opportunity to get back on track with blogging and talk about the Aftershokz Trekz Air headphones that I've been wanting to review for a while.  I figure this is also a good time to link up with Fairytales and Fitness for their Friday link up.

 

I had been using wireless earbuds from Amazon but they were pretty cheap.  And I had bought the same ear buds like three different times because they eventually stopped working at some point.  The most recent pair I had stopped charging so I decided to stop buying cheap earbuds and try to invest in something that will hopefully last longer.

I had been reading great reviews of Aftershokz so I decided to give them a try.  And I love them!  The unique thing about Aftershokz is the headphones don't actually go in your ears.  They use bone conduction so that you can still hear things going on around you.  Which is great for running. 

Sweaty post run photo - you can see that my ears are completely uncovered

 Here are some things I've noticed so far.

1.  Comfortable and light weight!

2.  Can definitely hear better and I can hear everything going on around me while running.

3.  They're a little weird if the volume is too high though because you can feel them vibrate.

4.  Another downside is that sometimes, you do want to tune out the world.  For example, at the gym or on an airplane.  They come with ear plugs to help with that, but I prefer just using some old wired ear buds I have for those types of situations.

5.  I'm still trying to figure out battery life.  So far, so good.  I even forgot to turn them off after my last two hour run and they had plenty of battery when I finally notices several hours later.  So it seems like the battery life is pretty long lasting.  The website specifies 6 hours of battery life.

Potato Almond Soup

Brr... it's definitely beginning to feel like Winter here.  It's cold and tomorrow's our first chance for some snow (just a little bit) so I've definitely been looking toward soups for dinner.  There's something so hearty and comforting about a hot bowl of soup when you've come in from the cold.  And this Potato Almond Soup from the Washington Post has the added benefit of being super easy.  Plus, it's pretty healthy, vegan and gluten free!

 

Photo from the Washington Post

4 Servings

Ingredients

2 medium russet potatoes

4 large cloves garlic

1 medium onion

2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

1 cup skinless almonds

2 cups water, or more as needed

2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar

2 sprigs fresh thyme, plus more leaves for garnish

Kosher or sea salt

Freshly ground black pepper

1. Pre-heat oven to 425 degrees

2. Peel the potatoes, garlic and onion.  Chop all veggies into bite-size chunks and place in a bowl. Drizzle with the oil, salt and pepper, and toss to coat. Spread the mixture on the baking sheet and roast for 20 minutes, until tender.

3. While the veggies roast, combine the almonds and water in a small pot over medium-high heat. Bring to a boil, but do not let them boil over; cook for 2 minutes.  

4. Toss the roasted vegetable mixture into a blender with the almonds and their water, the vinegar, leaves from the thyme sprigs and a pinch of salt and pepper. Puree until very smooth. It looked to thick to us so we added more water at this point, as well as some olive oil and more vinegar. So it's important to taste and add anything more you want at this point.  We also added some smoked paprika and garlic powder.

Not quite as pretty as the version from the Post but it was delicious!

And that's it!  Scoop out in bowls, drizzle with some olive oil on top, and some hot sauce if you want.  We felt like the hot sauce added an extra zing that really worked with this soup.  It tasted even better as leftovers the next day.  We served it with just some steamed green beans but it would be perfect with a simple salad too.  

I'm linking up with Deborah and Sarah for Meatless Monday.

 

Race 13.1 Baltimore Training - Week 2

I hope everyone had a great week!  Mine was a bit of a mixed bag.  I'm happy with the work outs I got in but ended up missing a couple runs due to weird foot drama and just plain scheduling.  Here are the details.

Monday - Rest Day - I was also working as an election worker again so I had to go to my assigned polling place to help set it up so everything was ready to open on time Tuesday morning.

Tuesday - 2.8 miles easy - cut a little short because I got caught in the rain.  Then I went to my shift at the polls.  I had the closing shift which meant I stayed until the end and drove everything to the Board of Elections at the end of the night.  I was very impressed with how organized everything was and how smoothly our particular polling location ran.

Wednesday - Strength training at home.  I started out doing a body pump video but my stomach was not feeling well with the quick movements.  I stopped the video and just did some basic strength training on my own, squats, glute bridges, calf raises, clam shells, planks.

Thursday - 3.6 miles on the treadmill.  This was a 1 mile warm up, 2.5 miles tempo and then a minimal cool down.  My shoes have been weird lately (they're only a couple months old!) and I ended up with a cut on the back of my right foot from the rubbing.

Friday - Yoga With Adrienne - I kept meaning to go out for a run during the day but things just kept coming up and I didn't manage to get out there before the sun set.  So I ended up doing a yoga session in the evening.

Saturday - 5 miles on the treadmill.

This is when things kind of got weird with my right foot.  It's the same foot I had tendinitis in earlier in the year and I'm a bit paranoid about it.  Because of the rubbing with my shoes, I had gotten new shoes.  But for some reason, the new shoes were fine on my left foot but tight on my right foot.  I don't know if I just need to relace the shoe or maybe it was a little swollen from Thursday's treadmill run where my ankle had gotten cut up.  The result is that it was even more swollen when I woke up Sunday :(

Sunday - Unplanned rest day.  Since my foot was visibly swollen Sunday morning, I ended up deciding not to run.  The swelling had gone by the afternoon and I toyed with the idea of going out for an afternoon run, but I decided against it.  I did go buy some new running socks because I realized the socks I've been using are pretty old and that may have been contributing to the rubbing on the back of my ankle too.

But the weekend wasn't all bad.  We did go out with to celebrate a couple friend's birthdays Saturday evening.  It started out with a 50th birthday dinner celebration and then to another friend's house to watch Mad Max.

So that was last week.  Hopefully this week is better. Here's the plan for this week.

Monday - Rest day
Tuesday - Speed work (1 mile warm up, 3.5 miles tempo)
Wednesday - Body Pump
Thursday - 3 miles
Friday - 4 miles
Saturday - 5.5 miles + yoga
Sunday - 10 miles

I'm linking up with with HoHoRuns and Taking the Long Way Home for the Weekly Wrap.

 

Race 13.1 Baltimore Training - Week 1

I hope everyone had a great weekend!  I had a bit of time to rest over the weekend which was really nice.  And I got in all my scheduled work outs :)  Here are the details of the week.

Monday - Planned rest day

Tuesday - Body Pump (last minute notice that the track was closed so switched Tuesday and Wednesday)

Wednesday - 2.5 miles easy

Thursday - 50 minutes on the elliptical

Friday - Speed work (.5 mile warm up, 3 miles tempo pace, cool down) plus Yoga With Adrienne's Yoga for Runners

Plus we also went out in the evening to the Kennedy Center.  Regina Spektor was performing with the National Symphony Orchestra and it was amazing!

Saturday - 5 easy miles

Sunday - 8 miles with a friend.  The weather was cooler and this was a near perfect run.  We both felt like we felt really good the whole time.

So that was last week.  This week is back to training. Here's the plan for this week.

Monday - Rest day
Tuesday - Speed work
Wednesday - 3 miles
Thursday - Body Pump
Friday - 3 miles
Saturday - 5 miles + yoga
Sunday - 9 miles

I'm linking up with with HoHoRuns and Taking the Long Way Home for the Weekly Wrap.