Make Ahead Monday - Chicken & Rice

Sometimes you just want to come home to a meal on the table.  When you are the main meal prepared of the household, this is a rare occurrence.  It is with this desire in mind, that I decided to bring about Make Ahead Meals, or MAM Mondays (Oops, make that Tuesday this week!)!  Based on the traditional 1950's casserole dinner, but with a healthy 2010's twist.  MAMs are made on the weekend and cooked during the week in the oven or crockpot!

You all know I'm not really a fan of condensed soups and I love my dinners to be full of vegetables.  Most MAMs that I come across are either prepared with two cans of condensed soup, or are simply pasta with sauce covered in cheese.  I like to call these "comfort casseroles."  With springtime approaching (and bikini season around the corner), I'm looking to keep the MAMs light and healthy.

The best thing about the MAMs that I have prepared so far, I come home to Boyfriend in the kitchen, pulling a hot dish out of the oven.  His timing is usually pretty good as he stalks me with his phone to see when I'm coming home.  (Want to stalk your significant other?  Download the Find My Friends app to their iPhone and yours.  Authorize each phone to view the other.  Voila - you've just lo-jacked your SO.)

This weeks MAM is a creamy chicken and rice casserole.  I added way more mushrooms and peas than the original recipe called for, because mushrooms are delicious.  I threw this meal together on Sunday in about thirty minutes and BF tossed it in the oven Wednesday night for a quick heat through and crisp up.  I was enjoying dinner a mere minutes after I got home.  Which when your commute is two hours each way, sometimes it's nice to not worry about what is for dinner.

Have any favorite casseroles that you want to see lightened up and made into a MAM?  Drop me a comment below and I'll see what I can do for you!

Wilde Week #10

1. This week I have eaten a ridiculous amount of European-style butter.  I blame Milk bar.  Boyfriend and I went to a third baking class (technically class #2 - the crunch) in Brooklyn.  There we made more delicious cookies with a half pound of butter in them.  Then we took them home and I ate them for breakfast.  Cookies for breakfast is totally okay, especially cornflake-marshmallow-chocolate chip cookies.

2. BF and I emptied out our piggy bank this past week.  It weighed over thirty pounds!  Now someone won't let me take it to the coinstar because he likes looking at the jars of money. 

3. There was a Girls marathon on Sunday night.  I tried so hard to enjoy it.  It just didn't happen, maybe I'm too uncool.  Am I the only one who just doesn't get it?

4. I got new running shoes!  After spending time with a nice girl at Fleet Feet, I learned you should buy running shoes a half size larger than you usually wear.  Huh, who knew.  Now I'm going to be so much faster, can't wait.  Just wish they were in a more obnoxious color.

5. I totally kicked butt at my Crossfit workout this Thursday!  Finished first!  Mostly due to my awesome jump roping ability coupled with everyone else's inability to jump rope.  I jump rope like a rock star.

6. Ever have one of those weeks at work when nothing went right?  Yeah, that was my week.  Chemistry was plotting against me all week long.  I can't wait for next week, I have to redeem myself.

7. Easter is tomorrow!  What does that mean?  Easter candy is on sale on Monday!  Yeah half price Reese's peanut butter eggs.  It also means that everyone who gave up chocolate for Lent can stop being crazy and have some chocolate bunny!

8. For some reason my Crossfit gym is closed on Easter Sunday!  I had to sign up for the 7am class this morning.  Someone isn't happy about my alarm going off at 6:45 on a Saturday morning.  Okay, it's more than one person who isn't jazzed about getting up at that time.  Class better be awesome!

Coconut Key Lime Squares

I've never been so happy to see Thursday than I have this week!  Not that it has felt like a very long week, it's just been a very tiring one!  Coupled with the fact that I spent a long weekend in Buffalo, eating totally healthy food (aka - hot dogs, Buffalo wings and Perry's ice cream), I'm exhausted.  I even missed one of my scheduled runs for my half marathon training plan!  I'd make it up, but I'm tired.

This past weekend I headed to Buffalo for a few reasons.  1. It was my dad's birthday!  We enjoyed local hibachi at Shogun (ONION VOLCANO!) and ate Dessert Deli cake that was more chocolatey than just pouring chocolate syrup in your mouth.  2. Perry's Ice cream invited me to come visit them and eat ice cream!  And they told me I could bring someone.  I brought my dad, because it was his birthday and he loves their ice cream.  I'll talk more about our ice cream factory tour next week, what I want to talk about today is - my long run in Buffalo.

If you have been reading along, you'll know that I'm only three weeks out from my half marathon!  Each weekend I've been making longer and longer runs to help train for my eventual 13.1 miles in central park.  I've run 10K races in the past and never really trained for them.  BF and I ran a Spartan Super last year that wound up being 11 miles, we trained one day for that race and ate crossant sandwiches the morning of the race.  I decided that neither of these tactics would be a good idea for my upcoming half marathon, I wanted to do it right.

Knowing that it was still a little cold in Buffalo, I packed my new running hat and gloves and fuzzy running jacket.  The only thing I wasn't prepared for was snow.  Which it did on Friday, four inches worth of the white stuff.  I headed to my brothers house and used his treadmill for my 4 mile run.  But there was no way I was going to run 8 miles on a treadmill.  It's so boring!

Instead, I mapped my run online, trying to find the right route from my parents house that would give me an 8 mile loop.  It also had to avoid running up the highway overpass near their house.  I decided upon a route that was just longer than 8 miles and crossed only one 4-lane highway.  It was also on a series of roads that I grew up driving down.  I'm very familiar with the roads of my hometown and I know exactly when each road intersects.  This proved an amazing bonus when running.

Saturday morning, around 9:00am, I worked up the energy to go running.  I put on my layers, showed my mom how to track me with her phone, laced up my shoes and hit the road!  I ran past my High school best friends house, my first house that we moved out of when I was 5, my high school and first middle school.  At mile seven I ran past my brothers house and was on the home stretch!  I crossed the highway and my mile tracker called out the completion of my eighth mile.  Unfortunately, I was still a half mile from home.

After running 8.47 miles in 82 minutes and burning almost nine hundred calories, I had no qualms with eating a big slice of cake for dads birthday that night.