Good Food Friday

It is time for Good Food Friday. And I have a treat for you. For at least one of you, this is a repeat. Yep, I stole this recipe from my dear sister. But it was so good, and I just need to share it with you. I love dessert. So may I present to you:

Bread and Butter Pudding

Ingredients:
10-12 slices of white bread (should be dense bread)
1 c milk
1 c whipping cream, unwhipped
1/3 c butter
1/2 tsp salt
5 eggs
2/3 c sugar
1 Tblsp vanilla
1 tsp cinnamon with 1 Tblsp sugar, (optional)

Cut crusts from bread and cut into small cubes. Arrange in a greased 9"x13" pan and let dry out overnight.
Bring milk, cream, butter, and salt to a boil. Mix eggs, sugar, and vanilla. Stir small amount of hot milk into eggs, then stir eggs into hot milk mixture. Should be very smooth. Pour mixture evenly over bread cubes.
Place dish with pudding in a roasting pan. Fill the roasting pan 1/3 full of water. Carefully place both pans in 350 degree oven for 35-45 minutes, until pudding is golden brown. Sprinkle with cinnamon sugar.
You can throw raisins or berries in too, if you are into that sort of thing.

Vanilla Sauce:
1/4 c butter, melted
1/2 c sugar
1 c cream or half n half or milk
1 Tblsp cornstarch
1 Tlbsp vanilla

Melt butter and stir remaining ingredients into it. Bring to a simmer for 1 minute or until thickened. Whip to blend. Dribble sauce over pudding.

I love this recipe, and it is really easy to make.
Try it, you'll like it.

A post you'll never ever forget

So I got a new cell phone. Do you know why it is wonderful? Because I can take pictures without having to lug around the camera! Now I can take little snapshots where ever I want.
My other bit of news is that the U of C was laying off 1200 people. I was in a bit of a panic. But, to calm your nerves, I'm safe.............for now. But all around the hospital, they are making cuts. Such as, we are not allowed to buy any more coffee, cups/utensils, Kleenex, etc. etc. And then in my search for toilet paper (they seem to be cutting back on that too), I ran into a bathroom yesterday with this sign on the paper towel dispenser. Click to enlarge.
No I don't talk on my cell phone while I am in the bathroom, but it was in my pocket, and I couldn't resist taking this picture. Please note there wasn't anyone else in the bathroom.
And to finish off this post, I thought I would post the furniture that currently occupies my new office (remodeling hasn't begun yet, nor will it for many months, thanks failing economy). So here is proof that are department has and will be moved into the psych ward - the bed with shackles. There were other pieces of furniture that I thought about taking pictures of that were in parts of the floor that haven't been remodeled yet, but they creeped me out too much to hold the camera/phone still.
Oh yeah, and I made really yummy cinnamon rolls last night.

The End.

Late Running Update

I know you all don't care, but I need to post this. This last week was 45.8. I've got blisters on my feet. Love it. Lucky for me, this week is a rest week!

I'm just not feeling the love this year. Maybe it is training on a treadmill for the 3rd marathon in a row. I don't know.

As for my lack of blogging. Bill is never home, thus I don't have a computer. Plus my life is totally boring right now. Although I still have a job, so I guess there is a bit of excitement.

peace out.

Running Update

Check out this video. This girl is running the Flora London Marathon. Most people in this marathon have to raise money to participate. So this college student made this video, using hare Garmin. You can upload the route you've run onto your computer and it will draw out the course, just in case you were wondering. Check it out. It is awesome. By the way, she wrote "Hello I am running in the 2009 Flora London Marathon for ICYE [Inter-Cultural Youth Exchange]" Here is her website. www.justgiving.com/jennys_run "

Week 3 of running kicked my butt. My total mileage for the week was 43 miles. 8 miles makes a big difference, needless to say, I slept well and I've already started draining blisters. Why do I keep doing this.........I don't know.

Good Food Friday

It's Good Food Friday, and boy, do I have a treat for you. May I present to you...........
Almond Joy Cupcakes
They are super easy, and oh so good. I made these for a coworkers birthday and they were a huge success.
Ingredients
cake mix
chocolate pudding
cool whip or whipped cream
coconut milk
slivered almonds (optional)
coconut (optional)

So to make:
First, make cup cakes. Then make so chocolate pudding so it can kind of set up. While it is setting up, poke holes in your cup cakes and ladle coconut milk over top of cupcake so that it soaks in (you can use a fork, knife etc. I tried the end of a spatula and it left too big of holes, experiment). Next, lather with chocolate pudding. Then top with cool whip or whipped cream. As a topping to, you toast coconut and sprinkle on top or you could add slivered almonds, or both. I did almonds, they were cheaper.

It was delicious and fat free (not really, but induldge in yourself).
Try it, you'll like it!

Happy Brithday Bill

Today is Bill's birthday. He is a big boy now. Lucky for him, he has class all day long. Bummer, but don't worry, we are celebrating with Ribs and Bibs, per Bill's request.

Happy birthday Bill!

May your special day be full of awesomeness.

I know these pictures are way small, but I had them on my email. And when you upload photos via MSN, they won't let you download them again after 30 days. Down with MSN, viva Google. Thus the smallness.

Running Update

Do you like my picture? One morning I woke up to find a mouse in my shoe. Luckily, it was of the fleece variety. (Bill wasn't so lucky and found a push pin in his. His foot was bleeding for a good 10 min.)
So this week was kind of a low mileage week again. Well it should have been more but I had a little mishap earlier this week. So my total mileage was 35.8 miles.
I hadn't slept well in a while, and so Bill told me to take a sleeping pill. So I did, no big deal. So Tuesday morning I woke up to do 4x100 meters strides and then 4 miles, so my total run should have been about 6 miles with warmup/cooldown. But When I got down to the gym, I could not get moving. I did my warm up mile and my strides, and I was struggling to hold my warm up pace. So I only did 4 miles total, 2 of which were walking. I was a mess at work too. So lesson has been learned, don't take a sleep aid if you don't have 8 hours to devote to sleep.
Mileage is going up this next week.

Good Food Friday

Good Food Friday is back, at least for a couple of weeks. I cooked over the break, and so I feel it is time to share. So share with you I will.

On Christmas eve, I made clam chowder in bread bowls. I bought the bread bowls because I'm just that lazy, but I did make the soup, and delicious it was.
So ladies and Gents feast your eyes on..........

Bratten's Clam Chowder

Ingredients:
1 cup chopped onions
1 cup chopped celery
2 cups finely diced potatoes
2 cans clams (6 oz each) [I used chopped, not minced]
3/4 cup butter
3/4 cup flour
1 quart of half and half (or you can use milk and cream or milk and half and half to reduce the fat content)
1 1/2 tsp salt
pepper to taste
2 Tbs red wine vinegar

Put juice (from clams) on vegetables and add water to barely cover. Cook till boiling (veggies need to be tender). Melt butter and make a white sauce, add vegetables and clams. Add vinegar just before serving. Voila.

Believe you me, I hated clam chowder growing up. I would take all the clams out and just eat the chowder. But then one day I tried the clam chowder at Legal Seafood and I've been a convert since. I don't think my mom ever expected me to call for such a recipe. It was a Christmas miracle.

Try it, you'll like it.

It's a New Years Miracle

Ladies and Gentlemen, I'd like to announce the winner of the 2008 Fantasy Football Oaks Society league.....................Bill!!!!!

After managing 3 leagues and finishing second in the first 2, Bill has finally won! What a champ! As a trophy for his fantasy football efforts, I bought him this lovely Chicago Bears lamp to commemorate his triumph (not really). Congratulations, Provo Polygamists. You've earned it. Bill had the best record in the regular reason (which he also had last year, but he lost in the championship), he did a great draft, kept up on all his players, and he even traded the #1 running back for the #4 quarterback in week 10. How did that trade work out? The running back fell off the deep end and stunk for the rest of the season (Clinton Portis), while the quarterback (Drew Brees) went on to become the #1 points scorer in fantasy football. Booya! My husband's a champ.

Provo Polygamist Team Logo:

It is time................Boston '09

It is your lucky day, I've signed up for the Boston Marathon again and thus will be posting my weekly mileage in order to hold myself accountable. Something about -5 degrees outside makes it hard for me to get my butt out of bed. But since I have to report my mileage, I'm miraculously able to get up and get moving.

So this week was a doosy. I wouldn't say I'm out of shape, but by no means am I in marathon shape. The first part of the week was a lot of tempo and marathon goal pace. I can run far, but I can't run fast. I'm still trying to decide what kind of a time I want to go this year, seeing as the hills nearly killed me last year even though I think I was in my best shape. Part of me wants to just have fun and not care about a time, but the real me comes out and feels the need to PR. A nice fast PR would be nice before I transition in to triathlons. But that won't be for a bit.
I digress, my total mileage for this week was........35 miles. I'm also doing a new training program from Runner's World instead of the Boston training plan that I usually do.
I posted this picture so that you could look forward to more awful looking pictures of me after suffering for 26.2 miles. yowza. Maybe I should make my avatar "Runner Chick". I totally look like this, all 5'3" of me.