Sunday Long Run {With Vegan French Toast Casserole for Fuel!}
Happy Sunday friends! There’s not a whole lot left of it, but I hope it was a good one. We had another beautiful weekend here in Atlanta. I was quite lucky to have carved out plenty of time to spend outside to enjoy the weather from Friday all the way through today. Perhaps a little too much yesterday judging from my “tan” lines, but totally worth it to keep the mental health in tip top shape. Though today it was more about keeping the physical health on point.
At the beginning of the year I signed up for a 10k race that would have been held this morning had Covid-19 not interrupted the plan. Normally spring is one of the seasons where I run a good bit, either training for or actually participating in multiple local races. With moving my personal training clients and classes online this last month, my running pretty much ground to a halt. We have been lucky here in our part of the world that getting outside for exercise has still been an option, and very much encouraged. My neighborhood has plenty of routes and space to still walk and run with ample room for social distancing. However, along with being absolutely smashed daily from working out more with my online classes and trying to find my quarantine mojo, running has been very low on my priority list lately.
Looking at my Garmin stats, you’d think I was still staying consistent. Wellll, most of the green markers were walks. Not that walking is not a fantastic activity, for both physical and mental health, but if all had gone to plan most of those marks would have been runs to get ready for the race this morning. If the worst of this past season was missing out on some runs, I’m really not doing too badly, so I can’t complain! This past week I finally adapted to all the body weight training I’ve been doing along with my corporate groups, so I made it a point to actually get out for some runs. Today marked my fourth run this week, woohoo!
Given that I would have been running 6.2 miles this morning anyway, I thought it was a good goal to just get out and knock out the distance even though I hadn’t stuck to my intended training plan. Looking back at my history, it’s been since the beginning of February that I’ve run more than 4 miles. Lately even just 2-3 miles has felt challenging, but I was up for a longer challenge today. The weather cooperated with a cool breeze and sunshine to make it pleasant despite my protesting legs. I have a feeling they’ll be a little pooped tomorrow after the effort (lots of hills this run), but I will be appreciative of the feeling and what it means. Here’s hoping I can shake off the lethargy of the past month, and start working toward new training goals again. The race has been rescheduled for September–plenty of time to work back up to peak conditioning!
Before I went out for my run, we started out the day with a delicious vegan French toast casserole (recipe here). I had gotten another heaping gallon of fresh strawberries on Saturday at the market pickup, along with some wonderful fresh bread from a local bakery. Usually the boyfriend makes us a smoothie on Sunday mornings, but I decided it was time for a special Sunday breakfast to use up some of those beautiful seasonal berries.
The recipe couldn’t have been any easier to put together, so while it was in the oven I decided to also make my first yearly batch of strawberry chia seed jam. So easy, just berries, any spices you like, and this time I did dates for a wee bit extra sweetness and depth of flavor. Cook it down with a bit of water until the berries are cooked down and the dates are pretty much melted into the mixture. Remove from heat and stir in a few tablespoons of chia seeds to thicken. Of course I couldn’t resist topping our breakfast with a few spoonfuls for an extra punch of berry flavor…
I highly recommend the recipe! We enjoyed it very much this morning, and we have enough for a few more days of indulgent-yet-healthy bowls to get our week going on a high note. My cup is quite full after all the time outdoors, good exercise, and some time spent with a few loved ones I haven’t seen in quite some time. I’m sure it will be quite some time before things get back to “normal” again, whatever that may look like in the future, but I’ll gladly take my small moments of joy and peace where I can get them.
Wishing you all a healthy and happy week ahead!
