A fitness update:
I haven’t talked much about fitness lately, and you may notice that I’m not doing a post about New Year’s resolutions, so here’s a little update on things not related to the kitchen.
Ever since the Dallas Half Marathon last month, my legs haven’t bounced back. I still have terrible pains on the sides of my knees that flare when I run about .5-1.25 miles. I purposely chose a race in early December because I thought having the Christmas holiday to rest and be kind to my body would be helpful and necessary. That was a good idea, and the rest has been great. I haven’t run more than 1.5 miles or picked up a barbell since before Christmas week. It has been very nice to not be sore, not exercise for over an hour, and not be so darn hungry. However, I have been doing yoga, the elliptical, walking, stretching, and the Stairmaster and still exercising 5-6 days per week over the break.
Now that it’s back to working hard, I have told my body I’m ready to run, but my legs are still not. I am definitely not considering the Houston Half Marathon in 4 weeks anymore, and that’s alright. My legs are taking a long time to recover, and it’s given me an opportunity to focus on some other fitness things I like to do, like pushing it hard at Crossfit (before the race, I was wary about being too sore, lifting too heavy, and pushing too hard). I also found a different elliptical machine I like at the gym (I am usually not a fan and find I don’t feel like they’re a great workout), and I added the Stairmaster and jumping rope back at the gym (killers after 5 minutes!). I have also been doing a Crossfit related body weight challenge of doing pushups and situps every single day starting at 1 on December 1 and adding one each day until 50. Today is Day 35 so I do 35 of each.
Fortunately, my leg pains are only related to running and is not bothered on anything else mentioned above, even when I do 70 pound power cleans or box jumps!
I love to run, will hopefully pick it up when my legs feel better, and would like to focus on faster short distances. Until then, no race recaps or long run summaries on here! Hope you’ll stick around for the pretty food pictures.
Turkey Chili and homemade Cornbread Muffins
I think that chili is a very lean and filling dish. It’s just browned meat with tomato sauce and spices. Not much fat, no butter, little oil. Pretty simple and healthy.
- 2 packs (2.5 lbs) Jennie O Lean Ground Turkey Meat
- 1 box Wick Fowler’s 2 Alarm chili kit (this just has the spices, you could obviously use your own)
- 8 oz can tomato sauce
- 16 oz water
- 1 white onion
- for toppings: lettuce, tomato, yellow cheese, guacamole
- The spices in the pack are red pepper, flour, cumin, oregano, chili pepper, dried onions and garlic, paprika, salt.
- In a large pot, coat with olive oil and sautee an onion.
- Brown the turkey meat in olive oil and onion until completely cooked.
- Add 1 can tomato sauce and 2 cans water. Stir well.
- For the spices, I added all except for half of the red pepper and half of the salt. The box says to adjust the heat by how much red pepper you add.
- Let simmer on low for 30 minutes.
- Add the flour with 1/4 C warm water and stir. This is optional, but makes the chili thicker and the perfect consistency in my opinion.
- Let sit at least 15 more minutes. We cook it earlier in the afternoon and let it sit on low or no heat until it’s time to eat.
- Top with anything you want!
Cornbread Muffins:
This recipe was adapted from an Ina Garten one I found online. I cut her recipe in half because it said it was for 12 muffins and there were only two of us. My halved recipe ended up making 12 muffins! So you could cut it in half again (?!) or just make 12 muffins. We froze the rest.
This recipe is not a healthified version. But it was really good!
- 1 1/2 C all purpose flour
- 1/2 C white sugar
- 1/2 C cornmeal
- 1 T baking powder
- 3/4 tsp salt
- 3/4 C milk
- 1 stick butter
- 2 eggs
- 3/4 can corn
- Mix the wet and dry ingredients separately with hand mixer. Pour wet into dry and mix well.
- In a muffin tin lined with paper cups, pour in batter and bake on 350* for 30 minutes.
- Let cool and enjoy!
These were really, really good. Adding the corn made it have a little pop to the bite. The butter made it so fluffy and not dry. And they were perfectly browned on top. A keeper recipe!
Maybe we can do a run/walk when Mom and I are in Houston for your birthday weekend.
Sorry to hear that you still have some pain, but I know that you will heal up.
I’m happy to hear that your knee doesn’t bother you when you do other exercises! 
Food looks great (as usual!)
That chili looks delicious! I love that you make yours a salad – I do that, too. I like the cold crunchy lettuce with the warm chili.
I loved reading your fitness update – I think it’s wonderful that without running, you are doing all sorts of other activities in your workouts. I need to mix up my workouts more often…like trying out CrossFit! And I used to have a jump rope and would like to get another one- thanks for the idea! Also love the situp/pushup challenge you are doing – what a great way to push yourself and see improvements.
It sounds like this is a time for you to concentrate on being fit and listening to your body. Billy has not bounced back from running at all. He joined me on a run yesterday afternoon for the 1st time since the race and felt pain in his knee after about 1/2 a mile.