Butternut Bacon Risotto

Yumm!

Nouns:
1.5 cups Arborio or other short-grain rice
3-4 cups vegetable stock
1/2 cup white wine
1 small butternut squash, seeded, peeled and roasted
4 slices turkey bacon, sliced
1 medium onion, diced
5-6 cloves garlic, minced
1 sprig rosemary
1 bay leaf
1 tsp thyme
3-4 oz fresh grated parmesan
olive oil

Verbs:
Heat the broth, wine and herbs in a saucepan over medium heat.  In a separate pan, lightly saute the rice in olive oil over medium heat for a few minutes until rice is coated and smells lightly toasty.  Add a cup of the hot liquid to the rice and stir.  Once the liquid is absorbed, add more, a ladle-full at a time, waiting until the liquid is mostly absorbed before adding more, until the rice is cooked through.  Stirring enough to keep the rice from sticking to the bottom.   In the meantime, saute the onion, garlic and bacon and add to the cooked rice mixture.  Remove from the heat and combine with the squash, which should mashed into small pieces with a fork.  Then add the cheese, plus salt and pepper to taste.

Running in the cold

Today was sunny, so instead of going to the gym I got ready to go outside for my run, thinking "yay!  What a lovely fall day!  I am so glad that I can run outside!  Tra la la la!"

I layered up, grabbed some gloves, and took about three steps into the outside world before my self-congratulatory internal monologue turned into "OH MY GOD.  I shall freeze to death and be a sad blue corpse only steps from my front door because it is so cold I cannot possibly make it back inside.  Why is the wind biting me?  Wind, why so cruel?"

Somehow, I persevered, convincing myself that once I got going, I'd warm up and all would be well.  At the end of the first mile I could no longer feel every gust of wind through all the layers on my torso or the mesh of my shoes.  My hands, gloved, were warm-ish.  Yay.  But the rest of me persisted in sending signals to my brain to continually update the cold situation.  Yep, still cold.  Whoo!  Cold gust there!  And, this particular shady patch of ground, extra cold!  COLD.

I am really not cut out for winter running.  I am waaaay too  much of wuss.

In other news, here's the meal plan for this week:

Corn and Bean Soup in the crockpot
Butternut Squash Risotto with Radicchio
Chicken and Barley Country Soup
Turkey Meatloaf and Roasted Potatoes
Irish Mac and Cheese, Roasted Broccoli and Cauliflower


I am having guests over on Wednesday (I think) and one is a vegetarian, so I'll make the Irish Mac and Cheese for that.  (It is Irish because you add beer, and also perhaps bacon if you like that sort of thing)

Running

It's been a slow couple of weeks for me and running.  I have been unmotivated and the weather has been terrible, which means that weekend running has just not been happening.  Boo.

I have decided to cut myself a little slack and just go with the flow for the rest of December.  A friend at work has asked me to run a half marathon with her the first week of April, so I am going to start training for the race in January.  I"m really looking forward to the training, but I'm also really enjoying taking it easy right now.  I run a few nights a week at the gym on the treadmill, watching Rachel Maddow and listening to Lady Gaga, and that's fine for now.

However, a good friend of mine has been doing lunchtime runs, and they are sorely tempting me.  I am not sure if I"m up for feeling sweaty and gross the second half of my workdays, but still, I get so antsy in the office that many days I just feel like I"m ready to burst out of there by midday, like I need to get all cold and snotty and tingly and tired on a good long run.  Maybe I'll give it a shot.