Avocado Tomato Dip and GF Brownies

As promised, here is my most interesting running schedule for the week:

• Monday: Ran 6.72 broken up into treadmill mills and road miles.
• Tuesday: Ran a 2 mile T/M warm up.  Set the pace between 8.00 and 8.06 and ran 4 x 1 mile sets. Rest 1 minute in between. Cool down 2.41 miles outside with Shane. Total miles 8.76.
• I got a nasty blister on my left foot and had to run upstairs for a band-aid at the end of 3 miles.  That’s one good reason to run in the house – all medical assistance is right at your finger tips.
• Wednesday:  60 minutes easy running.
• Thursday:  60 minutes easy running (because I OH SO want Friday off!)
• Friday: OFF
• Saturday:  20 minute warm up. 3 miles of HARD running (harder than tempo) and 3 miles EASY running x 5 to 6 times.  20 minutes of cool down running.  Shane will be with me for the warm up but he won’t let me run hard unless I let him off the leash and that won’t happen.

It’s not set in stone but that’s the plan.

As for that Monday night bike ride,  it got washed out for me. Ted decided to go and left the house at 7 pm.  He got back about 8:45.  I would have gone if we left before dinner, but after dinner is just to late in my book.  I like to get changed, do any stray chores if they need doing, read for half an hour, turn the TV on for 45 minutes (only 45 because I usually fall asleep or get fed up looking for something of interest) then be in bed by 9:30 pm latest.

What about that dip and GF Brownies?

Avocado Tomato Dip

This recipe came about because I had an avocado getting a little lonely in the fridge. It had been there 2 weeks and I wondered if it was still good. It was.

That’s not a photo of my avocado but it looked very similar so it was still good for the eating.

• 1 avocado – split, seeded and “meat” taken out.
• 14 or so  cherry tomatoes, sliced
• 3 chopped small mint leaves
• 2 TBS lime juice
• 1 tsp cilantro
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp or a few grinds of black pepper
• 1/4 tsp Old Bay Seasoning

Puree all of the above and put into a bowl. Serve with bagel chips (as shown), crackers, crudités, or pita bread slices.

We enjoyed the dip with some shrimp cocktail

Ted didn’t like the Extra Hot Cocktail sauce.  It was perfect for me…Ms. SPICY!

About those GF Brownies…

Betty Crocker has come out with Gluten Free mixes.  Why would this person who LOVES to create her own recipes and mixes ever buy a boxed brownie mix?  Because when it comes to Gluten Free, things can get a little tricky if not expensive.  A lot of times when baking gluten free, there is a mixture of flours and other ingredients veering from standard (standard being all-purpose flour, baking powder, baking soda, etc.).  If you don’t always bake or cook gluten free, these products will just go bad so the alternative is to do some testing on GF products by reputable companies. Hence, BETTY CROCKER!

The additional ingredients to add were…

But since I was in test mode, I through in (literally…no really, it went SPLAT!) 16 oz of LITE sour cream and 4 egg yolks.  Why? Because I had the sour cream that had not been open and the expiration date was June 28th.  Had to use it for something.  The egg yolks were left from another recipe I had baked earlier in the day. To be honest, 8 oz of sour cream and 3 egg yolks would have produced a better textured brownie.

The flavor is unbeatable!  Delicious!  The texture is a little bit spongy but I my tips above would cure that (8 oz of sour cream, 3 egg yolks).  Otherwise, make them as directed on the box and I’m sure you will have brownies that are indistinguishable from regular gluten brownies, the kind most of us are used to eating at … um, here’s a suggestion….July 4th picnics.  I would recommend this mix to anyone, gluten or no gluten diet.

Do you ever engage in “recipe dumping”?  Recipe Dumping = adding ingredients not called for in the recipe but that you have on hand and HAVE to use up so as not to be wasteful. 

Joanne