There are two things that I love about Friday night cooking - creating a delicious meal to fuel the weekend workouts and having delicious leftovers.
Last Friday I made this delicious eggplant lasagna. No recipe, just a bunch of delicious foods in the refrigerator for me to use.
Plus, Karel and I had just shopped at the Tomato Vine early that day, so we had lot of local, fresh produce to use.
With two endurance triathletes in our household, a lot of food needs to be in our house to keep us well fueled and happy. We shop a lot, we cook a lot, a lot of dishes get washed, we eat a lot and we yum a lot.
The weekends are often hard for endurance athletes when it comes to meal prep and planning. Endurance athletes have every reason to feel too exhausted to prep and cook food but that is no excuse not to do it. If you want your body to perform and stay in good health, you have to nourish it on a daily basis - especially on the weekends when you expect your body to workout for long hours.
Eating should not be an afterthought when your 5 hour bike workout or 2 hour run is over as that is the time when it's easy to give into post workout "reward" foods and cravings, particularly when you are too tired or hungry to cook. If the right foods for your body and workout load are available and ready in your house, then you will be fueling in the right way for your body on the weekend.
Eating should not be an afterthought when your 5 hour bike workout or 2 hour run is over as that is the time when it's easy to give into post workout "reward" foods and cravings, particularly when you are too tired or hungry to cook. If the right foods for your body and workout load are available and ready in your house, then you will be fueling in the right way for your body on the weekend.
My eggplant lasagna was perfect on Friday evening..... and on Sat afternoon after training. Karel enjoyed his vegetarian lasagna on Friday night and then added some meat to his Saturday post-workout portion.
When making your own lasagna, be creative. There are no rules or guidelines when it comes to how you dress-up (or fill-in) your casserole dish.
Here are the ingredients in my eggplant lasagna (by layer):
Marinara sauce
Thinly sliced eggplant
Arugula
Chickpeas
Crumbled tempeh (~half package)
Thinly sliced eggplant
Marinara sauce
Sliced onions
Mushrooms
Garlic (powder or fresh)
Thinly sliced eggplant (whatever is left)
Marinara
Crumbled tempeh (the rest of the package)
Shredded cheese
Marinara sauce
Thinly sliced eggplant
Arugula
Chickpeas
Crumbled tempeh (~half package)
Thinly sliced eggplant
Marinara sauce
Sliced onions
Mushrooms
Garlic (powder or fresh)
Thinly sliced eggplant (whatever is left)
Marinara
Crumbled tempeh (the rest of the package)
Shredded cheese
Bake at 425 degrees for ~45 minutes
What are you making for dinner tonight?