After last Saturday’s run I was really unsure how I’d do in my next 5k. I rested on Sunday, not because that was the plan but because I woke up a little tired from the night before – I had my book launch party Saturday night and it was a raging success, if I do say so myself!

You can buy the book from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, or fine book retailers everywhere. Run out and do it people, Christmas is right around the corner!

In addition to not running on Sunday I also hosted my annual Thanksgiving brunch that day. This is my favorite annual event, one filled with much food, friends, and champagne.

This is what we started with. Five more bottles were added to the cooler. Nearly all were consumed that day.

Monday morning brought a food hangover – seriously, why did I eat so much at Sunday’s all-day brunch?! It also brought an easy set of sprints to warm up my legs. They felt better, but still not great.

Tuesday morning I set out to do fartleks, that fun workout where you pick a point and sprint to it, then ease back for a little bit, then pick another point and sprint. Repeat for as long as you want. I hit the trail for three miles of this and my overall pace was 7:15. Finally, my legs had some juice in them.

After a weekend of gluttony, lots of wine on Saturday night and lots of food and champagne on Sunday, I needed to make a healthy meal to balance it out a bit. I decided to try a new one and I’m pleased with how it turned out. I changed a few things – I  used sweet Italian sausage instead of chicken sausages. I also doubled the amount of meat it called for. We like sweet Italian sausage so the more, the better! I’ll definitely make this recipe again, though next time I’ll probably omit the spinach as it didn’t really add anything to the recipe. Enjoy!

Skillet Sweet Potato, Sausage & Spinach Hash

• 2 sweet potatoes, peeled and diced small
• 1 apple, peeled, cored, and diced
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
• 2-5 sweet Italian sausages, removed from casing (add as little or as much as you prefer)
• 2-3 large handfuls fresh baby spinach (optional)
• 1/3 cup sweet yellow onion, diced
• salt and pepper to taste

Boil the diced potatoes for a few minutes to soften them up. Drain and add potatoes to skillet with diced apple and olive oil. Add a pinch of salt and the cinnamon to the pan. Saute over medium heat until potatoes are cooked and softened.

While the sweet potatoes are cooking, cook the sausages and onion in a separate skillet, making sure to break up the sausage as it cooks. Don’t try to cook the sausages in the same skillets the potatoes – I did that and ended up mashing up my potatoes. Still delicious just not quite as pretty. Once the sausages are cooked through, add spinach to skillet and stir. It’ll wilt pretty quickly. Add apple-potato mixture to the sausage and mix to combine.