Don’t worry I’m not getting all romantic on you 🙂
I hope everyone had a good weekend! I know I did! A healthy mix of school work, running, and shopping 🙂
I finally went for a long run in Rome! It felt amazing! I did a fast 7 miler… yes you read that correctly. I’ve been feeling awesome running here! I don’t know if it is all the carbs I am eating, or the fact that I’m not running as much as I do at home, so my body is just ready to go, but I feel great! I’ve decided to make the long run a weekly thing, every Sunday. Throughout the week I typically have time to run about 4 days for about 2-4 miles. I’m pleased though, it will be a good base to maintain my endurance as well as to start training for my half marathon!!! YEP! I just signed up for the Hershey Half Marathon in October! I’m totally pumped, it has been years since I did a 1/2 marathon and what better place than chocolate world!
Friday night me and the girls in my class headed over to our professors apartment for a wine and cheese tasting! It was loads of fun! We tried about 6 different wines and 5 different cheeses!
Olives!
Cheeses and crackers! We also had some delicious bread! It's not an italian gathering without bread!
This wine tasting was for white wines, but we are talking about doing one with red wines soon! We tried various types of white wine throughout the evening including some prosecco, which I love! But this one was my favorite, and even better it is only like 5 euro!
This was our view for the evening 🙂
Saturday was a day filled with shopping and exploring the city, yet again. There is SO much to see here. I’ve seen a majority of the tourist attractions, but just to walk around the city and experience it and all the people here is very fun. Plus there are tons of hidden piazzas and roads, it doesn’t get old! Not to mention the millions of shops that you can spend all day going in and out of.
Piazza Navona
Cafes
Sunday was work day….. one of my classes ends next week so we are down to the wire. With papers and presentations. It was only three weeks long, and then we have another class for three weeks. It is quite the excelerated program!
Ever since I had stuffed zucchini flowers at a restaurant in NYC several years ago, I’ve been dreaming of making them and eating them again. Well aparently they are kind of a big deal in Italy. You buy zucchini at the market with the flowers on them! So I decided today was the day I was going to attempt to make stuffed flowers.
Flowers and the filing
I started by removing the bottom part, then rinsing them gently. Then I mixed ricotta cheese, salt, pepper, oregano, and basil in a bowl. I stuffed the flowers and placed them in a pan, covered them with some tomato sauce, topped it off with some freshly grated parmesan cheese and let them bake until browned.
I chose not to fry mine, like they usually do. Mainly because I didn’t have bread crumbs or flour, but I would highly suggest a light coating. I think they would have been better. BUT they were still delicious!
Pre-baking
Final product!
And the zucchinis themself went into this creation 🙂
Pasta, zucchini, bell pepper, ricotta cheese, and tomato sauce
Aren’t these cool noodles!?!?
Back to researching! I’m doing a presentation on School Lunch Programs in poor countries later this week! I’m pretty excited about it, well the research, not the presentation.
I’ll be back soon with a post on my ‘typical’ day in Rome… wow that sounds weird!
“But the wisdom that comes from heaven is first of all pure; then peace-loving, considerate, submissive, full of mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere. Peacemakers who sow in peace reap a harvest of righteousness.” – James 3:17-18
Fitnessnfoodiegirl's Blog 