An Early Morning Run and Sneaky Vegan Pudding

This past weekend I was lucky enough to have a four day weekend. To start the weekend off, my friend and I planned a running morning.

We planned the run the night before and were not anticipating having to run through frost and cold temperatures in the morning.

GROSSS....it will definately take a while to acclimatize to the winter weather. That being said, it turned out to be a BEAUTIFUL morning!

I HATE THE SNOW!!!!

It was our first run in the colder weather and our lungs and knees reminded us that winter is not a particularly runner-friendly season. We powered through (with a few walk breaks), if for no other reason than to justify all of the stress-induced snacking both of us have been doing as of late.

As we rounded a turn in the path, we stumbled upon a tinsel-covered tree

I found out later that someone does this every year as a memorial to their loved one who passed away. So precious!

To treat ourselves for all the hard work we did, we stopped for smoothies at Urban Appeal. I got an Absolutely Awesome with a rice protein kicker, and my friend got a Rasberry smoothie also with rice protein.

It is quite possible that the neighbours thought I was a bit crazy when I put the smoothies on the lawn and got down on the ground to take a picture. Look how cute though!

After our run I still had a lot of time to kill in the morning, so I decided to experiment with vegan puddings.

I started with Vegan Vanilla Pudding at my boyfriends request (ok...he did not request the vegan part but I thought it would be fun). I found the recipe here:
The recipe was fairly simple. There were not many ingredients involved....

The most frustrating part of making this pudding was the process of thickening the mixture. It took FOREVER and seemed even longer as I had to stand and stir for at least 15 minutes. It is possible I have a very crappy stove.

The finished product. Put in the fridge for what also seems like forever, or what is in reality 2 to 3 hours.

Since I prefer chocolate pudding to vanilla (I mean....cmon)...I then decided to make Vegan Chocolate Pudding for dessert. I got the recipe here.

There were only 4 ingredients for this recipe.

I started melting the chocolate chips and did not stop drooling for the next 20 minutes.

This pudding recipe is made with Tofu which I was skeptical about at first, but it seemed to turn out OK.

It had to cool for a while which was torture, but the wait was completely worth it. It was quite possibly the creamiest, most decadent pudding I have ever eaten and you would never know that tofu and soy milk made up the majority of the ingredients.

Not the best picture but you get the idea. For a dinner party I would put the pudding in individual wine glasses and garnish with blackberries and raspberries. The grapes worked well too though.

The run and the baking were a great start to the extra-long weekend. Now I am in need of going for another run to wear off all the pudding I ate!

ADELLE