Yearly Archives

2009

42 In Articles/ Recipes

Southwest Chicken Soup & Homemade Tortilla Chips

Those of you who have been around for a while probably recognize my inclination towards recipes that are fairly quick and easy… but they also must taste good. I came across something similar to what I am going to share in a Real Simple from November 2004 and changed it up a little {because it called for kidney beans and they are my least favorite of all the beans}.

So, this is all you will need for the soup:

swchickensoupingredients

1 jar of salsa verde (I used the Pace that is pictured above)
1 rotisserie chicken
1 (15 oz) can of navy beans drained
(I used Bush’s)
1 (large 49oz) can of chicken stock (I only used about 2/3 of the can)

garnish: shredded cheddar, sour cream & tortilla chips

Remove skin from chicken and shred meat with forks. Combine all ingredients into a large saucepan. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer 10-15 mins. I used the entire jar of salsa verde and it’s “make-your-nose-sweat hot”… if medium salsa is too hot for you… just add 1/2 the jar of salsa.

Since that was so EASY…

Why don’t you make your own tortilla chip strips to go on top?

While your soup is simmering, in a large frying pan add about 1/2 inch of oil {I used canola but peanut would be good too} and set to medium heat.

Here’s what you’ll need for your tortilla chips:

corntortillas1

CORN. CORN. I repeat CORN TORTILLAS… not flour. Unless you like flour tortilla chips– I don’t and they would be nasty and disintegrate in your soup. So be sure to buy CORN TORTILLAS…. remember these are not your “usual flour tortilla wraps” that you make tacos with, they are CORN. I bought white corn but you could buy yellow corn. They’re either with the flour tortillas in the bread aisle or in the ethnic food aisle with ham bullion. 🙂

Cut them up like this:

corntortillas2

While you’re at it, just for fun {and to impress your husband and kids} go ahead and cut some triangles to make some “real” homemade tortilla chips.

corntortillas4

Ok, back to the thin sticks. You’ll want to cut them in half before you fry them so that your family members can get them onto their spoons and into their mouths. These haven’t been cut in half yet.

corntortillas3

Fry them for about 4 mins. You’ll know the oil is hot enough when you drop 1 in and it bubbles and floats to the top quickly. If it sinks and sits there… you’re not hot enough yet. Once you are hot enough you can lower your temp to low/med.

corntortillas5

Throw them on some paper towels, cover them with paper towels and give them a good shake so you can get a lot of the grease off. Then douse them with salt.

corntortillas6

And then put them on top of your soup.

soupYUM

I promise they are so easy and so good! They’d also be good on a taco salad!

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In the earlier post about all the insane things… the wooden blocks are Melissa & Doug.

In Friday’s post about Cheerios… our floors are prefinished pecan in saddle stain from Howell Flooring. They are a local company owned by a family in our church but I believe they will sell and ship nationwide. There is a phone number on their contact page and I’m sure any of their sales reps can answer any questions you may have… and you can tell them I sent you! 🙂

Also, I’m using flickr to host all my pictures and to make a long story short I am no longer able to use “spell check” so please exkuse iny speling airs. I think I said we were “fever invested” last week and there have been a few others here and there. Erika and I have had some pretty good laughs about some of my mistakes! 🙂

Good night friends! Make some Southwest Chicken Soup before it gets hot out!

21 In Articles

Stop the Insanity

There have been a few insane things going on around here…

the playroom: Friday I mentioned I was going to the playroom to work on the yard sale… I didn’t come out for two days. Seriously. I haven’t purged toys in 4 years and well, I learned a hard lesson… it’s a ton of work if you let the toys, babies, barbies, stuffed animals and puzzles build up. I got rid of a TON of stuff… mostly stuffed animals. Shhh… don’t tell my kids they’ll never notice. I will share after pictures later… but here are some befores… I’m sure I’ll hear some gasps from across the country. And by the way, I am not responsible for buying these toys… the guilty shall remain anonymous.

playroombefore

babies

stuffedanimals

littlepeople

And fortunately it’s looking much more under control now! Here’s a peek of the after…

blocks

late night: {this is a good insane thing} I had a girls night out last night! I haven’t done this in months and it is so much fun to do so. We had a delightful dinner and then headed to the book store for coffee, books, and chat. I loved every minute of if, so much so that we closed down Barnes & Noble… yes, I closed down a book store at 11pm. If you know me, you will be shocked. Rarely am I up past 9 pm and if I am it’s usually against my will. This was the opposite, it was the most delightful late night I’ve had in a long time!

croup: The girls both have croup. My children get croup in the winter like we get mosquito bites in the summer. They’ll be fine we just have to work through interrupted sleep and keeping fevers at bay.

ceiling: While preparing for the yard sale my husband was ransacking the attic above the garage… and fell through the ceiling. Thankfully not all the way through. But enough to do major damage.

garageceiling

He’s fine and I can see evidence that apparently he’s not the first to step off the flooring and fall through… see the other patch job? Ours will be a little more involved. Good thing we have nothing better to do than work on the ceiling in the garage! 🙂

snow: Did you see any snow this weekend? I’ve never seen snow this far south… until now… this morning this is what our backyard looked like. A windy little blizzard! And to think that the girls were in bathing suits and water buckets on Wednesday afternoon.

snowshowers

snowshowers2

chaseysnow

That’s Mom’s dog, Chasey. She thought she was coming south to escape snow and blizzard like conditions. She apparently brought this snow with her.

Stay tuned a recipe to follow…

29 In Articles

Cheerios & Brinner

We’ve entered the Cheerio stage with JM. Here are some very brief thoughts on our new stage of babyhood…

They’re good:

HappyJM

They’re bad:

BadCheerios

& they’re ugly:

UglyCheerios

You know that sound… don’t you? It kinda sounds like this “cccrrrrruuuuunnnnccchhh“. But they’re worth all the little crunches because they can bring MOST of this screams to a screeching hault.

On the home front today we’re running a fever infested household. Well, not a complete infestation… just Morgan and Raiger; they’re both feeling pretty pitiful. Annie {our sitter} said she’s still willing to come! So I’m locking myself in the playroom and hoping for BIG results!

Let me share a mortifying story. Yesterday Melinda was here {she’s the very nice lady who comes 2x a month to clean our house}. I was in the kitchen {trying to stay one step ahead of her} when I overheard Morgan in the den…

Morgan says, “Ms. Melinda, come look at this rug. John Martin spit up all over it. Here and here and here so you’re going to have to clean it up real good!”

Oh my, I wanted to die. I ran in there and gently explained to Morgan that Melinda had plenty to do without Morgan pointing things out to her. I tried to explain quickly that what she did wasn’t very nice. She didn’t quite get it… she said she was just trying to help. I thought I’d die. Melinda went on to say that last time she was here Morgan told her she needed to clean really good under her bed because there’s always dust under it when she climbs under… and that Melinda probably needs to move the beds to clean under them “real good”. Lord, help me! My 4 year old is going to run our housekeeper off! And I’m going to die of embarrassment.
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What’s for brinner, deer?

MyHelper

IyikeThis

Last night we had “brinner”– that’s breakfast for dinner– and Paige was my sous chef. I made homemade waffles {but I whipped the egg whites and folded them in at the end}… I turned around to dig for the baking powder as Paige explained, “I weally yike deese eggies“. I looked back to see Raiger with a moutful of raw egg whites, at least they were whipped and stiff… doesn’t that help? We ate our waffles with sliced cheddar cheese & deer sausage… it was so good. I used to be a snob about deer meat… I was of the opinion “I don’t eat wild game”… but now I have a freezer full of it and guess what…. it tastes REALLY good! I also used to be in the dark about Aunt Jemima “Butter Lite” syrup… if any of you are in the dark… consider yourself “now informed” and buy it at the grocery store.

Ok. I must get to the playroom.

Happy Friday! Mom’s supposed to be coming this weekend… I’m giddy, she came when JM was born {June 30} and we’ve been anxiously awaiting her return since!