Hi, remember me? Let's backtrack to October

Hi blogosphere, Remember me - the girl who used to blog?

Well, I don't even know what I've been busy doing, but I have been! And let's be honest, cell phones just make turning the computer on and using that so darn inconvenient. And my awesome canon rebel, ummmm let's say I still have pictures from Italy almost a year ago on that. Whoopsies.

So here are things I need to catch up on, in no particular order. I'll begin with a very special trip a few months ago.

In October I visited my bff Eden, aka Essy, in Philadelphia.

The night I got in, "ma" took us out for dinner.

We had some fun times.



Ummmm what? I didn't eat an entire pint of Ben and Jerrys. Eden totally helped.



Judge away, the lentil soup needed some Israeli pickles sprinkled on.  I bet Jaren understands. Those pickles make everything better. Pregnant or not.

I also left with a new scar:


Falling while walking to meet her after work. And at the end of January, that scar is there to stay. Since I am about 35 weeks pregnant today and have not shaved my legs due to that, I will spare you a pic of the scar.

Essy's birthday was that weekend so we went out a couple of times. Her good friend Rachel couldn't come to her main celebration so we went out the night before.








Okay I totally just screen shotted those from instagram and didn't crop them. Sue me.

We got to see our other sorority sister Katie (no pics, boo), and also got to see my cousin and her baby - Bridget and Ryan. I have pictures. Look how cuteeeeeee!





Ess was in Heaven - she loves babies, and would ya look at that head of hair?






Eeeeeh I can't wait til she visits and she can do that with our baby boy! (And until baby Maddox meets Ryan, who will have 23947394 times more hair on his head at that point).

Me and Bridget:


And the baby!


And now both babies!


Essy and I made some awesome recipes. I doubt I'll post those, so loose instructions are below...until maybe I make those again when I'm back in a routine. Then I can blog real recipes.

We made a "mexican lentil stew" - I cheated and bought pre-cooked lentils from trader jo's.




It didn't thicken up like I wanted (probably because the lentils were precooked, duh) so added quinoa and it thickened it right up. It was super spicy, but yummmmm.


We also made turkey chili,


 and a white bean/tomato/spinach stew:


Typical us:


The night we went to celebrate her birthday with her friends was very fun - it was a dueling piano bar which I hadn't been to in a while! Those are always fun. She did some weird type shot thing for her birthday.


But I wouldn't let her go on stage, 28 is different than 21. Even though we're both 24 still.....
Here are some more pics - make sure to check out the shoes we saw on some lady!

See ya next time Ess!

Tamale Pie

Hey, another recipe promised way back when. I am so on track this week :-)

I first tasted this recipe when my good friend Jaren made it. Ugh, it was amazing. I just wanted to keep eating it. When I made it Charlie was with a friend and proclaimed in front of him "You've been holding out on me". Thanks hubby.

I've made it several times and adjusted it a teeny bit. It's now my go to "bring a meal" dish - for when people have babies or whatnot, it's a for sure pleaser.

Ingredients:

-1 box of jiffy

-1 can of cream corn

-1/4 cup of egg beaters

-1/4 cup of nonfat yogurt or greek yogurt

-2 tbs taco seasoning (separated)

-2 four-ounce cans of green chilis

-1 ten-ounce can of enchilada sauce (green or red)

-2 cups of shredded cooked chicken breast (I use drained and rinsed canned chicken breast and Charlie the chicken snob couldn't tell!)

-reduced fat shredded cheese (however much you want)

1. Preheat oven to 400

2. Mix the jiffy, cream corn, egg, yogurt/milk, and chilis, and spread in a casserole dish. Bake for 20 minutes.

3. While corn mixture bakes, mix your chicken with 2 tablespoons of the enchilada sauce, 1 tablespoon of taco seasoning, and about ½ cup of the cheese.

4. When the corn comes out of the oven, poke it all over with a fork (some of it will stick to the fork so be careful). Pour the rest of the enchilada sauce over the corn mixture

5. Add the chicken mixture on top of the corn, and top with as much cheese as you want. Bake for another 15 minutes.

This is best served a few hours later so it can set.

Look at my adorable wittle essy. ONE MONTH ISH TIL I SEE YOU!


YUMMMMMM.




By the way, I've made this gluten free before for two friends who have celiacs. I ordered a gluten free cornbread mix from amazon, and I made my own cream corn (believe it or not cream corn has gluten!). I just mixed up a can of corn with a few tablespoons of the liquid and some milk and cornstarch. I didn't measure, just sort of used common sense and added as needed. Both friends loved it so I'd say it was a success :-)

Philly and Boston

The week before Charlie left I had a trip planned to visit Essy in Philly and then a trip to Boston with my mom for my great uncle's 90th birthday. My 91 (and a half!) year old grandma flew in from Israel for it. I considered not going for half a second because of the short notice deployment, but realized that Charlie would be working ridiculous hours in preparation for it, and there was no way I would miss my best friend, my grandma, and so much of my family.

I left on Tuesday during the day to see Eden and had a layover, so I didn't get in until passed midnight. "Ma" came and picked me up at the airport, best ma ever! I got to wake Eden up at midnight and snuggle like old times, like we hadn't been apart. Best friends are amazing things. Unfortunately, Eden had to work the next day, so I spent some time sleeping in, hanging out with Davida, I mean Ma, and then meeting up with my friend Megan for lunch and a pedicure. Somehow I got no pictures at all from any of this. When I stopped regularly blogging I started lacking with the pictures. Need to change that.

Loved spending time with the Shermans on Wednesdy and Thursday, and then Friday morning we went to pick up my mom at the airport. The ONLY picture I have of me and Eden is at Reading Terminal and my mom took it. Embarrassing, seriously.

Yes, she chose her shirt to match mine.

No, we don't care. We are awesome.

I love you Essy!!!!!

We did some typical philly touristy stuff including the Jewish Museum which me and my mom loved. That evening we were meeting my very pregnant cousin, Bridget and her husband at Penn (where they are residents) and driving up to Boston with them. Lauren and I had fun walking around some more, and I may or may not have taken a brief nap in the car in order to survive the late night driving I would be doing....

Bridget looked great and it was so nice to see Nick again. It was only the second time I met him, and the first time we didn't really get to talk much, but we had a great time hanging out in the car. My dad is very anti road trip, so it was kind of a big deal that I drove the whole way! Go me.

The next day we went to an Armenian restaurant for my great Uncle's 90th. The food was delicious and my aunt Jackie planned an awesome program. Here she is dancing with her dad:


We got to see my grandma and my cousin from Israel, but I don't have all of the pictures Jackie took, just these three:

Love that pic of me and mom!


From left to right: Aunt Jackie, my great Uncle Schari (that turned 90), my other great Uncle Dolfi who also flew in from Israel, my cousin Anat, my 91.5 year old grandma, my great aunt Marietta, mommy, and me.

And then a really uncoordinated picture of a lot of the family that makes me laugh because I don't know who some of the people are (I think they are friends or something?) and really, nobody is looking except for 5-6 of us.


I don't even know who is looking at what there, but it's the picture Jackie sent me. Toward the right you can see a very pregnant Bridget! EEEEEEEH so exciting!

The next day we want to Jackie's house for Bridget's baby shower, which was sooooo nice. One of her best friends and college roommates actually lives in Vegas and we've met a few times, so it was so nice to see her in the context of being Bridget's friend. All her friends were awesome, really felt like extended family. She is having a baby boy and there was a cute onesie decorating station, as well as a crossword puzzle about Bridget and Nick as babies (which I won!).

My great aunt Marietta was leaving from the shower to go back to Rockville (where she and her husband live) and I got some sweet pictures of her and my grandma saying good bye. So so sweet:


Romanians kiss on the mouth - it always made me uncomfortable as a kid (and still does) but what can I say? That's their way!


These two women are firecrackers. Seriously, it's incredible to see their energy.

And here is Marietta telling Schari he better wear the chef's hat she got him. I love how she is lecturing him!! Look how she is pointing at him, I love it.


And here he is with hand up - "I surrender". So funny!


The next day I NEEDED to get my Legal Seafoods fix in, so my poor cousin Jeffrey had to come with me once again. It did not disappoint. Here are my and Jeffrey at lunch:


After lunch we walked around Coolidge Corner (were we were staying, my favorite place in Brookline) and out of nowhere it started to come down with like, torrential rain. I think? Not something I'm used to being from Vegas, since honestly, I'm usually inside during the rare flash floods we get, and then they go away. Well, luckily, we happened to be right outside of JP Licks ice cream shop....so we had to take refuge from the rain. I had a sweet cream scoop in a white chocolate coated waffle cone. Honestly, I kind of like Cold Stone's sweet cream better.... I guess I'm loyal to what I like. My mom had a cappuccino flavor.


That night we wanted to take grandma out for dinner with Schari and a few others, so Schari's favorite restaurant.....is Texas Roadhouse. So funny! A 90 year old Romanian loves those steak n ribs! It was a bit loud in there to really talk to my grandma, but the ribs were yummy and I'm glad we got to take him to his favorite.




The next morning we were leaving but took my grandma and cousin out to breakfast to see them one last time. My mom snapped a picture on her phone but I don't have it yet. It was so good to see my grandma, and I can't believe she made the trip at her age. I always love going to Boston to see my fam, and can't wait for the next time!

French Onion Chicken

I made this for dinner last night and didn't think to snap pics along the way. In my blogging hiatus (hiati for plural?) I do keep cooking awesome things if I say so myself, I just forget to snap pics. So it's only natural that upon the return of one, I don't think to obsessively photograph each step. Sorry!

Anwyay, it was really good so I snapped pics of the leftovers which really don't look that good, but I promise they taste great!

I do normally use glass tupperware. I guess not last night.

I sent Jaren and Eden an email with the instructions. Here was my email t them:
I served this over pappardelle noodles, but you could serve over whatever.

I bought chicken breast cutlets from costco - I think I probably used an equivalent of 4 chicken breasts cut into strips. It wasn't organic chicken, we'll survive.

-1/4 block of low fat cream cheese

-1/4 cup fat free plain greek yogurt (or fat free sour cream)

-1 packet of liptons french onion dip

-olive oil

-2 medium onions (I would have done way more onions but i only had 2)

-white wine and chicken broth - I have no idea how much since i just eyeball (start w/a 1/4 cup each and go from there)

1. Rinse chicken. Sprinkle some oil in the crockpot and put the chicken in it - no need for salt, plenty in the liptons. Turn crockpot to high.

2. Mix the greek yogurt, cream cheese, and french onion, then mix in the wine and broth. The mixture should be more runny than creamy (if this helps determine how much broth and wine to put in). Dump it over the chicken and mix.

3. While the chicken is getting started in the crock pot (on high), slice the onions and separate them. Melt a tablespoon of butter and some olive oil over medium heat and add the onions, with some salt. Let it cook for about 10 minutes, then lower to low to caramelize, cover, and let cook for about 30 minutes.

4. Add the onions to the crockpot, stir, and cook for about another hour. It doesn't need to cook for very long since the chicken is smaller strips and the crockpot is on high. I think it was about 2 hours before it was completely cooked through.

It was easy and yum!

Here is a picture of it plated for lunch today:

I added some shredded part skim mozzarella cheese.

By the way, here was Jaren and then Eden's response to the e-mail:

Jaren Rabe	9:46 PM (16 hours ago)
to me, Eden

I stopped reading at "it wasn't organic chicken". 

Sent from my iPhone

Eden Sherman	5:47 AM (8 hours ago)
to me, Jaren

Hahaha oh man I wish I lived in Vegas... Never thought I'd type that

Sent from my iPhone

Haha love my friends, they make my heart smile. Enjoy the chicken!! Oh and speaking of friends and food, one of my favorite things is that Katy will pin a recipe, I see it, and make it for dinner that night or the next (obviously inviting her). We didn't really realize this until one day she said "I love pinning things, they magically appear for dinner at Avigail's that night". Hahahahahah!