Michelle Smiles

Teaching my children to question authority, except mine.

Guatemalans Unite!

March8

There was a small gathering of families who adopted from Guatemala in Gatlinburg last weekend. We all rented little condos at a resort and hung out. I don’t want to post photos of other folks’ kiddos so you’ll have to just enjoy a couple of my little family.

It was an odd gathering. It seemed to be a group of people with nothing in common except beautiful Guatemalan children. But it was fun to step outside of our comfort zone (we didn’t know a sole…I was acquainted with 2 moms on FB) and remind Sabrina there are other families out there that look like ours. It was also fun to meet other families who had that in common with us. I miss that part of the adoption community. We didn’t spend a lot of time with the other families but Sabrina and Tessa got the chance to play with the other children while the adults chatted.

The highlight for the girls was the waterpark that was on the resort property. (Holy expensive! $84 for the 4 of us and the “lockers for a nominal fee” were an additional $10. It was a somewhat smaller and older one than the Great Wolf type place. Good speed for our little girls but wow that price tag hurt.) The highlight for me was Saturday night after the gathering of families. We went back to our little villa, popped some popcorn, got out some ice cream, lit a fire, and watched a Disney movie all snuggled up together. It made me all warm and fuzzy and squishy inside. It almost made up for the next day when they were both being gigantic butts.

posted under adoption, family | 2 Comments »

Black Bean Soup

March7

I was telling a friend about this soup I made while my mother in law was in town. (She has a vitamix and I was thinking how silky smooth it would be after a blast in the vitamix.) She waved me off and told me to just blog it. She didn’t even want to hear about it. She likes the quick reference of the blog so here it is. (Mother in law in town for a week. Guess how many pictures I took? None. I suck.)

Doesn’t look very appetizing, does it? This is the last of the left overs. I didn’t even have a dollop of sour cream to put on top to make it a little prettier.

Black Bean Soup

1 lb dried black beans

1 ham hock (or pieces of cubed ham)

1 envelope ham bullion/flavor concentrate (I use Goya) – optional…I like the flavor it adds

1 can diced tomatoes (rotel would also be good)

1 sweet yellow onion

2 medium carrots

2 stalks celery

1 red or orange bell pepper

2-3 Tbs cumin

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp black pepper

1 Tbs chili powder

1 tsp ground chipotle pepper (or a few shakes cayenne)

4 garlic cloves

2 bay leaves

1 32 oz carton reduced or no sodium chicken broth

2 cups water

2 Tbs red wine vinegar or juice of a lime

If you have fresh cilantro, throw it in when you puree the soup.

First, soak your beans overnight. Give them with lots of room to expand in the water. Drain them when you are ready to cook.

All of these things are going to end up pureed so you can either dice them in your food processor/blender before you add them to the pot or let them cook in chunks and then puree them with the soup. I put them all the veggies and garlic through the food processor and then gave them a quick saute in the bottom of my soup pan. After they softened, I threw in everything else. Cover and let it all cook for 90(ish) minutes until the beans are very soft.

Here is the tricky part: getting it all pureed. First take out the bay leaves and throw them away. Then remove the ham hock. If you want to take pieces of meat off, do that and return the meat to the pot after you’ve pureed. If you are just throwing in ham pieces, do that after pureeing too. Pureed meat = gag. I have a stick blender but it is pretty cheap and doesn’t do a great job. So I thought I would use my Ninja blender. (Prior to this it was just a smoothie maker.) I put too much hot soup in several times and burnt myself and made a big mess. Add more water during blending if it seems too thick. Find a safe way to get it blended…I like it silky but others like it more rustic (read: chunky). Garnish with whatever sounds good: sour cream, cheese, avocado, etc. Enjoy!

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