I saw this recipe for Chicken Enchiladas Verde on Blissfully Domestic (have I mentioned I write there sometimes? No? Well I do.  Anywhooo…).  My mouth began watering.  Anyone who knows me, knows I can’t leave well enough alone when it comes to recipes.  Most recipes are just a jumping off point for me.  Besides, I can’t in good conscience put 7 cups of cheese in anything – I mean my homemade mac & cheese doesn’t have 7 cups of cheese in it.  And I don’t like green (or red or yellow) bell peppers.  In all fairness, I have absolutely no doubt that her recipe is beyond amazing – how can you miss with all of that cheesy goodness?  But on this cold (single digits here in Nashville) day I thought I would share my version.  As with most of my recipes, feel free to take away or add what appeals.  And if you are new here, yes all of my recipes are this vague.

Chicken Enchiladas Verde

3 or 4 chicken breasts ( about a pound) cooked and shredded (I boil them so they stay moist)

1 can black beans, drained and rinsed

1 small bag frozen corn – just throw it in frozen (or 1 can of corn, drained)

1 can chopped chiles or if you like heat chopped jalapenos

3 cloves of garlic, minced

1 Tablespoon cumin

1 or 2 teaspoon ground chipolte pepper depending on heat preference (if you don’t have this, throw in a couple shakes of cayenne instead…but I like the smokey and less hot chipolte for this recipe)

if you have some fresh cilantro, throw it in – if not, no worries

2 cups shredded cheese – use your favorite (I used a mexican blend intended for Tacos

1 16oz jar Salsa Verde

10 tortillas (I used 10″ flour…but corn would be yummy too)

Preheat oven to 350.  In a bowl, mix the chicken, beans, corns, chiles, garlic, cumin,ground chipolte pepper, 1 Cup of cheese, and 1/2 of the jar of salsa. Throw in a little salt and pepper too.

Spray a lasagna pan (10×15) with Pam – or a 9×13 if you don’t have a bigger one.  Fill the tortillas one at a time and roll them, placing them side by side.  If you are very generous with the filling, you might only get 9 enchiladas…if you are stingy you might get 11 or 12.  I usually get 10.  Top with remaining 1 Cup of cheese.  Cover with foil.  Bake 3o minutes.  Uncover, pour remaining 1/2 jar of salsa on top and bake for 10 minutes.  Allow to rest for 5 or 10 minutes and then serve. Top with a little sour cream.

Edited to add photo:

I tell you this story because A) what I discovered in the photo below made me chuckle and 2) I got nothing blog worthy today.

When I started dating Steve, I started spending a lot of time in Pittsburgh.  Pittsburgh wasn’t foreign to me – I used to go to shop at Ikea or wander around now and then.  My dad was from the area and he loved the ‘Burgh.  I was a casual Steelers fan but didn’t care all that much about football.

In Pittsburgh, there is no such thing as a casual Steelers fan.  You are A FAN or you aren’t.  The city embraces their team in a way I’ve never witnessed any where else.  For example, the mayor Luke Ravenstahl has changed his name to Luke Steelerstahl temporarily (we are playing the Ravens this weekend to determine who plays in the Super Bowl in case you aren’t following along).  No one in Pittsburgh sees that as weird – they just chuckle because it hadn’t occured to them.  After I moved to Pittsburgh I was amazed at how the Steelers effect the mood of the entire city.  When they are doing well, people are a bit nicer and happier.  How well they are doing determines how long this bouyed mood lasts – the year we won the Super Bowl you would have thought someone was putting Prozac in the water supply.  The Steelers truly bring the city together in a way that is hard to make people understand if they haven’t lived there to witness it.

Anyway, when I started spending time in Pittsburgh, in order to fit in I decided to buy a Steelers sweatshirt to wear on the weekends.  We were in in the Strip District one Saturday and I found one that was pretty cheap and decided to pick it up.  I’ve had this sweatshirt for years and worn it many times but I didn’t notice until this past Sunday why it was such a great deal.

For those who aren’t aware, the Steelers play in the AFC not the NFC.  Oops.  For the record, Steve never noticed either.

I had it on last Sunday when we went shopping for the Dyson.  We decided to Tivo the game because we are spoiled and hate commercials.  We turned the radio off in the car so we wouldn’t accidently hear about the game.  We avoided the TV section of the store in case it was on.  We made sure we were seated in an area of the restaurant that we couldn’t see the TVs in the bar that were playing the game.  Neither of us got on the web when we got home in case we could happen across the results.  We decided to get the kids to bed and then enjoy the game in peace.  We were just getting ready to sit down and watch the game when Steve heard his phone beeping to alert him to a new text message.  My mother had texted us both to say congrats on the win.  (We still love you mom.)

And as a bonus for sitting through my stupid stories, a little kiddo cuteness.

I love Tessa’s face here.  Sabrina is touching Tessa toy and it looks like Tessa wants to say “Hands off the toy sista or you will pull back a bloody stump.”

(*Imagine the voice of Gollum for the correct tone.)

I’m torn between pointing out once again that my life doesn’t even sort of resemble its former self of 3 years ago or just embracing the mom-ness and getting on with it.  It is Monday so I’ll go with the latter.

I have a new love in my life.

Through the generosity of family (aka the hoarding of gift cards for almost a year), I brought home my very own, beautiful, wonderful Dyson yesterday.  She is amazing.

I vacuumed with my old vacuum and then broke out the Dyson and filled its cup with dust, dirt, and hair my old vacuum hadn’t picked up.  The hype is to be believed…it really is that good.  My only complaint was a result of my own stupidity.  I read the manual but stopped at page 8…which is prior to the page that tells you how to empty the dirt bin.  When you pull the red trigger, the bottom opens.  If you don’t have it over the trash can, you might have to re-vacuum to clean up the mess you just made.  But you’ll do so gladly because you love your new Dyson that much.

Despite the fact that Sabrina has now decided that Tessa can’t even watch Dora when Dora is on TV (“No Tessa! No Dora! Nina’s Dora!”), we do see some sisterly love now and then.

And I share this one because it took me 59 tries to get a photo of Sabrina in her little tutu-like skirt found on clearance at Target last week and too cute to pass up.

Sabrina decided that since I wouldn’t make her toasted cheese for breakfast, she would make her own.

Aunt Lulu and Uncle Pat gave Sabrina this ambiguous/imaginative toy for Christmas.  It makes no noise, requires no batteries, and defies definition so it can truly be whatever the child wants it to be.  Today it was a pan to cook toasted cheese.  Many days it is a chair.  Sometimes it holds puzzle pieces.  It is pretty cool…it even sparks mommy’s imagination.

I’ll leave it to you.  Am I a Fry Guy?

A lost cast member from Space Balls?

Or Mush Mouth’s sister?

Or as Gibb suggested, a scrubbing bubble?

Maybe I’ve gone too long without adult contact? Sabrina has had a cold so we’ve opted out of all activities this week.

Me: Good morning sunshine!  Did you sleep well? What would you like for breakfast?

Sabrina: Yogurt? (With a cute smile and encouraging nod.)

Me: We are out of yogurt. How about eggs?

Sabrina: Toasted cheese? (With an even cuter smile and more emphatic nod.)

Me: How about eggs? You love eggs.

Sabrina: Toasted cheese? (Exceeding maximum cuteness factor.  Starting to look slightly maniacal.)

Me: We are out of cheese slices so no toasted cheese.  We are going to have eggs and toast this morning.

Sabrina: *Sobs* Toasted Cheese! Waahhhh!!

Lord help me when she finds out we are out of fruit snacks at snack time.  I think we need to go to the store before she stages a coup d’etat.

Dear Fellow Starbucks Customer:

Thank you.  You reminded me that the warm, fuzzy glow of the holidays has been washed away by days on end of rain.

You saw me walking into Starbucks with an infant in one arm and my wallet in the other hand.  You then speed walked to beat me to the counter so that you and your 4 children, who each required her own specialty order of hot cocoa,  wouldn’t have to wait.  You could have spent the time it took for them to make my solitary latte discussing exactly what each child wanted to order so that I wouldn’t have to stand behind you through the Great Whipped Cream or No Whipped Cream Debate of 2009 – just a suggestion.  I had the joy of juggling a squirming, increasingly irritated infant while waiting for the Starbucks trainee to figure out how to make each of the 4 different hot cocoas and your complicated macchiato (what the hell is a macchiato anyway?).  Thank you for giving me that extra 15 minutes (I think this particular trainee might not make it through barista college) of strength training for my left arm and face time with my angry infant.

I hope your kids all spilled sticky, sugary, pepperminty, whipped cream covered cocoa in your mini van.

Signed,

The under-caffeinated momma with the over developed left arm

Since I didn’t have any Sabrina photos last time, here are a couple.

Sabrina loves hats – as long as they aren’t hats that I want her to wear.  She is very 2 that way – also very cute.

She loves to imitate mommy.  Sadly, I must spend too much time on the computer because she was very excited at Christmas to borrow her cousin’s “laptop”.  Abuela decided to get her her own for Christmas.  Now Sabrina walks around talking about her “puter”.

I channeled my inner Martha Stewart this weekend by personalizing the girls’ stockings.  We won’t discuss the ornament painting fiasco – I hope to work the kinks out of that project later this week.

I’m so curious to see how the girls interact as they get older.  I hope what I’m seeing now isn’t a glimpse of the future because Sabrina is incredibly bossy to Tessa and already trying to pick fights with her – and she can’t even talk yet.  If Tessa is babbling, Sabrina will yell “No Tessa!  Tessa no talk! Quiet!”  If Tessa is in the same room while she is playing, Sabrina will snatch up her toys and yell “No Tessa!  Nina’s toys!”   When Sabrina is eating, she tells Tessa she can’t have any of what she is eating.  “Nina’s yogurt!”  It is funny but I fear it is shades of things to come.

In other Sabrina news, she is such a daddy’s girl that it is almost  painful.  It has reached the point that if I say “Mommy loves you” she’ll yell “NO!” at me.  If I say “Daddy loves you” she responds “Okay” or “Yes!”.  I remind myself that it is a fuzzy concept for her right now but I have to admit it sucks.

Rachel asked about my family album plans.  Steve bought me a beautiful album for our anniversary (*cough* in 2007 *cough*).  It is still empty.  I’ve neglected to start a proper family album because I feel overwhelmed.  We take hundreds of photos each month – to edit and print the good ones seems like such a huge task.  My resolution is every 3 months to pick 3 photos from each of the previous 3 months and 3 months from the previous year, edit them, and print them at Walgreen’s (or Snapfish – whatever).  Hopefully, by the end of this year I will have  a pretty good start on the family album because if I wait until I can do it all it will never get done.

My 2008 was filled with fear.  I spent the first 7 months convinced my pregnancy would end badly.  I spent the remainder of the year convinced something awful would happen to our beautiful new baby – I checked to be sure she was breathing so often that my husband stopped teasing me about it.  You know it has left the realm of cute quirk and moved on to concerning neurose when people stop joking about it.

My 2008 was also filled with love and laughter.  My wonderful huband, amazing daughter, and new baby girl make me laugh and remind me to be thankful every day for all we have.

Who knows what 2009 has in store?  I’m actually hoping for a quiet year. The past 4 years have been a roller coaster (mostly good things) and I would be okay with a year of ordinary – even a little dull thrown in.

I don’t make resolutions.  Mostly because I don’t keep them and don’t want to start the year as a failure.  Also because in the years that habit should have formed, I was too inebriated to be making life altering resolutions just before the midnight hour struck.  My final excuse reason is that I find an entire year too be too overwhelming.  And I imagine I would make undefined resolutions like: being a better person, being healthier, etc.  Those things are so subjective that they are difficult to acheive.

I did make 1 resolution.  I will get the family photo album started up to date.  Other than that, I will simply say that my December pledge to hop on the treadmill every day is upped to 25 minutes for the month of January.  The rest I’ll make up as I go.