Food Fun

Because I like food so darn much, I found this amazing recipe and we made it for dinner. It will tantalize your tastebuds. It will liberate your lips. It will seduce your senses. Among other things, of course.

CHICKEN TAGINE (courtesy Allrecipes.com by KJones)

INGREDIENTS

• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 8 skinless, boneless chicken thighs, cut into 1-inch pieces
• 1 eggplant, cut into 1 inch cubes
• 2 large onions, thinly sliced
• 4 large carrots, thinly sliced
• 1/2 cup dried cranberries
• 1/2 cup chopped dried apricots
• 2 cups chicken broth
• 2 tablespoons tomato paste
• 2 tablespoons lemon juice
• 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons garlic salt
• 1 1/2 teaspoons ground cumin
• 1 1/2 teaspoons ground ginger
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 3/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1 cup water
• 1 cup couscous

DIRECTIONS

1. Heat olive oil in a skillet over medium-high heat. Place the chicken pieces and eggplant in the heated oil; stir and cook until the chicken is browned on all sides but not cooked through. Remove the skillet from the heat.

2. Place the browned chicken and eggplant on the bottom of a slow cooker. Layer the onion, carrots, dried cranberries, and apricots over the chicken.

3. Whisk together the chicken broth, tomato paste, lemon juice, flour, garlic salt, cumin, ginger, cinnamon, and ground black pepper in a bowl. Pour the broth mixture into the slow cooker with the chicken and vegetables.

4.Cook on High setting for 5 hours, or on Low setting for 8 hours.

5. Bring water to boil in a saucepan. Stir in couscous, and remove from heat. Cover, and let stand about 5 minutes, until liquid has been absorbed. Fluff with a fork.

The Randomness

Yes, I copied and pasted from Facebook. But because some of you don't visit it, or have even deleted it off so that people couldn't google you, for your viewing pleasure I've included it here.


1. This is not a random list, because let's face it, I was born random. Good news is my parents knew they were having me. Bad news, they weren't told it would be random.

2. I hold a ham radio license. My call sign is KG6CCF. That would be said "Kilo Golf 6 Charlie Charlie Foxtrot." I have not used a ham radio in over 8 years. Good thing it doesn't spoil in the fridge like regular ham.

3. For those of you who know of my sleeping phenomenons, here is another. I was taking a nap at home alone while I was in high school. There was a knock on the door that woke me up. I answered. It was a man selling milk. He would come by once a week and leave how many ever gallons of milk on your door. Kind of like the old days. He asked if I was the woman of the house. Seeing how I was alone, I said I was, because technically I was. He asked me how many gallons I thought I would need, and I told him there were 8 in my family. He said "6 children?" I nodded. His eyes got big in amazement and then said "let me shake the hand of the woman who has had 6 children and still looks so young and good." I didn't deny it. Now I did end up signing my mom's signature saying I wanted 4 gallons of milk, I think twice a week. Needless to say, my parents weren't happy when at 5am Monday morning 4 gallons of milk were left on the doorstep. And that is why I blame my sleeping. I was in no state to make lucid decisions regardeing milk. And to this day, I never make decisions about milk when I just wake up. Sheesh- this should have counted as 5 elissa things.

4. I somewhat enjoy watching Hannah Montana. Don't tell her evil twin Hannah Nevada.

5. I once tried to make raisins out of grapes by standing outside on a hot day holding a plate of grapes towards the sunlight. I got bored and never fufilled the mission.

6. Both my parents have brown hair, so when I came out the milk man was questioned.(*Apparently 'the milk man' would come back into my life. See item #3.) Guess you could say it was a random act of God. (See 'random' in item #1).

7. When I was 10 we moved to a bigger house with a 1/2 acre backyard. In southern California that is considered horse property. I begged my parents for a horse. I got one for Christmas.

8. The horse I got for Christmas in item #7 was plastic.

9. I was devastated the Christmas in items #7 and #8.

10. Because my birthday is after school gets out in June, I never got "kidnapped" by my friends. This includes being dressed up in mismatched clothes and having wacky makeup applied in not so beautiful patterns. Being the jealous being I am, I kidnapped myself on the last day of my freshman year and did the above kidnapping routine. This was not a random kidnapping.

11. I was once 11. But only for a year.

12. I was kissed by a boy in kindergarten. His lips were cursed by an evil witch as no other lips have been upon mine. Except my family. Even evil witches can't control that.

13. When I was in fourth grade I wanted to become an archeologist. That idea went extinct.

14. I once attempted to make pumpkin fudge and due to unforseen measures there was a chemical reaction that made the fudge so hard we had fun karate chopping it afterwards. There were only minor injuries.

15. I've had a CAT scan. It was not (as many of you are thinking) of my head, although the machine did have a quaint purring to it. Entirely intriguing.

16. When it is pitch black outside I walk rather tenatively for fear that my foot might become encased in unknown substances leading to an untimely death which would be far from random. So I guess that would be considered farrandomed.

17. In the 7th grade I watched an episode of X-files where some crazy with long fingers came through people's vents and ate their liver then hung them on the wall. Ever since I have been terrified of vents and case out the vents of any given building I enter.

18. Many of you know I served a mission in Georgia. Many of you also know I have a rather random obbsession with alligators. Many of you don't know I smuggled one home. His name was Alpert. He didn't survive the flight. He was (as I later found out) allergic to peanuts.

19. I have a dog named Captain Jack Sparrow. Only occasionally does he bring in wenches from the island bars.

20. I have forseen the future. It said I would finish this blasted thing.

21. Instead of telling a woman to have a nice day, I invited her to have a nice day. I invite you to do the same. Please RSVP beforehand though.

22. I lived on an island off the coast of Seattle where we had our own private beach. I never saw Jeff Probst.

23. I have taken up quilting. My loan shark said it's not very profitable. I beg to differ. And when I'm with him, I really do beg.

24. I fell asleep (wait, I'm getting to the good part) once while singing a hymn in church. But we were standing up. So I literally fell asleep. Right back onto the bench.

25. My sister wants to use the computer right now. What's abnormal is that she isn't bowing down to me. When will she learn?

26. My little brother thinks that Tom Cruise and Harrison Ford are having a love affair. According to him, a mountain man named Jim Bridger carries a picture of the two of them in bikinis slapping each other's butts. My little brother is not related to me.

27. I decided to do a #27, just so my mother could say "I thought it was only 26."

THE END

What? So it's been awhile

Okay, after some requests, I've decided to come back from my hiatus of non bloggerness. I was going to have a picture of these sunflower cupcakes I made, but the friend never uploaded them. What I'm trying to say is... I sure don't have a whole lot. But, so that you won't be completely in utter despair, I'll post part of my letter aka story that I wrote to my cousin and friend who are both on missions. I get really bored of writing the same boring things, so when in doubt- make it up. Of course that also happened on the mission during the weeks we didn't have lots of people trying to kill us I'd make up stories to send home. The best is when they believed them. But I don't except you to believe the below, just hope. The reason it has a love theme, if you can call it a love theme is because when I was on a mission my dear friend Shaniqua (names have been changed to protect Adrian) would write about her crazy love life and my companion and I would always wait for our Mormon soap opera fix. So I’ve just decided that despite my lackness of a love life, I’ll just make one up.


It was a dark and stormy night as I forced myself to drive down to single’s branch FHE. That’s right- forced. The ones that go with a happy face usually are the ones that have something wrong with them. But let’s not get into politics- this is a love story- not a political statement. Although I may or may not make one. Back to the star crossed fateful night. My thoughts were racing as I went into the building. Did I really enjoy dinner that night? What time would I go to bed? Did I feel like writing a missionary anytime soon? Needless to say, when I ran into Horatio, the impact sent the anxiety filled thoughts flying like butterflies during migration season.
“Uh, hello” I nervously said with my face in a scrunch trying to figure out why this boy, no man, had chosen to run into me at that particular moment.
“Why hello!” His cheerful greeting caught me off guard. If I were an actually guard, I probably would have dropped my sword. So metaphorically I dropped my sword. “It’s so good to see you here at FHE… Elissa.” Did he really call me by my name, or was I conjuring up sounds that resembled my name from his voice? Not only was Horatio the elder’s quorum president, he had also served a mission where he had been instrumental in opening up some communist controlled tribe in the harsh land of Africa. He had dark brown hair that complemented his dark brown eyes- intriguing eyes. A set of perfectly set pearly white teeth that had not been the result of braces (he happened to be born perfect) smiled underneath a nose that was sculpted as if from the hands of Michelangelo.
After my eyes popped back into my head from drinking in this tall glass of purified water, I said the only thing I could come up with at the moment “Yes, here I am. At FHE. Bumping into you. Not that I came here to bump into you…er” My voice trailed off as did all my self confidence that this conversation was going anywhere but the history books.
He laughed. One of those laughs that sound like the angels of heaven are playing their celestial sounds and projecting it through the mouth of this, this, this, Horatio. No other words could state it quite like the sound. “Well, we’re playing steal the bacon and I was wondering if you would like to be my partner?” His partner? Life partner, no, eternal partner? Of course. I just had to call my mom and tell her grandchildren would be arriving within the next two years, after a beautiful temple wedding of course.
“As long as you can bring home the bacon, I’ll gladly be your partner.” Really? Did I really just suggest to him that he could provide for me past this dumb FHE game?
“Oh, so we have a funny one in the building.” Still the smile, I guess I didn’t botch my eternal prospective after all. And there we were- two people of averaging heights with different interests and different cars with different mpg s going into the cultural hall like we were arriving to our reception. He probably didn’t notice the lemon filled butter cream cake with the rotating glass couple on top. Or the little girls in matching periwinkle dresses with puffed out sleeves attending the guest book (made by the oldest lady in the ward, complete with rick rack borders). His eyes missed the sparse filled table with wilted vegetables because we decided to pay tithing rather than have fancy food. No matter, we were going to play steal the bacon, except not steal, because that’s a commandment not to, but we were going to be hand in hand for the rest of the night.
And then the electricity went out.

This is where I then sent out the letters. Give 'em something to look forward to. But honestly, I'm not feeling the cheesy mormon love story thing, so I might change to adventure or science fiction. Then again, people love those genres, so in a way everything is a love story. Which reminds me, before I stop my eternal rambling, I was at Panda Express today and my fortune cookie said "You will make many changes before settling down happily." Hope none of those changes involve plastic surgery or anything...