As I was cooking tonight the song My Favorite Things from the Sound of Music popped into my head. In case you don't remember it here is a link to jog your memory: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ikpj24WMOLw&playnext=1&list=PLEC5068D619C75C3C&feature=results_video

Sorry I took a bite out of the brownies before I took this pic...they are good

I am sure it had to do with the fact that I was making brownies and I kept thinking to myself,"hmm brownies are a few of my favorite things." However, since the brownies had to go into a parchment lined pan I also started thinking,"hmm parchment paper is a few of my not so favorite things."

While I was cooking though I started to think of what my favorite things are and so I decided to share a few of my well favorite things...some cooking related...and well some random because you know I love randomness.

1. I love running in the rain. There is nothing better than the feel of rain on your face as you run.
2. I love homemade pizza...especially when it is made with love
3. I love the movie Life is Beautiful...it is just an amazing reminder of how powerful the human spirit is and how a positive attitude can truly change any situation...if you haven't seen it please do.
4. I love dark chocolate and red wine...together
5. I love the smell of garlic and olive oil especially if its going into homemade marinara sauce...and even better when its cold outside and the windows get all steamed up from the sauce being simmered on low all day...heaven
6. I love reading cookbooks like novels before I go to bed...if I remembered my dreams I am sure I would be dreaming about food
7. I love Taco Bell but it makes me ill within seconds
8. I love my amazing girlfriends who I share laughter, good food, wine and trash tv with
9. I love fried turkey...never thought I would say those words
10. I love leftover pumpkin pie for breakfast

Tonight I made a recipe called Perfect Brownies...now if you call yourself "perfect brownies" you have some pretty big shoes to fill, right? And let me just say this claim is justified. These are pretty much the perfect brownie...they are rich, chocolatey, gooey and moist.

What? You don't drink wine while you bake?

This brownie  recipe  calls for high quality chocolate in the form of  cocoa powder and chocolate chips. So I used Scharfenberger cocoa powder and Hersheys semi-sweet chocolate chips...no generics tonight for these perfect brownies. I do have to say these brownies are not only perfect they are also by far the easiest brownies I have ever made.



I did also learn something from this recipe. It says that you only want to mix the ingredients until they are incorporated because if you beat it gluten will be produced from the flour. Gluten is a protein that makes bread chewy and you don't want to make your brownies chewy....interesting little fact, ay.

Ok so I don't know the source of this brownie recipe. All I know is that a friend emailed it to me last year and I am just now getting around to trying it. I love the fact that there are only 6 ingredients and usually these are things that I have laying around the house...ok sure I had to call my neighbor for eggs, but hell I usually have eggs.

Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups sugar
3/4 cup flour
3/4 cup cocoa powder
3 eggs
3/4 cup butter, melted *** I love recipes where I don't have to soften butter because I always forget to take it out of the fridge and I end up spending hours waiting for butter to soften when really I just want to cook right now ***
3/4 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

Combine the sugar, flour, cocoa, eggs and melted butter and mix. Mix until the wet ingredients are incorporated and stop. Stir in the chocolate chips. Line a 9x13 baking dish with parchment paper. Pour the batter into the pan and spread it out. Bake at 325 degrees for 20-30 minutes. It's done when a toothpick inserted in the tallest part comes out clean. Be careful of sticking the toothpick into a chocolate chip.

These brownies are heaven with either a great glass of wine or ice cold milk...either way they are truly a slice of heaven. Cheers my friends!!

I often joke that we have become a society that celebrates mediocrity. I was always raised that in order to be successful you had to work hard, you had to be the best and you had to shine. And that is exactly what I did throughout my life. In high school I worked hard to get good grades, I was class president, I did community service, joined clubs that would help me get into college, wrote for the school paper and tried to play sports. In college I worked my way through school by working and going to school full time. I was bound and determined to graduate with honors, wrote for the school paper, taught step aerobics and worked graveyards for 4 years. And after school my path continued pretty much on the same whirlwind journey. I am proud of my accomplishments, but I also recognized the blood, sweat and tears that it took to get me to where I am today. And I have no regrets and would do it all again in a heart beat.

However, because of my drive, expectations and hyper activity level I do have a hard time understanding this celebration of "meeting standards," that we often see today. I struggle with understanding why every child gets a trophy when they play sports or why people get raises in their jobs for doing the minimum or why there are consolation prizes....you didn't win you should get nothing is what I often want to scream!!! I actually often joke that if we are going to celebrate mediocrity we should truly embrace it by being excited when we get 17th...hence this ribbon that was placed on my desk a few months back helping me to truly celebrate 17th. Seriously if being #1 doesn't really mean anything, why can't we celebrate 17th?



So tonight when I got done cooking I was a little frustrated with my dish because it was mediocre at best. I was like damn I have nothing to write about...but then inspiration hit me...and I thought hell I can totally write about this.  I made Cooking Lights Rice and Peas and guess what? It was just ok.  It wasn't knock your socks off amazing but just like every child who gets a trophy it has potential and it is just a matter of what we all do with that potential and how we nurture it which is important.

I will say this recipe was easy and it could be a nice side dish, but it just wasn't as described. The recipe description made it sound like it was a soupy risotto type of dish but it was kind of more a mushy risotto little number. It started off right as how can you go wrong by sauteing onions in butter. Then you add the arborio rice and cook for 1 minute...still on the right track. Add the vegetable broth, water, salt and pepper and this is where it started to go astray. I think it would have been better with chicken broth to give it more of that salty flavor and I think I would have used all broth instead of water which kind of took away from the flavor. Cook for 20 minutes and then add the Parmesan cheese, peas and parsley. I would have added more Parmesan as I think the nutty flavor of the cheese could have also enhanced this recipe quite nicely. And of course more salt because as you all know I am kind of a salt fiend.



Here is the recipe if you want to try it or play around with it:

• 2 tablespoons butter
• 1/2 cup finely chopped yellow onion
• 1 cup Arborio rice or other short-grain rice
• 2 1/2 cups organic vegetable broth (such as Swanson Certified Organic)
• 2 cups water
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
• 1/2 cup (2 ounces) freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese
• 2 tablespoons finely chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley
• 1 (16-ounce) package frozen green peas, thawed

Preparation

1. Melt butter in a large saucepan over medium-high heat. Add onion to pan; sauté 5 minutes or until golden. Add rice to pan; sauté 1 minute. Add broth, 2 cups water, salt, and pepper to pan; bring to a boil. Cover, reduce heat, and cook 20 minutes, stirring occasionally. Stir in cheese, parsley, and peas; cook 2 minutes.

So last night I did another hostile takeover of another kitchen...well seriously how hostile can it be since I feed you...actually I just wanted to use that phrase. I decided to make Cooking Lights Three Cheese Chicken Penne Florentine and it was some seriously low calorie/low fat comfort food. There were several highlights of this takeover as I also got to takeover their 6 year old...never thought I would hear the words,"be good for Danah." He was super good as he wouldn't even talk to me...I am pretty scary. I also learned how to make brown sugar walnuts...more to come later...and I also learned how to raise civic minded children.



During dinner we started talking about politics and as many of you know politics just isn't my passion. Sure I try to vote when I know where my polling place is and I try to at least stay somewhat aware, however I do not read the ballot books cover to cover, I do not normally research upcoming elections as thoroughly as I should and I don't have like political passion causes. However, my friend was telling me that her father would always assign every member of the family an aspect of the upcoming election when they were growing up to research whether it was a candidate, a bill, etc and they would share their "research" with each other over dinner. Isn't that an amazing idea!!!

Ok so back to dinner. The true key to this recipe is blending the cottage cheese. And honestly I almost skipped that step and just dumped the cottage cheese into the pasta mixture. But putting the cheese in the blender made it super creamy and truly added to the richness of the meal...hence hiding the fact that it was low cal/low fat. So word to the wise whatever you do, blend that cottage cheese.

First of all saute the mushrooms, onions and bell peppers in olive oil. Cook for about 4 minutes and then add the spinach, fresh oregano (which adds a nice herb flavor) and salt/pepper. Ok the recipe only calls for pepper but seriously add salt.

Meanwhile cook the pasta according to package direction. Blend the cottage cheese. Shred the chicken and I used a rotisserie chicken so I didn't spend all night in the kitchen instead of drinking wine with friends and it worked perfectly.

Once everything has been cooked add the vegetable mixture, cottage cheese, pasta, cheddar cheese, parmesan, milk and soup. Put it into a baking dish, add some additional cheddar and parmesan and cook for 25 minutes in a 425 degree oven.

This is truly the perfect winter, good for you comfort food. Its pretty enough to use for entertaining, healthy enough you don't feel guilty and cheesy enough that it leaves you happy.

• 1 teaspoon olive oil
• Cooking spray
• 3 cups thinly sliced mushrooms
• 1 cup chopped onion
• 1 cup chopped red bell pepper
• 3 cups chopped fresh spinach $
• 1 tablespoon chopped fresh oregano
• 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
• 1 (16-ounce) carton 2% low-fat cottage cheese
• 4 cups hot cooked penne (about 8 ounces uncooked tube-shaped pasta)
• 2 cups shredded roasted skinless, boneless chicken breast
• 1 cup (4 ounces) shredded reduced-fat sharp cheddar cheese, divided $
• 1/2 cup (2 ounces) grated fresh Parmesan cheese, divided
• 1/2 cup 2% reduced-fat milk
• 1 (10 3/4-ounce) can condensed reduced-fat, reduced-sodium cream of chicken soup, undiluted

Preparation

1. Preheat oven to 425°.
2. Heat olive oil in a large nonstick skillet coated with cooking spray over medium-high heat. Add mushrooms, onion, and bell pepper; sauté 4 minutes or until tender. Add spinach, oregano, and black pepper; sauté 3 minutes or just until spinach wilts.
3. Place cottage cheese in a food processor; process until very smooth. Combine spinach mixture, cottage cheese, pasta, chicken, 3/4 cup cheddar cheese, 1/4 cup Parmesan cheese, milk, and soup in a large bowl. Spoon mixture into a 2-quart baking dish coated with cooking spray. Sprinkle with remaining 1/4 cup cheddar cheese and remaining 1/4 cup Parmesan cheese. Bake at 425° for 25 minutes or until lightly browned and bubbly.

Yeah I never thought I would say those words but here I am breaking my own rules. And seriously who thinks of "damn good" and "tofu" going together in the same sentence. But in this case it is very true!!! This is probably the best tofu recipe I have ever made!! And I have actually made quite a few tofu recipes...I know it's wacky but growing up in Humboldt and having a hippie Mom you just take some of the granola with you wherever you go. I see tofu and I think home.

Last night I made Citrus Marinated Tofu with Onions and Peppers. This recipe came from Bon Appetit so seriously you know they aren't going to publish a mediocre tofu recipe, right? This recipe was also very cool because the entire meal is cooked via roasting in the oven so it was easy and low maintenance. However, back to the tofu it is marinated and roasted and so it dries it out and gives it a more substantial texture. The marinate also has amazing flavor and since tofu takes on the flavor of whatever it is in this worked out well for this recipe. (TDM you seriously need to try this recipe)

The recipe did call for medium tofu which I could not find. It actually specifically says no firm tofu, but my options were firm or extra firm (scary description) so I went with firm and in my opinion it worked out fine. However, I did have to google tofu consistency to figure out what and how the different consistencies occur. I guess tofu is made by blending hot soy milk and some type of stuff that makes it form a curd. I was afraid to do too much research into what makes soy milk into a block of smooshy stuff....so I glossed over that part. Anyway for soft tofu when the soy milk and "coagulant" are blended this mixture is poured directly into its package and hence soft tofu is born. Now for medium to extra firm tofu the mixture is poured into a mold, covered with cotton, pressed to form a block and then cut and packaged. I guess the firmness of the tofu will vary depending on the type of recipe you are trying to accomplish. So if you are trying to use tofu in a dessert or smoothie you would use soft tofu and if you are trying to use it in a stir fry or for roasting you would go with a firmer consistency. Wow now you learned something about tofu!!








Ok now focusing and getting back to the recipe. So first you make the marinate which consists of cilantro, lime juice, garlic, cumin, paprika, salt and pepper. I have recently become a garlic purist so I get fresh garlic and peel and dice it myself to enhance the flavor. But holy heck this recipe called for a 1/4 cup of garlic so let me just say I was peeling and dicing for awhile. Pout 1/2 cup marinade in a bag and let the tofu slices sit for about 15 minutes. The marinade has a great flavor from the citrus of the lime, the spice of the cumin and the earthy flavor of the cilantro.

Put the rest of the marinade in a blender and add additional cilantro, olive oil, honey, salt and pepper. This will be the sauce that you spread on top of the tofu/vegetable mixture.

Meanwhile slice your onions and red bell peppers. The recipe says to toss the peppers with cumin and smoked paprika, however I will be honest I ran out of cumin with the marinade so I used chipotle red pepper. It was actually really good and gave the vegetables a little bit of a kick.

Once the tofu is done marinating put the vegetables and tofu on a cookie sheet covered in foil and roast in a 450 oven for 25 minutes. So I plated this dish with the vegetables on the bottom, the tofu and then a layer of the sauce and a garnish of fresh cilantro. I also had this for lunch and it was actually even better the next day.

Here is the link to the full recipe if you want to be brave and conquer your tofu fears:
http://www.bonappetit.com/recipes/quick-recipes/2012/03/citrus-marinated-tofu-with-onions-and-peppers

Here is the Spanish white wine I served the tofu with and it was a light citrusy wine that complimented the lime and spices perfectly:




Cheers my friends!

So last night I got to takeover another friends kitchen and let me just start by saying I seriously have stove envy. I was super excited when I got back to a gas stove in my place, but cooking on this beautiful chrome, commercial grade stove pretty much made my lifetime!!! Thanks MP!




I also learned about dino-bites, have you heard of these? They are pretty much the coolest kid food invention known to man. Granted I know I don't have kids so I may just be out of the kid food loop but what a great marketing idea-chicken nuggets shaped like dinosaurs...that is just downright awesome! I didn't have these as a kid...oh wait thats probably because I wasn't allowed to eat chicken or fried food and we didn't own a microwave for fear that I would die of radiation poisoning by the time I was 7. Love you Mom if you are reading this! Anyway if you hadn't heard of these I learned that you can get them at Costco and if you want them crispy you cook them in the oven and if you want them more flexible you throw them in the microwave. Yes, even I learn things from kitchen takeovers.



Anyway last night I made the Cheesiest Potato Soup. It was really good, but I have to say I think I could have made it cheesier...not saying it needed it but since its claiming to be the cheesiest potato soup recipe...well I am just calling shennanigans on that claim.



So the soup is very easy just melt 2T of butter and saute the onions in a pan until they are soft. Add the potatoes and broth and bring to a boil. Simmer for approximately 15-20 minutes, covered. Blend the soup in batches and return to pot. Add cream, cheese, dried dill, cayenne pepper, salt and pepper and voila!!



Here is the recipe if you would like to give it a try: http://allrecipes.com/recipe/cheesiest-potato-soup/

I was very cognizant of picking a recipe for Kitchen Takeover #2 that screamed comfort food, but didn't take forever in the kitchen and prohibited me from visiting. This recipe was great as it was warm, cozy, had a lot of great flavor and was easy enough that we could cook, talk and drink wine without jacking up the recipe so bad that we had no idea what we were making.

Hope everyone has an amazing week-Happy Monday!

As many of you know as a child I would watch my family read and make recipes from Bon Appetit magazine and I use to thumb through the pages thinking it was probably the most boring magazine on the face of the Earth. Sure I was more of a fan of Ranger Rick and The Muppet Magazine, but those are details, right? However, since I recently gave up my Ranger Rick habit I started to read Bon Appetit myself and it always leaves me in awe. The food creativity, the photography and the global scope of the magazine always has me completely overwhelmed, intimidated and intrigued all at the same time. 

Please do not get Kitchen Takeover confused with Kitchen Makeover because the only thing that gets changed in your kitchen when I takeover is the cleanliness. So last night I took over my best friends kitchen...I invited myself over to cook her and her husband dinner. For clarification I made pasta I did not cook them...the above sentence reads a little funny but it made me laugh so I kept it. As you can see I totally dress up when I takeover someones kitchen:

When I first moved to Southern California there were a few things that I was enthralled about and that I quickly had to learn about. The first being sprinklers. We didn't have sprinklers in Nor Cal because nature watered our lawn and so when I moved here I was amazed by the fact that people had to program "nature" to water their lawns. Therefore I needed a tutorial on how sprinklers worked, were programmed and the optimum time for them to be activated. I also learned about restaurant ratings systems. No, I am not talking about Michelin Stars or anything as high class as that. I am talking about the cleanliness ratings on the outside of restaurants, from health inspections. I loved that at a glance I could decide if I wanted to eat at a restaurant or if I would get a communicable disease just by walking through the door. In Humboldt County we just didn't have those...yeah I know what you are thinking and yes all of it is true.

Since I started cooking so regularly I decided I needed my own rating scale, however mine is not based on cleanliness it is based on my love of the recipe. It has 4 ratings:
1-Never again am I making this and its going straight into the garbage
2-It's edible however you will never see this again
3-This is pretty good and if someone specifically requests to see this again I will track down the recipe (although it may take awhile to find the recipe in my 700 cookbook collection)
4-I hear angels singing when I put this food in my mouth and I am pretty close to an orgasm happy

However, since I mentioned Michelin Stars, did you know?

• Michelin ratings started in 1933 in France
• The highest ranking for a Michelin star is a 3 and the lowest is 1 (duh, right?)
• There are only 81 restaurants world wide with a 3 star ratings, which indicates this restaurant is "exceptional cuisine, worthy of a special journey."
• Michelin raters are completely anonymous

This recipe is a 4 in my book!! This is truly one of the best recipes I have found in a long while. I love the broiled shrimp with the garlic and olive oil. I love dill!!! And I love the saltiness of the feta cheese. Then you through pasta in there and its pretty much double happiness in my book.





However, of course I did modify it a bit. The recipe called for a 1/2 lb of shrimp, however I went to the grocery store after the gym and the seafood counter was closed so I had to buy frozen shrimp...not my favorite but it worked. However, the frozen shrimp came in a 1lb bag so I decided to cook the whole bag and add extra shrimp and it was tasty...added protein too, right? When I make this again I will make an effort to get fresh shrimp, however for this recipe to still be so tasty with frozen shrimp says a lot about the flavors.

I also couldn't find mint, but I am not a die hard mint fan unless its in a mojito so I left it out and honestly I love dill so the dill alone was perfect for me. And seriously I really love dill!!! And yes it took me 8 attempts to take this picture of this dill.

So the shrimp is cooked in the broiler. Add olive oil, garlic, salt and pepper and broil 2-3 minutes. I cooked it for a little longer but this is the first time I used my broiler so I don't know if the recipe was inaccurate or if my broiler just takes a little extra time. My recommendation is to watch it closely because seriously no one wants chewy rubbery shrimp.

Cook the orzo pasta while you cook the shrimp. And once the shrimp are done add the lemon zest, lemon juice, scallions, mint (if you use it), dill, cucumber, feta, olives and olive oil in a bowl. Once the pasta is done throw that in the bowl as well and either serve immediately slightly warm or cool in the
fridge.

Ingredients

• Kosher salt
• 8 ounces orzo pasta (about 2 cups)
• 1/2 pound large shrimp, peeled and deveined (tails removed), coarsely chopped
• 1/3 cup plus 1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• Freshly ground pepper
• Grated zest of 2 lemons, plus 1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
• 4 scallions, thinly sliced
• 1/2 cup chopped fresh mint
• 1/2 cup chopped fresh dill
• 1 cup diced English cucumber
• 4 ounces crumbled feta cheese
• 3 tablespoons halved kalamata olives

Directions

I tried this recipe last night warm and I also had it leftover for lunch today and I truly liked it both ways.

You might be wondering why the hell I am making a recipe with an ingredient that I hate...well let me tell you. It goes a little something like this.
1. I hope that this one recipe will change my mind about this ingredient
2. If I don't like it I won't eat it and that is better for my lovely little figure
3. Good chefs don't always just cook for themselves they cook for others
4. Because I can...



So today I made Mommom's Chocolate Bourbon Spiked Banana Bread. And I have to admit this recipe had a few ulterior motives:
1. I had bought a giant bottle of bourbon for that bourbon chicken recipe I made a few weeks ago and I thought the 3 T that this recipe called for would get me closer to finishing that bottle


2. If I brought this recipe in to work I thought the 3 T of bourbon would instantly make for a happy and positive work environment
3. I wanted to know who the hell Mommom is...and come to find out it is Joy the Bakers Grandma...cute name right...I always just called my Grandma Grandma...how boring and unoriginal (Grandma I know you aren't reading this because you are blind but just know that I love you even thought I didn't have a cute and sassy nickname for you).

Can blogs also do shout outs? Hell it's my blog so I guess I can do anything I want, right? Anyway I just want to give a shout out to E & J for letting me play with their wazoo camera....having fun trying to take real pictures...yes they are a work in progress but...well hell isn't everything.

So tonight I actually wanted to make a shrimp and orzo pasta salad and I actually went to the grocery store after the gym to buy the ingredients, however the meat/seafood counter was closed. To most people you might be like,"oh crap," however to someone like me it was almost a mini-temper tantrum on aisle 4. However, because I am a Dispatcher I recognized that I needed to be flexible, divide and conquer so that is what I did...I bought frozen shrimp. However, due to my lack of patience, when the shrimp took longer than 14 minutes to defrost I allowed my self diagnosed a.d.d. to kick in and I decided to make banana bread.

I also had another realization tonight...you know you bake too much when you go to bake and you realize that the bowl of your mixer is still dirty in the sink from your last baking experience. Wow aren't I accomplished!!!



Anyway I digress...banana bread! So add the dry ingredients in a bowl-flour, baking powder and salt. I bought my flour at Fresh and Easy and I couldn't find a bad that said all-purpose flour so I bought this. I was a little confused because it said "wheat flour," but I figured all flour starts as wheat and they had a different bag that said "whole wheat flour," so I figured that was more of the wheat variety I was thinking of. Hmmm....

In the past I have also always used "regular" salt for baking and kosher salt for everything else, however recently I have decided kosher salt all around...and so far I haven't noticed any discrepancies in my baking.



In a mixing bowl add butter and sugar and cream until it gets to that pretty yellow color. Add the eggs and mix. You are then supposed to add the mashed banana, however due to my vomit reflex, I decided to throw the bananas in the bowl whole rather than mash them because I was just afraid that the action of mashing bananas might just put me over the edge. Mix the bananas with the bourbon and the lemon juice. Finally add the dry mixture and combine.



 Once this is all mixed turn off the mixer and stir in the nuts and chocolate chips. I have to admit I did add more chocolate chip than the recipe called for because seriously when was the last time you heard someone say,"crap this recipe just has way too much friggin chocolate." Just saying....



Here is the link to the recipe:
http://leitesculinaria.com/80161/recipes-chocolate-bourbon-spiked-banana-bread.html

And although I hate bananas even I have to admit that this bread smells divine in the oven. I obviously can't be a really good judge of the flavor profile of this recipe due to my predisposed judgments against bananas but I did not see anyone go running and screaming after eating it so all is right in the world in my eyes.

"If you have the power to coax something beautifully sweet out of your kitchen, it's as though you have a magic wand in your hands." -Joy the Baker

Happy Monday y'all!!! (yes that is a little Southern shout out...yup 2 shout outs in one blog...that is just the way I role). Peace out!

So I pretty much love tortilla soup...ok actually I love most soup...but tortilla soup has a special place in my heart. This recipe came from Rachael Ray but it's called Jane Foxs Tortilla Soup...and I tried to figure out who Jane Fox was but I still don't know who the hell this lady is. But she can make a damn good tortilla soup so I am pretty sure I like her. I can tell you that when I first saw the recipe I read it as Jamie Fox and I thought to myself hmmm that's weird I wonder why Jamie Fox, the comedian,  has a tortilla soup recipe, but I quickly realized I was just reading it wrong.



Last night I decided I just needed a night at home. I was tired, I was fried and I truly needed an attitude adjustment. So it became me against the kitchen. This tortilla soup has great flavor due to the chili powder and cumin, it is zesty but not so hot that you want to cry and great accouterments in the form of avocado, lime, cheese and tortilla strips. To steal Rachael Ray's phrase this recipe is truly yum-o!!!

Just in case you wanted to know a few things about tortilla soup:

• Did you know there is a movie called Tortilla Soup that came out in 2001? I haven't watched it but I thought you might want to do a theme night so I included that little bit of trivia
• Tortilla soup was created as a way to use leftovers, especially stale chips. No one loves stale chips so thought this was a good idea. 
• It is believed that tortilla soup originated in the Mexico City area 
• And in case you want additional tortilla soup reading material here is a great LA Times article on the soup of the night: http://articles.latimes.com/2005/nov/30/food/fo-tortillasoup30

This recipe is very easy to make. Start by cutting 6 tortillas in strips and cooking them in the oven, after spraying them with cooking spray. Take another 6 tortillas and cut into squares and saute them in corn oil. I used vegetable oil and they seemed to turn out just fine. Then add the onion, garlic, cilantro, bay leaves and spices. Cook for about 7 minutes and add the broth and diced tomatoes. I like that this recipe doesn't have tomato overkill...nice flavor but not so many tomato chunks that you want to gag.



This recipe is made even easier by the fact that it uses rotisserie chicken...and actually because I am a lazy grocery shopper I bought grilled chicken breasts at the Vons deli counter because I didn't want to wait the 30 minutes for the rotisserie chickens to be ready. And I have to say I really liked these and I would totally buy them again...actually think the charred flavor from the grilled chicken breasts added to the flavor of the soup...but I can't verify that for real.



Finally to serve the soup put avocado and lime juice on the bottom of the bowl. Pour in the soup and top with jalapeno, queso fresco and tortilla strips. I had this soup with a crisp white wine and I have to say I was truly very happy.

Ingredients

• 12 corn tortillas, 6 sliced lengthwise into 1-inch-wide strips and 6 cut into 1 1/2 squares

• Vegetable cooking spray

• Salt and pepper

• 1/4 corn oil

• 1 large yellow onion, chopped

• 2 - 3 cloves garlic, chopped

• A handful cilantro leaves, coarsely chopped.

• 2 bay leaves

• 2 tablespoons mild to medium chili powder, such as Gephardt's or ground ancho chile powder (about a couple scant palmfuls)

• 1 tablespoon ground cumin (about a palmful)

• 6 cups chicken stock

• 1 15 ounce can  diced tomatoes with green chiles

• 2 rotisserie chicken breasts, skin and bones discarded, meat shredded or diceed

• 2 avocados

• 2 limes, cut into wedges

• 1 small red onion, finely chopped

• 2 large jalapeno chile peppers, seeded and chopped

• Crumbled queso fresco and sour cream, for topping

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees . Arrange the tortilla strips on a baking sheet in a single layer; spray with cooking spray. Bake until deep golden, about 15 minutes. Season with salt.
2. Meanwhile, in a soup pot or dutch oven, heat 3 tbsp. oil over medium heat. Add the tortilla squares and cook, stirring, until browned, 2 to 3 minutes. Add the remaining 1 tbsp. oil, the yellow onion, garlic, cilantro, bay leaves, chili powder and cumin; season with salt and pepper. Cook, stirring, until the spices are toasted and the onion is softened, 7 to 8 minutes. Add the stock and tomatoes and bring to a boil. Add the chicken and lower the heat to a simmer until ready to serve.
3. Peel, seed and dice the avocados. Place some at the bottom of each soup bowl and douse with a healthy squeeze of lime juice. Pour the soup into the bowls. At the table, top with the red onion, baked tortilla strips, jalapenos, queso fresco and sour cream. Serve with the remaining lime wedges.

Now for my Sunday night toast-here is to hoping for a better week ahead. Last week kicked my ass and I really don't need another week like that for awhile. So cheers my friends!!!