Is there anybody out there?

Just curious if anyone is still reading this thing...

Tortilla Soup

Have you guys ever had the Chicken Tortilla Soup at Max and Erma's? If not, you should try it. It's so good. Anyway, I was at my sister's last weekend and she made a knock-off recipe version of it. Sooooo good and tasted very close to the real thing. I made some this week and thought I'd share the recipe. Just a fair warning that it did make a lot of soup. I would probably try to cut the recipe in half next time and I'd probably still have to freeze some. Also, I did not fry my own tortillas. I bought some 'Santa Fe' tortilla strip salad toppings in the produce section of the grocery store. It was so much easier. Also, I would recommend making this in a non-stick pot.

Max & Erma's Chicken Tortilla Soup
2 cans Campbell's Cream of Mushroom soup
2 cans Campbell's Cream of Chicken Soup
2 cans Campbell's Cream of Celery soup
2 cans Campbell's Cheddar Cheese soup
2 (15 ounce) cans chicken broth
1 (15 ounce) can diced tomatoes
1 cup Pace medium picante salsa
1 (4.5 ounce) can Ortega green chiles
1 medium onion, chopped
4 cloves fresh garlic, minced
1 teaspoon red chile powder, more or less to your taste
Salt and pepper to your taste
1/4 cup fresh, chopped cilantro
4 cooked chicken breasts, cut into small chunks
1 package flour tortillas
1 package shredded colby/cheddar cheese

In a large stockpot combine and whisk together until smooth all eight cans of soup. Add chicken broth. Add tomatoes, salsa, green chiles, onion, garlic, chili powder, salt and pepper.
Bring all ingredients to a full boil, reduce heat, and simmer for 1 hour.
Add cilantro and chicken breast chunks. Simmer another hour.

While soup is simmering, make your soup toppings: Cut flour tortillas into small thin strips and deep fry in hot oil until lightly browned.

To serve: Ladle soup into bowls, top with shredded cheese and fried tortilla strips

Do you love Mallo Cups?

Remember Mallo Cups? Delicious marshmallow surrounded by milk chocolate and coconut. Yum! They actually are still around but usually hard to find unless it's around Halloween time. Anyhoo, if you remember them and love them, you MUST try the new limited edition Hershey's Kisses filled with Coconut Creme. They are delish and taste EXACTLY like a little mini mallo cup. I'm addicted!! I just sounded like a commercial. Mmmwwwhhaaa!!

Snoop

Anyone see a resemblance as much as I do?? Becky, you and Nick should teach the Bean to moke and then it would be like looking in a mirror for her. :-)

hope you're ready...

And it's only going to get bigger!

Leah Polito

I told Brady I was going to take a picture of his feet so he was making it a close up.

sad day.

ahh will i ever learn? probably not. i woke up last thursday morning to find my little hammy, fry, looking miserable and not doing so well. his tiny little paws were pale and he was very unsteady. when i looked at him and picked him up, i knew that his prognosis was rather grim. since i know from past experiences that hamster conditions rapidly decline, i decided to just take him to the vet and have him put to sleep. mike was very good to help me through this rough time. the temperature outside was around 10 and i didn't want to add to the little fuzzy's discomfort, so i wrapped him in a big towel and carried him outside. mike drove to the critter hospital. the worst part was that i had to drop him off because the vet wouldn't be in until 9. poor little thing. after work, i went back and paid the bill. 88bones. can you believe it? i always say i won't get another, but i love the little fuzzies. sniffffffffff ....

Potter....seriously

First the blog and now I'm talking about Harry Potter.....doesn't get any nerdier than that. Seriously, I used to make fun of "those people" you know, the ones that were beyond the age of 14 and actually reading Harry Potter. And now I'm one of them. I'm telling you....they are addicting! Even the doctors I work with were talking about them so I knew I had to check them out. I wasn't disappointed. The books are written so well that they make you never want to put them down. Anyway, make fun all you want, but like the old saying goes, "Don't knock it till you try it". You should start now too....it was just announced that Book 7 (the final book) comes out July 21, 2007.