New Plan!!

My new plan is this: post a chicken enchilada casserole recipe every month.

It's not really a new plan. It's apparently what I've decided to do. My friend Droolie gave me her recipe and I liberated it from gluten. Aunt Droolie's nephew used to have a hard time pronouncing Chicken Enchilada Casserole and called it Chicken Encarada Rascapole, so who am I to argue?

Also? Full disclosure, I haven't made this yet, so let me know how you like it. :)

Chicken Encarada Rascapole – Gluten-free

4-6 Chicken Breasts
1 large chopped onion
12 corn tortillas
Salt and pepper to taste
1-2 cups GF Chicken stock
2 cloves crushed garlic
½ cup minced fire-roasted chilies (mild or spicy to taste) (or 1 Small can minced green chilies)
1 T cumin
1 tsp dried oregano
3 T corn flour
1 T canola oil
1 Cup grated Jack cheese
1 Cup grated cheddar cheese
1 Can Evaporated Milk
¾ can of Ro-Tel, drained

Put chicken, chicken stock (enough to cover chicken), large chopped onion, crushed garlic, cumin, oregano in a crock pot and cook on low for 8 hours. When chicken is finished cooking, remove the meat from the crock pot and set aside to cool. When cooled, shred chicken with two forks.

In a large saucepan over medium-high heat, heat the canola oil, and whisk in the corn flour. Cook for a few minutes, then slowly whisk in the evaporated milk. Stir frequently until the mixture starts to thicken. Slowly incorporate the broth mixture from the crock pot, and add the Ro-Tel tomatoes. Heat through, continuing to stir with a spoon. Taste for salt and pepper. Pour the sauce over the chicken and mix, setting aside ¼ to coat tortillas.

Lightly oil 13”x9” baking pan. Dip the tortillas in the reserved sauce and line the baking dish in a single layer. Add chicken in a layer, and top with a layer of mixed cheeses. Repeat until everything is used. Top with a final layer of tortillas and cheese. Refrigerate overnight (optional, because really? Who wants to take 2 days to make this?).

Bake 1 hour at 350 degrees (if refreigerated) or for 25 minutes at 350 degrees (if not refrigerated)

It was fall but it felt like winter, been gone a couple months, felt like a year

It was August.  I posted a list of food I have eaten.  I closed my eyes and now it's November?  It's time to start getting ready for Thanksgiving and being thankful when somehow I missed September and October and blinked and missed the riotous oranges and reds and yellows of the trees in the city and outside.

It got cold.  I can see my breath in the morning and have a harder time justifying leaving the house for work in a wet ponytail.  Well, clothes and a wet ponytail.  It's time to start putting logs on the fireplace and sipping cider in front of the crackling flames.  Forgetting the utter lack of a fireplace down here and my general aversion to hot cider after the first 4 sips.

Every fallwinter I make a mulled cranberry cider.  I throw unmeasured amounts of heady wintry spices, lemon juice and sugar into a pot and simmer it until it's thick and syrupy and my college roommates and friends told me I made the house smell like Christmas.  But it doesn't quite smell like Christmas, because the smell of snow is missing from the mix.

Even though I've never had a white Christmas.  California is prone to 80 degree Christmases and last year, my first Christmas On My Own, was too mild.  There may have been a snowy Christmas in Chicago when I got a Play-Doh Dr. Drill and Fill and my grandmother taught me to make snow angels.

It's coming out too stream of consciousnessy, but I don't want it to.  That's not why I sat down to poke this blog awake.  I started a tumblr, but I'm still trying to get the shoes to mold to my feet.  These shoes fit already.

I have the gooey feelings of excitedsad that happen during this time of year.  The ones I get during the scenic shots of The Spitfire Grill but more.  I've got my toes on a precipice and I'm leaning forward into the wind.  There's exhilaration and a little bit of fear but I keep muttering platitudes to myself .

Jump and the net will appear.

Leap of faith.

I want to write a song but I don't know how it goes.  But it's there.  There are many of them there.  I just can't hear them though.  So I knit and watch reruns of House and swim along the current of Twitter and Facebook updates.

But my guitar has been sneaking out more.

I know this is annoying to read; it's fairly annoying to write.  But there are many words that are blocking the exit and if I get them out it may be just the ticket.

That's just the ticket, he said accentuating the words with a swing of his arm.  He adjusted his newsboy cap and walked off jauntily.

Unsubstantiated rumors, or, it's Armageddon, people!

The District of Columbia is NOT where you want to be right now. It gets a bad rap for the crime and the pomposity of its residents but in the last 24 hours, there were:

• Highway closures from burning or overturned vehicles
• Manhole fires resulting in power outages
• Rumors of armed robberies at the new Target in Columbia Heights (the Metro muggings were not from the last 24 hours)
• My co-worker's apartment was used as a staging area for U.S. Marshals and MPD to take his fugitive neighbor into custody
• Several people lost water last night
• The people who drive my shuttle said the numerous cop cars (and, a co-worker later reported ambulance was present) at L'Enfant Plaza station were for a reported jumper on the tracks. No service disruptions reported on WMATA website, though.
• The Eliot Spitzer story doesn't really fit in the timbre of these other occurences but has a DC element to it.
• Also not an unsubstantiated rumor, but a darn good graphic in this story about pedestrian safety.

Prevalent Themes

I'm writing a paper for work, and "Prevalent Themes" is one of the headers. So it seemed appropriate to address what has increasingly become a prevalent theme around Chez Caribou.

Hi! I forgot to blog for 3 weeks!

I finished knitting cabled purple legwarmers, but my camera's still dead, so you don't get to see them yet.

I'm working a lot.

Knitting not quite enough (although I am swatching for the Eunny's Deep-V Argyle vest right now and about to undertake some gift knitting).

Playing the guitar almost never which makes me sad.

Becoming increasingly fixated on local eating (due to dietary restrictions, locavore is not in my future) and thoughtful about food choices.

In a related vein, becoming very excited about cooking and experimenting and creating foods again.

Wishing I had a camera with which to photograph my knitting and food.

And snuggling Ernie, and making lagomorph noises in the proximity of Pants.

still lame, but with 90% more freezing!

so, i'm in washington, DC right now looking for apartments, talking to people and whatnot because i almost have a job locked in.

gulp

a real job with a real salary and a beautiful little apartment in 16th street heights. however they're not 100% yet because i haven't had the formal offer from HR yet and i haven't paid the security deposit on the apartment yet. so just slink by and don't say anything about the almost job or the almost apartment because i'm already convinced that i'm jinxing it by posting about it.

and it's COLD here. it was 75 degrees colder yesterday morning than it was when i left california.

but i have all sorts of warm goodies with me like lady eleanor, rogue 2, the sillyhead, and the finished anemoi mittens.

although the second mitten i knitted is WAY bigger than the first.

pics later.

DON'T JINX ME IN THE COMMENTS PEOPLE. save your good will for later.