Recipe: Panzanella Salad Redux

I know I've posted this salad recipe before, but I just wasn't happy with the pix I posted last time.

While the iPhone is great for snapping covert shots of stupid shit like a woman in gold spandex pants, acrylic platforms, and wig that would make Jan Crouch jealous, it's not so great for making food look appetizing.

So, here we go. Panzanella Salad Redux.

INGREDIENTS:
- Italian Bread
- Italian seasoning
- olive oil
- 20 cherry tomatoes, halved
- red onion, sliced into thin strips (to taste)
- 8 leaves fresh basil, chiffonade'ed
- 1 avocado, sliced into wedges or cubes
- 3 white potatoes
- 2 tbsp red wine vinegar
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 2 cloves garlic, minced
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1/4 tsp pepper
- romaine lettuce
-chicken (optional)

DIRECTIONS:
Slice bread into cubes and douse liberally with olive oil and Italian seasoning. Bake at 400 for roughly 15 minutes, or until cooked to desired crunchiness.

Boil potatoes until they are tender enough to split with a fork, but not falling apart mushy. Cut them into halves or quarters.

Chiffonade your basil so it looks all feathery and makes you look like you know what you're doing when it comes to cutlery. (Mine turned out a little bruised. SO WHAT. THIS ISN'T A BASIL CONTEST.)

I made this super easy for people who are lazy, but like good food, but are trying to eat healthy, but really just want to eat five pretzels with cheese sauce and a large Ice Blended Vanilla from Coffee Bean, BUT-NO-I'M-TRYING-TO-EAT-AT-HOME-AND-SAVE-MONEY-AND-CALORIES, YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT IT'S LIKE OKAY?!? Just buy a fully roasted chicken from the grocery store. They're always juicy and and practically begging to go home with you. And Friday nights, they're only $5.99 at Vons. Ridiculously good deal, if you ask me.

Cut chicken into cubes. Add tomatoes, onion, basil, potatoes, avocado, croutons, and lettuce into a large bowl. In a separate container, mix vinegar, olive oil, garlic, salt, and pepper. Pour over salad.

Now, I'm no Jillian Michaels, but I would classify this meal as "way healthy". Which means you can eat a shit ton of it and not feel guilty. However, since it's so hearty and filling, you really won't even want to eat more than like 4 servings because you'll be full. But it's a "healthy full" which means you practically just went to the gym.

Boner'ppetite!

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Why Did the Duck Cross the Busy-Ass Freeway?

Yesterday was like the 5th time I've seen a duck family crossing the 101 freeway during rush hour traffic in the past few months. I don't know what it is about this stretch of land that's so inviting to a family of ducks. Every time it happens, and I see them waddling across the road, I gasp and my heart skips a beat and I want to run out and scoop the ducks up and return them to safety and be a duck-hero and have Sarah McLachlan write a song about how I'm an animal saver.

But instead I make a sad face and zoom past them.

Most of the time, traffic slows and swerves and I leave the scene saying a Hail Mary. One time though, when traffic was particularly shitty and barely crawling along, a women in the car next to me threw her car into park, jumped out, and started scooting the chicks to safety. I was happy and proud and beaming for that woman who risked getting her car pulverized for the sake of some dumb little birds.

But every time since then, I feel ashamed that I didn't get out.

And I think "Maybe that's why bad things happen to me- Because I don't save ducks!!!!!"

These little duck families are super cute too. If there's one thing I'm a sucker for, it's cute, baby, fuzzy animals in danger.

What would you do??? Would you stop and shoo them across? Or would you drive away, humming The Circle of Life?

Like this. Only we weren't in Europe. And I wasn't wearing a vest.

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How's My Weekend, You Ask...

Yesterday morning, Boyfriend went up to Santa Maria to help his parents move. Since I had a shitty (read: endometriosis) week, I decided to stay home and make the most of this maxing and relaxing weekend.

This is how my weekend panned out.

SATURDAY

-Wake up at 7:30am to take Biscuit to the vet. Two hours and $175 later, we have a diagnosis of "fungal infection". The vet mentions something about "contagious" and "ringworm" and my skin literally jumps out the window and runs down the street.

-Boyfriend leaves for Santa Maria. I decide to spoil myself with a mani/pedi gift card that that I'd been hoarding for the past three months. (Since I'm poor as shit, I have to use these special moments sparingly.) Feel good about myself and manage to make Vanna White gestures as often as possible in order to show off my beautiful nails.

Like these except not as nice.

-Bathe Biscuit with special anti-fungal shampoo. The bathroom looks like I wallpapered it in black angora. Decide to leave it for later when it's all dried up and I can easily Swiffer the heaps of dog hair.

-Do 85 loads of laundry, including bed linens and dog beds, due to a certain canine's "fungal infection".

-Proceed to have wrestling matches with both a fitted sheet and a duvet cover.

-Notice that my "splurge" manicure is fucked. Rage out.

-Get awful, binding, diarrhea cramps. Drag myself backwards ala The Exorcist into bed and pass out.


SUNDAY

-Wake up at 2:45am with painful, explosive, faucet-butt diarrhea. (You can thank me later for that image.)

-Play hopscotch from the bed to toilet from 3-4am.

-Play hopscotch from the toilet from 8-10am.

-Boyfriend texts that he's on his way back. Drag myself out of bed and attempt to clean the black angora bathroom.

Pretty much just like this.

Which brings me to right now. 2:11pm, laying in bed, guts are sore, exploding butt, haven't eaten anything except Gatorade. I guess the bright side to this ongoing hell (read: endometriosis) and constant stomach problems is that I've lost weight. And if we're going to brag here, I even weigh less than when I got married back in 2007. At least being sick is good for something. At least.

So much for my weekend of maxing and relaxing.

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Recipe: Oven Fried Chicken.

I bought a new cookbook.

It's this one.

The other night, Boyfriend and I decided to try out our first recipe.

This recipe was destined to go one of two completely different ways: Boyfriend loves fried chicken. I'm not really a fan.

Here are the details.

OVEN "FRIED" CHICKEN
According to Real Simple magazine

Ingredients:
-Canola oil for the rack
-1/2 teaspoon paprika
-Kosher salt and black pepper
-1 cup buttermilk
2 3/4 pounds bone-in chicken parts, skin removed
1 cup crushed buttery crackers, like Ritz


Directions:
1. Heat oven to 375. Oil wire rack and place it inside of a baking sheet.
2. In a shallow dish, combine paprika, buttermilk, and 1/2 teaspoon each of salt and pepper. Add chicken and turn to coat.
3. Place crackers in a shallow bowl. Remove chicken from buttermilk mixture and coat in crackers. Press gently to help stick the crackers.
4. Place chicken on wire rack and bake until crispy (or until thermometer reads 160F for white meat and 165F for dark meat). Make sure to turn chicken halfway through the cooking process, at roughly 20 minutes.

Notes:
-For the wire rack, we used olive oil.
-We don't have kosher salt. We used cheap-ass Morton.
-I let the chicken sit in the buttermilk for about 20 minutes because I've heard all the fancy chefs on TV say that the enzymes in buttermilk are good for breaking down the meat.
-I only like chicken breasts. So that's what we used. Before beginning any of the recipe, I placed them in a Ziploc freezer bag and beat the shit out of them with a rolling pin. That way, they'd be nice and tender. Then, I cut each breast into 2-3 strips. Because I like chicken strips.
-We used grocery store brand "butter crackers". I wasn't disappointed.
-Since we used "tenderized" breasts, we also only cooked it for approximately 35 minutes total.

Review:
This chicken never got "golden" or "fried" looking like the picture in the magazine. And it didn't really TASTE like fried chicken either. With that said, this chicken was really good. The meat was juicy and tender. The coating really was rich and buttery. And if there's one thing I like, it's RichAndButtery. It reminded me of something I would have eaten when I was little. Like, if I lived in the south or something. Because they eat a lot of fried chicken in the south, right? Anyway, it was definitely a kid-friendly meal, that's for sure.

Serving up this plate of belly-filling goodness made me feel like a real life June Cleaver. It seems really wholesome and familyish. The leftovers were even good the next day. I think next time, I might try adding more paprika to the buttermilk and salt/ pepper to the crushed crackers.

This recipe was easy to make and yielded a filling result. Make this on Friday night and you'll have a great snack to take to the beach on Saturday.

Boner'ppetite!

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As Close as I'll Get to Homemade Tortillas.

Every time I go to the grocery store, I see this package of Tortilla Land Uncooked Tortillas* that practically throw themselves off the shelf at me.

I've managed to stay strong for the past year and half.

Last week, I buckled.

As far as meals, I didn't really have anything in mind for them. Aside from my favorite childhood snack- tortilla wrapped around a stick of butter.

. . . . . true story.



So. Tonight, Boyfriend and I decided to make tostadas.

WITH OUR HOMEMADE TORTILLAS.

!!!!!

So, heres how the tortillas went down.

Fresh out of the package, 12 uncooked flour tortillas.

The directions say to cook on each side for 30 seconds. I didn't bother to time anything, I just flipped when it started to bubble. Since the dough is not sticky, it's easy to check the underside without ruining them.

In order to prevent mine from burning, I would alternate the pan from a lit burner to a non-lit burner every few seconds.

And there you have it. Within 15 minutes, I had a dozen "homemade" flour tortillas.

Now, if you've ever had a homemade flour tortilla before you know what Mexican heaven tastes like. And I can honestly say that fresh off the pan, these taste like legit homemade tortillas. I even tried it with a little scoop of butter and OMG BUTTER BURRITO IS SO GOOD.

Boyfriend and I decided to take the "homecookingness" of it up a notch and make tostadas.

To make the tostada base, we fried two tortillas in canola oil...

...Covered the tortilla with Rosarita beans (that I may or may not have re-refried with butter because straight out of the can they look like dog food slop that not even Biscuit would eat), topped with chopped up chicken (cooked in a frying pan with olive oil, salt, pepper, and Schilling Fajitas mix), 9lbs of cheese, lettuce, tomato, sour cream, and Tapatio.

I have to admit, both of us were shocked at how flavorful and hearty this meal was. It was definitely the "homemade" touches on the tortilla, beans, and chicken that made the difference. It was a really pleasant surprise and we ate every last bite.

Boner'ppetite!


* At my grocery store (Vons), these are located in the refrigerated aisle, near the butter, yogurt, and cheese.

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It's Always Fun Discovering Photos of Yourself That You Don't Even Remember Taking.

I'm sitting at the computer right now, uploading a picture to Facebook. Boyfriend comes up and plugs in his camera to upload some recent photos.

When he plugs in the camera, there's a brief flash of the previous photo import.

I notice what looks like someone in a hospital gown.

TILTE: "What was that? It looked like someone in a hospital gown."
Boyfriend: "Yeah, that was you."
TILTE: "No, really."
Boyfriend: "I'm serious. I took those at your colonoscopy."
TILTE: "No, you didn't."
Boyfriend (laughing): "Yes, I did! I asked you if you wanted to take pictures for your blog and you said yes."
TILTE: "NO I DID NOT. I don't remember that."

Come to find out, not only did I OK the photos, apparently I was the one who originally asked (post procedure) to have my picture taken. Because, as it turns out, I'm vain and ridiculous even when I'm totally loaded.

So, I opened up the photos in question...

And there I was. Looking all kinds of crazy.

And since we all know just how vain and ridiculous I am, I won't post the real "cream of the crop" photos. The ones where you can see my corpse legs and scrunchy hospital socks and bedhead and paranormal activity staredown.

On the upside, things can only get better from here.

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...And Then Something Good Happened.

As some of you (who follow me on Facebook) may or may not know, I had another colonoscopy recently. It was something I was not looking forward to because not eating solid food for 24 hours straight puts me on the same level of incoherent insanity as a sister wife.

However, it was something I actually was looking forward to as well. The results of my colonoscopy would give us a better idea on how my health had improved or deteriorated. And it would be one step closer to the impending surgery that's been begging to be scheduled.

Anyway.

Last Tuesday, I got home from work to find an envelope from my gastrointestinal doctor. Of course, I ripped that shit open, not even stopping to think about what type of news I could be receiving.

After skimming through the medical mumbo-jumbo and trying to make sense of the "findings" and descriptions, I found the doctor's note.

And my eyes honed in on the only part of the note that mattered...

"...benign..."

THANK GOD.

Because if we're going to be honest here, there were some major concerns about the possibility of non-benign results.

So that happened.

And Boyfriend and I rejoiced and the clouds parted and the angels sang and Biscuit did the dougie.

And it was a really great moment.


As if that weren't enough, there also happened to be an unknown package at the front door. A package addressed to me. A package that I wasn't expecting. A SURPRISE DELIVERY FOR ME??!?!!?!

Again, I straight ripped that shit open.

And what did I see...?

A STACK OF COOKIES ALL FOR ME!!!!!

Attached to the treasure was a note wishing me well from my friend, Danielle.

It was something I totally was NOT expecting because nobody ever sends me surprise goodies. And also, cookies are delicious and they don't just end up on your doorstep out of nowhere.

I loved it.

The cookies were ordered through a website called Cookie Good that Danielle had previously discovered while hunting for unique cookies. And since she knows me well, she knew that sweet edibles were a surefire way to pick me up.

My cookie tower included Caramel Pretzel, Circus Animal, Just Plain Sugar, Red Velvet, Salted Butterscotch, S'mores, Salted Peanut Brownie, and PB&J Blondie.

That night, Boyfriend and I got right to work and made a significant dent. Actually, what happened was Boyfriend ate the Salted Peanut Brownie while I took several bites out of every option. You know, just for quality control.

And I have to say, for not being a fan of chocolate or marshmallow, the S'mores cookie was my favorite. It was crunchy on the outside with softer, gooey bites on the inside. With a glass of ice cold milk, right before bedtime, it was perfect.

It was a delicious and a very thoughtful surprise and I loved it.


So that was my good news.

Was there anything that made you feel special recently?

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Sausagefest. Literally.

This past Memorial Day, we decided to throw an impromptu barbeque. Instead of doing the same old burgers thing, we went for an all-sausage menu: Italian sausage, bratwurst, kielbasa, and hot dogs for the kids.

Biscuit was ready at all times to catch any wieners on the loose.

We invited a couple of friends over and spent the evening relaxing around the grill.

The peppers were a great addition and added that certain je ne sais quoi. (I'm sure that's French for vegetable.)

Boyfriend had the fucking INGENIOUS idea to chop up all the sausages and make mix-n-match sandwiches. Topped with peppers and creamy dijon and served on a toasted roll, it was the kind of stuff dreams are made of.

After dinner, the kids played a riviting game of Gone Fishin'. Those fishing poles are surprisingly hard for small hands to maneuver.

The dessert fruit salad was courtesy of our guests. And since I'm a Fatty McSweetTooth, I topped it with Dream Whip.

Now that summer is here, we'll be keeping this menu on the shortlist.

Boner'ppetite!

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I'm Tired.

I'm tired of being exhausted.
I'm tired of hurting when I sit.
I'm tired of hurting when I stand.
I'm tired of needing to be near a bathroom at all times.
I'm tired of spending half of the day on the toilet.
I'm tired of not being able to make plans because I don't know how I'm going to feel.
I'm tired of making plans and then having them ruined.
I'm tired of colonoscopies that make my guts feel like I did a thousand sit-ups.
I'm tired of shitting my intestines out.
I'm tired of calling in sick.
I'm tired of spending money on medical bills.
I'm tired of back aches.
I'm tired of crying.
I'm tired of people not knowing.
I'm tired of people acting like it's not a big deal.
I'm tired of trying and still not achieving.
I'm tired of having so many doctors I can't keep them straight.
I'm tired of taking pain relievers every three hours.
I'm tired of not having an appetite even though I know I'm hungry.
I'm tired of hearing "oncology" and "bowel resectioning".
I'm tired of describing a gut-wrenching pain that has no comparison.
I'm tired of waiting to feel better.

I'm tired of endometriosis.

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Pearl's First Trip to Disneyland: The FINAL Installment

Ok, I'm sure most of you have to be thinking "Fuck, MORE Disneyland pictures?? How many pictures can you take in one day????"

Joke's on you. I can take dozens of pictures of a fast food burger alone (just check my iPhone), so imagine the possibilities at a theme park!!!


TUESDAY

We decided to skip breakfast and take our time getting down to the park. Vicki and her family headed to Downtown Disney while Pearl watched cartoons (and I may or may not have straightened my hair).

Just before entering the park, Pearl snapped this beaut. It's a little washed out, but I tend to look better like that anyway.

Welcome to California Adventure!

The water rafting ride I was too chicken to go on because there was a dip involved and people screamed and no thanks.

My favorite ride in the park.

Pearl's favorite ride. At the end of it, Ariel and Prince Eric are animatronics waving at each buggy as it exits. Pearl and I waved back like they were human. One of us really believed they were. I'm not saying who but it was me.

A signature shot.

Pearl's face while we waited in the longest line ever, Toy Story. But even I have to admit, it was worth the wait and funner than I expected.

The Caesar Salad I ordered from the Mexican food stand. I'll tell you one thing, the food at California Adventure blows Disneyland's food out of the water. I equate Disneyland food with overpriced hospital cafeteria. The prices here were probably just as steep, but I felt like I was getting a quality meal, not some burger slop served up by Barth, the chef from You Can't Do That on Television. Also worth noting: THEY SELL BEER IN CALIFORNIA ADVENTURE.

Ever since we saw Puss N Boots, Pearl likes to break into "salsa mode" whenever the mood strikes.

Cotton candy was a dietary staple during this trip. I'm sure you're shocked.

AND YES! MORE RANDOM SHOTS FROM BOTH PARKS!

 Making our grand entrance on Main Street, USA.

My best Chip N' Dale impression while WEARING a Chip N' Dale hat. What's worse- that I was making this face, or that I actually make this face on a regular basis? The world may never know.

I love the face on the girl behind us. And no, there was nothing wrong with her so yes it is okay to laugh.

Someone's obviously way more interested in trying on "cute little hats!!!"

And probably my favorite shot of the day.

Wasn't that fun? It's like you just took a family vacation of your own, only you saved a shit-ton of money and didn't have to deal with all the annoyingly slow people and their 48-seater baby carriages.

Have a great weekend!!!

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