Nanny's Chili

{Now that we're on a plant-strong, vegan diet, I replace the ground turkey with TVP granules}

Growing up, we always ate very healthy. So much so that I had to make up for lost time at my friend's houses when we'd have sleepovers. Chips and dip at midnight? Yes please! Reese's Puff Cereal for breakfast? Of course! Not that my parents forbid us from eating junk, they just tended not to buy it. Jack or Moses will be lamenting this same thing later in life because naturally, I'm a healthy or go home kind of parent myself. Come one come all for organic, all natural snacks. But woe betide you if you offer my child something with high fructose corn syrup or partially hydrogenated oils in it. However, I won't make them eat brussel sprouts like my mother did. No matter how many times she'd say, "They taste good!" it never resulted in my taste buds changing their minds. I still don't get why we were made to eat them. Ok sure, they're packed with vitamins or something. But so is a gummy vitamin that tastes like candy, so give me that instead and we'll call it even.

Brussel sprouts aside, I loved and still love my mom's cooking. One of my favorite dishes is her chili recipe which is healthy but hearty. I'm pretty sure it's won awards (at the chili cook-off at my parent's church). I'm probably the only one in the family that makes it now, since everyone else is making a veggie chili recipe I introduced them to when I was vegetarian. The last time I used that recipe was when we were first married and I made a giant batch. We ate it for dinner one night and then I gave it to Tim in his lunches for the rest of the week. Seriously. Poor guy. He can't take a bite of that chili now without gagging. I think its the sweet potato.

Anyways, back to the real chili. So it's my mom's recipe but I'm calling it Nanny's Chili because it sounds better than "Mom's Chili" which sounds gross, no? In our family, we call the grandmothers "Nanny" - I think it must be a Canadian thing. So naturally, my mom is Nanny to the grandkids. Unless you're Jack in which case you're "Neena" formally known as "Nee."

1 lb lean ground beef or turkey (for vegan, use TVP)
1 red pepper
1-2 onions
2 garlic cloves
3 TBSP olive oil (for plant strong, just use water or broth)
28 oz can diced tomatoes
15 oz can tomato sauce
15 oz can kidney beans
2 TBSP chili powder + 1/2 TSP black pepper (if you like your chili on the spicier side, double this)
2 TBSP paprika
2 tsp garlic powder
2 tsp salt (or to taste)

Dice red pepper, onions and garlic cloves

Brown the meat. 

Saute the onions, pepper and garlic in olive oil until tender and brown.

Add to meat.

Add tomato sauce and diced tomatoes.

Rinse the beans.

Mash about half of them.

Tend to your child who has been crying the whole time.

Once child is calm, add your spices and stir.

Let simmer on low for 1-2 hours.

Mmmm. 

Serve with crusty bread. 

Hello, Canada

We just got back from a 48 hour trip to Canada. It was kind of a spur of the moment thing so it went fast and felt too short. But it was so needed! It felt freeing to get out of Cleveland and have a change of scenery. At first it took some convincing because gas is so expensive. But then Allie and James offered to cover the cost which was such a blessing. James also promised that we'd "eat healthy" if we agreed to travel up. As if junk food was the main reason I was hesitant. "Oh is there going to be unhealthy food involved? Oh well count me out then. I won't be visiting until you've purged all saturated fats from your cupboards." It was a nice thought though. We basically just ate the whole time. Not really, but it felt like it. After a healthy vegetable stir fry Saturday night Allie commented that she felt really "clean" after eating it. I agreed.  It was quickly countered by sifting through a bucket of new and old candy that made me feel sick.

It's funny that when you have kids, your vacation activities always center around what they'd like to do rather than what the adults are interested in. There's never any talk of what the majority (the parents) would prefer but rather what the smaller, pickier, more likely to get bored minority would like to do. So off to Waterloo Park we went to see the animals - most of which were no where to be found because oh, it was about 40 degrees farenheit (4 celsius) and totally freezing.

We did witness a peacock trying to woo a female counterpart.
This is what's happening here:
Male: "I'm amazing"
Female: "Meh"

Since nobody was having fun standing out in the cold, we decided to make our rounds at the Superstore. Now...for those of you who aren't Canadian, Superstore is on par with Target (and in some ways...better. Don't tell me to take it back. It's true.) Superstore isn't called Super for nothing. It's a fully stocked supermarket with not as many home goods as Target but amazing Joe brand clothes. Tim and I agreed that if we lived in Canada we'd probably shop for our wardrobe exclusively at Superstore. We'd be Joe brand models.  That said, $20 for a shirt is still out of our price range so we settled on a clearance pair of slippers for Jack that cost us $4. Worth every penny. Oh, and we got a bag of bulk bin corn nuts because its just what we do.

Hey Tim, if you read this can I just say that the cd you made for the car ride was uh-mazing? Seriously. Good picks babe. Track #76 - Great is Our God by Young Oceans is what we're listening to now (we're on the road, somewhere in Ohio) and its making this whole post feel really epic as a backing soundtrack.

Wow am I ready to be out of the car. Jack has dropped his pacifier and juice down by his feet a thousand times. And I don't think it was always "on accident." So now he's crying because I reached my limit of neck-craning, arm-straining, body-contorting attemps at getting them back. Ahhh car rides.

Anyways,  it was a good trip - despite my still feeling a bit sick from the strange mix of foods we ate. And that nerve racking moment at the border on the way home when I couldn't find my permanent resident card so we pulled over to the side and put on the hazards while I scrambled to locate it and one of the scary border police started moving towards us ready to shoot us for loitering. Not really, but maybe. Don't worry, I found it just in the nick of time. Otherwise I'd be writing this from jail. Not really, but maybe.

We started training Jack to be a Canadian Mountie at an early age.
Our plight continues.

This is Me.

Sometimes I find windows open on my computer with old search engine entries. Like just a few minutes ago I clicked on a window I'd forgotten to close, and there staring at me from the Google search bar was 'Haley Joel Osment.' No joke. Why? Because I swear I saw him in a car commercial last night. I was wrong. For some reason I found this all very funny. I mean... its Haley Joel I-See-Dead-People Osment who hasn't been in a movie in years and I was probably the only person on earth Googling his name. But I'm pretty sure whoever reads this will think, "Why is she wasting my time with this story?"

Here are some other very critical things about me that I thought you should know:

I often get words stuck in my head whose definitions are unknown to me. By stuck I mean I'll be going about my day and the word will pop into my head and keep repeating itself. This has happened twice with the word diatribe. I have yet to ever use it in conversation. If you don't know the meaning of the word diatribe, look it up. I had to.

On the very rare occasion we'd eat at McDonald's growing up, I'd often go for the fries before the rest of the Happy Meal (it's all about the toy, peeps). So my mom would always say "Lauren, eat your hamburger please" because that's the most nutricious part of the meal, right? Twenty years later I watch Super Size Me and realize the fries were probably the safest part.

I hate shoelaces. They are what stand between me and going off and doing what I need to right this instant. I try to avoid shoes that have laces which is why I buy Toms and flats and flip flops. I have a pair of tennis shoes that I love but they have laces so its a bittersweet relationship. If there's an outfit I'm wearing that looks best with the lace-ups I'll stand in front of the shoe rack trying to decide whether I want to exert the effort to untie the laces (because you know I just slipped them off last time I wore them instead of untying them) and then retie them. In the time it takes me to make this decision, I probably could have just done the job.

That is all.

Best Black Bean Dip EVAHHHHHH

See that title? If I was reading it to you, I would totally yell the "evahhhh!" part because it's that GOOD. "Holy Moses is it delicious" as my Nan Cresswell would say. I mean, it's so good you should go out and buy some black beans right now, unless you're like me and always get sucked in to Heinen's 10 for $10 on cans of beans and now have thousands of legumes squirreled away.

But I digress. Here's the recipe, complete with pictures! Although if there's one recipe pictures don't do justice to (or any good for that matter) it's this, because it basically just looks like poop.

I'm calling this Judy's Black Bean Dip, because my mom discovered it while she was on a Daniel Fast and I would often show up for lunch at her house (uninvited) in case she happened to have some in the fridge.

1 medium yellow onion, finely chopped
2 cloves of garlic, minced
1 tsp cumin
3 cups of black beans, rinsed (28 oz can)
3/4 cup salsa
Shredded chedder cheese (my mom subbed in nutritional yeast since she was off dairy, so I did the same)
Sea salt to taste (1/2 tsp to start. I ended up using about 1 tsp)
Pepper to taste

Saute onion and garlic in a little water until tender.

Mash about half of the beans and add to the pan.

Add cumin, salt and pepper.

Stir in the salsa

Stir in shredded cheese. Or, you can use nutritional yeast which looks like fish food but tastes kind of like cheese and cuts down on calories.

Serve warm. Eat with corn chips!

(Thanks to Tim for his fabulous hand modeling)

Normal Day

Some days are tough. Days when I wake up and totally feel like the people on those commercials for anti-depressant medications where the narrator says things like "Do you have a hard time facing the day?" and they cut to a shot of someone lying in their bed in the middle of the afternoon.

Yep, today was one of those days. Except I was up by 7:30 because the boys needed things like food and diaper changes and so...you know, staying in bed all day is not an option. But nevertheless, I was feeling pretty low. Usually I have lots of positive self-talk going on and a very thankful heart to back it up. But today all I could think about was what wasn't going the way I wanted it to in my life.

I don't know where I'm going with this exactly, except to say that today...was a rainy day in my heart. And this is a blog and therefore a picture of my life and "the story of us" as it were and sometimes that story hits a dry spell where it feels like nothing is happening. But on those days, where normal feels dull...I'm reminded of this quote from Mary Jean Iron (whoever that is...)

"Normal day, let me be aware of the treasure you are. Let me learn from you, love you, bless you before you depart. Let me not pass you by in quest of some rare and perfect tomorrow. Let me hold you while I may, for it may not always be so. One day I shall dig my nails into the earth, or bury my face in the pillow, or stretch myself taut, or raise my hands to the sky and want, more than all the world, your return."

Happy Birthday Judy!

Tomorrow is my mom's birthday but we celebrated today. I love my mom. I always say that as the boys get older they'll always know that my parents are two of my best friends and two of the greatest people they will ever know.

My mom is special for lots of reasons but I think the thing most people walk away with after meeting her is a sense that they just encountered a very genuine, kind-hearted woman. She's a servant of the rarest kind, the type of person who doesn't think twice about putting others before herself. Always helpful. Always generous. She puts me to shame when it comes to being a mother and she could win awards in the grandmother department. She's one of those people who I feel that no matter how long I live, I will never be able to repay all her kindnesses to me. She's amazing.

Shop at my Shop!

I'm dipping my big toe in the waters of selling my artwork online. Visit my "shop"! Let me draw something for you! You'll help pay for Jack and Moses' diapers :)

Click on the birdboxink shop link on the tab bar (above). 

Or click here if you're like me and have a hard time finding things.