7 Quick Takes (#26)

1) The last couple weeks have been craaaazy for Jason and I.  As a DRE/Youth Minister, his schedule gets hectic right about now.  I feel like I haven't seen him in forever!  But you know what makes up for it?  When the kids and parents give him lots of presents in the form of chocolate and candy at the end of the year....I guess I should add in another pilates class...

2) Newest obsession of mine is Indian cuisine.  I used my new cast-iron skillet to make some Chapatis (Indian Flat Bread) made with plain yogurt.  Excuse the most unappetizing photo ever of a food item and trust me - these are delicious!!!

Chapatis
- 2 cups whole wheat flour
- 1 cup whole plain yogurt
- Salt to taste
- 2 tablespoons expeller pressed coconut oil or olive oil

Mix ingredients into a dough and cover let sit for an hour in a warm spot.  Divide dough into 12 balls and press into a flat circle using your rolling pin.  Grease and heat your cast-iron skillet to med-high heat and cook the chapati for 30 seconds on each side.

I paired the flatbreads with this awesome Chana Masala (Chickpea Curry).  I used dry garbanzo beans that I soaked and cooked in my crockpot.  As with all my cooking - I let my husband be the judge.  I'll eat anything so I'm not the best judge of foods.  And after standing over a pot and smelling all the spices, you lose all sense of taste.  When I started the dinner, Jason looked in the pot and saw chickpeas.  He is a meat and potatoes kind of guy and immediately offered to go to the store and get some summer sausage as an app since my meal was clearly lacking in the meat department.  I asked him to give the beans a chance.  And I popped him a beer.

The verdict - My meat-eater grubbed on this bean dish and LOVED it!!!

It was the perfect combo between sweet and seasoned (we didn't do the hot pepper).  We also added the juice of 1/2 a lemon at the very end and it enhanced the flavor so much!   Jason agreed that this meal, sans meat, is just perfect and in need of an encore performance in the near future.  Leo wouldn't touch the neon yellow dish, Elena liked eating her "Baby Chicks", and Roman's clothes are covered in bright yellow stains from the chickpeas falling off my fork and landing on him.  I'm using a serving spoon next time to shovel in my over-sized bites.  Any suggestions for my next Indian dish??

3) Our house is the local neighborhood Goodwill.  Our neighbors are super generous and give us all their toys when they do spring cleaning.  We have scored a lot of awesome stuff from them, including three bikes.  That brings our total to 4 small bikes.  But my children abide by Murphy's Law...

Murphy's Law #632: If thou hast multiple options, they shall surely still fight over one.

4) We did some recent spring cleaning to throw away all broken toys.  Three trash bags later of "toys" (you know - the paper towel tubes, etc...) and our lives are manageable again.  Many "new" toys were unearthed in our disaster of a basement playroom.  

And there was much celebration and joy in the land.

I would say they all lived happily ever after but you know that would be a downright lie...

(oh boy - Colleen is going to come knocking and take my Elena home with her where she will be happier!!)

So long as she takes some of the toys too...

5) Brothers:

6) I cancelled my Groupon account - did you??


7) When I was on Pinterest finding and saving the most recent batch of recipes, I saw this funny photo posted to my "Oh My" board a couple months back.

Source: flickr.com via Lisa on Pinterest

It actually reminded me of something:

Thanks to Jen for hosting and have a great weekend everyone!!!

Also - Don't forget to get in on the Trout Fishing in America CD Giveaway that I am hosting!!