{Non-Traditional & New Traditions}

Happy January! I could say "Happy New Year," but it would probably be silly since the new year is fifteen days old. However, it would still be okay, because technically our (Megan, Mary, and my) schedules are about the same amount of days behind. We all survived finals week and went home for Christmas break. It was a good, albeit long and somewhat lonely, break for all of us, I think. Skype and cell phones and Facebook helped a lot!

But soon Christmas was over, 2011 had been ushered out, and it was January! I started the first leg of a quasi-relay to Wisconsin: I drove three hours to Mary's house. The next day, Mary and I travelled to a gas station near Eau Claire, where we met Megan and her mother! We spent the next few days at their wonderful home in the North Woods. We toured the towns, went bowling, drank coffee (even me), watched movies, laughed, hugged, and celebrated Christmas.

Christmas = We also cooked!

Yayyy cooking again. :)

The menu for the night was something with chicken and a really long name. It also wasn't exactly a "traditional" holiday meal. But it was super fun to make and wonderful to eat!

Megan started--well, she started with the green beans. But as far as the main dish goes, she started by tenderizing/pulverizing the chicken. The best part was the way she talked to it, trying to get it to cooperate with her! Mary and I are thankful that she doesn't use a meat tenderizer on all of her "friends."

She did a lot of other stuff with the chicken, which I suppose she can tell you about herself. I was useful and got her lots of paper towels, though! :) She rubbed salt and pepper into them and what not. Then she washed spinach and tried to squeeze all the water out. THAT was funny!

The spinach was for the stuff that was supposed to go in the chicken. There was other stuff in the mix...not that I know what it all was (I don't remember) but I did "help" a little! :)

The next part was putting the paste in the chicken and rolling the chicken up. (And that is a verb particle, not a preposition at the end of my sentence!)

The chicken was then dipped in something and rolled in something else that had breadcrumbs in it to give it texture.

Marinara sauce was the next step. It smelled sooo good by this time, and we were hungry!

And, really, what meal would be truly Wisconsonian (or semi-Italian) without cheese?

Megan was a little exited to be cooking. :)

By the time the dish was done, we all had watering mouths! It smelled--and tasted--super delicious!

Oh, and we also spent a lot of time making faces at Megan's new fish. But we decided not to cook him. :)