Saint Patrick's Day 2015

We absolutely love this holiday!  We love it because of our heritage, the culture, the history, the green and let's not forget we would absolutely love to visit Ireland one day...and honestly if we could choose the destination of our "Dream Home" it would be in Ireland.  Everyone we tell this to states the rain they get, well we must be weird or naturally our personalities migrate towards this country, well because we LOVE THE RAIN!! We honestly would not care about the rain there!  We have lived in rainy country and currently live in a country where it has a literal rain season then a typhoon season. So maybe we will get sick of it or maybe we will just think it's totally awesome and continue to love the rain!

We are currently trying to know more about our Irish history so we can love this holiday even more.  It's not about drinking to us, it's about family and where we come from.  We want to instill these traits into our children and by doing so we want to have family traditions that they will remember and hopefully pass down to their children. 

So for this Saint Patrick's Day we started having a little fun with it.  I plan to ad more too it as our babies get more imaginative, but for this year we stuck with making our Irish Stew consisting of a corned beef brisket with cabbage, carrots, and taytoes!  Along with our stew I made some banana bread, well because I really needed to do something with the bananas that were turning black.  While our stew was finishing it's cooking cycle in the crock pot, I took Graison and Cowen (in thebaby backpack) to the baseball field and kicked the soccer ball around then when he was bored of that we ran the bases learning where home, first, second, and third were at.  Graison was catching onto it pretty quick.  I drew some leprechaun hats and had Graison color his while I colored Cowen's hat, then we cut them out and placed them on their heads securing the fit with some green washi tape!

This was all while Sheyden was at work, so he didn't get to participate in the fun, but he did devour some corned beef and cabbage with us!  Maybe next year it'll land on a weekend so we can all celebrate the day with some fun!  Now I've got an entire year to plan out Saint Patrick's Day 2016!!  So for now please enjoy some pictures and maybe next year we will have a bit more history to share!

Candikaye's Creamy Chicken Noodle Soup

So yet again I have tweaked a recipe and have made to delicious to mine and my family's liking, however Sheyden is currently not home but I believe he will enjoy the leftovers just as much as he will whenever I make it again in the future.  He doesn't turn down food a whole lot, especially when I'm cooking; one because I'm his wife and two because he really does love my cooking! HAHA! 

I even had a special helper with me tonight.  Graison was interested in my chopping of carrots, celery and onion and decided he wanted to add it to the pot. Also, he is just like his mama and loves to pull faces when smiling for the camera! 

And so to my recipe!

Candikaye's Creamy Chicken Noodle Soup

Ingredients

• 2 cups dry noodles
• 2-3 boneless skinless chicken breasts*
• 1 1/2 Tbsp olive oil
• 1 1/2 cups chopped yellow onion (1 medium)
• 1 1/3 cups chopped carrots (3 carrots)
• 1 1/3 cups chopped celery (3 stalks)
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 2  chicken bouillon 
• 3 Tbsp chopped fresh parsley
• Salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
• 3 T butter
• 3 T flour
• 2 cups milk (I used non fat)
• 1 can cream of chicken soup
• 1-2 c each of frozen peas and corn
• (I did not have corn and wish I did)
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• Directions
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• Prepare noodles according to directions listed on package (note that you want the noodles to finish about the same time the soup is nearly finished cooking) and drain. 
• In a large pot, heat 1 1/2 Tbsp olive oil over medium heat. Add onion, carrot and celery and saute until tender, about 3 - 4 minutes, then add garlic and saute 1 minute longer. Add chicken broth, parsley,  and season with salt and pepper to taste. Add chicken breasts to a new pot and bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Reduce heat to medium, cover with lid and allow soup to cook until chicken has cooked through, about 10 - 15 minutes longer (cook time will vary depending on thickness of chicken breasts). Remove chicken and allow to rest for 5 minutes, then shred into small bite size pieces.  Add chicken water (stock) to veggie mixture. 

Heat 2 cups water and add all bouillon cubes; technically it should be 2 cubes for 2 cups but I wanted it concentrated because of the already boiled chicken stock.  Add broth to the stock and stir.

• Melt butter in a medium saucepan over medium heat, add flour and cook, stirring constantly, 1 1/2 minutes. While whisking slowly add in milk and whisk vigorously to smooth lumps (it will take a lot of whisking to smooth since this is a lighter roux - lesser ratio of butter to flour). Whisk in cream of chicken soup and bring mixture to a boil, stirring constantly. Pour milk mixture into soup mixture and return chicken to soup along with cooked noodles, peas and corn. Serve warm with fresh bread or crackers if desired. 
• *If using thicker breasts, slice in half through thickness of breasts so they cook faster and more evenly.