Laughing in my Sleep

Apparently, I woke Pidgeon up last night because I was laughing in my sleep. It was a cackling laugh too, so I must have been dreaming about something funny yet evil. Too bad I don't remember the dream! Dreams about our baby being half salmon/half human and potentially dinner for a group of friends I remember, funny/evil dreams you can forget about. Oh well! 

We were supposed to go on a double date last night. The plan was to meet up at the bowling alley and I was exhausted. I get pretty wiped from 5-9, then catch my second wind and am wide awake until 2:00 a.m.  So, at 8:00 p.m., I pulled myself together, got dressed, packed a pair of socks into my purse and went into the living room to wait for Pidgeon to finish getting ready. And that's when the phone rang and our date called to tell us that their babysitter cancelled last minute. From the sounds of it, they were really, really upset and angry about the last minute cancellation. They spent 30 minutes calling around and trying desperately to find a replacement babysitter. At 9:00 p.m., they called to tell us that they'd given up. I told them not to be so upset about it and that we would definitely do it another time. I guess I don't understand where they're coming from. They have two children under the age of 3 with one more on the way. I guess they really needed the night out. 

I was pretty hungry at that point and hadn't been out of the house in almost 2 days, so Pidgeon decided to take me to Emek for a quick dinner. Now, I had promised my parents I wouldn't eat out anymore because of the whole puking evening two days ago. But, I figured how bad could an Aroma tuna salad really be? Besides, I had cooked a cauliflower kugel and a meatloaf for Shabbos and just didn't have the strength to make something else for dinner. I'm really going to have to think about buying a freezer and cooking in advance of baby, otherwise Pidgeon is going to be eating a lot of Branflakes and skim milk since I doubt I'll have the strength to make us anything.

Aroma was pretty empty last night and we had a nice time. Then, we went to Super Moshava so I could do my favorite activity - walking up and down the aisles of a Supermarket. I found these packages of MealMart ready-to-eat food, you know the ones I blogged about a while ago that will be given to soldiers as rations in the event of (g-d forbid) another war. I quickly ran to show them to Pidgeon and he wanted to buy one to eat, but it's not on the diet, so I think he was pretty disappointed. I then found genuine Hershey's syrup and was soo tempted to buy the bottle so I can make myself some chocolate milk. But, it was 20 shekel and we're on a budget and a diet, so I left it back on the shelf and was just happy knowing it was there. We ended up picking up some Philadelphia cream cheese, an orange juice, some more cheese sticks for Pidgeon and 2% strawberry frozen yogurt. We had a bowl of the frozen yogurt when we got home and it was really yummy. I didn't get to sleep though until 2:00 a.m. and when Pidgeon's alarm went off this morning at 7:00 I was not pleased.

He left the apartment very quickly because we're having some problems in our new car with the gear shift. Apparently, it's SUPER sensitive mechanism, so we have to be careful when we move down gears. We're really not these heavy handed people so I don't know why it keeps breaking, but we're still under warrantee so they fixed it for free.

Afterward, Pidgeon ran my pre-Shabbos errands and brought back some whole wheat Challot from Pe'er and breakfast from Bagel Bites. We've been to Tal Bagels, Bagel Bites and the new bagel store on Emek (forgetting the name). At the end of the day, Bagel Bites has the best bagels. And, I'm not just saying that because it's closest to our apartment. They're really decent bagels. 

By the time Pidgeon returned, I had the chicken done. I roasted another whole chicken that cost us a bit more than 5 shekel (we bought it at Falcon and not SuperDeal) with balsamic vinegar, red wine, rosemary, garlic, salt and pepper. It smelled amazing once it was done, and I cooked it one hour covered and one hour uncovered. The skin is now nice, brown and crackly but the meat is still very juicy. I hope it tastes as good as it looks. While it was cooling on the stove top, I made a leek and portobello mushroom soup for first course tonight. We're really going light for dinner, so I felt we needed something else as a starter. I've never made this recipe before but I found it on Epicurious and hope it's tasty!

I then grilled two steaks for tomorrow lunch. First course will be a grilled steak salad with a balsamic dijon mustard dressing. At this point, I'm wiped but have to deal with the chicken and wash all the dishes. So, I took the BEST invention ever and set to work on quartering the chicken.

I cannot stop praising these poultry shears. They are absolutely amazing, you'd think the chicken bones were fabric it just glides right through them. I also never learnt how to properly quarter a whole chicken, but I figured it out pretty well if I do say so myself. Within minutes, I had four pieces of chicken and two wings cut off. I also cooked the neck too, and left that together with the chicken. Hopefully, it will taste as good as it looks!! If you need a pair, and you live in Jerusalem, go to 4UGifts on Derech Hevron and ask Sara for the poultry shears. It will save you tons of money in the end!

Well, I was trolling the blogosphere yesterday and came across this amazing baking site called Bake or Break and the photos literally had me drooling. With Rosh Hashana coming up, I'm thinking about baking something to formally usher in a sweet New Year. Now, all I have to do is figure out which recipe I want to try first as they all look so great!

I'm off to finish tidying up before Shabbos!

Shabbat Shalom from Baka!