chicken and DC

So, what do these have in common? This week.

My week has been a little crazy. The 8th graders from school were on a class field trip to DC from Wednesday morning until this evening, Friday. Even though I'm an 8th grade teacher, my switch came late in the year and I was held back to teach some of the other classes. No worries, with this whole Celiac thing, I think it was the BEST thing possible (besides just having three days off). So, I was covering my 5th and 6th graders, along with a different homeroom, someone else's lunch duties and traffic duty, and covering the headmaster's two classes while he was in DC. I didn't really have extra responsibilities, just as much as different ones. I was running around most days trying to figure out who I was supposed to be when. All in all, I figured it out.

So, we roasted a chicken, again. I thought this would be complex, but most of this post is going to be two of my new favorite recipes. (I also made gluten-free lasagna that was tasty, but most people probably already have a good recipe for lasagna.)

Roasted Chicken
1 small chicken
1 whole lemon (halved)
2 teaspoons celery salt or favorite seasoning (I use rosemary and salt and pepper)
1/2 teaspoon ground pepper
1/2 cup water or chicken broth

(Empty the chicken of any "goodies.") Trim off extra fat from the chicken and pat dry with paper towels. Squeeze the lemon juice all over the chicken and inside the cavity. Place the squeezed lemon inside the cavity. Sprinkle the chicken with seasoning and pepper. Place the chicken in a crockpot (or roasting pan for the oven). Pour water/chicken broth in the bottom of crockpot or pan. Cook until meat thermometer registers 180 degrees. This usually takes around 2 hours in the oven or 6 hours in the crockpot. Roasting in the oven gives more of a crispy taste. Crockpot is very moist, but does not brown very much. The first time we did this, we couldn't get the chicken out of the crockpot because every time we would try to pick it up, it fell completely apart. It's DELICIOUS and provides great leftovers...see below.

After the chicken is removed and cut up, drop the bones and some other fatty pieces back in to the crockpot. Add water (8-12 cups) and any extra veggies and seasoning around. (onions, celery, carrots, parsley, etc.) Let boil for a few hours and remove from heat. Skim all the extra things (bones, meat, veggies, etc.) out. Refrigerate overnight and remove fat from top in the morning. Store chicken broth or freeze it in separate containers for something else in the next few days.

Chicken Tortilla Casserole

2 cans diced tomatoes
1 teaspoon mexican seasoning
1/2 cup chopped cilantro (I use a lot less than this...2 tables spoons or so)
2 cups shredded chicken (I use the leftovers from the roasted chicken and cut it up before I refrigerate it)
1 1/3 cup shredded monterey jack cheese
1 1/3 cup shredded cheddar cheese
10 tortillas

Preheat oven to 400. Grease 2 pie plates.
Combine tomatoes, seasoning, and cilantro to make a sauce. Stir in the chicken.
Place one tortilla in the first pie plate. Top with 1/4 cup of the tomato mixture and 1/4 cup of cheese. Repeat three times and top with 5th tortilla. Sprinkle cheese on top. Repeat for the second pie plate.
Cover lightly with aluminum foil and bake for 12-15 minutes. (Until cheese is melted and sauce is bubbly.)

I eyeball this entire recipe. I hate measuring for things and I only make one pie plate for Mike and I. The recipe says it feeds 4. When I made ONE pie plate, it will feed us for at least 4 meals, maybe 5. I think this recipe feeds more like 6 growth spurt men or 8 normally.

You can also top with black olives, beans, sour cream, and extra cilantro.

DEFINITELY a new favorite in our household!

***Thank you Carol Fenster!

to infinity...and beyond

The last week has been quite rough for me. I spent most of last Sunday in the bathroom and managed to make a doctors appointment for monday afternoon.

Although we are grateful for my diagnosis of Celiac Disease in December, I have continued to have rough days and weeks. i went back to the doctor to investigate another chronic disease or some other culprit. Mike and I are realizing that there have been great milestones since December, but there are still several days (or even weeks) that I can hardly function in society. After last weekend, we went back to visit the doctor.

After waiting for an hour to see the guy, he came in pushed on my stomach a few times, and said "We can send you back to the GI." Again, I'm grateful this guy was willing and ran a million tests on me for a few weeks, but I really don't enjoy seeing him or paying him money to send me to someone else. Why couldn't he just tell me this on the phone?

Tuesday and Wednesday were great days. We celebrated Wednesday by having a gluten free pizza from one of our favorite places in town. TASTY! I even added my homegrown fresh basil. Delicious! Well, Thursday came and so did the pizza. Apparently, since I have now been GF, I am more sensitive to it. So, simply by baking the pizza in the same oven (or touching it with contaminated hands) I was MISERABLE. 1:00am - 1:00pm I was leaning against cold metal fixtures and walking laps around the block. Luckily, once I made it to the bathroom a couple times, all was over and I even regained some energy.

On my way home from work, I called a new friend. Katie has been diagnosed with Celiac just about a year longer than I. She has figured out some tricks of the trade and found that going GF was not quite enough for her. I took some notes and was encouraged by our conversation. The next day, I was back to normal and even went out to pick up Elisabeth Hasselbeck's new book, "The G Free Diet." I read nearly half of it within 24 hours. I've realized that although I thought I had eliminated gluten from my diet, it was still creeping in to my body. Now, with lots of help, encouragement, and prayers, we are continuing this fight against Celiac. I've learned that the 100% GF diet is more like 110%, and HAS to be. I never want to feel that nausea again, especially when I can do something to prevent it. The silver lining, I don't know if i have any other chronic disease or anything else, simply just an elastic grain that haunts me everywhere I go.

Since it is Sunday and some of you haven't made it to church, I'll leave you with some action points:
1) PRAY! Pray for me and my body. Pray for Mike to continue to have patience and understanding with me. Pray for a good dietitian and wisdom from him/her and wisdom for me and understanding my body.

2) Get tested. Nearly 1 in 133 Americans have Celiac Disease. However, less than 5% of them know they have it. Many people will never experience symptoms. That might seem like a good thing, but there are many more complications of Celiac, especially if people continue to eat Gluten. A simple blood test can help identify if you are at risk or not. If a first degree relative has CD, your chances are 1 in 22. If a second degree relative has it, your chances are 1 in 39. Again, it's better to be safe than sorry. Can you imagine finding out you have cancer, diabetes, osteoporosis, infertility, thyroid disease, colitis, etc and then realize you may have been able to prevent it, just from changing some things in your diet? Next time you go to the doctor, ask them to draw some blood. Americans are FAR behind the times with this one, but more and more research is being done. Thank you to Australia and Europe for leading the way! (Even Italians with all their pasta and pizza have more GF options than we do.)

And a side note, thank you Katie! You've helped me see some hope in this and I am grateful that hopefully my other chronic pain and headaches will go away as well. Who knows, maybe even I'll realize what it feels like to not have my skin hurt.