Month of January (Minus 2 Days), Winter Fun, Shishito Peppers, and My Adventures in Cooking Indian Food!

 On the plate:  Perfectly charred shishito peppers, chicken tikka masala, chana masala, and chapati

Soundtrack to cook to:  Uptown Special by Mark Ronson...lots of fun and funky beats to shake your booty to.  Doesn't the song Uptown Funk sound a little like James Brown's Living in America?

Happy New Year!!  Woo hoo!  2014 was super awesome, but 2015 has gotten off to a really great start.  I can't wait to see what it has to offer.  :-)
Once my parents left in late December, Joseph's parents came and visited us for a week.  The kiddos loved having so much family around!
Since Joseph had a few days off, we decided to make the most of the days that we had together.  Our first adventure was to the Children's Museum....but first, we had to go out to lunch.  We stopped by an amaaaaazing seafood restaurant called Row 34.

Alex enjoyed a buttery lobster roll with homemade chips.

And so did the William Billiam.

The beautiful Franses/Wang family!  Joseph, Elias, and Linda
at Row 34.

Annnnnnd this killer seafood tower greeted us for lunch!
I couldn't wait to dig into the oysters!  I looooooove raw oysters.
You can see the enthusiasm in Elias and Linda's eyes.

Mmm-hmmm!  Me, about to slurp up a deliciously
briny, salty, and sweet raw oyster.  Deeeeeeelish!

And now, with full bellies, we walked over to the Children's Museum and had a lovely time exploring.

Elias, Alex, William, and Linda, looking through
microscopes at the museum.

The boys crawling around a boat.

William was pretty pooped after that.

Love his little hands and chubby cheeks.  :-)

And sometimes, while we're getting ready for bed, Oscar feels that is important to break out into a dance.

Of course Joseph has to help him a little bit.  ;-)

Alex requested this doggy dance, so Oscar and Joseph obliged.

Happy New Year, 2015!!!  We spent a very tame night at home with Elias and Linda.  Before the boys went to bed, we did a kid's countdown and the boys celebrated with some sparkling apple cider.

Me and the boys - Woo Hoo!  Happy New Year!!

The boys loved the party blowers.

Oscar wanted to join in with the festive head gear.
Boiler up, little pup!

The adults enjoyed some champagne while the
boys were watching the kid's countdown on my computer.

...4...3...2...1...Happy New Year!!!

Joseph, William, and Elias, ringing in the kid's new year.

Alex, enjoying his sparkling cider.

William and Elias, ringing in the new year.

Our festive boys.  :-)

Oscar is 8 1/2 years old and will be 9 in March.  He is very protective of our family and is my tail when I go around the house (he follows me everywhere).  After a six mile run one night (after the boys fell asleep), I decided I wanted to take a a bath.  I got in the bath and heard little nails clicking on the tile.  I peered over the edge of the tub and saw this.  He stayed that way for my entire bath.  Even though he barks like a lunatic when we have a guest over, he's still a really great, loving, and loyal dog.

Our loving and loyal little dog.

After my bath, he climbed into bed with me (Joseph
was working overnight).  He always snuggles himself up against
me like this at night, completely under the covers.  :-)

The next morning, Elias, Linda, and I took the boys to the Watertown's Indoor Playground so the boys could run around.

Alex decided to make himself a recliner and relax.

That afternoon, we dropped the boys off at school and Linda and Elias treated me to a very decadent and delicious lunch at L'Espalier.  Thanks so much for an incredible lunch, Elias and Linda!  It was perfectly heavenly!

Linda and Elias at lunch at L'Espalier in downtown Boston.

There's that beautiful dessert again!  The gorgeously
silky, sweet, creamy, and crunchy apple tarte tatin.

Nono and Nai Nai take over bath time duties when
they're visiting.  That's usually when Joseph and I
like to sit on the couch and enjoy a glass of wine.
Thanks so much for your help!!  :-)

Elias snuggling with Alex.

And now it's William's turn.

This picture just cracks me up!  I love their expressions.  :-p

This child can eat endless melon of any kind.
This container was filled to the top.  Alex had a few
tablespoonfuls of the cataloupe, while William ate
the rest.  He loooooves melon.

 The boys shaking their bum bums!  This cracks me up so much!

Our silly little minions!  Thanks mom and dad
for getting these hooded towels.  They're hilarious!

Our goofy guys!

We've been working with William on potty training.  He's been doing pretty well!  We just have to make sure that we take him to the bathroom every two hours, and so far he hasn't had any poop accidents (for the past two weeks).  He wears "big boy underwear" (which has a little bit of cotton padding) throughout the day, and diapers for nap and night time.  So far so good!  We just have to stay on top of him and we'll hopefully be done with diapers soon!

William modeling his big boy underwear!
He's sooooo proud of it.

"Mommy!  I'm wearing big...boy...underweaarrrr!"

I love how he kind of "sings" it.  :-)

Joseph holding Alex like a baby...because sometimes
our big guy likes a good snuggle.

One must always be wary of ninjas and the like when
one is getting ready for bed.

One of our first decent snows!  (Although most of it melted by the afternoon.)  I packed the boys in the sled so we could go on our walk with Oscar.  They had a lot of fun being pulled in the sled.

Alex and William, ready to go around the block.

 William, pulling his big brother in the sled.

William is a really strong two year old.

Look at the little man go!

 Alex's turn to pull William!

William was pulling Alex again, while Oscar watched on...
he was very unamused with the snow (considering the
fact that if we even get an inch, it starts to scrape his belly...
and his other parts).  :-/

Our sleepy big boy.

Holy shishito...peppers that is!  These delicious little peppers are the perfect snack, appetizer, or veggie side dish!  I have become addicted to these because not only are they incredibly delicious, but they are soooooo ridiculously easy to prepare.

Ingredients:

• 1 pint shishito peppers
• extra virgin olive oil
• kosher salt

Directions:

1. Wash the peppers and pat them dry.
2. Heat up a pan with about 1-2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil  (make sure the pan is very hot).
3. Place the peppers in the pan and then leave them alone....don't move them at all....no seriously...leave them alone for a good 3-4 minutes.
4. Use tongs to rotate each pepper (there should be a perfect char on the side that was facing down).  Keep repeating step 3 until each pepper is charred all around.
5. Give a liberal sprinkle of salt all over the peppers.
6. Serve and enjoy!  (Don't eat the stems)

The kids and I enjoyed snacking on these one afternoon.
They're perfectly peppery (while not being spicy)
and the salt and char are a nice addition to accompany the
natural pepper flavor.  Simple and simply satisfying.

It was extremely cold one day, so we had a home day in the morning.

The boys loved playing in the tunnel.

Love these little stinkers.

Our little bubble guppies

 Silly boys with bubbles.

Oscar Boscar, carefully guarding his new Bobo.

What??!!  Did you say Bobo??  He always perks up
whenever you say that word around him.

On January 11, 2015, we met up with some of William's classmates at the Lego Land Discovery Center in Somerville.  The kiddos had a great time playing together!

William and Alex, exploring the "lab" where Legos are made.

Alex, Elliot, and William, playing with some Duplos.
They had such great focus.

Joseph was feeling under the weather, so I whipped up some delicious matzo ball soup one night.  I like to jazz mine up a little bit with some extra ingredients.

Ingredients:

• 1 box of matzo ball soup mix (make sure it has the ingredients for the matzo balls and the soup)
• 5 stalks celery, chopped
• 2 large carrots or 1 cup chopped baby carrots
• 1 onion, diced
• 1 lb chicken breast, chopped into bite-size pieces
• 1-2 cups egg noodles

Directions:

1. Prepare the matzo balls according to the instructions.
2. Brown the chicken in ~2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil (8-10 minutes).
3. While the chicken is browning, chop up the vegetables.  Once the chicken is cooked through, add in the vegetables and cook for another 8 minutes.
4. Pour in the water and the seasoning mix and bring the soup to a boil.
5. Roll the matzo balls and place them in the soup.  Place a cover on the Dutch oven and cook until the matzo balls have plumped up to almost twice their size (~10-12 minutes).
6. Serve! 

This soup makes a LOT and it's so delicious and soul-warming.  It's sure to make anybody who is feeling under the weather, feel better instantly.  :-)

Mmmmmm!  Matzo ball souuuup.  *drool*  :-)

Oscar was napping and then all of a sudden got up.
By the looks of the smile on his face, he was having a good dream.

Our silly Oscar doing his best "Phteven" impression.

Bahahahahaha!  I love this dog!

Our silly Oscar, giving us his best smile.  :-)

On January 15, 2015, we met up with one of Alex's friends from school for a play date.  Alex had actually known this boy when he was about 15 months old at his My Gym class!  They reconnected this year when they were in the same class together.  It's so cool to remember them from then and to see them now.
For our play date, we met Alex's buddy at Lego Land Discovery Center.  Yep...we went back again.  The perks of buying a year long membership.  The boys love it there.

Noah and William in the play place area.

 William, getting his dance on.

 Alex and his friend Noah, rockin' out and being silly on the microphone.

William and Noah, being silly crooners.

Alex's turn!  Of course William wanted in on the fun.

William and a Lego guy.  (He told me he wanted me
to take his picture.)  :-)

William on top of a Lego Duplo puppy.

 Alex, dancing his little heart out to Meghan Trainor's Lips Are Moving.

This is the face of "grumpy" William when he doesn't
want to listen to us.  Yep....we see this face pretty often.

Alex was teaching Oscar all of the names of the coins
that he had found.

Big brother Alex, helping William put on his socks and pants.
He's a really great helper.

This picture cracked me up!  Oscar photobombed William.
:-p

Woo hoo!  Time for another field trip!  Joseph had an overnight, so I had to get the boys out of the house during the day so he could sleep.  Since it was the weekend, I decided to pack them in the car and take them to the Discovery Science Museum in Acton.  It takes us about 40 minutes to get there and I could keep the kiddos there until the early afternoon to ensure Joseph could get some sleep.
We've never been to the Science museum, but have been to the children's museum a number of times.

William was amazed at the water tornado in the entrance.

William approached the giant amethyst, grabbed a hand lens...

...and said, "Nope mommy...no dinosaurs here!"
I swear, this kid is so funny and he doesn't even know it sometimes!

The boys loved playing with this giant magnet.
It was a lot of fun for Alex because he's been studying
magnets in school.

The boys loved spinning the balls around on this table.

The boys in a simulated twister!

There was SO much to see and do at this museum!

Alex loved this fun house mirror!

William manipulating the optical illusion machine.

Alex looking in the mirror's reflection to see the true picture.

Alex was amazed by this fog table.

William loved banging on the drums.

 Fun on the drums!

The kiddos playing with a sound board.

Alex playing with giant magnetic pattern blocks.

They thought the pin table was pretty cool.

More fun with magnets.

Unfortunately these museums don't have a food court, so thankfully, I had packed us a lunch.  We ate lunch in the car and then crossed the parking lot and went to the children's museum.  It was so great because they are so close to each other.

William in the playhouse.

"Peet-a-boo!"

Woo hoo!  We got another decent snow!  Thankfully Joseph was home, so we donned our snow gear and took the boys to the park to go sledding.

Joseph pulling the boys in the sled.  It's just easier
this way (it's tough for the kiddos to do so much
walking in the snow with all of their snow gear on).

The boys, ready to go down the hill!

 The boys, sledding down the hill together.

Now it's Joseph and Alex's turn!

"Wheeeeeee!!!"

My turn with William!  Alex rode down on his bottom.

 Mommy and William's turn!

Silly Alex going down the hill on his bottom!
He went surprisingly fast!

William wanted to pull Alex again.

But Joseph took over when it proved to be a little difficult.

Joseph and Alex built a Franses snow family!
William on the left, Joseph, Nikki, Alex, and a
small Oscar dog in the front right.
The Franses men were very proud.

Time to go inside and warm up after a morning out in the cold.

This has been Oscar's favorite spot in the entire house
the past week.  I wonder why?  :-)

Joseph and Alex, goofing around.  :-)

This past Sunday, we met my sister and Joseph's cousin Ilias out for brunch at a restaurant in Cambridge called East Coast Grill.  The food is pretty decent, but I love that they had a make-your-own Bloody Mary bar!  It had about 10 different types of seasonings, 4 different hot sauces, and a seemingly endless array of pickled and spicy vegetables to put in your drink as well.  It was awesome!

Me and my sister, ready to fill up our glasses!

As you can tell, I got my money's worth!  (I love
spicy pickled green beans!!)  My mouth is salivating
just looking at this picture.

And now for part of my new year's resolution!  This year, I resolved to learn how to cook Indian food.  It's completely out of my comfort zone, I LOVE Indian food, and I wanted to expose our family to this type of cuisine (separate from the few times that we've gotten it for take-out).
I decided to start easy and look for dishes that I knew and that I could cook in a slow cooker or cook quickly.  I made chicken tikka masala, chana masala, and chapati (a whole wheat version of naan bread).

Slow Cooker Chicken Tikka Masala

Ingredients:

• 5 boneless, skinless chicken breasts cut into 1 inch pieces (about 3 pounds)
• 1 small onion, finely chopped
• 4 cloves garlic, minced
• 2 Tbsp fresh ginger, grated
• 1 large can of crushed tomatoes
• 1½ cups plain Greek yogurt
• 2 Tbsp olive oil
• 2 Tbsp Garam Masala
• 1 Tbsp cumin
• ½ Tbsp paprika
• 2 tsp salt
• ¾ tsp cinnamon
• ¾ tsp black pepper
• 1 tsp cayenne pepper (more if you like things spicy)
• 2 bay leaves
• ½ Tbsp cornstarch
• Garnish with chopped cilantro

Place the onions and garlic in the bottom of the crock pot.

Place the tomatoes and the rest of the spices in the crock pot.  Mix around.
(I know the directions say to put in the yogurt.  However, if I were to do this
recipe again, I would stir in the yogurt 10 minutes before serving.)

Place the chicken in the crock pot and toss the chicken around so the pieces are evenly coated.

Put on the lid, and set it on high for 3 hours, or on low for 6 hours.
(Stir it occasionally)
*I also added in some peas, green beans, and corn to the dish.

Serve this over rice and garnish with fresh cilantro

And now for the chana masala!  I did the prep work for the crock pot dish while the kids were in school.  Then, I picked up the boys, put William down for a nap, and Alex helped me to make the chana masala.  (It's really that easy and is so full of flavor!)

Chana Masala

Ingredients:

• 1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
• 2 medium onions, diced
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 2 tsp grated fresh ginger
• 1 tbsp ground coriander
• 2 tsp ground cumin
• 1/2 tsp ground cayenne pepper
• 1 tsp ground turmeric
• 2 tsp paprika
• 1 tsp garam masala
• 2 cups tomatoes, chopped small (or 1, 15 oz can of crushed tomatoes and their juices)
• 2/3 cup water
• 4 cups cooked chick peas (or 2 cans chickpeas, drained and rinsed)
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 lemon, zest and juice

I have many helpers in our kitchen.  Batman helped me that night.
:-)

Saute the garlic, ginger, and onions in extra virgin oil for about five minutes.

Stir in the seasonings and coat the onion mixture well.
Toss in the tomatoes and their juices, and make sure you scrape
any of the onion bits that have stuck to the pan (that's where all of the flavor lies!).
Stir in the chickpeas and lemon juice.  Cover over medium/low heat for about 10 minutes.

Voila!  Chicken tikka masala, and chana masala topped with some fresh
and vibrant cilantro over some fluffy brown rice.

These dishes were absolutely delicious, FULL of flavor, and had the
kiddos and hubby asking for more.  This made a LOT, so we had enough
left over for the next day.
So far, my introduction to cooking Indian food has been a success!
Woot woooooot!
(Another bonus is that these dishes are super healthy.  Lots of lean meat,
vegetables, and very little fat.)

Snowpocalypse 2015...teen...teen...teen!  (Imagine me saying this in a voice that repeats the last sound of 2015.)  Oh heavens....yes, we got a lot of snow and yes, people panicked.  Starting in the evening of January 26 to the wee hours of the morning on January 28 we got a lot of snow.  So much snow and wind that the city of Boston and its surrounding towns had a "no travel" ban.  Which meant that Joseph and the kids got to stay home!  Woo hoo!!  We enjoyed a relaxing and lazy day at home.  It was really nice.  We ended up getting about 2 feet of snow (which is quite a bit), but we were projected to get 3 feet.  It wasn't as bad as they made it out to be, but yes, it was quite a bit of snow.

Our front porch by 10 a.m. on the morning of January 27.
Needless to say, we had to shovel a path for Oscar
just so he could go to the bathroom.

Since we had leftover Indian food, I decided to make my own chapati (which is the whole wheat version of Indian Naan bread.)  I found the easiest recipe possible and was pleasantly surprised with the results!

Chapati

Ingredients:

• 1 cup whole wheat flour
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 tsp salt
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 3/4 cup hot water

In a large bowl, stir together the flours, salt, olive oil, and hot water
together using a wooden spoon.

Knead the dough on a lightly floured surface (you may need to add a little more water).

Divide the dough into 10 pieces and let the dough set (under a kitchen towel)
for 30-45 minutes.

Roll the dough ball out thin and lightly salt both sides of the dough.

Place the dough on an extremely hot cooking pan (with very little oil).

Watch the dough puff up all over.  (Cook each side for about 30-45 seconds).

This is what it looked like after I flipped it.  You'll want those charred
pieces.

All bubbly, salt, crunchy, and delicious!

Our dinner the next night, served with some delicious
chapati to scoop up all of the chicken and chickpeas.
Sooooooo much better!

After the big snow, we ventured out to play in the snow and clear our patio and front porch area.  It was a little chilly, but the boys had a lot of fun.

The boys, wallowing around in the snow.

William and Alex, our snow bunny super heroes.

William with all of the snow in our front porch area.

And finally...what to do with the Indian leftovers?  There was a little bit of chicken tikka masala left over, but not enough for a full meal.  So, I chopped up the chicken into small bits and sprinkled the chicken on some tortilla chips, topped with a little bit of salsa, chopped green onions, fresh cilantro, and some cheddar/mozzarella shredded cheese.

Put it all on a pan and under the broiler on Low for a few minutes
(just until the cheese gets melted and bubbly).
Oh my heavens!!  This went perfectly with some pickled jalapeno slices.
A nice little twist on nachos and a fun way to use leftovers.
It was a huge hit in our household!

Woo hoo!  What a wonderful month full of new goals and exciting adventures.  We had a lot of fun with our families visiting over the holidays and our hearts and happy tanks were definitely full.  This is going to be an awesome year!  Until next time...

Love and kisses,
Nikki