chicken broccoli braid and baby's preferences

i cooked again!  and it was something i've only ever made once before... like back in 2008.  i remember because we were in pennsylvania that summer and lydia helped me make it!  it's the pampered chef chicken broccoli braid which is this exact recipe minus the onions.  it was always one of my favorites that my mom made.  when i was browsing through recipe books to make this weeks menu, i came across the recipe in the cookbook nurse amanda made for me when she was living at our house in 2006 while my parents were on their mission.  anyways... i have no idea why it took me so long to get the courage to make this without lydia holding my hand because it really wasn't hard at all.  my favorite part was that nothing was time sensitive, nothing required me to multitask, everything went in one bowl (no accidentally mixing the wrong things together!), and it barely made any dirty dishes.  excellent!

that's my phone.  yes, it slides open.

before i took this picture i'd never fully realized the intense blue-ness of this bowl.

look amanda!  your cookbook page made it in to a picture!  ps- i noticed tonight that part of the recipe was supposed to have a graphic to illustrate the dough fringing.  it wasn't there but i laughed at how thoughtful that was of you.  "cut dough on sides as pictured above" or something like that...

delish

it calls for slivered almonds but i only had sliced.  not as pretty but the taste and the crunch were still there!

 we'll have to come back to the story that goes with these two pictures taken while the braid was baking.

the PINK bow

putting shoes on.  that's a remnant of toilet paper.  baby girl loves to blow her nose.  she also now refers to the toilet paper on my nightstand as "mommy's [blows out of her nose]" which when she says it is the funniest thing ever.

look how pretty!

that's honey's fork.  he has low patience for pictures after the food comes out of the oven.

mmm, so creamy and flaky and crispy and crunchy.

and plenty of leftovers!  just the way i like it!  i'm going to be sad when our family is big enough that we won't have half of our meal for leftovers every time i cook.

notes to self for the chicken broccoli braid:

i didn't measure the broccoli or the red bell pepper but i'm sure i added more of both than what the recipe calls for.  especially pepper because i love that stuff.

i added less chicken than called for because i haven't been that into chicken lately.  again, didn't measure it but i just used one of those cans of costco chicken.  it made it so quick and easy and that chicken works really well in this recipe.

each of the packs of dough, i laid them so the longer length went left to right.  otherwise it wouldn't have fit on the pan... which was sad for me to figure out half way through when i was struggling to rearrange my dough on the cookie sheet.

fringing the dough i did lots of thin slices to ensure that all of the dough cooked through and evenly without any parts getting too done.  i cut each "section" into four fringes and made sure to stretch them out thin when i was pulling them up and wrapping them.  it worked because it turned out better than i was hoping/anticipating.

when i sprinkled the almonds on top, i made sure to press them in with my hands so they would stay nice and firm.  

also... because it cut down on dishes, time, and wasting an egg... i didn't bother brushing it with egg white.  i know it makes it look prettier but i also knew i wasn't serving this to anyone other than my little family of three.

aaaannd here's the baby story to match the pictures above...

we've been working on colors more lately so this afternoon as i got baby girl up from her nap and got her dressed, i explained to her that her dress is purple and the sandals she picked out (they're her current favorites) are also purple.  so i asked her if she wanted a bow and of course she said yes.  i picked a purple one and after about fifty failed attempts for me to get it correctly positioned in her hair (she kept yanking it out saying "nooo!!!" and then placing it on a different part of her head) i was so confused what she could possibly want about the bow.  then she ran to her closet repeating over and over "i want bink!  i want bink!" and all i could think is that she was wanting a binky (i keep them hidden high up in her closet) but i thought it was weird she wasn't calling it a binky because she can say that perfectly well.  so then after more of the guessing game as i pointed to random stuff up high in her closet, she requested "up" and tried to point to what she wanted but it was still too high.  so i started pointing again... do you want this? "no" is it this?  "no" how bout this? "no" to all the things i pointed at.  then i got to a pink hair flower "yeah" and a pink and brown pom pom sort of bow "yeah" so i grabbed the pom pom and put it in her hair.  she was pleased.  walking down the stairs i wondered what compelled her to call the pom pom thing a "bink" when she pointed to it again and excitedly and very clearly declared, "it's pink!"  HA.  ohhhhh!  you didn't want your purple bow... you wanted to wear something pink!  i should have caught on to that sooner since she's started pointing out pink things in books and such that we've read.  "that's pink" "that's pink" pointing to a flower or a car or whatever in the book is pink.  i think the problem is that it is literally almost impossible for me to understand her if her voice gets whiny which has been soooooo very much of today... but oh my goodness how that girl is a talker and it is so. much. fun.

also, while we were waiting for dinner to bake, i found baby girl in my bathroom and she was spitting on her finger and then wiping it on the back of her hand.  then she spit on her finger again and held it out to me.  it took me a minute before i finally understood her to be saying "lotion" as she most generously offered me some.  ummm, no thanks baby girl.  i'm gonna pass this time.  but that was so very thoughtful of you.

i can't get enough of her.  oh, except tonight when that whining was out of control.  then i realized i'd met my quota for today.

ps- happy friday the 13th!