Veggie Tortilla Soup

I came across this recipe online. I love avocados, so I thought I'd give it a shot. . . . . And holy yum! I was surprised by how delicious this was. Plus it was super easy to make! I've made it twice for the fam in the past month, we love it! It serves twelve and we're happy to eat the leftovers :)


2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 chopped onion
1 chopped red pepper
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 1/2 tablespoons ground cumin
1 can crushed tomatoes
2 cans chopped green chile peppers
3 cans (14 oz) vegetable broth
1 can corn
2 cans black beans
2 cans pinto beans
2 diced avocados
tortilla chips

1. Heat oil in a large pot on medium heat, stir in onion, red pepper, garlic, and cumin. Cook for 5 minutes or until veggies are tender.
2. Mix in tomatoes, chile peppers and vegetable broth. Bring to a boil.
3. Reduce heat to low. Add corn, black beans, and pinto beans. Mix and let sit for 5-10 minutes.
4. Add avocado and chips before serving.
5. Eat to your heart's content :)

Christmas Cookies

For Christmas dessert I made 2 different kinds of cookies. I made these Reindeer Sugar Cookies first:

The original recipe used peanut butter cookies, but Dal is allergic to peanuts and I didn't want to risk a trip to the hospital on Christmas. What I didn't think through was that sugar cookies are thinner than most cookies, which made it difficult for the 'antlers' to stay. However, after much trial and error, help from my dad, and help from an egg-shaped cookie cutter he changed to 'reindeer shaped', we got the pretzel antlers to stay :) Thanks dad for your help! And thanks to my mom for tasting the dough before I rolled it out. I forgot the sugar, talk about gross- don't know how that happened! Haha.

I also made Chocolate-Peppermint Wafer Cookies. These are seriously so delicious!

I found this recipe on pinterest (shocker, I know). Just go to www.realsimple.com/food-recipes/browse-all-recipes/chocolate-peppermint-wafers-recipe-00000000024240/

The only thing I changed was I used milk chocolate instead of semi or bittersweet. Milk chocolate is the best :)

*Helpful Hint* Again, after much trial and error, and help from my parents, we found the best way to melt the chocolate and not overheat it, was to melt it in the microwave at 30 second intervals, stirring in between.

Merry Christmas!