The Miracle of Chicken

This past week has been very interesting. I'm sure the Lord is using it to prepare me for the years of medical school and residency that are ahead. Since last Sunday, Ryan has been incredibly busy with projects, papers, presentations, and quizzes. He has been up well past midnight most nights this week and then has 6-9 hours of class every day. Usually he comes home for an hour at lunch and dinner (between classes), but this week was so busy, he often didn't even do that. So that meant we had a lot of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for lunch and either a quick spaghetti dinner or a sandwich on the run for supper. One night we had the sirloin again.

Tonight we had about a 45 minute window for dinner. Ryan had a paper due at 5, so he spent the day in the library. Then at 6, he played in a 4 on 4 soccer tournament. But I was determined to actually cook dinner tonight and was craving Lemon Chicken. The only problem was I had already been to the grocery store twice this week and they didn't have any chicken breasts.

I've started grocery shopping on Wednesday evenings. Ryan is in class from 5-8pm, and our friends, Ben and Karen, invited me to come to the store with them. This is a huge help because when I go with them, I can carry more back with me. But the store doesn't stock their produce until Thursdays, so I usually go back Thursday afternoon as well. Yesterday they had a huge selection of fresh produce - eggplants, portabella mushrooms, asparagus, and leeks. I bought a leek. I've never cooked a leek before (or even tasted one, that I know of), but I thought it was time to try one. I checked the meat department again and still no chicken breats (they had plenty of feet, necks, and backs, though!).

This afternoon I decided to run by the store again and see if they had gotten any more chicken today. Also, I forgot to get Ryan some yogurt at the store the past 2 days, so I needed to go anyway. Before I left, I actually prayed that there would be chicken breasts, mostly because I was sick of having the same 2 kinds of meat all the time.

On a side note, on my way to the grocery store, I met a lady whose husband teaches marketing in the undergrad program here. We started talking and I found out her daughter actually lives in Greenville, SC!! I told her I went to Bob Jones University for college, and she said she visited the Museum & Gallery recently, and was so impressed by it and the campus in general. She told me she's a Christian, too, and asked where we went to church in Grenada. I was able to tell her about the Neptune's church, although I couldn't give very good directions about how to get there. We talked the whole way to the store, and I was so thankful to have a connection with another Christian, let alone someone connected with Greenville!

Anyway, so I got to the grocery store and went directly to the back and looked in the case where they keep the chicken. I again saw plenty of other unappetizing parts and could tell they hadn't stocked it since yesterday. But then in the corner, I saw 2 packages of boneless skinless chicken breasts! I think I might have cheered out loud! The Lord must have been saving those just for me, because there's no reason why they should have been there. I was so thankful for such a direct and undeserved answer to prayer! I remembered to buy some yogurt and another gallon of milk before I left.

Back at home, I decided to make potato leek fritters to go with the lemon chicken. The fritters were just mashed potatoes and leeks mixed with 4 beaten eggs, bread crumbs, parmesan cheese, and salt and pepper. I fried them in a little bit of oil for about 2 minutes on each side. For the chicken, I cut the breasts into 1" pieces, coated them with flour, and seasoned them with garlic powder, paprika, salt, and pepper. I browned them in butter until they were cooked, and then added lemon juice and let them simmer for a couple more minutes. Both dishes turned out well, and were pretty easy to make. Plus, we have a ton of the potato mixture left, so I'm going to try frying up a couple more for breakfast tomorrow morning with eggs. We also had what Ryan calls Pistachio Fluff. I have no idea what the real name is. I found the recipe on the side of a box of pistachio pudding. It's just 1 1/2 cups Cool Whip, I package pistachio pudding, 1 can crushed pineapples, and 1/2 cup chopped pecans. I love it because it tastes like summer!



I'm on my way to watch Ryan play soccer now. After that we'll probably continue our Friday night tradition of watching a movie and eating popcorn. And if I'm lucky, maybe he'll have time to come to the beach with me tomorrow! Happy weekend everyone!