Snowpocalypse 2012 and Snuggle Soup

Hey there Butterballs, and welcome to my snow fortress!



For the last four days or so, Missoula has apparently been having it's seventh worst winter storm since 1850-something. We've gotten over a foot of snow, plus an inch of freezing rain, which really puts a nice shiny finish on the glacier that is my back yard. It started on Wednesday when I was teaching in Florence. It took me about forty minutes to travel the 20 miles back home. Shortly thereafter, God opened up his curtains of doom and dumped about a million pounds of icy awesome on our heads. School got canceled the next day (which is good, because little Quimbie the Beetle car couldn't even see over the drifts...), and it took six neighbors two days to dig/snowblow our cars out of the driveway. We managed to get both our cars into one clear parking spot, and called it a weekend. I've since shoveled about 12 tons of snow for the sole purpose that our mailman could deliver what ended up being pizza coupons, and a Bon Apetit magazine.

Butters is not a fan of the snow. He has not come off the couch in approximately five days. Not that he did that a lot anyway, just that his level of lazy has gone up about 1200%. I.e. Butters has a pulse and that's about it right now. I've tried to sway him with everything from kitty kibble, to new toys, etc. Not. Having. It.

So those of you who don't live in Hell's freezer might ask, "So what does one do during snowpocalypse?" You actually have several options:

1. You can get day drunk and make snow people versions of yourself an your roommates in the yard. (I'm lookin at YOU, Pecker)

2. Shovel until you tear something.

3. Watch your across the street neighbor angry-shovel at midnight.

4. Wrestle a polar bear.

5. Draw colored pencil portraits of your giant cat.

6. Make Snuggle Soup with Pecker, Caitlin, Rebecca, and your long-suffering husband!

Snuggle soup originated when Caitlin wrote on my Facebook Wall asking if we could make snuggly soup. I, of course, instantly misread this as Snuggle Soup. As in, an actual existing recipe, for something called Snuggle Soup. This did not actually exist until we combined all our ingredients in the Chopped test kitchen (sometimes known as my house), and invented it. Turns out Snuggle Soup is a broth-y southwest thing that you dip tortilla triangles in, and this is how you make it:

You'll need:
2 Chicken breasts
1 lb of spicy sausage
2 cans of chicken stock
1 pint of water
3 large carrots, cut on the bias
1 large onion, roughly chopped
1 can garbanzo beans
1 can black beans
1 lime, cut in half and the juice of it
2 tbsp taco seasoning
1 tbsp garlic
2 tsp cracked black pepper
2 tsp salt
1 tsp cumin
tortillas
1 cup-ish cheddar cheese

Drain and rinse bot kinds of beans in a colander. Break up the sausage and cook in a large stock pot, reserve, use left over grease to cook chicken. Cube the chicken breasts, cook until slightly browned, reserve. Add a little more oil of your choice (obviously I like olive...), cook garlic, onion and carrot on medium heat until translucent (for the onion, if your carrot is translucent, you should probably not be eating it...), and slightly brown for the carrot. add the meat back in, and pour the stock and water in on top of it. Add in spices, lime juice and the halves of the lime. heat through, add in the beans. Let simmer until the beans have started to thicken the broth a little.

For the tortilla crisps for dippin!
Heat a little oil in a frying pan, add tortilla, sprinkle with cheese. Let cheese melt, flip, let the cheese get crusty. Repeat until you have about two tortillas for each person being served.

Enjoy! Snuggle down for the long, harsh winter, Nanook! You deserve it! You can always pretend the snow is sand and that you are on the beach. Just don't like, go outside in minimal clothing or you will probably get hypothermia, but no need to fret! You have a big old pot of Snuggle Soup to keep you warm!

Isn't that the beachiest beach that ever beached a beach!

Not really. That's our yard under about ninety million tons of snow.