Hello Blog Friends!
This has been a week with many “moving parts” as I have juggled extra office jobs including preparations for Cook-Along Episode 2, the Alumni Advent program and some serious work on the sections of the 2023 Manual for which I am responsible.
For general office tasks, the documents for the November Board meeting needed to be pulled together and emailed to all the members. A reminder also went out about the November 15th deadline for submissions to the Advent/Christmas Networks newsletter. Junior Youth Camp’s fundraising supper is coming up on November 19th and ticket sales have picked up. In most cases the payments are deposited automatically via e-transfer but I still need to enter each one on an Income Log sheet as part of the day-to-day accounting. Yesterday I sent a third plea to prospective presenters for Carols & Cocoa and also sent another copy of the poster to a long list of alumni and host communities reminding them to circle their calendars and join us Saturday December 10th at 4pm on Google Meet. We are hoping to collect a wide audience😊.
It is good to be looking at the 2023 Manual although I can already see that more work is needed to make sure that ALL the changes are made relative to the transition to locally-led Day Camps. I am using the FORMAT from the 2022 Manual but the CONTENT from 2015, the year of the previous iteration of “Something to Celebrate!” so there is much “to-ing and fro-ing” between different files 😊.
As a side bar Guylaine (CTM’s Director of Communications) has been creating the fillable form whereby host communities can fill in and submit their application for the 2023 Day Camp Program of their choice. There has been some difficulty in my getting access to it on the Day Camp Google Drive, however Jillian visited yesterday and was able to provide some valuable expertise in solving the issue so that, next week, I should be able to share a link with a list of potential host communities. Despite having a list with about 50 contacts it would still be wonderful to find a way to reach a wider audience with our programs. So far we just have not been able to find anyone with just the right skillset but we haven’t given up yet 😊.
As mentioned above, this afternoon is Episode 2 of The Christmas Cookie Cook-Along, Geneviève will be a first-time chef, but I understand she is a whiz on TikTok and so am looking forward to seeing her in action making Sugar cookies with our young aspiring bakers 😊.
We are having heavy rains at present due to being on the edge of a quite serious tropical storm, yesterday the rain was really torrential and I was very concerned we might lose power overnight, causing quite problem in running an online cooking course, but thankfully so far we are still all engines go!
Before I sit down again at my laptop for the Cook-Along Thomason will need another long and soggy walk but since I currently still have some baguettes in the oven time management is becoming a bit of an issue.
So before I get the baguettes onto a cooling rack and pull on my wellies let’s have our November Soup of the Week recipe!
I made this soup for supper on Wednesday evening when Jenna joined me and we both really enjoyed it so here goes….
Spicy Chicken Soup
- Soup:-
- Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
- 12 oz. sweet potatoes (about 2 medium), diced into ½” cubes
- ½ small green cabbage, thinly sliced
- 1-2 tsps. chipotle powder (2 makes it REALLY spicy 😊)
- ¼ cup lightly packed cilantro leaves, roughly chopped
- ¼ cup fresh lime juice
- Greek yoghurt
- Diced avocado
- Sliced white onion
- Tortilla chips
Heat the oil in a Dutch oven and sear the chicken pieces on both sides, reduce the heat and continue cooking for 15-20 minutes until just cooked through. Transfer to a plate to cool slightly while preparing the broth. Slowly add the broth to the pot, scraping all the yummy brown bits off the bottom. Bring to a simmer, taste and season with salt and pepper as needed. Add the sweet potato, cabbage, and chipotle, and simmer until the potatoes are tender, about 20 minutes. Tear the chicken into bite-sized pieces and add to the soup, along with the cilantro and lime juice. Stir until the chicken is warmed through. Serve immediately with toppings. Store leftovers in the fridge for up to 5 days or in the freezer for several months. Serves 4.