The Hopkins Model

The only people who are good at cooking at the ones who are stuck doing it every day. They don't look at food sites or buy recipe books or rip recipes out of magazines because cooking is a hobby, they do all that because they are stuck. doing. it. every. day.

When I was a kid, I would play at my friend Brenda's house nearly every afternoon. Around 5 pm, her mom would come home from work and magically turn a few ingredients into a magical meal for a family of 4 (5 if I was lucky, which was probably 80% of the time). I was completely fascinated with how Margo could do this - here she was tired from working as a secretary all day long, and she immediately went to work cooking. Everyone sat at their cool "breakfast nook" table together and visited and laughed during supper.

I learned three things from that part of my childhood.. 
1. I was going to be a secretary because they could do everything.
2. I was going to have a real family and we were going to have supper at the table every day.
3. If anyone was at our house during supper time, they were going to eat with us.

So far that's worked really well. I was a secretary from ages 15 to 25. I have a great family and we eat together at 6 pm every day. Everyone we know has an open invitation to join us.

Thank you Margo, Denny, Brenda and Jason. I loved your family.

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La De Da Enchiladas

• 2 pkg. Grilled Chicken Breast Strips, Southwestern (fully cooked)

• 1 can cream of chicken soup 

• 1/2 cup sour cream

• 1 cup salsa

• 2 tsp. chili powder

• 1/2 cup Mexican shredded cheese

• 1 pkg. flour tortillas (10 count/medium size)

• 1 tsp. olive oil (to grease baking dish/pan)

• 1 can diced tomatoes, drained

• 1 bunch sliced green onions (or 1/2 diced onion) 

Mix soup, sour cream, salsa and chili powder in a bowl.

Chop chicken strips into smaller pieces and add them to another bowl, along with cheese and 1 cup of the soup mixture from other bowl.

Scoop chicken mixture into tortillas, roll them and place seam-side down into greased baking dish/pan. Keep doing this until you run out of chicken mixture or tortillas or space.

Pour remaining soup mixture on top of tortillas.

Cover and bake 40 minutes at 350°.

Top with diced tomatoes and onions.