After a day at the beach, we were in the mood for seafood and something tropical. I found the recipe here, and only changed the “salsa” because I didn’t have all the fruit it called for. I also increased the quantities for the fish. Here’s how I made it.

Coconut Crusted Tilapia with Citrus Salsa

• One bag of frozen tilapia filets, thawed (from Aldi, 6 filets)
• 4 eggs, beaten
• 1 heaping cup flour
• 1 heaping cup plain (unflavored) breadcrumbs
• 1 heaping cup sweetened shredded coconut
• Vegetable oil to cover the bottom of the pan about 1/8-1/4″
• 1 can pineapple chunks, drained
• 1 can mandarin oranges, drained
• 2 small limes, peeled and cut into small pieces (save a few lime wedges for garnish)
• 1 tsp sugar, optional

Mix the fruit together (except the lime wedges) and sprinkle with sugar. Set aside.

Rinse the tilapia with cold water and pat dry. On a large plate, mix together the shredded coconut and breadcrumbs. You’ll need three separate plates for the breading: one for flour, one for eggs and one for the coconut and breadcrumb mixture. Dredge the fish in the flour; dip into the beaten eggs and then coat thoroughly in the coconut and breadcrumb mixture.

Heat vegetable oil over medium heat in a large skillet and place the breaded fillets so that they are not touching each other. Cook on each side for about 4 minutes or until golden brown and cooked through. Remove from heat and set aside on a paper towel to drain excess oil.

Place each fillet on a plate and spoon salsa over top. Squeeze lime wedges over the top.

We just served it with some tortilla chips, but it would also be good with rice and salad.

Yesterday’s LA took quite a bit longer than I had expected. I hope that I can get that tightened up a bit as time goes on. I’m still figuring out our new spelling program (All About Spelling), so that’s a bit time-consuming. The girls are doing great with Spanish so far. Of course, we’ve only covered one lesson but they’re enjoying it and asking for more. Art has been fun, too. Last week they did a group project with horizontal, vertical and diagonal lines. Today they made designs with bent and curved lines. I think we have one more lesson on line before we move on to shape.

A few weeks ago we watched this program on PBS (a fantastic show, by the way). Ever since I haven’t been able to get Lebanese food off my mind. Especially shawarma, one of my favorites. I’ve been looking for a recipe and finally decided to go ahead and try one that I found here. I made a few changes, though. The shawarma turned out quite good. The sauce, not so much. It tasted really good but had the consistency of peanut butter, even after adding some olive oil and water and giving it a whirl in the food processor. I’ll have to find another recipe for that.

Anyway, here’s my version of the recipe. There are only a few changes from the one I linked to but I’ll write it out here anyway. I wish I’d taken a picture, but I was too busy eating.

Chicken Shawarma

Chicken and marinade:

• 1 1/2 – 2 lbs boneless, skinless chicken thighs or breasts (thinly cut)
• 1 cup plain Greek yogurt
• 1/4 cup vinegar
• 2 cloves garlic, crushed
• 1 teaspoon pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• scant 1/2 teaspoon ground cardamom
• 1 teaspoon allspice
• 1/4 cup lemon juice

Combine all ingredients except for chicken to make marinade. Add the chicken, mix well, cover and refrigerate at least eight hours or overnight.

(I need to find a different recipe for the sauce)

Just before mealtime, prepare the fillings:

• 8 -10 loaves of pita bread (I like Toufayan Mediterranean-style flatbread)
• one English cucumber, thinly sliced
• one small onion, thinly sliced
• 1/2 teaspoon (or more) lemon pepper
• 3 medium tomatoes, thinly sliced
• 1 bunch fresh parsley, finely chopped

Take the onions, tomatoes, cucumbers and sprinkle with lemon pepper. Add other filling ingredients in a large bowl and combine well (I tossed with my hands).  Taste-test and add more lemon pepper if needed.

Grill the chicken (in a basket or grill pan) for about 10 minutes or until done.

Heat the pitas on the grill for about a minute (or less) per side, just until warmed.

Place enough chicken on pita to cover 1/4 of the loaf. Add veggies and pour sauce over the top. Roll like a soft taco or burrito and you have shawarma! Wrapping half the shawarma in foil makes it a little easier to handle.

• Sonlight Core 2 (world history–Fall of the Roman Empire to 20th century; geography; bible; literature)
• Sonlight Readers 2-intermediate (Ellie and Micah) and 2-advanced (Bethany; she started these last year and will finish them this year)
• Explorer bible study Beginnings 2 (Ellie and Micah) and Discovery (Bethany)
• First Language Lessons levels 2 and 4
• Writing With Ease levels 2 and 4
• All About Spelling (Ellie and Micah)
• Sequential Spelling (Bethany)
• Zaner-Bloser Handwriting Grade 1 (Micah) and 2-manuscript (Ellie)
• Queens Cursive Handwriting (Bethany)
• La Clase Divertida Spanish
• “How to Teach Art to Children”

Tim teaches science, math and piano. He’s going to be using Real Science 4 Kids Pre-level 1 biology with all three of them, and CLE math. I think he’s still figuring out what levels he’ll use for math.

I think we’ll probably start in another week or two. I haven’t decided yet if we’ll just jump right in with everything or start slowly. I’m leaning toward jumping right in. We’re doing quite a lot more than we have in the past, so I expect our school days to be an hour or two longer than before. The girls aren’t thrilled with this, but they are looking forward to starting Spanish and art which are both new for us.

Once I got her out of her wet, snowy things I found out what the problem was: homesickness. I took her in my lap in front of the big picture window and we watched the falling snow. I tried to cheer her up:

Me:  Isn’t the falling snow pretty?

Micah: No. It just blends in with the sky and I don’t like the color of the sky here. It’s too dark. I want to see the sun.

Me:  Well, you could imagine we’re inside a snow globe. Isn’t that kind of fun?

Micah (with a “duh” tone of voice):  No. This is too big to be in a snowglobe. There can’t be houses and trees and things like that!

Me:  Sure there can, there could be a snowglobe with a little house in it…

Micah: Not with a door, and a window and everything!

Me: Okay… look at the tree across the street, next to the white van. The snow makes it look like it has cottonballs on it!

Micah: I’d call it a dirty van, not white. The snow just makes it look dirty.

Our conversation continued like that for a little longer, with me trying to cheer her up and her refusing to be cheered. I finally gave up. Gee, I wonder where she gets that attitude from?

We are looking forward to our last few days here and more time with friends and family, but we’re also looking forward to heading home this weekend.

The girls have loved the snow. They’ve spent a lot of time already playing out in Granny and Granddad’s yard with their cousins. It’s really been fun seeing their reaction to it. They were totally amazed by the icicles at a McDonald’s we stopped at for breakfast in Kentucky. When we arrived in Michigan, the first thing Bethany did after getting out of the car was gingerly touch the snow. “It’s soft!” she said in awe.

It’s been a great weekend spending time at Cornerstone EPC’s missions conference. They are so good at both making missionaries feel welcomed and appreciated and also making real connections between missionaries and church members so that we’re not just a random picture on a refrigerator door.

If you’re going to be in southeast Michigan over the next week and a half or so, we’d love to see you. Drop us a note or give us a call so we can set something up!

Our server got hacked a while back and I’ve been putting off going through the blog to make sure everything still worked. I finally did it tonight and I think I’ve got everything back in order. The hacker destroyed our newsletter archive, but I’ve got it put back together now. The latest edition (which just went out today) is even there. You can click on “Newsletters” in the drop-down menus at the top of the page to find it.

We’ve been homeschooling again this year, and things have been going pretty well. Bethany’s in 3rd grade and Ellie and Micah are in 1st. Our mornings are kept very busy with things like parts of speech, diagramming sentences and learning about ancient civilizations. Tim teaches math and science, for which I am so thankful. It’s really worked out well. The girls seem to like it for the most part, although we do get occasional complaints of “I wish I were back in public school!” When I remind them that they wouldn’t be able to spend most of the afternoon playing if that were the case, they usually change their minds and are back on board with homeschooling. We’re involved with a local co-op that meets Friday mornings and we have a lot of fun with that.

I’ve been spending a lot of time on a new project: putting my grandpa’s record collection into digital form. If you’re interested in 1940s music and radio programs or vintage audio gear, make sure to check out my blog, Grandpa’s iPod.

We’ve been freezing through the cold spell that “gripped the south,” as they say in the weather reports. Today it was finally back to about normal. Houses down here just aren’t made to keep out the cold. Even with the thermostat set at 71 (unheard of for us back in Michigan!) the first floor of our house must have been well below 65 degrees for days and days.  The girls were amazed to even see ice on the ground a few mornings. I think we’re going to be in for a rude awakening when we visit Michigan in February!

Which reminds me, we’d love to see as many people as we can while we’re up there. We haven’t nailed the exact dates down yet, but we should arrive somewhere around the 12th of February and probably will stay until around the end of the month. We’ll be in touch!