A Warm Hug Is What it Takes

Mother knows best, so the proverbial saying goes but oh well, don’t look at me because often I don't! I feel like I have too many misadventures as a mom. In fact, I’m sure my kids could write an entire book entitled MOMMY’S (MIS)ADVENTURES and it will be as thick as a Webster dictionary.

Just this morning, I got a text from my daughter Izzy. She said I have to check her out from school because she wasn’t feeling well. Frantic that it may be swine flu (see, I didn’t even know the symptoms of swine flu despite the flood of emails I get regarding the disease) I called my sister, Marvie, who is a physician in Orlando. “Does Izzy have swine flu,” I asked anxiously, “because she said she has a throbbing headache and an upset stomach?” She answered my question with another question, “Did she take something this morning?” “Yeah, I gave her ascorbic acid to remedy her sniffles,” I responded. My sister then asked a pretty simple, yet vital question, “Did she eat something before taking the ascorbic acid?” I responded no and she said, “Well then that’s the culprit, ascorbic acid should be taken with a full stomach.”

I felt bad for my daughter having to suffer through the pain. As I drove to her school, thoughts of my past misadventures as a mom rushed to my mind. One time my son complained about a terrible pain and I gave him Tylenol to try to ease it. However, it’s a good thing my husband overheard the conversation, and probed further, asking him where the pain was coming from, and when it started. The next thing I knew was we were at the ER. I was grateful to have a husband who has a medical background… I don't even want to think of what could have happened next.

So on the way home, I asked Izzy what she wanted for lunch. “Soup,” she replied. I made this soup that is "tinola-esque". Tinola is a soup dish traditionally served with chicken cut ups, slices of green papaya and chili leaves. But since I wanted to serve something fresh and hot right away, I didn’t have to go through the process of sautéing. With a left over breast from the rotisserie chicken we had last night and the chayote squash, I did what Rachel Ray calls “chop and drop”. It gave a welcome relief to my daughter’s upset stomach, plus the soup gave her a warm hug in this cold December weather.


CHOP DROP TINOLA SOUP

Ingredients:


Slices of chicken breast (left over from a store bought rotisserie chicken)
3 slices of ginger (crushed)
1 medium onion (chopped)
1 medium tomato (chopped)
3 cups chicken broth (I used knorr chicken bouillion dispersed in water)
Fish sauce (patis) to taste

Directions:
As I’ve said, this is easy to prep: just chop, drop, cook the dish and it’s done. Pour the chicken broth in a pot, and add all the sliced ingredients in as soon as the broth is boiling. You’ll have the taste of tinola in no time! Enjoy!