cabbage-chickpea cold-fighters

To my great delight, I woke up to a city full of snow this morning!  I'm really surprised by how much snow we've gotten.  I know it's January, but I really thought we used up all our snow last winter and it would just be bitterly cold this winter like the almanac said.  Well...okay, it IS bitterly cold, but I'm glad I'm rewarded for my frozen face and toes with some snow.

The cold tonight was downright painful.  By the time I was about a block from home, I couldn't even walk correctly because my feet had frozen into immobile little blocks of almost-ice.  Appropriately, on the ride home from teaching this evening, Frozen (Chill Mix) and Ice found their way into my iPod rotation.  Anyway, since I was too busy being cozy and enjoying the snow in the morning, I didn't get to go food shopping before work.  I figured I'd stop by at least Whole Foods on my way home from the train, but when I realized how much pain my face was in, I decided to go home and figure out dinner when I got there.  I tried to come up with an alternate plan as I was carefully side-stepping patches of ice on neglected sidewalks, but after a while I had to put all my energy into reminding my feet how to walk.

I knew I had some material to work with, but I was having trouble finding the motivation to be creative.  When Mister offered to go get me chickpeas, I couldn't say no.  He is becoming more like my dad every day (or maybe I'm just noticing it more).  I sent him out for chickpeas and told him if he found two very ripe bananas (normally, the produce where he was going is rotting anyway, so I thought there was a chance) I would make him cookies.  He returned with the chickpeas (this is where he differs from my dad*), a Mint Chocolate Luna Protein bar because he thought I'd enjoy it, Breyers Oreo Ice Cream, and some nuts to snack on.

I couldn't think of a more innard-warming dinner than the Chickpea Rice Soup with Cabbage Isa recently posted on theppk.com.  I know Mister doesn't really like soup for dinner, but...he got me the chickpeas, so he's got no one but himself to blame.  It was subtle, just like Isa says in her introduction.  There were no overwhelming flavors, nothing that jumped out at you.  The carrots and cabbage could have been a little crisper for my taste, but it is soup.  Beautiful, soothing, and cleansing soup.

* Bonus story!  Does everyone have their flashback hats on?  Okay, watch the screen:

I don't remember how old I was, but I know I was still in high school because I was living at home and so was my sister.  There was a shopping center a few miles from my parents' home that opened a Pepperidge Farm outlet and my father couldn't have been more excited about it.  He's a good hometown boy - loves his TastyKakes and Pepperidge Farm, has a Wawa credit card, and can give you a tour of just about any place in eastern Pennsylvania without batting an eyelash.  Anyway, Mom asked him to go to Pepperidge farm for a loaf of bread.  He returned about an hour later with 9 different cookies and exactly no bread.  It was from that day until the store closed its doors that my father was forbidden from entering unchaperoned.