E is for Empanada!

E is for EMPANADA!

Not sure what an empanada is? Well, you can CLICK HERE for more information about these yummy Latin American treats. Now here is my adventure with them!!

This will probably wind up to be a really long story, but it will be an amusing one!

So, this week is Kadyn's "Star Week" which all of you know means my week to bring treats for the class. Here I am last Wednesday, opening Kadyn's folder to find the "Star of the Week" packet of information from Mrs. Harris. I'm thinking, "Kadyn is so excited about this and I was excited for her!" "Mommy, I get to be the line leader ALL week, she squeals!" This is a huge deal to kindergartner's I've realized! As I'm reading thru her package, I see "all snacks need to start with the letter 'E'". My mind immediately begins to wonder... "what kind of snacks start with the letter 'E'?" She has a little note at the bottom with a few suggestions that she could come up with and then says "sorry E's are hard!" GREAT! I think...

As I'm brainstorming, the same things keep crossing my mind... eggs, eggs, egg salad, egg rolls, Eggos... egg, egg, egg! Then I think, "I can't take EGGS to school for the kids' snack, they would probably think I was so GROSS and maybe even tell Kadyn, "your mom is gross!"... I can't afford to ruin a reputation that I've yet to even build... so, I enlist help... from my mom and others. We all get to work on coming up with "E" snack ideas!! Good thing I had a few days! As I'm finishing out my week last week, after pulling out handfuls of hair, I come up with one of the greatest ideas... "I'll get fruit empanadas!!" Empanada starts with an "E"... YES! I got excited! But wait, where am I going to find empanadas?? Silly me, I type in "Mexican Bakery" in the yellow pages on the 'Net... hoping something might pop up around here. Well, what do you know... there was ONE listing for "mexican bakery" on there... but it was way down in Franklin. Well, that's okay because I have to be in Franklin on Saturday for a baby shower. I'll just call them up and get their store hours and make sure they make fruit empanadas.. I'll kill 2 birds with 1 stone while I'm in Franklin. Yea Right!

Not thinking twice, I pick up the phone and dial the number to this mexican bakery. Suddenly, there is a voice on the other end answering the phone in Spanish. Okay, no problem... I deal with International customers at work all the time, when I start speaking in English, they start speaking in English. Well... that's what I expected to happen during this call. Boy was I wrong! The person on the other end had NO CLUE what I was saying, then proceeded to say, "No habla english". I said, "no one there speaks English?" The person replies, "No." I was thinking, "you just answered me in English..." Oh well... I got off the phone and was stumped. Ah ha! I'll call my sister-in-law all the way down in San Antonio and get her to call them for me (she speaks fluent Spanish). I'll get her to get all of the information for me!! Okay, so she does... they close at 9PM (I never knew a bakery stayed open that late) and they carry strawberry, pineapple & cream cheese empanadas. Okay, I was back to being excited about an "E" snack!

Saturday afternoon rolls around, I had written down their addresses. Yes, there were 2 addresses listed in the yellow pages for 1 mexican bakery with 1 phone number. So, I was confused but hey, I wrote them both down... maybe there were 2 locations?? What did I know? I also don't know much about Franklin, so I was going down there completely blind, not knowing what to expect.

Started looking for the first address listed (Murfreesboro Road) which I knew that general area being Hwy 96 where all the shopping centers are, that's all I know about Franklin. "This should be easy to find," I thought. No way, hardly ANY of those buildings have street numbers on them. The fire station had one of the 900 block but I'm looking for the 1200 block. Up and down Hwy 96 I drive, going into 3 or 4 strip malls, not finding this mexican bakery. So, I got frustrated and decided to look for the other address that was listed in the yellow pages. Now, this is where the story gets funny...

I drive and drive and drive, passing BGA then Franklin High School on Hillsboro Road. Find all of the roads that Google told me to take to get to my destination. I turn on the first road off of Hillsboro.... "Hmm, this seems to be all residential." But what do I know about Franklin, maybe this road will lead me out into another commercial area. Keep driving, making my turns. Nope, still residential. So, I started thinking, "well, maybe this is the mexican bakery owners HOME address!" I wonder if this owner will be home and have some empanadas on hand to sell me? Probably NOT! Okay, again I'm FRUSTRATED! So, I figure my way back out of the residential area that I've gotten myself into and back to where I started from... Hwy 96! At this point, I'm determined to find La Azteca Mexican Bakery @ 1202 Murfreesboro Road!

Once again, I drive up Hwy 96... this time I see 1202 Murfreesboro Road! "Well, that's funny, that doesn't look like La Azteca Mexican Bakery, that looks more like an O'Charley's!" At this point, I've had it. I decided that SOMEONE at this bakery was going to speak English! So, I stopped in a shopping center parking lot and called (keeping my fingers crossed). I get the same Spanish greeting I had gotten the previous day (had no clue what they said), so I started speaking hoping someone would answer back in English. I get a "Hold On!" in a Spanish/not really good English accent. I'm holding... a man comes to the phone that kind of speaks English. I didn't understand him that well, but hey, it was better than yesterday! I ask him where he is located and he tells me "Alexander something, Bank of America something". So, I got enough of it that I figured I could find them. Then I ask, "Do you all have a sign outside of your store?" "Yes," he says. Okay, surely I can find it then. I take off for the last time of finding my empanadas!

Ding, Ding, Ding! There's Bank of America and there is Alexander Shopping Center. Well, this was the ONLY shopping center I hadn't driven through while driving up and down Hwy 96. And it was the yuckiest. I never thought Franklin would have a yucky shopping center, but this is the one! I put 2 and 2 together and found the mexican bakery... however, there was NO sign outside like the man said!! They just had painting on the windows!! This being a dingy shopping center, I was a bit leery and Kadyn was with me. But I was on a mission!

We walk inside this mexican bakery/grocery store and the employees are playing some Spanish music LOUD. I almost felt like I was at a concert. Once they realized I was in there, they gave me a weird look and said something to each other in Spanish and then quickly turned their music down. I begin to speak and they go get the man that I spoke to on the phone. I ask him where the empanadas are... he smiled when I said it "like I said it funny" (which I probably did), then takes me to the bakery area. He points me to the empanadas and then I ask which is which. He doesn't know, so he has to ask the lady that makes them about them. So, I find out that one is pineapple and the other is cream cheese. So, I decide to get some of both. There wasn't anything in view to get them out of the case (which is help yourself), so I had to ask. The man showed me where the tray, paper and tongs are. I get them out and head to the cash register.

We get up to the cash register, ringing us up is the bakery lady who doesn't speak English. I have a tray full of empanadas and she looked at me like I was a pig. I said, "oh, these are for my daughter's class." She gave me a look letting me know she had no idea what I just said. So, I felt dumb and thought "I can't remember any of the Spanish that I learned way back in high school, so I'll hush now and just smile." She rang me up, I paid and as we were getting ready to leave, I said, "Kadyn, tell her Gracias!" Kadyn says, "Gracias!", the lady smiled and we leave. As we are walking to the car, I look at my receipt and what do you know... this place isn't even called La Azteca, it's called Los Primos!! So, I wouldn't have been able to find it anyway, the yellow pages really needs to update their information online!! Goodness!!

I was so happy for that mission to be over! That was the longest and strangest experience I've had in a really LONG time! But it was all in the name of the "E" snack for the class!

Moral of the story: Before you get a bright idea, make sure you've gotten all of your information covered!

Well, I got an extra empanada for myself to try. I figured I needed to be the guinea pig before passing them off to Mrs. Harris and the class. They were really good, in my opinion. So, if your child came home on Monday and didn't have a CLUE what they ate for snack... now you know!