This past weekend my mother hosted a fantastic birthday party for my sister. My cousins chipped in and made the food, and it was amazing. Really, really delicious!
The Menu:
Grilled Tri Tip
Vegetable Salad with dressing
Fresh Garden Salad
Baked Potato Casserole (Kim’s version :O)
Chopped, roasted green chile with garlic and salt
I took pictures, of course! Thanks Mom, Kim and Keri!! Happy Birthday Sis!
I love chocolate! I always tell my kids, if they want candy, chocolate is a better choice then any of the “sugary” candies out there.
I love coffee, espresso in mochas to be exact.
I love cooking with Pillsbury refrigerated dough products, they are verastile and easy to use.
So here we are! A concoction of 3 things I love. Enjoy!
Mocha Tartlets
1 cup semi sweet chocolate chips
1 cup milk chocolate chips
1/4 cup butter
2 tsp Fine Ground Espresso (I used Illy)
MELT (30 seconds in microwave, stir, heat 20 more seconds)
Roll out Pillsbury dough of choice (I used crescent rolls)
Cut out circles with cookie cutter
Bake 8 mins on 350 degrees (monitor their progress)
Remove, use tool (I used the end of a wooden spoon) to form shell
Use pastry bag or cake decorator to squeeze chocolate mix into shells
Top off with chopped nuts or sliced almonds
COOL
Enjoy!
Download PDF: Mocha Tartlets Recipe (Right-click save as to download or click to view in browser)
Ever since I got my Ninja I have been promising the boys a fruit smoothie. The week before I had picked up some frozen strawberries and blueberries. I went to work. I wish we had bananas though, I love bananas in smoothies.
It was yummy, the boys ate it right up. I especially liked the whipped cream. We ate them with spoons then drank up the last of it.
2 cups Strawberries
1 cups Blueberries
2 cups Ice
1/2 cup Milk
1 cup Strawberry Yogurt (7 oz)
2 tbsp Honey
Lemon juice from 1 Meyer Lemon
Whipped Cream
*My husband added sugar to his so it may need to be a little sweeter*
My husband has been asking for a pasta casserole for a long time and so this past Friday, I decided to cook up a yummy casserole for my Dearest.
I went straight to Allrecipes.com as usual, love that site.
Used Ingredient Search for: Spinach, Pasta, Cheese
I decided on Cheryl’s Spinach Cheesy Pasta, which has 4 and half stars from 238, make that 239 people!
We rate it a 5! All the boys cleaned their plate and Daddy was heating up bite-fuls all night!
What to do for lunch? That question is the question I battle with almost daily. I never want to get boring or bland with the lunches I make for my little guys. I partake in Muffin Tin Mondays sometimes, which is fun. You arrange all kinds of yummy food in muffin tins, kids love it.
While trying to figure out what to make yesterday all I knew is I wanted it to be warm and comforting. I also did not want it to be too filling since it was only lunch time and we have 2 snacks times during the day. I thought chicken noodle soup sounded yummy, open the cupboard – no chicken, no noodles, no soup.
But I did come across Tomato Soup. YES! What goes perfectly with Tomato Soup? Of course, Grilled Cheese Sandwiches!
I loved this always as a child, so delicious, warming, comforting, the perfect combination of flavors.
My kids love this meal too! Even though I almost always forget to make it. Last time they had it must have been last spring. They even decided to put their sliced carrots in the soup.
What really blew me away: my middle child. The ULTRA picky almost 5 year old had 3 servings of soup. I was shocked he even tried it, but I played it cool and he kept asking for more, success!!
Yesterday marked day 3 of being at home. We ran out of a lot of things in our kitchen. I wanted to throw something warm and comforting together. I also spent most of the afternoon reorganizing so when dinner time came let’s just say I didn’t have a lot of time or energy.
I went to the pantry and found 2 cans of cooked chicken breast (a nice item to have, quick and versatile), I also had carrots that I needed to use, chicken stock was the 3rd thing I found. I then went to allrecipes.com and did an ingredient search… The results came back and they had some excellent chicken recipes… most take some time to prepare and cook.
Back to the fridge… Pillsbury rolls… cheese. Got it… Cheesy Chicken Popovers, the quick and easy version.
I brought 2 cups of stock to a boil, then added 1/4 cp milk and 1 tbsp of corn starch, brought to a boil and then reduced the heat and added chicken and sliced carrots, added salt, pepper, seasoned salt, onion salt and garlic salt. I also added 2 tbsp of cream cheese and a 1/2 cup of marbled cheddar.
I rolled out Pillsbury biscuits and put them in my Jumbo Muffin Pan (they do not look there is much room, but this is a JUMBO pan). Baked them for 5 minutes.
I then filled them and topped each one with another rolled biscuit. Baked for 8 minutes on 350.
They were delicious. One thing I would change is the type of Pillsbury rolls, I only had Flaky Layers Biscuits, would have preferred Crescent Dough.
Kids and husband gobbled them up.
What’s not to love about avocados? They might be the most delicious super-food in the world.
Healthy snacks that my kids like are sometimes hard to come up with. One thing that has proved to be a favorite is avocados. Avocados, like many fruits and vegetables, amaze me. That you can walk up to a tree, pick a fruit, cut it open and enjoy it fascinates me. Avocados are creamy, light, and delicious.
The possibilities are almost endless. Some ways we like to use them:
Unfortunately they are expensive but sometimes we can find them for $1.00. I picked some up and we enjoyed them the good old fashioned way.
What’s your favorite avocado dish?
Strolling through Whole Foods is a treat because the produce and cheese departments are beautiful!
Recently while walking around admiring it all, I came across a bag of Meyer Lemons. I was excited to see them because I had recently heard about them on Top Chef. I have always been interested in the difference between Meyer lemons and other lemons. Come to find out they are not as acidic and they are sweet and tart, yum.
I found this blog that talks about them and suggestions on how to use them. I will be trying the pasta dish, it sounds so good!
For now, I enjoyed taking pictures of the pretty lemons. Hope you like!
Now it’s time to make some fresh lemonade!
My husband loves chocolate and I love my husband. Wasn’t it only natural that I would set out to find the most chocolatey cake ever? I started out on my search and eventually found the one I had to try.
It was amazing, delicious, moist, a chocolate lovers dream come true… on a plate… with sprinkles and pretty candles.
The recipe is called Too Much Chocolate Cake and it has 5 stars from almost 2500 people. It called for a bundt cake pan too which I really liked the idea of making, they are so pretty, and I like the way they slice up too.
And just in case you were wondering about the name of the cake – NO there is not too much chocolate. Enjoy!
Moist, spicy, warming, chocolaty, the perfect Fall recipe. Great to have around, give out and include them when sending care packages to loved ones. I headed over to allrecipes.com, this recipe has 5 (out of 5) stars from almost 4,000 people – you can’t beat that!
The recipe is called Downeast Maine Pumpkin Bread it is supposed to make loafs but I wanted to use my new muffin pans. My sister couldn’t resist giving me my Christmas present early, I guess she figured I could get a lot of use out of them for the Holiday Season. I LOVE THEM!!! It came with 3 muffins pans, jumbo, regular and mini.
We added chocolate chips to the recipe as well. To keep the chips from falling to the bottom of the muffin, toss them in flour first.
