Monthly Archives: May 2014

Strawberry Cobbler

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The husband and I went down the road to the strawberry farm this past weekend. We brought home a huge container of strawberries. HUGE! Once home I chopped most to freeze for smoothies. Used some for Strawberry Chia Jam. Recipe for jam will come at a later date. The last thing I made was a fresh Strawberry Cobbler (recipe a friend shared with me). My husband called it a pie but it’s a cobbler. He is still saying it was a pie. Poor misguided soul.
Oh my it was yummy no matter what you call it.

Cobblers. It seems everybody has their favorite recipe. To me the key to a good cobbler is the cake like top. If it’s not good it doesn’t matter how wonderful your filling is. This is a new recipe for me. It is not my favorite but it is a good cobbler. Darn good cobbler. One day I will share my two go to cobblers. They are simple, fool proof and so amazingly tasty.

Fresh Strawberry Cobbler

Fresh strawberries. Enough to fill you pan/pie dish over half full.
1 cup Bisquick
1 cup granulated sugar (I only had half a cup so I did half granulated sugar and half coconut sugar)
½ cup melted butter
1 egg

Chop your strawberries. Put in the pan the amount of strawberries you think is plenty. Now put in some more. These guys will cook down a lot. Sprinkle a tablespoon or two of your sugar over the fruit.
Mix your Bisquick, rest of sugar, egg and butter together. You will have a thick batter type concoction. Spoon this over your strawberries.
Cook in a preheated oven at 350 degrees for 45 to 50 minutes.

Fresh picked strawberries

Fresh picked strawberries


Sugar mixture

Sugar mixture


batter topping

batter topping


I had a piece with a little bit of whipped cream. The husband had his with vanilla ice cream along with a huge helping of whipped cream. It was good. If I make this again I will either add more melted butter or some water to the batter topping. I think a thinner batter would have mingled more with the strawberries instead of just floating on top.
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Chia Seed Pancakes

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Yes it is true I have a new love in my life. I have fallen for Chia seeds. I use the Chia seeds to replace eggs in most of my baking recipes. This weekend I used them in my pancake mix. If you are wondering how Chia seeds affect the taste, they don’t. Your baked goods will still have the same great taste you are used to. The only thing I noticed different about my pancakes and this could be all in my head is the pancakes seem to soak up the syrup more than my usual pancakes. Still they are very tasty pancakes and more filling since Chia Seeds contain fiber.
The Chia seeds I am using now I got from Amazon. My local Ingles carries them also. I think Wal-Mart may carry sell them. You will think they are pricey (I did at first) but I use them a lot. A LOT and I have only used have a bag. They go far.

This is the basic egg replacement how-to for 1 egg:
1 tbsp chia seeds
3 tbsp water
Mix in a small bowl, let set for 15 to 20 minutes for the seeds to absorb the water and gel. I like to call it Chia Goop. You can also make the goop ahead and store in fridge for up to a few days so it is ready when you are ready to bake.

Scratch Pancake Recipe
1-1/4 cup flour
1 tbsp. coconut palm sugar (or regular sugar)
1 tbsp. baking powder
1 tsp. salt
1 egg (replace with chia goop)
1-1/4 cup milk (more or less, depending if you like a thick or thin batter)
1 tbsp. melted butter or oil
1 tsp. vanilla extract

This is what the Chia seeds look like after they gel.

This is what the Chia seeds look like after they gel.

You can also use box mix (I use them a lot, I find the store brands are better than the name brands)
Just add 1 tbsp coconut palm sugar and the Chia goop
Even the complete mixes that don’t call for egg I still add the Chia seed goop. If you don’t want to use the Chia seed, still add an egg to the complete mixes. It just makes a better pancake batter.
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Open Sesame Chia Seed Candy

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I have been wanting to do this for awhile. I have went through tons and tons of Pins to find the perfect recipe. Is there a perfect recipe for this? I don’t know but I found the perfect recipe for me, it was more the measurement and technique I needed. I omitted and added a few things here and there.
What am I talking about?

Sesame Seed Candy!

Yes that little bitty pale unassuming seed that adorns out hamburger buns. You take that seed, work a little bit of magic, and BAM! You have a nice little candy that makes a great tasting, sorta close to healthy snack.

Here is the original Sesame Candy recipe. Below is my adapted recipe along with my account of the whole process.

Sesame Chia Seed Candy

Ingredients:

1 c. Sesame seeds
2 tbsp. Chia seeds
3-4 tbsp. honey
3 tbsp. coconut sugar

Dry roast your sesame seeds for 5-7 minutes. Pour into a bowl add the Chia seeds and mix well. Set aside. In a small pot add the sugar and honey. Bring to a boil, now simmer for 5 minutes. Stirring constantly. Add seeds. Stir. Pour onto a piece of wax paper or a silicone baking mat. Cover with another sheet of wax paper, roll candy with a rolling pin until about ½ inch thick. With a knife cut/score into 1 inch squares. Let cool. Break apart. Done!

I measured out my sesame seeds, put them in the pan to toast. I toasted mine the full 7 minutes because I wanted some of my seeds a dark brown color. After toasting I pit them and the Chia seeds in a dish. I happened to have my small pie dish close by so I used it.

Ready for toasting

Ready for toasting


Toasted Sesame seeds mixed with Chia seeds

Toasted Sesame seeds mixed with Chia seeds

The pot was on the stove to heating up while I mixed my seeds together. So the pot was hot when I started measuring out the honey. I poured my first tablespoon in and it went wild with the boiling. So I had to work fast to get all the honey and the coconut sugar in the pot, while trying to stir at the same time. FYI: have what you need in arms reach, closer if you can. I was like a crazy woman trying to do all that at once with everything I needed in different place around the kitchen.

Boiling, boiling, get that stuff a boiling.

Boiling, boiling, get that stuff a boiling.


5 minutes and a lot of stirring later I poured in my seeds and began mixing, this comes together quick. At first you think that is not going to be enough honey mixture to coat that much seed. It is plenty.
I did not have any wax paper so I used one of my new baking mats. I used another to lay over top. I also don’t have a rolling pin (mainly for the husbands safety) so I used this high tech gadget called a can of soup. Worked fine.
Ready to roll

Ready to roll


High tech rolling technique.

High tech rolling technique.


Okay as soon as I finished rolling I tried to remove the top baking mat. Nope not a good idea some of the candy mixture was coming up with it. I just stopped pulling the mat and mashed it back down over the candy. I popped the whole thing in the freezer for maybe 2 minutes. Took it out while it was still warm enough to cut. This time the top mat came up easily. Not wanting to damage the bottom mat I used a butter knife to ‘cut’ the candy into squares. I did not cut all the way through the candy.
You can see in the upper right where I tried to lift up the top mat

You can see in the upper right where I tried to lift up the top mat


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After letting the candy cool a few minutes I broke the pieces apart. Both mats had sticky stuff on them but I only had to run water over them for a few seconds and they were clean. I think I might be in love with silicone baking mats.

How did the Sesame Chia Seed candy taste? Great. Sweet with a toasted nutty taste. This is going to be my midday snack at work next week. Thanks for joining me on this Pinteresting adventure.
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Fiery Hot Lips: DIY Cinnamon Lip Balm

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Fire balm

I love me some cinnamon. I am still enjoying the cinnamon toothpicks I made. I was gathering supplies to make a small batch of lip balm and was thinking about those cinnamon toothpicks. Suddenly an idea hit me, thankfully not hard, but it did hit me. The idea? Cinnamon lip balm. I read several pins on making lip balm and from them I came up with the recipe down below.

Let me tell you something about cinnamon lip balm…it is not for the faint of heart.

Lip Balm of Fire:

Ingredients:
4 tsp. of beeswax pellets
1 ½ tsp. of Shea butter
2 tsp. sweet almond oil
1 tsp. Argan oil
3-6 drops cinnamon oil
A tiny chunk of lipstick if you want tinted balm
A tiny container for your balm

In a pot add a few inches of water, turn burner on low. Give the water a few minutes to heat up. Using either a glass jar or some other container that can take the heat, place the jar in the warm water. Into your jar add the beeswax, Shea butter, Sweet Almond oil and Argan Oil.
Let everything melt, stirring with a wooden spoon. Once melted add your lipstick chunk if you are tinting. If not remove from heat, add your cinnamon, stir then pour into your storage container.

Beeswax

Beeswax


Wax and oils melted together.

Wax and oils melted together.

This is my first time dealing with beeswax. What I learned from this first time is that the stuff wants to set up FAST. So have your storage container handy so you can pour quickly.

I should have added a bigger chunk of lipstick. I had a bronze color which using just a little made my balm look dirty. I meant to pour just three drops of cinnamon oil but a tad more came out of the bottle. I let my balm set, which didn’t take long. It smelled like cinnamon heaven. I put it on my lips and it burnt like hell. My lips were on FIRE. Grabbing a rag I wiped what I could of the balm off my lips. Still the fire was raging. I made a mad dash to my freezer, grabbed a cube of ice and tried to cool down my burning lips. It took a few minutes but my lips cooled down. On a positive note my lips were nice and soft. Was it from the oils in the balm or did the dry rough skin burn off? I don’t know and I’m not going to try it again. Hell who am I kidding? It’s cinnamon, of course I’m going to try it again.

This was a very Pinteresting and painful adventure. Do you have a favorite lip balm recipe? Please share.

Setting up

Setting up

Baked Fajitas

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Saw this on Pinterest the week I made my DIY taco seasoning. Thankfully I wrote down the recipe because like a few other pins I have tried Pinterest flagged them as spam and now the sites are gone.
I only have a photo of the dish before it went into the oven. It smelled so good when I pulled it from the oven I couldn’t keep the husband away from it before I could snap a picture.

Ready for the oven

Ready for the oven


It was tasty and so much easier and less time consuming than the regular way I make fajitas. Only thing I will do different next time is marinade the chicken like I do when I have made fajitas in the past. Recipe for marinade is below baked fajita recipe.

Baked Fajitas

1 lb. chicken breast, cut into strips
1 can diced tomatoes
1 small can green chilies
1-2 onions, sliced
1-2 bell peppers, sliced
2 tbsp. vegetable oil
1 ½ tbsp. taco seasoning
½ tsp. lime juice

Preheat oven to 400 degrees
Mix chicken, onions and peppers in a baking dish
In a small bowl combine oil, lime and taco seasoning.
Drizzle over meat and vegetables.
Bake 25 to 30 minutes.

Warm some tortillas, gather up your toppings (sour cream, guacamole, cheese, etc.) and enjoy!

Marinade for chicken:
¼ c orange juice
¼ c lime juice
¼ c olive oil
1 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp dried onion flakes
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp chili powder
1 tsp oregano
Dash of salt and pepper

Mix it up in a small bowl throw in into a baggie with your uncooked chicken. Put into fridge to hang out for and hour to several hours.

I love onions, every so often I get a craving for some cooked onions. This marinade is awesome to use to fry up a pan of onions. Eat those onion by themselves or toss on top a baked potato. Yummy.

Blast from the Past: Cinnamon Toothpicks

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IMG_6495

I remember in my early teen years walking to this convenience store down the road just to get a pack of cinnamon toothpicks. I loved those things. Sometimes my lips and mouth felt like they were on fire but that was part of the fun. I thought I was the coolest thing walking down the road dressed all in black with my toothpick hanging from my lips. Haha.
On a whim I typed in cinnamon toothpicks on Pinterest and imagine my happiness when a how-to pin popped up. I had on hand what I needed to make these. So hell yeah I did! Recipe from Ehow

Cinnamon toothpicks:

Cinnamon oil or flavoring
Small glass jar with a lid
Toothpicks

Pour oil into jar till it’s about 1/8 to ¼ deep.
Stand toothpicks upright so only one end id in oil. Just grab up a bundle, no need to count.
Screw on lid
Let sit overnight or 24 hours
Spread toothpicks on baking sheets to dry. When no longer oily/wet to touch.
Could take up to 7 days.

what you need

I did not have a small jar, well I did but the toothpicks were to tall I would not have been able to screw on the lid. So I had to go with a bigger jar. The jar was way to big. I poured cinnamon oil flavoring into the jar I realized right away that was not going to work as is. I would not be able to stand the toothpicks upright and the flavoring was spread to thin on the bottom. I had to do a little improvising. I tilted the jar to get the oil to one place, gently placed the toothpicks in, screwed on the lid. Then sat the jar tilted into a small cake pan and placed another glass jar up against the toothpick jar so it wouldn’t fall out of the pan.
Lastly I gently backed away trying not to bump anything.

Making it work

Making it work

Drying out

Drying out

Twenty-four hours later the oil was completely absorbed. I laid the toothpicks out on my pizza pan to dry. It did not take long to dry, just a day and a half.

Yes they are just like from my younger years.

I Need a Little Cheese Ball part 2 of a Family Food Saga

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Today I am trying out my Aunt Anita Little’s cheese ball recipe. She has been making this for as long as I can remember. Every family gathering has to have this. No exceptions. She was happy to share her recipe with me.

This recipe makes one decent sized cheese ball:

Anita Little Cheese Ball Ingredients:

1 small box of Velveeta cheese block
1 8 oz block of cream cheese
1 tbsp garlic powder
Crushed pecans or crushed Ritz crackers (enough to roll ball in)

Cube your Velveeta cheese and place in bowl to soften. Lay out cream cheese to soften also. This will take a few hours.
Once softened. Put cream cheese in bowl with cheese. Take a fork and begin mashing the two ingredients together along with the garlic powder. Anita Little (because you can say Anita without the Little) informed me that I could try using a hand mixer but it won’t work to well, the beaters will just get seized up in cheese. She said work those arm muscles, work them long and work them hard. (okay she didn’t say that part, just something like it)
After working up a sweat and your ingredients are now one with each other. Shape your mixture into a ball. Anita Little suggests wearing a pair of non-powdered gloves for this step. Once the ball has taken shape roll it in the pecans or crackers until ball is coated well. Set in fridge to chill.

Serve with crackers.

Great for any gatherings or functions. Or after tasting this cheese ball you may want to just hoard it for yourself. Hoarding it is totally acceptable, I won’t judge.
cheeseball 5

Yes there are many different cheese ball recipes on Pinterest, I could try them but why? This to me is the perfect cheese ball.

Okay now that I have shared the recipe with you I will share my experience of making one.
cheese ball 1
I cubed my Velveeta which turned out to be pretty easy and painless.
cheeseball 2
cheeseball 3
Then the wait for the items to soften began. Tick tock, one hour, tick tock, two hours. FYI: this is not something you can throw together last minute.
With my trusty fork I began mashing everything together. It was a workout you might just want to throw in the towel but don’t after you work it several tough minutes mixing gets easier.
cheeseball 4
Once I had my cheese mixture done I put on a pair of plastic gloves and jumped right in. I saw immediately why Anita Little suggested gloves. Oh what a mess it could have been without them. There was a lot of cheese mixture, instead of 1 huge cheese ball I made 3 smaller ones. The first two I rolled in crushed pecans the third in crushed Ritz crackers. Into the fridge it went to chill out.
cheeseball 6
cheeseball 7

It was great. Too great. Now I’m sitting here typing this with some serious heartburn. It was worth it though. Oh so worth it.

Yummy Indoor S’mores

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The universe talks to us all. We just have to learn to listen. For example I had bought some of the new Hershey chocolate spread to try out. It was Wednesday. Thursday I come home from work to find a surprise left for me on my kitchen counter, marshmallow Peeps. My dad had got them for me after Easter and just decided that Thursday afternoon it was time to give them to me. So almost an hour later that same day I open up the sales paper from our local grocery store. Graham crackers were buy one get one free. Yes universe I hear you loud and clear…you want me to have smores.
Can’t fight fate people.
So later that evening I was enjoying a couple of indoor S’mores. To top it off I was enjoying my snack while wearing my ‘Chillin with my Peeps’ t-shirt.
Happy, I was so very happy. It seems toasting little yellow marshmallow bunnies puts a little lightness in my dark soul.

Indoor S’mores

You need:
Hershey chocolate spread
Marshmallow (peeps or the regular)
Graham crackers

The Gang

The Gang

Turn oven on to the broil setting. Take one of your graham crackers spread on the Hershey’s heavenly spread. Set aside. Put marshmallow on other graham cracker, place on cookie sheet.

The sacrifice

Pop that marshmallow in the oven. Watch closely. When the marshmallow is brown to your preference remove from oven.

Toasty Bunny

Toasty Bunny

Now marry the toasted bunny up to the chocolate covered graham cracker. Now you have a sandwich of gooey marshmallow chocolate happiness. Also known as S’mores.

After doing all that there are two things left to do: sit back and enjoy.

Yummy Indoor S'mores

Yummy Indoor S’mores

Foot Fetish Much?

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Right now my feet are soaking in a big bowl with warm water, vinegar and Listerine. I have seen this foot soak Pin everywhere on Pinterest. Since Mother Nature has finally got herself back together and finally realized winter is over it is time to get my feet looking summer worthy.

Last weekend I tried the baking soda and vinegar foot soak. It seemed to work well. My feet were soft and not so dry afterwards.

The husband is in the next room laughing at me. He keeps saying “Well you’re going to have minty fresh breath and feet.”
I replied, “you can kiss my minty fresh ass.“
With a look of horror on his face he says, “Oh my god you’re going to soak that in Listerine too?“
Oh he thinks he’s funny. He needs to leave the funny to the professionals. Like me.
Some Pinners have complained about the Listerine turning their feet blue, my solution: don’t use the blue Listerine! I have read the Listerine foot soak is also a good home remedy for toenail fungus.

After my soak I will follow that up with a foot massage using Argan and lavender oil. Sometimes you just have to pamper yourself.

The Listerine foot soak is easy.

All you need is:
½ Listerine
½ Vinegar
2-3 cups warm water
A container big enough to soak your feet in

Sit back and relax for the next 10 minutes.
Rinse and dry feet.

Now moisturize.

I did not take any photos of my feet soaking. That would entail me to shave my legs. I’m not that motivated tonight. Besides it just feet in a bowl of water I’m sure you can visualize that, better yet gather up your supplies and soak your own feet! Your feet will thank you.

After writing this last night I did follow up with that foot massage. I asked the husband to do it for me, he laughed so hard he snorted. That’s alright he would have just tickled tortured my feet anyway.
For my massage I just poured a little Argan oil in my hand with a few drops of lavender oil and massaged away. Argan oil works well for a foot massage, it absorbs into the skin quickly so when you stand up you don’t have to worry about doing any ‘Risky Business’ dance moves because of slick feet.

Get those feet fresh!

Get those feet fresh!