Cake pop obsessed

Cake pops are all the rave right now and me being obsessed with trying new things I couldn't wait to try these.  If you recall from an earlier post a couple months ago I made cheesecake red velvet cake pops and they were delicious.  They were a huge hit but were complicated to make.  I made 2 different kinds this time and they were equally delicious and much easier.  Today's agenda, brownie pops and red velvet pops.  YUM!!!!

Brownie Pops

1 box of your favorite brownie mix

1 bag of milk chocolate

1/2 cup of Peanut Butter

Mix and make the brownies the brownies according to the directions on the box.  If there are directions on how to make the brownies more cake like follow those directions.  Bake according to the directions on the box and let cool.

Once the brownies have cooled take a fork and shred/crumb up the brownies.  I just did the middle part and the edges are crunchy and I didn't want the pops to be hard.

Mix together the crumbled brownies and the peanut butter until the the mixture is creamy and all mixed together.

I used a 1/2 tablespoon to make mine but you can make these as small or big as your would like.  Measure out the size you would like and roll into a ball.

Once you have rolled all of the mixture place the balls in the fridge or freezer.  It works best when rolling them in chocolate for them to be cold so the mixture doesn't crumble into the melted chocolate.

Melt one bag of chocolate over a double boiler and stir frequently so the mixture melts evenly and doesn't burn.

 

Once you have rolled all of the balls in the melted chocolate place them back in the fridge until the outer shell has hardened.

I didn't take pictures of the red velvet pops as it is the exact same process but instead you use red velvet cake mix, 1/2 cup of cream cheese frosting and a bag of white chocolate chips.  These are absolutely my favorite flavor combo yet, but they are a little more stingy to make.  The below picture is my first ball that I dipped in the chocolate and the last!  WOWZA.  The cake mixture start crumbling into the chocolate and by the end the chocolate was dyed pink and hardening.  The next time I make these I will only take a few out of the fridge at a time to ensure there is less crumbling.  I will also melt the chocolate in batches to help with the mixture turning pink.  These bad boys were all the rage at work when I brought them in.  A huge hit!  These are so easy to make and are always a nice little treat!

 
Enjoy my friends!  xoxox

something different

This weather is seriously unbelievable!  When I woke up this morning I had a frost alert on my phone and it was 41 degrees.  Wasn't it just 80 last week?  This is by far my favorite season but I just had to turn on the heat and that I dislike!

How was everyone's week?  Mine was long and sleepless.  I have been sleeping somewhat decent the past couple of weeks and then this week....BAM no sleep.  I am right back to getting max 5 hours of sleep a night.  What is the deal?  I am exhausted when I actually decide to lay down but toss and turn for hours.  After a couple days of this I inevitably become so exhausted that I crash.  It is a vicious cycle.  UGH!

Now onto a foot update.  I went back to the doctor this week and no progress :(  I have been wearing this darn brace for 3 weeks and it is just as painful as it was day 1.  Doc says that I will need to wear the brace for at least another 6 weeks.  Yikes....the thought of wearing this stupid thing for another 6 weeks makes me cringe.  I am supposed to only be wearing gym shoes and can't walk more than a block.  Good thing we are leaving flip flop weather and moving into closed toe shoe weather.

What's for dinner this week?

  Marsala laced mushrooms courtesy of my friend Robin.

This recipe was quick, delicious and pretty healthy.  Robin ate her's on a baked potato and I thought that was a great idea.  The night I made these I was craving some mashed taters! 

Marsala-laced mushrooms

Serves 4-6

2 Tbls butter, divided
1/3 C Marsala cooking wine
1 Tbls soy sauce
1 lb thickly sliced mushrooms
1/3 C plain dry breadcrumbs
2 Tbls parm
1/4 tsp dried sage

oven- 425 melt 1 Tbls butter. combine cooking wine and soy sauce, stir in butter.

 

Pour mixture over mushrooms in a large bowl. Let stand 10 min., stirring frequently.

Meanwhile, in a small bowl stir breadcrumbs, cheese and sage. Melt remaining butter and stir into breadcrumb mixture. Set aside. 

Put mushrooms in an 8 or 9 ' pie plate or square baking dish. Bake on upper rack 15 min. 

Remove and pour off half the juice. Sprinkle w/ breadcrumb mixture and bake 10 more min. 

Robin has suggested rolling the shrooms in the breadcrumb mixture and I couldn't agree more.  They turn out extra crunchy and yummy.  Reheating these bad boys wasn't as pleasant.  They were ok but the first time around was best.  Throwing them back in the oven for 10 mins or in a skillet with a little evoo worked ok.  Experiment and see what way you like best.  

Enjoy!

xoxox

It's finally fall

Hello friends!!

I am sorry I have not been a very active blogger.  I have had a hard time making time for it.  But here I am :)  The Colts are not playing so hot so I need a distraction anyways!  Fall is by far my most favorite season.  I love the chilly weather and I get to eat lots of soup/stew/chili!  HOORAY!  I could eat soup every day...I really could.  This week I made my friend Sara's chicken chili. 

This is a great recipe that she shared with me and I love it.  It is super simple and quick!  Me likey!

Chicken Chili

Put 3-4 Chicken breasts in the crock pot
Salt and Pepper per your taste
1/3 a packet of taco seasoning 
1 can of Rotell 

Cook on High for 3-4 hours
* *about 1/2 - 3/4 of the way through, I take a fork and half the chicken breasts just to ensure thorough cooking.

Once cooked all the way through, Remove chicken and shred. I then layering the following:
Shredded chicken
2 cans of Northern Beans (drained)
1 (additional) can of Rotell (or desired type of tomatoes)
1 small can corn/peppers (mexi-mix)
2 handfuls of shredded cheese

Mix it all together, cover, and cook ingredients on Low for another 30 minutes or so....
**Once everything is warmed up, I like to take a big spoon and smoosh some of the beans against the side of the crock pot, mashing them....it creates a nicer/thicker/more tasty base. :)

Salt/pepper/more cheese as you like when eating!
Enjoy!
 

I have eaten this chili all week and am still not sick of it.  It makes about 5 servings.  I added about 1 can of water to the end product just to make it a little more soupy but it is delish as is...thick and hearty. 

What is your favorite fall soup/stew/chili?

Hello there punkin

Fall is in the air and I am excited.  It is by far my most favorite season.  I love the smell of burning leaves, sweatshirts, tailgating (duh), and the cool weather.  I dislike being extremely hot or cold.  So this weather is my heaven.  My favorite flavor in the fall is pumpkin!  Mmmm!! I can not get enough of this stuff.  I put it in pastas, smoothies, pastries, drinks...you name it...I will try it.  This week I made a smoothie and pumpkin fettuccine.  I get bored really quick when it comes to breakfast.  I need to switch it up a lot.  I can only eat so many eggs, or so many bowls of oatmeal.  I like change!  My solution when I get in this rut....SMOOTHIES.  I <3 them.  You can make so many different flavors that it never really gets old.  I am a planner.  I always have been.  I get anxiety if I do not have a plan.  Its my nature and I like it.  It keeps me organized and knowing what is going on at most moments in my life.  Grocery shopping is another one of the things that I must be organized about or I will stress.  I know I know....you are probably thinking I need to lighten up.  But I enjoy it.  I really do.  If I could go grocery shopping and plan meals as a full time j.o.b.  I would.....in a heart beat.  It's fun and challenging to me.  I enjoy sitting down and planing my meals and then organizing what I will be getting.  And yes my lists are organized.  I organize them however the store I am going to is laid out.  I don't want to have to back track and be wandering all over the store.

 So I plan out which store or stores (yes sometimes I go to several) I am going to and then write my list accordingly.  The reason for many stores is that I love Trader Joes, Whole Food and Fresh Market however some things are just cheaper at Marsh or Kroger.  And I also go according to sales.  I want to get the best deal on my food as possible.  Yes it is a process, but to me it is worth it. 

The past couple of days I have made a "pumpkin pie" smoothie for breakfast.  Um hello....can you say yummy!  I do not mind sipping on this my entire way to work.  It makes me in such a good mood and its healthy.  I put protein powder in all my smoothies since I don't get enough through out the day.  You can absolutely leave it out.  I made mine with half milk and half plain yogurt but you can do whatever you want.  My protein powder is a tad sweet so I don't use any sweetener and use plain yogurt for that reason too.  If you don't use any protein powder I would suggest vanilla yogurt/greek yogurt or honey flavored.  I ran out of pumpkin pie spice so I just used cinnamon and nutmeg.  Equally delish as pumpkin pie spice!

Pumpkin Pie Protein Smoothie

1/3 c canned pumpkin

1 frozen banana

1 scoop vanilla protein powder

5 ice cubes

¾ c. milk

1 ½  tsp. pumpkin pie spice


For dinner pumpkin fettuccine.  I bought several cans of pumpkin at the store and just could not get enough of the flavor.  So behold yummy fettuccine.  Now the easy way to make this and not so healthy is to buy a jar of alfredo or make your own and stir in some pumpkin puree.  I wanted to lighten it up a little bit.  The way I made mine was

Cook about 3 servings of fettuccine

3/4 cup of chicken broth
1/4 cup of finely chopped onion ( i used red cuz i had it on hand but you can use any kind)
1 clove of finely minced garlic
S&P
2 wedges of garlic and herb laughing cow cheese

Boil all the above ingredients until the chicken broth evaporates.  Let the onion and garlic brown.  While the broth simmers mix together the below ingredients in a separate bowl.

3/4 cup of pumpkin puree
3/4 cup of milk
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
S&P

Once the chicken broth mixture is browned pour in the pumpkin mixture and heat through.  Once its warm pour all over your pasta and enjoy!  Healthy and delcious!

Hope you guys enjoy!  Have a great long weekend and be safe this labor day!

xoxox

Karin
 

Beef Brisket...enough said!

Happy Monday friends!  Or not.  What is it about Mondays that just plain suck?  I am always exhausted and feel I need another day to just relax from my weekend.  OYE!

I am obsessed with the food network and the cooking channel.  I watch them all the time and record a ridiculous amount of shows.  I love to learn new techniques and get inspired by new foods ideas.  One of my favorite shows is Claire Robinson's Five ingredient fix.  The premise of the show is that she can make any disk great in five ingredients or less.  Pretty great huh?  When a recipe contains 10+ ingredients I am immediately turned off.  That is to much work and money.  One of Claire's shows a couple of weeks ago featured a slow roasted brisket.  It looked amazing and I knew it would be in my near future.  I have cooked a lot of beef in my day but BBQ....not so much.  I have already wanted to try it but was intimidated by it.  This recipe is so easy and requires little knowledge about BBQing.  The only downfall is that brisket is expensive.  I bought a 3 lb slab and it cost me $21!!!!! WHAT!  That is insane.  I figured I would go ahead and use what she made but next time I may use a less expensive cut of beef such as london broil, flank steak, boneless chuck roast or sirloin tip.  There are plenty of other options that would be just as great.  Anywho, I only cooked about 1.5 pounds this go around.  I am so excited that I have another 1.5 pounds in the freezer to make this recipe all over again soon.  The meat was so tender and falling apart when I brought it out of the oven.  My mouth was watering the whole time.  Oh my you have to try this pronto!!  A couple things I did differently.  The recipe states to trim the fast, I did not :)  The fat bastes the meat while in the oven and in my opinion keeps it moist and adds a ton of flavor.  Instead of using 6 lbs, I used 1.5.  Which means the cooking time was drastically reduced.  I cooked mine for almost 3 hours and it was to long.  The meat was still delicious but a tad dry.  The internal temperature only needs to reach 185.  Next time I will cook for closer to 2 hours.  And that's about all I changed.  Claire's idea of dipping the rolls in the juice is genius!!!!  It almost turns the sandwich into an Italian beef of sorts.  So messy but OH SO GOOD!

Braised Beef Brisket

Ingredients

• 1 (6-pound) beef brisket, trimmed of fat
• 1/2 cup BBQ spice blend, be sure and check sodium levels
• 4 cups water (1 cup cold, 3 cups hot)
• 1 tablespoon very finely ground coffee
• 1/4 cup dark brown sugar
• Freshly cracked black pepper
• 1/4 cup cider vinegar, preferably unfiltered
• 6 potato or dinner rolls, split

Directions

• Rub the brisket generously with spice blend, cover with plastic wrap and let marinate overnight in refrigerator.

• Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
• Put the roast, fat cap up, in a roasting pan. Add 1 cup water to the pan and roast the brisket uncovered for 1 hour.

• In a medium bowl, combine the coffee, brown sugar, pepper, to taste, 3 cups hot water and cider vinegar.

• Remove the brisket from the oven, pour the coffee mixture over the brisket, cover with foil and braise until brisket reaches an internal temperature of 185 and is fork tender, about 3 hours. Remove to a carving board to let rest.

• Simmer the braising liquid in the roasting pan on the stovetop, skimming fat and allow to reduce just slightly or to desired consistency.
• Thinly slice beef across the grain. Dip the meat slices or the cut sides of the rolls in the reduced sauce. Make sandwiches with the meat and serve. Pour the remaining sauce into a small bowl and serve it with the sandwiches.

I made a simple tomato salad on the side.  I received some garden tomatoes from a friends mom this weekend and could not wait to eat them.  I think garden tomatoes taste SO much better then store bought tomatoes.  They are so juicy and delish.  I simply cute them into wedges and then in thirds.  I then marinated then in a tad of olive oil, S & P, a touch of vinegar, basil and oregano.  I didn't have fresh herbs but you can absolutely use either.  I let it sit in the fridge for about an hour and then dinner was ready.  I loved this meal and think you will too.  Enjoy!

Cheers :)



Some like it sweet, some like it sour....i like both

Chinese food....I have a love/hate relationship with it.  I get extremely grossed out by ordering it from those little hole in the wall places.  I don't know the quality of the meat they are using, the amount of sodium they are adding to their food and most importantly the cleanliness of the establishment.  Yes this holds true for all restaurants however it seems to bother me the most with Chinese places.  I don't know why.....I am strange.  Most of you know about my chicken phobia.  One to many bad experiences and I am not a chicken snob. I pretty much will only eat it if I cook it.  I get so grossed out by the fat and veins.  Enough to make me not eat it and eat vegetarian half of the time.  It has been years that I have been like this I honestly don't think it will change.  I have come to terms with it and most of my friends are aware of this issue and accept it! :)  I try not to be obvious when I am a dinner guest but sometimes it is to much for me to bare.

Ok enough about my wierdness! :)  I read about this recipe on one of my favorite blogs.  According to her it is the best Chinese food recipe she has found to make at home.  While I love it i do not get it often therefore I was chomping at the bit to try this one.  This is now the second time I have made this recipe and it is a keeper for sure.  This recipe also heats up great!  I made some brown rice and served it on the side.  The sauce does dry up a little bit after the dish cools down so if you are a sauce lover I would suggest making extra :)

Sweet and Sour Chicken

Yield: 4 servings

Prep Time: 30 minutes | Bake Time: 1 hour

For the Chicken:
3-4 boneless,skinless chicken breasts, cut into chunks
Salt and pepper, to taste
1 cup cornstarch
2 eggs, slightly beaten
¼ cup canola or vegetable oil

For the Sauce:
¾ cup sugar
4 tablespoons ketchup
½ cup vinegar (preferably rice or white)
1 tablespoon soy sauce
1 teaspoon garlic powder

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees.

2. Season chicken with salt and pepper.

3. Working in two batches, toss the chicken pieces in cornstarch and then coat with the egg. Heat the oil over medium-high heat and again in two batches, brown the chicken, turning it so that all sides are browned.

4. Place the chicken in a single layer in a 9×13 baking dish.

5. Whisk together the sauce ingredients in a small bowl and pour evenly over the chicken. Turn the chicken to ensure each piece is coated.

6. Bake for 1 hour, turning the chicken every 15 minutes.

Enjoy my friends!!

I'm baaaaaaaack

I know some of you have been bugging me to post something.  I am so sorry I have been out of the loop.  Honestly....life got in the way and I have been busy and when I am not busy I want to be lazy.  I moved.....a MONTH ago.  Holy h*ll.  I didn't realize it had been that long until just now.  Wow I really have been away for a while.  This post is not going to have any food tips, tricks, or recipes in it.  It's more of a hellllo I am still here and this is what is going on! :)

Since the move I feel like my life has been non-stop.  I have plans generally 3-4 nights during the week and at least 1.5 days during the weekend.  I have enjoyed a couple lazy nights or day on the weekend but for the most part I am constantly doing something.  This has the obvious pros and cons.  I have a social life.  This is not a bad thing at all, but sometimes its nice not to.  Does that even make sense?  I love and adore my friends and don't know where I would be without them but sometimes I just need some me time.  I feel like I have not taken any in a long time.  It's one of those things that I know I need some alone me time but when it comes down to it I get bored and feel like I am missing out.  What is wrong with me?  Why must I constantly need to be involved and knowing what is going on?  I don't! 

The past couple of weeks I have been struggling with quite a few things.  Some are known to some of you, some are not.  I came to realization this week that I NEED me time to get some of this figured out.  Life is about challenges, fun, excitement, hurt.....and so many other things.  No one has a perfect life..and mine is far from it.  I have flaws that I desperately want to rid myself of or at least improve.  The one that always ranks high on my list is always a constant struggle for me.  I haven't been vocal to anyone but really close friends regarding this but if you know me you can assume what it is.  Controlling my weight.  It is constantly a daily battle.  Everything I put in my mouth I am analyzing, criticizing and beating myself up about.  I count every single morsel one day and then the next I "don't give a f*ck" and then go back to beating myself up.  Will it ever end?  Nope.  It is something I will need to deal with and learn out to deal with.  Some people will never have to worry about this in their lives...consider yourself lucky.  This is miserable!  For the first time in years I do not have a gym membership.  Well ok that is a lie....i have one but it is currently paused.  I wasn't going.  I haven't gone. And I don't want to go.  I was paying $41 dollars a month for something I wasn't using.  Yes my company pays for a majority of it but I still couldn't justify it.  I can use the company money towards something else like a massage.  I paused it in the hopes that I will un-pause it soon.  We will see if that happens.  I talk about losing weight ALL the time.  I am educated in it and could probably blow some of your minds with all the knowledge I have.  I am constantly reading blogs, magazine and articles about it.  I have all the tools but no motivation.  Where is it?  Will I ever get it back?  I have done it before and it's not easy.  It takes a lot of work and time.  I know I am the only person that can do this.  No one can do it for me.  PERIOD! Ugh! 

Thank-you for listening.  That is all for now :)  I have been cooking more recently now that I am all moved in and back into a routine I will hopefully be posting at least once a week.  Stayed tuned and keep the comments coming.  I love hearing from everyone out there and it helps to know that someone is listening sometimes!

Cheers!

xoxo

Karin