You will thank me later: Chocolate Kiss Cookies

Heeellllllo? Hellllllooooooo? Is anyone out there?

For a girl who picks up and drops things as quickly as hot potatoes, I gotta say I'm proud that I am continuing to update - even if I'm not sure anyone is reading. So shoot me a comment if you are!

Although, according to my Blogger data, someone was referred to this blog because they searched "depressing valentine's day cards" on Google.. I hope you found what you were looking for!

I am still working on my valentine's day packages and had really high hopes of making all sorts of different cookies to send to friends - I even purchased enough baking ingredients to make three different types of cookies. Then, I made these and it was all over. Done. I don't think I will ever make anything else again. And we are eating most of them so very few friends are getting them this go-around. :-/ I am all about life being easy and these could not get easier! And if you love peanut butter and chocolate, especially together, you'll be in heaven. Thank me later. :)

One batch makes about 24, so I made one batch and then immediately made a second batch. Here is the recipe for one batch, but feel free to double or triple accordingly

You will need: 1 cup smooth peanut butter (1/2 of a jar), 1 cup sugar, 1 egg and 1 teaspoon vanilla extract, 24 Hershey kisses

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a large bowl, combine the sugar and peanut butter until creamy and fluffy ("It's so fluffy, I could die!!" from Despicable Me always comes to mind).

Add egg and vanilla, and mix until you get a soft dough.

Roll 1 and 1/4 inch balls and place 2 inches apart on greased cookie sheet.

Bake for 10-12 minutes at 350 degrees. Unwrap the 24 (or so) Hershey kisses that you will be using.

When you take them out of the oven, immediately press a Hershey kiss into the center, leave to cool for 5 minutes before moving to a cooling rack.

Oh my gosh, so ridiculously yummy, and they are best the night that you make them as the chocolate is incredibly soft. Enjoy.

Easy Recipe Alert: Spinach and Artichoke Dip

This cooking novice is all about starting off easy - so for the Superbowl, I decided to whip up some homemade versions of my favorite dishes. I love knowing where the food I'm eating is coming home - albeit, I prefer to buy organic although we don't always and who the hell knows where mayo comes from?

I am obsessed with appetizers, if I could only eat cheese and crackers, chips and dip and mini quiche for every meal, I would be set. So our Superbowl dishes consisted of rotel and chips (good Midwesterners are all too familiar - my east coast friends had never heard of rotel!), crescent wrapped mini hot dogs and spinach and artichoke dip. Here's my super duper easy recipe for Spinach and Artichoke Dip:

You will need: 2 cups Parmesan cheese (we only had 1.5 cups on hand, and it worked great), 1 box (10 oz) frozen chopped spinach (thawed), 1 can (14 oz) artichoke hearts (drained and chopped), 2/3 cup sour cream, 1 cup cream cheese (8 oz = regular Philly Cream Cheese box), 1/3 cup mayo, 2 teaspoons minced garlic and some sort of dipping cracker/bread/pita (we made our own from french bread, butter, and salt).

Bread Directions: 

Using about 1/3 of a large french loaf, we cut thin slices, placed them on a cookie sheet, drizzled a bit of butter and salt on the top. Pop them in the oven on Broil for 1-2 min, turn over and repeat on the other side. Perfectly toasted bread - and we know where it came from (healthy + yummy)!

Dip Directions: 

(Could not be easier!) Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Mix together the Parmesan cheese, spinach and artichoke hearts.

All I think of is "BLOB" - I love how ugly this looks pre-mix. :) 

Combine remaining ingredients (sour cream, cream cheese, mayo and garlic).

Mix remaining ingredients in with spinach mixture.

Bake 20-30 minutes. Voila! And SO YUMMY!

Life should be easy.

I believe it: life should be easy.

Or, at least, life should not be hard. So I just popped in the oven 12 mini-strawberry and lemon pies (of course I had to add lemon, I am addicted to lemon) which has so far taken 5 hours to make! This is not easy, this is hard, and probably the last time that I will make mini pies (until mincemeat pie season, because I want to try those). Anyway, those pies = next blog = 30min/pie each = whoever eats them better love them.

So I wanted to post a quick and easy recipe, complete opposite of what I did today. We have had stir fry chicken and veggies with rice two days this week - which is a testament to how amazing (and easy!) it is. Potentially one of my favorite meals ever - and those are two days per week that we are not eating pizza (which my boyfriend would eat 7 days a week if there was enough pizza in the world).


You need: veggies (whatever you like - I use white onion, carrots, celery and green pepper), chicken (or tofu or another meat or you can take the protein out, I am flexible with what you decide to make for yourself), rice and about two table spoons of oil (I love this recipe with peanut oil but we didn't have it so we used regular olive oil).

Choppy chop chop - Get your oil warming in a pan (usually medium or medium/high), add thinly sliced onion and let those fry up beautifully as you chop the other veggies.

 

At the same time, start your rice. To be honest, I never cook the rice, because I usually burn it or it all sticks, so the boyfriend makes the rice, perfect, every time, I don't know how he does it. My best suggestion is to follow the package instructions (you have ever right to close this tab and never return to my blog again - "she is telling me to follow the directions on my own package, useless!" I understand.) Moving on.

When your onions are starting to caramelize and are completely soft, add your other veggies to the pan. (The picture above looks like my veggies were pretty chunky but in fact, the carrots were slivered width wise into 1/6ths - I say the thinner the better for all stirfry veggies.)

In a separate pan, start your proteins. Although I prefer fresh, we had only frozen chicken breasts available so I took enough for two hearty servings out and grilled them up (on medium). 

See the veggies, chicken, and rice, all living harmoniously on one stove?

Once the chicken is cooked (or no longer frozen, ugh), chop it up in quarter size pieces and toss it on in with the veggies. Don't be shy. Your veggies should be softening up nicely and the onions will be caramelizing beautifully.

The chicken will pick up the oil from the pan and start searing nicely with the veggie flavors. Leave frying for another 10 minutes. 

Just pile that deliciousness on top of the rice - I like to add a little soy sauce, and voila, life could not get easier!

I am wishing you a wonderful and *easy* day! Cheers. 

Mind Blowing Blackberry Cobbler

So the pasta last night was good yet not mind-blowing but the dessert I made was as phenomenal as any cobbler, tart or even pie that I have ever had.

First, a shout out to a dear (and amazing) friend of mine who has a great blog of her own: The Busy Bee Writes. After spending about two hours yesterday catching up on her blog, I got 1. Hungry and 2. Inspired. So thank you, B, for always asking to see more of my photos and for your inspirational blog. I think this is one of the reasons people blog - to stay connected with those who are not close. :) Also, she is always adding amazing and healthy recipes!

This is such a simple recipe! We had a couple of packages of blackberries in the fridge (thanks to a great sale at the store) so with my chaperon's help (you know, starts with G, ends with -oogle), I found this simple and delicious recipe.

You will need: 8 inch square baking dish, 4 cups of blackberries, 1 tablespoon (or more) lemon juice, 1 egg, 1 cup of sugar, 1 cup of flour and 6 tablespoons of butter. 

Pop that oven up to 375 degrees and grease the baking dish (I didn't do this and trust me, our dish soap and sponge is  hating me today).. Sprinkle the blackberries on the bottom of the dish and squeeze the lemon juice over the top (I prefer real lemon over packaged lemon juice and I used half of a large lemon, which is more than the 1 tablespoon from the recipe but I think it turned out better).

In a bowl, combine the egg, sugar and flour and then sprinkle over the fruit. Melt the butter and drizzle over the mixture and fruit. Bake for 35 minutes or until browned and bubbly, then let sit for 10 min. 


VOILA! YUM! Phenomenal blackberry cobbler. Between three of us, it was gone by the end of the night. I will definitely be making this again, and again, and again. :) Hope you enjoy!

Bowtie Pasta with Bacon and Peas

The whole reason we were at the grocery store last night was to get cream - for a pasta dish that I had found on the blog The Bitten Word. These guys are amazing - however, unlike them, I get all of my ideas from the internet, and my chaperon is Google.

I am not a great cook. Our staple foods when I was a kid were scrambled eggs (often for Thanksgiving - hello, British mother) and pasta carbonara (hello British mother who lived in Italy for many years). So I can make some mean scrambled eggs and pasta carbonara. But not a lot else. And for years - through college where I don't remember what I ate, through my 'working but poor eating only ramen and popcorn' phase, and then when I could actually afford food so 'I just ate out all the time' phase - I just never cooked.

Now I am dating a man who loves cooking, and he's good at it too. To his chagrin (love that word), he has opened pandora's box for me. Now I want to cook! All the time, not just at night, multiple courses, cook, cook cook. We actually get into tiffs about who gets to cook that night - so like we learned in kindergarten, we now take turns. Cooking at home helps with the budget (we're on a tight one), helps with stress (he has a stressful job, my lack of job is stressful) and it's fun to book!

I am also dating a man who did not grow up on my hearty egg and bacon pasta diet (same man as above, I'm not dating multiple men) - and he finds my pasta carbonara to be a bit heavy and greasy. Normally I say "his bad" and make it anyway, but I decided to find something similar but different. With my chaperon by my side, I stumbled across this recipe for Pasta with Bacon and Peas. Being that we had almost everything in the pantry meant that the $3 spent on cream was worth it.

First, I fried the bacon on medium heat. Shout out to THE BACON HOUSE in DC - you will not find this place on yelp as it is the glorious apartment of four of my friends who eat bacon like it is going out of style. These are also four of the fittest people you will ever meet, so I am skeptical of anyone who says bacon is bad for you. 

   

When the bacon was done, I lifted it out of the bacon grease and put it to the side draining on paper towels. I started boiling the water for my pasta - I chose a bowtie pasta instead of the angel hair that was recommended because that's what we had and name one person who doesn't love bowtie pasta! It's just fun.

I then put a lot of frozen peas in the frying pan (still full of bacon grease) and sizzled those up a bit while my pasta water was getting going. I don't the the recipe called for a lot of peas but I like pilling my dishes full of veggies - I like to think it evens out the fabulous pile of bacon seen above. When the peas had soaked up much of the grease and when I put the pasta in the water (with a handful of salt that I don't let anyone see), I added a cup of cream and stirred almost continuously. Adding the bacon back to the sauce a few minutes before the pasta is done will warm the little pieces back up.

When the pasta was done (usually on the low side of the prep time to make sure it's al dente), I drained most of it but used about 3/4 a cup of pasta water and added it slowly to the sauce.

Mix everything together and VOILA!

It was good - and yummy, and I had two bowls but not mind-blowing. So I am going to think about how I can make it even better. Will let you know if I make chances. :)