Baking with Blondie

These delicious pockets of heaven melted in my mouth this afternoon. I love chicken and marinara sauce together. And crunchy egg roll wrappers? Need I say more? They're so versatile, you could stuff them with almost anything. Any surplus wrappers after making a recipe is never a problem, and always gets the juices flowing of how to use them! I stumbled upon this blog via Pinterest (surprise, surprise), and have fallen in love with Andie's blog . Her recipes are simple, accessible, and perfectly delicious. I think we must have the same taste palete - I couldn't stop pinning her recipes as I scrolled through them. I can't wait to try them! Also, she has a really interesting weight loss story - lost 135 pounds, and she looks fantastic! She also happens to be the Social Media Manager for Foodista.com. You can find her awesome weight loss story here. Anyway, this recipe is a keeper. I can't wait to make it again! I was a little nervous about the whole "boi

Sometimes I can be pretty dense in the kitchen. I skim a recipe, remember most of it, and call it good. As you might guess, this can lead to disaster, especially when little recipe details could have saved you A LOAD OF CLEAN UP TIME. When I rolled out my dough, I forgot to lift up the edges of the pizza (I usually leave the outer edge of the pizza down pretty flat, I love the thin-crust). So... with this recipe, after you scatter the sausage, potato pieces, and cheddar cheese, you pour the eggs/milk mixture over the pizza. Without the edges flattened down to create a barrier, the egg/milk mixture runs right off the pizza, and onto the bottom of your NON-self cleaning oven. (My pizza pan has little holes in the bottom.... ) Egg + oven floor = burnt, black, borderline inferno. It smelled like death. Guess what I'm doing tomorrow? *sigh* Nonetheless, Ryan and I really liked the pizza itself. I'm a sausage-lover, and can't get enough of it! I think next time I'll

{Pic Source } Last night, Ryan got home from his internship a little late. We ate dinner (soup and grilled cheese), then his nose went straight into his law review editing. Yay Friday, right? It happens. Our little guy was already asleep, so instead of waiting until the typical Sunday night to make up some cookies, I headed into the kitchen to keep myself busy. I'm in love with the chocolate-orange combo flavor. It tastes like Christmas, to me. Ever since I pinned this recipe to my Pinterest board,  I couldn't wait to do something with the pile of oranges I have. I just needed some chocolate chips.... waiting until grocery day (Friday) drove me crazy - I wanted to make them asap! But, these cookies were well worth the wait, and the chocolate-orange flavor came through perfectly....   ... that is, when they're not burnt.... I've honestly never done this before (really!!), but I completely destroyed about a dozen cookies on a sheet. I was switching back and fo

Yum. Very yum. Quadruple yum here. Pinterest strikes again. We had these today for dinner today and MAN, they're beyond tasty. Next time we make them I think we'll double it and go lettuce wrap crazy. They were that good. Usually I try to stick to simple ingredients, but when you're cooking up some Chinese/Japanese goodness, you've gotta splurge at least once on a few ingredients: sesame oil and rice vinegar. These made the difference in the overall taste of the wraps. Whenever I look over Chinese/Japanese recipes, I often find these two listed in the ingredients. Might as well buy them once, and use them for 20+ nights of yummy Asian-inspired dinners, eh? The other ingredients aren't too out-of-the-way (except for the cashews, maybe). I added rice to give the wraps a little more filling - or to just eat on the side with some soy sauce drizzled. Also, this is the first time I've purchased, and used fresh ginger root. When I peeled the outside l

Cusinart Mini-Prep Plus 4-Cup Food Processor Yes. I'm blogging about a food processor.... if that doesn't clue you in on how exciting things are around here today... I'm kind of obsessed with this thing. We received it almost 5 years ago as a wedding gift, and I've been in love with it ever since. I mean, who doesn't love a teeny little chopper? Whenever I need to chop something up quick, or puree something up for my little manchild, this is my go-to, and it never fails. Dishwasher safe, easy to clean, blade as sharp as ever after all these years, this thing can dance the dance, my friends. I knew when I wanted to make baby food at home, from fresh veggies/fruits/meats, that I'd need something to puree the heck outta the ingredients. I'd seen the whole "baby bullet" thing on TV, and was convinced I needed one of them, or a new blender - glad I didn't go that route. This little baby does all that same work for me, thank heaven

I'm a huge fan of pasta salads. Whenever there's a picnic or potluck, I usually fill up on the pasta first. I just love to have bits and pieces of veggies, fruits, and meats altogether in one dish. For lunch/dinner today, we had this delicious Broccoli, Grape, and Pasta Salad. My favorite part of this salad was the yummy bacon! I went a little crazy, and ended up cooking up the entire package, instead of the prescribed 8 strips. It was definitely worth it. If you knew my family, you'd know we are big bacon eaters. It's like candy to us - so addicting. Speaking of addicting, is it possible to eat just ONE cashew? I didn't realize how splendorous cashews are until today. I've been missing out. This recipe is such a keeper! The flavors were true to the ingredients, without drastic alterations. I love this dish so much. I can't wait to have it again for lunch tomorrow. Plus, as I mentioned before, it's a meal with a fruit, veggie, grain, and prote

Ryan and I have always, always, always loved going to Gloria's Little Italy in Provo. It's a little pricey, but when we get to go, we savor every moment - especially every bite of their mouth-watering gnocchi. Gloria makes them herself - and her husband Mauro runs the restaurant. If we're lucky, we have some of their heaven-sent gelato on our way out. Once again, while browsing the hunger-inflicting pins on Pinterest , I found the idea of making some delicious gnocchi for dinner. I love using Pinterest to find new recipes to try each week. I've really enjoyed the blogs these recipes have lead me to. After searching though their websites and falling in love with their recipes, I'm hooked by the end. This blog is pretty awesome. Russanne provides a simple and approachable recipe for home-made gnocchi. I tried it out this afternoon for our Sunday dinner, and will have to throw it into our recipe rotation. As tasty as the light garlic oil mixture I used f

Last night I was on the phone with my Mom, she was baking up some yummy egg rolls. This reminded me of these delicious Southwestern Egg Rolls I made on New Years Eve. I found the recipe on a fantastic blog - it's a gold mine of wonderful recipe ideas, and the ingredients aren't so out-of-this-world that it's harder to throw the recipe together. The egg roll wrappers can be found in the produce section. I remember the first time I was looking for them at the grocery store... couldn't find them anywhere! To me, the produce section seems like a strange place to eventually find these, but they're right there next to the wonton wrappers. I think the next time I make this, I'll use less spinach or avoid it altogether (I already used half the recipe called for, and it was too much for my taste). Annie was right, eating this with salsa hits the spot perfectly. I love how crunchy the wonton wrappers become in the oven! It's delicious! But, I learned (from the l

Made-From-Scratch Cheese Ravioli This afternoon I conquered the mighty mystery of homemade ravioli. Ruth (Ryan's Mom) gave me her pasta maker and ravioli molder a couple weeks ago. To say I was stoked out of my mind to receive them is a complete understatement. I love love love them. Thank you! I wanted to skip the regular spaghetti and linguine setting on the pasta maker, and head straight to the ravioli beastie. After all, I already had a good shot at making those two pasta styles a couple years ago. I started out with a simple filling this time, but can't wait to try making ravioli with meat next time. The recipe I used for the cheese filling (adapted from my Mom 's lasagne-filler) is as follows: 2 cups ricotta cheese 2/3 cup cottage cheese 1 egg salt and pepper 1/2 tsp garlic salt 1/2 cup chopped fresh Italian parsley 1 cup Italian cheese mix Put the cheese mixture in a "frosting" piping bag, with a circular tip. That way it would be much ea

A surprisingly tasty and simple meal for two. I found this blog written by a line cook in Orange County, via Pinterest , and really love it (minus the whole "step-by-step pictures. It really drives me nuts. I know what pine nuts look like in a bowl, people). Nevertheless, there are a bunch of wonderful recipes on the blog I can't wait to try. I must warn you, though, this apparently is a "chick-food recipe" according to Ryan. Perhaps if you serve this with a half cow or whole skewered pig it would better fly on a man's plate. I, on the other hand, enjoyed it the way it is: simple, tasty, and inexpensive (if you don't count the olive oil - when did it get so expensive?) In his defense, Ryan did say, by way of chick-food, it was really delicious and he would eat it again. I loved how it didn't take any time at all to make - just about the same time it takes for your noodles to reach al dente. I most certainly will be making this one again. If with

Recipe This was certainly an adventure. I have never made anything even close to a souffles before. It was slightly frustrating, and I definitely messed up a couple steps along the way, but I'm hopeful my next attempt (when eggs go on sale....) will be much, Much, MUCH, better. It didn't turn out at all, and I'm determined to Ace it next time. Mistakes: First, I added the vanilla straight into the melted chocolate.... this just made a chocolate chunk. I later (after convincing myself to not jump off the roof) added a little oil to loosen it all up, and allow it to look more like a thick liquid. After checking the recipe, I realized I didn't add the butter into the chocolate - Mandy, read your recipe, dang it.  Second, I didn't wait for my eggs to reach room temperature before whipping the crap out of them in my Kitchen Aid mixer. Again, I should have read the recipe more carefully.  Third, I only have 4 little white ramekins, and it called for si

{Source} Each week during winter we have a homemade soup. Normally, I'm not a fan of wild rice, but I saw this recipe on Pinterest and thought it would do well for Sunday (plus leftovers on Monday). The recipe was pretty simple and inexpensive. However, chicken breasts were up there this past week, so we bought chicken drumsticks instead. Instead of adding in the chicken breasts when the recipe suggests, I pre-cooked the 6 chicken drumsticks (skins removed) in my small crock pot overnight with my own  little mixture: 1 onion, sliced - laid along the bottom 2 cups herb chicken stock 1 tsp Italian seasoning 2 tsp garlic powder 3 tsp cubed butter salt pepper Then before church (9am, oh yeah), I removed and discarded the bones from the drumsticks (the meat practically fell off the bones at that point, very easy), and added the chicken pieces to the regular recipe in my big crock pot (minus the celery). I think it worked out better that way. "Ingre