New Things Monday

It's time for my New Things Monday.  This is where I try something new and tell you about it.  It's just my opinion.  :)

I'm not a big hummus fan.  I've tried several different ones and I really can take it or leave it.  Until I discovered something different.  I was at my BFF's one day and she took out some hummus and told me it was really good.  She said it was edamame.  It was a light green color.  I was curious because I'd never had edamame anything and I decided to give it a try.  I dipped a pretzel into the edamame hummus and loved it.  OMG.....so good.  The next day, I ran errands and found edamame hummus at Wegmans.  So yummy!

I like to dip some baby carrots, grape tomatoes, pretzels or turkey roll ups in it.  

(Picture taken from google images)

Easy Banana Bread Muffins

I did some baking today.  I made some easy banana bread muffins, just because.  :)

You will need:

Homemade Cake Mix

3 ripe bananas

2 eggs

Homemade Vanilla Extract

Cinnamon 

Cinnamon Sugar mix (optional for top)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Mash up bananas and mix in the eggs.  Add cake mix and mix until combined.  Sprinkle in some cinnamon and vanilla extract.  Put into pam sprayed muffin tin.  Sprinkle on some cinnamon sugar if you'd like to eat one and then bake in oven till a cake tester comes out clean.  About 15 to 20.

Eat them plain.

Or add some reduced fat peanut butter.

Deviled Eggs

I was doing meal prep this afternoon.  I made some hard boiled eggs to take as snacks for work.

How to make hard boiled eggs:

Add eggs to a pot and add water until eggs are covered.  I also found a tip online to add a tsp of baking soda to the water.  Put pot on stove on high.  Once water gets to a roaring boil set timer for 1 minute.  After one minute, remove pot from stove and set on counter with a lid on it.  Set timer for 10 minutes.  After 10 minutes put eggs into a bowl of ice water.  You can then crack and peel the eggs.

Now I made extra eggs to purposely make a few hard boiled eggs.  I don't even think I've ever made deviled eggs....like ever.  Wow....can that be?  I've certainly eaten my fair share, but never made them.

They came out pretty awesome.

Here's the blog I used to make my deviled eggs.

hard boiled eggs

salt and pepper

olive oil mayo

yellow mustard

sweet pickle relish

paprika

bacon bits

Slice in half the eggs you're using for the deviled eggs.  Carefully, take yolks out and put into a bowl.  Crush up the yolks.  Mix in salt, pepper, bacon bits, paprika, relish, mustard and mayo.  I didn't measure, I eyeballed all of that.  I only did 4 eggs so I didn't make that much mix.  Spoon mix into egg halves and sprinkle some more bacon bits and paprika on the top of each.  

When I asked my husband if he wanted some deviled eggs, he perked up and said "YES".  He had no clue what I was making since I was making multiple things.  haha  He bit into one of the eggs and said "these are amazing" in which I responded "Guess I've been holding out on you with making these huh".  LOL  They were that good.  :)  I'll be making more of these.

2015 Garden Update- #8

I did some things to my garden this morning.  I re-potted my squash plants, did some cleaning, rearranging, put some fresh soil to some pots and I also planted some more seeds.

Here's my squash sprouts.

Here's a sprout I took out of plastic cup.  I had Nate take a picture for me.

Here's the same plant in a new pot to help it grow more.

Some seeds I planted.  Alaskan peas and cucumbers.

I did some rearranging.  All plants that have spouted (except for the broccoli) is in the window sill.

Here's the zucchini and squash plants.  I need to plant some more zukes but I need more dirt first.

Here's my sprouted peas, and green beans.  :)

Alaskan peas

Broccoli

Still a very happy green bean.

2015 Garden Update- #7

Another garden update.  :)  These pictures are from today.

My Alaska peas are taking off like crazy.

Talk about garden porn.  haha  This green bean is looking mighty happy.  :)

Sugar snap peas

Broccoli  (I may have planted too many in the pot...oops)

More Snow February 2015

I was gonna go to Richmond today but plans got postponed because of impending weather.  I got up early this morning so I could run errands before the storm.  As I was in the kitchen getting some water I saw a fat red cardinal in the tree.  I got this picture quickly before he flew away.  So pretty.  I need to get to Lowe's sometime next week before work to get some bird seed.

I left and then got to Wegmans and got what I needed.  I then went to Target, Food Lion and back home.  I was home within a hour and a half.  I got everything on my lists and def beat the storm and the crowds.  I did start to snow on my way to Target but it was really small flurries.

Finally around 11 the snow started falling quickly and then it snowed for several hours.  Some of the snow flakes were the size of golf balls.

It's sticking on roads and sidewalks.

Sleet and freezing rain starting fall and now everything is icy.

I hope that's the last of this mess.  It's pretty....but it's just so cold.  I'm thinking about Spring.

Chocolate Chocolate Chip Cookies

I wanted to make some cookies for a guy at work as a thank you for picking me up and taking me to work the other day.  I decided to make my chocolate chip cookies but make them chocolate, chocolate.  :)  My only decision was "do I use cocoa or melted chocolate chips for the chocolate".  I found this recipe where they used melted chips so I went with that.

To make:

1 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup sugar

2 sticks unsalted butter

2 eggs

2 tbsp water

1 tsp homemade vanilla extract

2 1/2 cups flour

1 tsp salt

1 tsp baking soda

2 cups chocolate chips (or a little more)

2 cups melted chocolate chips

In a large bowl, beat sugars and butter until fluffy.  Mix in 1 egg at a time.  Mix in water and vanilla and set aside. In a small bowl, mix the flour, salt and baking soda with a fork.  Set aside. On the stove, melt 2 cups chocolate chips in a sauce pan and be sure to constantly stir.  Once chips are melted, add to your sugar mixture and mix in the melted chocolate.  Then little by little add the dry mix to the sugar mix.  After that add chocolate chips until combined.

Scoop dough onto pam sprayed cookie sheets.  I got 30 cookies and even had some dough left over for tasting.  :)

Bake on 350 degrees for about 15 to 16 minutes.  (I used cake tester to make sure they were done all the way through).

Let cookies cool for about 20 to 30 minutes.  Then put in a container with a slice of bread to keep them soft.

They are much darker than what you see in these pictures.

How good do they look?

Delicious 

I will make these again they were tasty and full of chocolate goodness.  :)

2015 Garden Update- #6

Garden update for this week.

Lots of good things this week.  There might be snow outside but that's not stopping sprouts inside.  :)

I have peas, and broccoli.

Peas

Broccoli

Zucchini

Left: Green bean/ Right:Zucchini  (moved here since sprout was falling over)

New green bean sprout

Basking in the sunshine while snow is on the ground.

Peas

Squash

Lots of sprouts.  No flower sprouts yet.  I'm also going to have to repot the squash plants soon.  I have 6 or 7.  :)  Hopefully, this means I will have a ton of squash this spring/summer to enjoy.

Snow February 2015

We've had a little snow but it melted quickly.  Earlier this week we finally got hit with snow.

The snow started in the early afternoon and accumulated quickly.  I made it home slowly.  The roads were so bad.  Once I got home I took this cute picture of my house.  It looked really cute with the snow falling and the porch light glowing.  If you zoom in on the octagon window you will see Nate peeping our the window.  haha  :)

The next morning, Nate got up early and shoveled the driveway, cleaned off the cars and worked on digging the cars out.

He didn't use the snow blower.  I guess he wanted the exercise?  Isn't the point of a snow blower to make things easier?  :)

This is the front porch and steps.

Backyard/deck

This view should be familiar since this is where I put my container garden in the Spring/Summer.  :)

It was cool how snow seeped through the deck cracks.  haha

Nate had to go into work at 9:30am.  And he found out about a half hour before he had to be there.  I was in the middle of cooking breakfast for us.  We figured Nate's office would close but they didn't.  I made some homemade pancakes, bacon and scrambled eggs.  Since Nate had to leave he didn't have time to eat so I packed up his breakfast and he ate when he got to work.  :)

I had a coworker pick me up since I couldn't get my car out.  I have to go to work b/c I'm essential personnel.  DJ's don't get snow days.  

Nate was able to pick me up from work that evening when I got off.

Sausage and Egg Frittata

You will need:

8 eggs

1 onion (chopped)

1 green bell pepper (chopped)

4 turkey sausage links (heated in microwave and cut into small pieces)

reduced fat shredded cheese 

black pepper

red pepper flakes

parsley flakes

nutmeg

Crack eggs into a bowl, and whisk them.  Whisk in the onion, green pepper, sausage, cheese, black pepper, red pepper flakes, parsley flakes and a little bit of nutmeg.  Add to a pam sprayed pie dish and bake on 350 degrees.  You will know when it's done b/c it won't jiggle.  I used a cake tester on it to make sure it was done all the way through.