Happy Halloween!

 

 

 Don't use Halloween as an excuse to make yummy dishes today. If you don't "celebrate" Halloween, how about celebrating Fall? I made cake pops, mini pumpkin shaped cakes & caramel apples(first time!!) Yesterday I roasted some pumpkin seeds. Half original(salted) and the other half a sugar/cinnamon mix. Of course the girls loved the sugary ones and hubbz will always chose plain salted. I have made BBQ flavored ones too and let me tell you, I think those were my all-time fave.

 

 Now lets talk about me FINALLY making caramel apples.. I KNOW! It took me long enough. So I found a recipe on allrecipes.com for a caramel sauce. And I had all the ingredients already. I didn't have  white sugar(I know- I gotta go food shopping. blah blah blah) so I used brown sugar instead. The recipe called for non-dairy creamer but I used what we had which was International Delight Irish Cream creamer. My house was smelling like a candy factory when the caramel was cooking.. OK. Maybe I exaggerate a little but it was a sweet smell. I had  5 small apples so I didn't have to make much caramel. My kids are going to be on a sugar high for the next 1 1/2 weeks! Not something to brag about but hey- whatchagunnado? I had a regular sized cake mix box. I was able to make 6 mini pumpkin-shaped cakes and about 30 small/medium cake pops. And maybe half a bag of white chocolate chips frosted all of that too. Not too shabby!  I will post the recipes for all of the things mentioned on this post a little later so come  back lata, ya hear?!

Fondue.. it changes lives.

So last night hubbz and I went out to dinner to The Melting Pot. It was suppose to be a birthday dinner for our 12 year old daughter, Alina, but she wasn't feeling good plus we purchased a living social voucher a few months ago. It was about to expire so we decided to go ourselves. Let me tell you.. it was FAB!

The ambiance was so nice. Our waitress was great. The food was awesome. The price- Eh. Let's just say that was our special treat. Let me break down what we had.

We had the Four-Course Classic which consists of:

First Course- 
 

Cheddar Cheese Fondue

Aged medium-sharp cheddar and Emmenthaler

Swiss cheeses melt beautifully with lager beer,

garlic and seasonings.


The server mixes all oft he ingredients right there at your table and voila! A luscious cheese fondue is born!

Second Course-

The Melting Pot House Salad
Crisp romaine and iceberg lettuce, aged
cheddar cheese, Roma tomatoes, seasoned
croutons and sliced egg with your choice of
Peppercorn Ranch Dressing or our sweet and tangy House Dressing (hubbz chose oil & vinegar)

Third Course- This is the main course. The meats come to you raw. You have up to 4 choices of "broths" that is put in a warming pot on your table. You add your meats in the flavored broth and actually cook them. We chose the Court Bouillon which is a vegetable broth hand-seasoned
with herbs and spices. Very happy with our selection.

Seasoned choice Angus sirloin, Memphis-style BBQ pork tenderloin, succulent white shrimp,

herb-crusted all-natural chicken breast and teriyaki-marinated sirloin.


They also give you I think 6 sauces for dipping, I fell in love with the "Green Goddess" sauce. I can't remember all of the ingredients but I think there was some cream cheese, sour cream, onion and I don't know what else. But anyway, it was delish. I asked for more lol

Fourth Course- This was all for me because hubbz isn't a sweets person. I PIGGED OUT!

Ying & Yang

This fondue satisfies dark and white
chocolate cravings in an artfully balanced fondue dessert.

 

Dippers:

Fresh strawberries, bananas, cheesecake, Rice Krispies Treats, marshmallows,

pound cake and brownies.


The quality time was well worth it but next time, we will order take out and just park somewhere and enjoy our time lol

Here we are at the restaurant.... all together now- AAAWW! ;)

 

Stop! Freezer Time!

So today was the beginning of something that will save me some time and just a touch of sanity. I started FREEZER MEALING! What is freezer mealing? Well it's actually freezer meals. I think I just made up freezer mealing but anywho... Freezer meals is when you cook meal(s) that are freezer friendly. I made Beef Enchiladas, Cheesy Fried Chicken, Shepherd's Pie, Pepper Steak, BBQ Chicken & Cornbread.

Tomorrow is day 2 of my freezer meal adventure.

On the freezer menu:
Mexican chicken alfredo
Italian tenders
Spicy sweet potato fries
Chicken crescent bundles
Chocolate chip muffins
Apple crumb muffins 
Mini pancakes

Welp, that is all the freezer meal talkin I can do for one day. Until manana!

I like Freezer Meals and I cannot lie!

I've been seeing a lot of blogs about freezer meals. Those are meals that are freezer friendly. Thanks to The Virtuous Wife, I can make it happen. I have 7 mouths to feed and it isn't easy making sure everyone has dinneralmost everyday and trying to stay on a budget. Somedaays I do want to be in the kitchen at all so freezer meals is going to help me out a whole lot.

 

Things I will be making and freezing:

muffins: chocolate chip, banana crumb & PB muffins

Meals- beef enchiladas, shepherd's pie, mexican chicken alfredo, meatloaf muffins, scalloped potatoes & cheesy fried chicken breasts, italian chicken tenders.

Veggies- broccoli, brussel sprouts, peppers, onions.

I will also be making & freezing uncrustables(PB with jelly and fluff with nutella) & mini pancakes.

Maybe even some soup.. something fast and easy like homemade chicken noodle soup or chicken & rice soup.

 

 

I am so excited about making this. It will save me some time and energy. Let's see how it goes!

 

 

 

 



M.I.A Nomore!

 

Have not done much cooking lately due to a shortage of ingredients due to my laziness. I have been putting off grocery shopping for a week  now. It's getting cold over here so I naturally start hibernating at the first sign of Fall weather.

 

I do have 1 recipe to post and that is a dish that my mother made yesterday.

 

Chuleta's en Salsita (pork chops in a little sauce)

 

Will post the recipe soon! It is SO good!

 

Pretzels! Get your soft pretzels hea!

I did it! I made soft pretzels! I have been wanting to make them but thought it was hard to make until I looked over a recipe from my fave recipe site, allrecipes.com I had the ingredients and a toddler willing to mix and bake.

Here they are in all their salty and buttery glory!

 

 

It was fairly easy to make. The only thing I had an issue with was actually making the pretzels. It wasn't so easy to make the shapes so I made only a few pretzel-shaped ones and mostly did pretzel bites. The girls loved them. Julian isn't a fan of pretzels- hard nor soft.

 

Recipe is a keeper!

 

Click for recipe.



Hostess(cupcakes) with the Mostess!

 

I made hostess cupcakes yesterday. YOU READ THAT RIGHT!

I.MADE.HOSTESS.CUPCAKES.YESTERDAY.

 

Look!

 

 

*Squeal!!*

 

I know they don't have the famous white swirl on top but that's OK! They were just as delicious, maybe even more. ;)

 

They were not made from scratch. I used boxed devil's food cake mix to make the cupcakes and used these lovely and yummy things to add filling and frost the tops.

 

I also made minis!