 I love Valentine's Day and with all of the sweet treats that will be popping up this week, it's going to be really hard to resist the temptation to try them all. I found a recipe for Lemon Cheesecake Yogurt Cups on pinterest from skinnytaste.com and I figured these would be a great little treat to keep in my freezer for anytime that I'm craving a little dessert without a lot of extra fat and calories. The recipe even included the nutritional information. Calories: 108.6 Fat: 4.7 grams Carbohydrates: 12.6 grams Fiber: 1.1 gram Protein: 3.6 grams Sugar: 7.1 grams Sodium: 107.9  Lemon Cheesecake Yogurt Cupcakes 12 reduced fat vanilla wafers 8 ounces 1/3 less fat cream cheese 1/4 cup sugar 1 teaspoon vanilla 6 ounces fat free vanilla Greek yogurt 2 egg whites 3 Tablespoons lemon juice 1 Tablespoon lemon zest 1 Tablespoon flour fresh berries for garnish
Bake 25 minutes. Cool to room temperature.
Chill in refrigerator. Top with fresh berries or freeze.  These little cheesecake cups were really yummy and virtually guilt free. I tucked some away in my freezer too to satisfy those dessert craving that will inevitably happen this week.
Ciao!
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Sometimes I just do things the hard way. (Most of the time actually.) I found this recipe for a Cream Cheese Coffee Cake in one of my Cook's Illustrated magazines. According to the way the recipe is written, the cake is supposed to be baked in a 10 tube pan and then cut into slices. In retrospect - that would have been waaaay easier. For some reason, I decided to turn my coffee cake into individual mini coffee cakes. The problem with that is that I only have 1 mini bundt pan. It went something like this: bake, cool, wash, bake, cool, wash, bake, cool, wash, bake, cool, wash.)  Cream Cheese Coffee Cake Lemon Sugar - Almond Topping 1/4 cup sugar 1 1/2 teaspoons lemon zest 1/2 cup sliced almonds Cake 2 1/4 cups flour 1 1/8 teaspoons baking powder 1 1/8 teaspoons baking soda 1 teaspoon salt 10 Tablespoons butter 1 cup + 7 Tablespoons sugar 1 Tablespoon lemon zest juice from 1 lemon 4 eggs 5 teaspoons vanilla extract 1 1/4 cups sour cream 8 ounces cream cheese
Remove from pan and cool on wire racks.  At the end of the day ... the mini coffee cakes were totally worth the extra effort. There's no doubt in my mind that they are more time consuming than a tube pan coffee cake but sometimes a little extra time pays off in the end. These cute little breakfast treats area super cute and really delicious. (especially the lemon - almond topping)   Ciao!
 I bought dozens and dozens of bananas for last weekends wrestling tournament and at the end of the weekend, I had quite a few left over. They were the perfect ripeness for baking so I spent an afternoon whipping up my favorite banana recipes.  I made banana chocolate chip muffins, frozen bananas and banana pound cake. (This is one of my husband's favorite cakes.)  Banana Pound Cake 3 teaspoons + 3 cups sugar 3 cups flour 1 cup butter 8 ounces sour cream 6 eggs ¼ teaspoon baking soda 2 bananas 1 ½ teaspoons vanilla Glaze: 1 ½ cups powdered sugar ½ teaspoon vanilla 3-4 teaspoons milk
Pour into pan. Bake 75-85 minutes at 325.
Ciao!
 I usually don't think about grilling kabobs in February but the weather has been so beautiful that I've been inspired to light up my Big Green Egg lately. I had planned to make chicken kebobs on the Egg this week but when I got to the grocery store, I changed my plans. The turkey tenderloins looked really good at Whole Foods so I decided to use turkey instead of chicken on my kabobs. Even though I think it looks really pretty to alternate vegetables and meats on a single skewer, it's really not very practical. The vegetables usually cook much quicker than the meat and I end up with over done veggies. I separated my vegetables onto their own skewers so that I can cook each vegetable to perfection.  I skewered some baby bella mushrooms...
and some slices of zucchini...
and some sweet red bell peppers...
and some red onion wedges.
Together, I had quite a colorful collection of vegetables for grilling. 
Ginger Marinated Chicken ½ cup soy sauce 1 teaspoon garlic powder ¼ cup ketchup 1 teaspoon ginger ¼ cup brown sugar 1 teaspoon mustard 1 Tablespoon oil 6 chicken breasts 1 Tablespoon molasses  I poured the marinade over the turkey and put it in the refrigerate for about 2 hours. I grilled my vegetables first.
I grilled my turkey kabobs second.
I grilled twice as much turkey as I thought we would need for dinner because I wanted to use some another meal. The kabobs were such a big hit that we ended up eating all of them for dinner. It's back to the grocery store for me. I'm really glad that everyone liked the dinner.  Ciao!
 I've heard these dessert squares called all sorts of things: 7 layer bars, magic bars, triple layer bars. I call mine magic bars because my cookies only 5 layers. (I did some research and I found out that traditional seven layer bars have butterscotch and white chocolate chips to make the 6th and 7th layers.) No matter what you call these little cookies, they're easy to make and really delicious.  Magic Bars ½ cup butter, melted 1 package graham crackers 1 can sweetened condensed milk 2 cup chocolate chips 1 1/3 cups coconut 1 cup walnuts Melt butter in 9x13 in oven.
Sprinkle chocolate over nuts.  Bake 25 minutes at 350.  I baked my magic bars in disposable pans so that I could transport them to the school for a party. Once the cookies cool, slice them into squares or bars.
If you're a fan of chocolate and coconut and nuts, you will love these cookies. By the way this recipe is for my friend Julie. Happy baking girl. Ciao! |
