What did I ever talk about before I started a kitchen remodeling project? Two weeks into this massive project and I can officially say that it's consumed my life. 🤣I think about my kitchen all day - every day. I've even started dreaming about my new kitchen. No joke. 😅 The other night I had a dream that I forgot to put shelves in the new pantry. So today, I'm giving you - and me - a much needed break from all the kitchen talk. There will be no pictures of cabinet hardware, floating shelves or knife block discussions on today's blog. I'm choosing to focus on the delicious food that I will soon be able to make in my new and improved kitchen. Oops, I did it again. 🤦🏻♀️ I don't know if this happens to other people, but I've spent way too many hours standing in the granola bar aisle of the grocery store, comparing brands. If you've ever looked at the nutritional information on a box of granola bars, you know that they can range from a fancy rice cake to candy bar status. 🍫 I love a good granola bar loaded with chocolate chips but if Im going to eat something chocolatey with 14 grams of fat - I'm going to go all in and eat a snickers bar. 🤷🏻♀️ Making homemade granola bars is really the only way that I can know exactly what goes into my favorite snack. Being able to choose all of the ingredients and having control over the sweetness is ideal and it's actually way easier than you think to make granola bars at home. Fall Harvest Granola Bars are the perfect no-bake, energy boosting snack that everyone in your house will love. Fall Harvest Granola Bars 2 cups old-fashioned oats 1 cup whole almonds, roughly chopped ½ cup pumpkin seeds 1 cup packed pitted Medjool dates ⅓ cup maple syrup ¼ cup creamy almond butter ½ cup dried cherries ¼ teaspoon salt
Scoop into an 8x8" square pan with a parchment sling. Freeze 20 minutes. Remove bars with sling. Cut into 16 bars. You have full permission to take this recipe and make it your own. Customize it with your favorite nuts, fruits, nut butter and oats. Then send me a picture of your creation, of course. I'd love to see what kinds granola bars you make too.
Ciao!
0 Comments
My house has been bustling with contractors, installers, designers, project managers, and electricians for two solid weeks and by Friday, I had had all I could take. #remodelingakitchenishard Don't get me wrong, I'm super grateful - and thankful - for all of the work that they're doing to create my new dream kitchen but it's definitely been an adjustment to share my normally quiet house. A day trip to the North Georgia mountains was exactly what this girl needed to escape the construction chaos. Luckily, Ben stepped in to run point and make all of the kitchen decisions that had to be made on Friday so my girl and I could get away for the day. Ok, so I didn't exactly escape completely. There were still a couple dozen phone calls, pictures and text messages back and forth because let's face it - everyone knew that I wouldn't want to be left out of any cabinet hardware decisions. 🤷🏻♀️ #IthinkIhavecontrolissues 😂 Despite all the of the phone calls, you'd be surprised at how quickly the stresses of remodeling fade away when you're feeding a zonkey or drinking wine at the Fainting Goat Vineyard. 🐐(By the way, In case you were wondering - I'm pretty sure that the adorable goats at the Fainting Goat vineyard were just regular goats. The wine was good though.) 🍷😂 Spending the day apple picking, lunching, wine drinking, animal feeding, sampling the homemade apple desserts and shopping was exactly what this stressed out girl needed. I came home with a full belly, rested and rejuvenated - and carrying 2 bags of freshly picked apples. 🍎 Picking my own apples from the trees in the North Georgia orchards is one my favorite Fall traditions. #whenyouknowyouknow 🏞Last month I posted a recipe for slow cooker apple butter and now that I have some extra apples in the house, I'm feeling the urge to make another batch because we went through the first one really quickly. AND ... I'm all about using my slow cooker until my kitchen is back up and running. The first thing that I'm going to make with my second batch of apple butter are these apple butter cinnamon rolls. They are divine. These cinnamon rolls are super soft and fluffy and have just the enough sweetness and spice to make them breakfast worthy. Apple Butter Cinnamon Rolls 1 cup plus 1 Tbsp. whole milk, divided 1 ½ tablespoons active dry yeast ⅔ cup plus 1 tsp. granulated sugar, divided ½ cup butter, cut into 4 pieces and softened 2 large eggs, lightly beaten 1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice (from 1 lemon) ¼ teaspoon ground nutmeg ½ teaspoon plus ⅛ tsp. kosher salt, divided 4 ⅓ cups bread flour 1 cup Slow-Cooker Apple Butter ½ cup packed light brown sugar 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon 2 ½ cups powdered sugar 2 tablespoons apple cider 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Brush glaze over rolls. I love Fall baking and I feel like these apple butter cinnamon rolls epitomize the essence of Fall baking. The warm Fall spices like cinnamon and nutmeg rolled into a delicate yeast dough and drizzled with a hint of apple cider icing -perfection. Tell me there's a better way to kick off a beautiful Fall weekend. 🤣
Ciao! I'm finding the beauty in the chaos today. There are boxes and cabinets, ladders, saws and tools - everywhere. The garage, the kitchen and the living room are all littered with pieces and parts of the new kitchen, just waiting for their turn to be installed in the new space. It looks like Christmas morning without the wrapping paper. 😂 🎄 My emotions today are fluctuating between nervous excitement and eager anticipation. 😬 By the time I post my next blog - we will surely have some pictures of our new cabinets ... installed. Eeeek! While I "patiently" wait for the installers to finish their job, I won't have access to my oven or the microwave. My plan was to cook dinner on the grill tonight but ... it's been pouring down rain for the last 3 days and I don't feel like standing in a downpour while I wait for our salmon to cook. ⛈ It looks like it's take out for us, for the next couple of days. We actually haven't eaten out nearly as much as I thought that we would during our kitchen remodel so it's not really a big deal. I don't mind ordering our dinners out - what I miss most are the fun desserts that we would make to celebrate all of the ordinary and extraordinary events in our lives. A couple of weeks ago - I made this Caramel Apple Charcuterie Board to kick off the start of the Fall season. (Like I said - we celebrate it all in our house. 😅) I LOVE caramel apples but it's a struggle for me to eat a giant apple in one sitting. And let's face it - there's no good way to wrap and store a half eaten caramel apple. Not to mention the fact that my entire face ends up sticky, no matter how carefully I try and eat it. The solution to my caramel apple conundrum - caramel apple charcuterie. There's no specific recipe for this dessert charcuterie board. I think the pictures speak for themselves though. I simply sliced apples, dipped them in sprite to keep them from browning and then put a skewer in each one. Next was the fun part - the bowls of toppings. We went with: Melted chocolate Melted caramels Marshmallow fluff Mini chocolate chips Mini M&M's Health Bar bits Shredded coconut My thought was that I would eat LESS of these since I wasn't committed to eating a whole apple but the truth is that I ate so many apple skewers that I think I are more than just one apple. 😬 Ooops. I just wanted to try every combination of toppings. 😂 The caramel, the chocolate and the marshmallow made great "glue" for the rest of the goodies. Maybe it's a good thing that I can't make this again right now because apparently - I can't limit myself when it comes to caramel apple skewers. 😂
Ciao! Well, I'm officially a mobile baker. Tonight I gathered up groceries and supplies and stacked on my dining room table - ready for transport. You didn't think that not having a kitchen was going to stop me from baking, did you? Tomorrow afternoon I'm packing up all my supplies and heading to a friends house to get my baking on. 😅 It's been a full week since my kitchen remodel began and I'm already itching to get baking again. 👩🏻🍳 Thank goodness for sweet friends who generously offered to let me use their kitchen while mine is down. Clearly, they haven't seen the mess I can make while I bake. 😜 I'm definitely not going to be making buttercream because honestly - I'm not quite sure how to explain greasy ceilings. 😅 Even though I won't be whipping up any buttercream tomorrow, I do have all of the ingredients gathered up for vegetarian chili, chocolate cake, chocolate crackle cookies and pumpkin spice muffins. That should satisfy my need to bake for at least a few more days. 🤣 I made these muffins for the first time, a couple of weeks ago. The recipe is simple and straightforward. The texture is light and fluffy and the flavor is nothing short of perfect. These buttery, cinnamon sugar coated, pumpkin spiced muffins are the most delicious Fall treat. October is pumpkin spice season and let's just say - I prefer to sink my teeth into something made with actual pumpkin than to drink something pumpkin flavored. Pumpkin Spice Muffins 1 ½ cups flour 1 teaspoon cinnamon 1/2 teaspoon ginger 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg 1/4 teaspoon cloves 1 teaspoon baking powder ½ teaspoon baking soda ¼ teaspoon salt ½ cup vegetable oil ½ cup white sugar ½ cup brown sugar 2 large eggs 1 teaspoon vanilla extract 1 cup canned pumpkin puree Cinnamon Sugar Topping ¼ cup white sugar 1 teaspoon cinnamon ¼ cup butter , melted
Dip each muffin top into butter and then into cinnamon sugar topping. If you happen to have a jar of pumpkin pie spice on hand - you can replace the individual spices in the recipe with 2 teaspoons of pumpkin pie spice. Enjoy!
Ciao! Twenty Eight years ago, two people - with very different personalities - decided to join their lives forever. ❤ Anytime you merge two lives together, it's a calculated risk - there's no guarantee that these two individuals are going to able to live together harmoniously. But at that age of 22, we chose to believe that our love was bigger than our differences so we took that leap of faith and tied the knot on a beautiful September afternoon in Mayfield Heights, Ohio. 🥰 We celebrated our 28th anniversary with a mid week get away to St. Simons Island a couple of weeks ago. It wasn't far into our marriage that we discovered that we had very different definitions of the word "vacation." One of us likes to use the time to relax, disengage, rest and destress. The other one, likes to spend every moment exploring the sights, sounds and flavors of her new surroundings to the point of blissful exhaustion. 😅It took some time but I'm happy to report that we've finally figured out how to vacation together so that we're meeting both of our needs. We spent our time on this tiny Georgia island relaxing on the beach, indulging in way too much seafood and playing golf on one of the most beautiful golf courses that I've ever seen. The combining of two lives is a gamble. Obviously, there's less at stake when you're working with food and combining ingredients instead of personalities but, it still involves an element of risk. Sometimes my experimental food combinations are a complete disaster and I think to myself, there's a reason that no one eats hash brown potatoes on a salad. (Yes, I did try that - once. 😅) But then other times - I wonder who the first creative genius was to made the brave choice to combine dark chocolate and sea salt. 🍫 It seems like a weird combination but it makes my life so much more delicious. When I first started to flirt with this recipe for Pumpkin Cake Cheesecake I had very mixed feelings. The thought that this could be a total failure was running through my brain but I still couldn't dismiss the nagging feeling that this just might be a match made in heaven. There was really no way to predict which way this unusual mash up was going to go but I couldn't live with myself if I didn't at least give it a try. What if this pairing is the next great dark chocolate/sea salt combination? Turns out - the merger of a warm, spiced pumpkin cake and a cool, creamy vanilla cheesecake is a beautiful thing! There's really no other way to describe it. It's not a cake. It's not a cheesecake. This creation really is its own dessert category. A cake/cheesecake mash up that is as delicious as it is indescribable. Pumpkin Cake Cheesecake Cheesecake 16 ounces cream cheese, softened to room temperature 3/4 cup sugar 1/4 cup plain yogurt or sour cream 1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract 1 Tablespoon flour 3 large eggs, at room temperature Pumpkin Cake 3/4 cup canola oil 1 cup brown sugar 2 large eggs, at room temperature 1 teaspoon vanilla extract 1 and 1/3 cups pumpkin puree 1 cup flour 1 teaspoon baking soda 1 and 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon 1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice 1/4 teaspoon salt Cream Cheese Frosting 4 ounces cream cheese, softened to room temperature 2 Tablespoons (16g) unsalted butter, softened to room temperature 2 cups confectioners sugar 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract 1/8 teaspoon salt 1–2 Tablespoons milk
Decorate with pecan halves. Cut into 16 slices. Happy Anniversary to the one who makes me a better me.
Ciao! |
Like my page on facebook.
Follow me on Instagram
Categories
All
Archives
April 2024
|