Semi-Homemade Pizza

This pizza was the first thing I made for my roomie and I after moving into our new place. I cheated a little and got store-bought pizza dough from Publix. Maybe one day I'll blog about making pizza dough from scratch. When I was growing up (and to this day if my brother or I are home), my mom made pizza from scratch every Friday night for dinner. I can only remember a few times we ever ordered in, and if my mom was away, my dad would make little pizzas from English Muffins. I order in Papa Johns WAY too often now, which is shameful, because this was so easy!

Grab a package of pre-made pizza dough from your local grocery. Publix is super awesome and puts the sauce, cheese and some toppings next to the pizza dough in the bakery for you. :) But if you don't go to Publix, the sauce is next to the Spaghetti sauces (make sure you get Pizza sauce!) and you can use either mozarella or an Italian blend of cheese. Try not to get diet or fat-free cheese, it just doesn't melt as well. We just used cheese, but feel free to add on your favorite toppings. When I want veggies, I always saute them a little to take the raw bite out of them and then throw them on top.


I have a pizza stone that I bake my pizzas on (among other things), but if you don't, just use a regular cookie sheet. Bake at 400 for 20-25 minutes (or whatever it says on your package) until the bottom is crusty and the cheese is all melty. 

Enjoy!!

Banana Cupcakes!

Today, we had a baby shower/potluck at work for the girl I share my office with. I was supposed to make carrot cake cupcakes but they turned out a DISASTER. I dunno what I did wrong, but it was bad. Unsalvageable-bad. So, I had to make something else at the last minute and had 2 ripened bananas so I decided to make my old favorite Banana Cupcakes with Peanut Butter-Cream Cheese Frosting. They were a BIG hit! I also made sausage balls, which I'll blog about later this week.

Enjoy!

Garlic Knots

If you need a super easy garlic bread for your next Italian dinner, these garlic knots are your answer! Once again, I found these on pinterest and whipped them up one day.

Parmesan Garlic Knots
1 package refrigerated biscuits
1/4 cup olive oil
3 tablespoons Parmesan cheese (I used the cheap kind in the jar with the green lid)
garlic powder
Italian seasoning
salt & pepper

POP the biscuit package (and admit it, it still scares you every time too!) and let the biscuits rest for a bit (I find it's easier to work with them when they're not from-the-fridge cold). Form each biscuit into a 9-12" rope and tie in a knot. Bake according to the package directions until golden brown. While baking, mix the remaining ingredients. Right after taking the knots out of the oven, spoon the oil mixture over each knot. Serve warm.

I even microwaved these and had them for breakfast the next few days at work. Yes, I'm one of those people that has no shame at eating non-breakfast food for breakfast.. AT WORK.

4th of July Strawberries

For the 4th of July this year I was invited to a fun pool party in Wilton Manors (a super trendy and awesome neighborhood in Ft Lauderdale). I was asked to bring a dessert, but I wanted to do something healthy and I found on pinterest (of course, do you see a theme?) some adorable 4th of July Red, White & Blue strawberries. They were so easy to make and a BIG hit! Except, everyone's mouth turned blue from the sprinkles! ;)

4th of July Strawberries
strawberries (I bought 3 pints because that day at Publix the strawberries looked a little sad and I wanted enough that I could use that were "pretty"... yes I'm crazy!)
white candy melts (I found these at Michael's using a coupon, but you could also use white chocolate)
blue sprinkles

Wash and dry the strawberries. It's very important to dry them well otherwise the candy melts (or chocolate) won't stick! Pour the sprinkles in a bowl (a bowl is easier than using a plate). Put the candy melts in a microwave-safe bowl, microwave for 30 seconds, stir, and repeat until melted. Dip a strawberry about 2/3 the way up in the candy melts. You might have to roll from side to side to get it fully covered. Then dip about 1/2 the way up in the sprinkles and roll from side to side until evenly sprinkled. Lay on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper or tin foil. Refrigerate until firm (this won't take that long, maybe 30 mins-1 hour). Take to a party and show off to all your friends how cute and creative you are! :)

[These would also be super cute for Christmas with green sprinkles.]

ENJOY!

My AMAZING Fridge!

So when my roomie and I moved into our fabulous townhouse in Ft Lauderdale, it had fancy stainless steel appliances and we were SO excited. Turns out, the fridge kind of sucks at space. There's all these awkward shelves and drawers and it's pretty much a hot mess. The freezer is EVEN worse. BUT, this weekend I found out a special fact about my fridge that changed my opinion totally.... my fridge fits TWO half sheet pans on one shelf!

Yes, that's right, you're looking at two half sheet pans (with chocolate chip cookies) on ONE shelf. It's amazing. Just thought I'd share my excitement over this! If you bake, you know how exciting this is!!

Honey Beer Bread

This is another pinterest-inspired post! Seems like I'm cooking and baking my way through that website. I came across this on Saturday and decided to make it on Sunday as a treat. Here's the original blog post from a super cute blog called Lemon Sugar. If you think you can't make bread, THINK AGAIN. This was literally the fastest and easiest loaf of bread I have ever made. No kneading necessary!

Honey Beer Bread
3 cups flour
2 tablespoons sugar
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons honey
1 12-ounce bottle beer (I used Dogfish Festina Peche -- it's peach flavored and really delicious to drink all by itself too!)
4 tablespoons butter, melted

Mix the dry ingredients (flour, sugar, baking power & salt) in a large bowl. Add in the honey & beer. Stir until mixed. In a greased loaf pan, pour half the melted butter into the bottom. Pour in the batter. And pour the rest of the melted butter on top. Bake at 350 for 50-60 minutes, or until toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. (How easy is that??)

This turned out amazing. The edges were crumbly and moist (thanks to the melted butter) and the inside was warm and delicious. The only thing that could've made it better would've been some honey butter! Hope you enjoy!

Crafts: Bachelorette Basket of Booze

So, I apologize in advance: this post isn't going to be about food. Sometimes I like to be a bit crafty. Since this is MY blog, I guess I can write about anything I want, right? I feel like everybody is always looking for inexpensive and cute gift ideas, and here's one I made!

A few weekends ago I traveled to Tampa to celebrate my friend Becky's Bachelorette weekend. I had no idea what to get her, so I did some searching on pinterest. I found this adorable 21st Birthday basket, and decided to recreate it Bachelorette-style. It turned out AMAZING, and she (and the other gals) loved it!

You need:
a basket/bucket
foam to fit the basket
spray paint
wooden dowels or lollipop sticks (I used these)
ribbon (I used 2 spools)
super glue
easter filling for covering the foam
shooter-sized bottles of your Bachelorette's favorite booze
anything else fun (I got a thong and some Bachelorette cards)

Start by cutting your foam down to fit your basket. I cut mine so it was an inch or two shorter than the top of the basket. I recommend doing this outdoors. I did it in my kitchen and there were little white pieces of foam EVERYWHERE! Then, spray paint the foam to match your basket (mine was dark brown so I spray painted it black; I just didn't want it to be glaring white through the slats in the basket). I also spray painted my lollipop sticks black as well. This was harder than it seemed... I ended up having to stick them in the excess foam to be able to get all the sides, and even then, I ended up with spray paint everywhere! (Another outdoors portion of this project.) I then cut ribbon about 18" long for each stick and superglued it to the ends. Tie your shooter bottles to the sticks with the ribbon. I made a cute bow on each one too. Then stick each one in the foam. (There were a few that were a little too heavy to tie, so I just placed them in there.) Add your easter grass and voila!

Here's an overhead picture:

The most expensive part of this project was DEFINITELY the booze. I didn't really pay attention to what I was picking (I got 20 bottles) and the bill was a shocker at the end. But, I bet you could find those $1 shooters and then this would be a lot cheaper. Other than the booze, I spent maybe $20 on all the other materials (use those Michael's coupons to your advantage.. you can even print them off the website!). An adorable, thoughtful and inexpensive gift!

Get creative.. even when you aren't in the kitchen!! :)

APOLOGIES!! & A Yummy Salad

First, let me start by saying I am truly and deeply sorry I've been supremely lax about this blog. In the past few months, I moved to Ft Lauderdale, have gotten settled and into a routine, so hopefully now I can start a. cooking more (eating out is expensive and BAD for you!) and b. writing this blog again!

My favorite salad of all time is tomato & cucumber salad. Basically chopped tomatoes and cukes with olive oil and rice wine vinegar. Well, lately, I've been getting SUPER into pinterest, and found this little gem of a salad the other day that I wanted to make. I made it (semi-according to the recipe) and it was delicious. This morning as I was making lunch, I had an extra cucumber but no tomato, so I decided to whip it up again. I started to cut up an apple for a snack, but thought that it might be tasty to add it to the mix, and it turned out AMAZING. (Confession, I sorta liked the apple more than the cucumber part of this salad.)

Sweet & Spicy Cucumber Salad
1 cucumber, thinly sliced
1/4 red onion, thinly sliced
1 apple, thinly sliced
1/3 cup rice wine vinegar
1/3 cup water
1 tbsp white sugar
red pepper flakes to taste (I added a bit too many, oops, spicy!)
salt & pepper to taste

Start by slicing up all the veggies. My cucumbers were a little fat, next time I'll slice them thinner. The red onion I sliced very thin and it turned out great. I hate raw onions, but these were a little pickled and super yummy. The original recipe says to salt and drain the cucumbers for an hour, I did this, but I'm pretty sure you could skip it. Mix the water, vinegar, sugar, red pepper, salt & pepper in a bowl. The sugar should dissolve after a few mixes. Add in the veggies and let sit for a few hours in the fridge (if you can wait that long!). I made this at 7:30 this morning and ate it as a morning snack and it was perfect.

ENJOY!

(Sorry for the tupperware and questionable picture quality, I clearly didn't think this through fully this morning.)

Confessions of a Recipe Hoarder

My Name is Janie, and I Hoard Recipes.

Every month, I get these amazing magazines (Bon Appetit thanks to Coke Rewards, Food & Wine thanks to some spare Delta Airline points, Real Simple thanks to an impulse purchase at Publix and Everyday Food thanks to one Miss Flossie Gillen) and every month I religiously go through them and tear out recipes I want to try. I missed a couple months and took like 5 Bon Appetits to Germany with me and went through all of them while I was there and tore out a ton of recipes. (This doesn't even begin to count all the recipes I get from the email subscriptions to all these magazines too.)

I have a wonderful recipe binder from William Sonoma. And it's neatly divided into sections like Appetizers, Soups & Salads, Breads, you get the idea. And in each section I have all my favorite recipes on cards neatly organized. And then I have a plastic sleeve with all my hoarded recipes staring me in the face every time I turn to that section. Problem is, I hardly EVER get around to trying them! Mostly because once I find something I like, I want to make it again and again because it tastes so good when it hits your lips, which leaves little time to try new things. I'm also like this at restaurants. So when I try, and like, a new recipe, I move it from the big plastic sleeve, to a recipe card sleeve. I've gotten too lazy to transcribe them all onto fancy cards, so I just stick the cut out in the sleeve.

Since the arrival of pinterest on the scene, my recipe hoarding has gone digital... and gotten worse. Now daily I can scour the pages of pinterest, find and pin recipes that look amazing, but I will likely never make. I have a board for savory recipes, for sweets, for drinks, for healthy food, even for holiday recipes! HELP! I'm pin-ddicted!

However, now that I'm all settled in Ft Lauderdale and my roommate and new coworkers are ready to EAT, I need to get to cooking, and pronto! My piles aren't getting any shorter! My goal is to try one pinterest recipe a week and one "real" recipe a week. Let's see how we do!