Stop 'Pin-ing' and Start Doing!

Who doesn't love Pinterest. It is the best and worst way to spend your time.  If you're anything like me, you've created boards for things that inspire you, make you hungry or get your 'crafty-ness' amped up.  I have been thinking lately that I sure have pinned a lot of stuff, but have yet to actually do anything with them.

Enough was enough!

I want to stop Pin-ing (not totally - lets be real) and start doing!

I needed to bring a dessert to an Easter gathering on the weekend.  I took to my Pinterest Recipe board for inspiration and when nothing on there tickled my fancy (translate: too much work to make) I started looking up other dessert recipes on Pinterest.

I found this:

Slutty Brownies

Holy Smokes.... these are sooo good!  And so easy to make.  

But as a warning, make sure you have a healthy sized scoop of Vanilla Ice Cream on hand or a big glass of milk.  You'll need them!

They were a hit!

Thanks Pinterest!

Now, to find something to do next.....

Pumpkin Anyone?

I love fall.  Absolutely LOVE it.

There is nothing I don't love about it.

One of the great things that go along with Fall, is pumpkins.  Pumpkins for decoration and for eating.

I have never cooked or baked with pumpkin before so when I found this recipe I had to give it a shot.  It also helped that it was full of sugar and cinnamon and a maple glaze.

Thanks to a friend at work, I was sent this recipe and was sold.

I felt like this took forever to make (you need to let it rise twice for an hour each time) but it was worth it.

I forgot to take a picture of it before the hubby and I dug in, but this is what my version looked like:

Sorry for the poor picture quality, my phone was the only 'camera' I had handy.

I definitely recommend this recipe!

So yummy.

Recipe: Fettuccine Alfredo

This recipe is one of my all-time favorites that my mom passed down to me.  Up until she showed me this recipe, anytime I made Fettuccine Alfredo it came from a jar, always thinking that home-made was far too difficult.

It's not.  It has to be one of the easiest recipes ever.

Like some of my other recipes, I don't have this one written down.  It's one of those 'little bit a this, little bit a that' recipes that you know like the back of your hand.  But, for the sake of good alfredo sauce, I will put it in print.

Please keep in mind that my measurements are approximate (with the exception of the whipped cream) and can be adjusted to your taste.

Ingredients:

500 ml Whipped Cream

5 cloves of crushed garlic (I'm a garlic lover, so I always use lots)

1 tbsp. Olive Oil

1 1/2 tsp. Nutmeg

Salt & Pepper to taste (which to me means a few shakes of each)

Two decent sized handfuls of Fettuccine (no idea how to measure fettuccine)

Directions:

Fill a pot of water for your fettuccine bring to a boil, and cook pasta as directed on the package.

(The sauce takes as long as the pasta takes to cook, thats how you know the sauce is done.)

I turn the water on to boil when I start the sauce.

Put olive oil and garlic into a medium sized pot and brown the garlic.  

Once the garlic is slightly browned, dump in the container of whipped cream and top with nutmeg and salt & pepper.  Mix well.

Bring the whipped cream to a boil, and then reduce heat and let simmer.  You basically want a gentle boil/simmer.  This reduces the whipped cream and makes it all thick and creamy - so yummy!

Stir constantly to avoid it burning to the bottom of the pot.

Once the pasta is cooked, the sauce should be nice and thick, about the consistency of pudding.

Add the sauce to the drained pasta, mix and add Parmesan Cheese as desired.

Enjoy!

Recipe: Broccoli & Sun Dried Tomato Pasta

I am a HUGE pasta fan.  If I could, I would eat pasta every night for dinner.

This recipe is one that I found difficult to write down as I didn't start with a recipe.  I just threw stuff in the frying pan and made changes as I went.   That being said, this portions in this recipe are more of a guideline than a strict rule.  It all depends how much garlic, broccoli and tomatoes you and your family like.

This is a go-to pasta recipe for me, the ingredients (with the exception of the broccoli) are all things I keep on hand.  It is also super quick.

Start to finish, it's on the table in about half an hour.

Broccoli & Sun Dried Tomato Pasta

Ingredients:

·                 4 – 6 Cloves of Garlic, crushed

·      1 -2 heads of broccoli, cut into florets

·      1 C. Sun Dried Tomatoes

·      2 Tbsp Olive Oil (use oil from Sun Dried Tomato Jar)

·      4 C. Bow-Tie Pasta

·      Parmesan Cheese

Instructions:

Turn water on to boil, and add pasta.  Cook as directed.

Heat oil and crushed garlic in a skillet until brown. 

Add broccoli florets and sundried tomatoes.  Sautee in skillet until pasta is cooked.

Add parmesan cheese to the skillet,  then add the pasta and mix it up.

Serve with more parmesan cheese !

Let me know what you think once you try it!

Enjoy.

Recipe: Slow Cooker Chili

Most of the recipes that are in my usual line up of meals, I unfortunately don't have links for, or I didn't find them online, therefore there aren't links for them. So I decided that I would start to post some of them so that I could link back to them in the future.  Sounds like a good idea to me!

I found this recipe online somewhere, and made a few modifications to it along the way.  My modifications are in pink.

Slow Cooker Chili

Ingredients

·      1 1/2 pounds ground beef (500g both ground beef & mild Italian sausage,  sprinkled garlic powder while cooking)

·      1 large onion, chopped

·      2 cloves garlic, minced (6 cloves)

·      1 (10.75 ounce) can Campbell's® Condensed Tomato Soup (Regular or 25% Less Sodium)

·      1 (14.5 ounce) can diced tomatoes (2 cans Western Family garlic & olive oil diced tomatoes)

·      1/2 cup water

·      2 (15 ounce) cans kidney beans, rinsed and drained

·      1/4 cup chili powder (less than ¼ cup)

·      2 teaspoons ground cumin

       1 tbsp basil

       1 tbsp parsley

Instructions:

Cook the beef in a 12-inch skillet over medium-high heat until it's well browned, stirring often. Pour off any fat.

Stir the beef, onion, garlic, soup, tomatoes, water, beans, chili powder and cumin in a 3 1/2-quart slow cooker.

Cover and cook on LOW for 8 to 9 hours.

The portions in pink are the changes that I made to the recipe.  I serve this chili with garlic bread, so yummy.

This recipe also freezes really well.

If you try it, let me know what you think.  I would love to hear how it turned out and if you made and changes to the recipe!