Tis the season...

...for baking!

I decided this year that I was going to bake up a plate o' goodies for all our new neighbor friends. We've met a few people on our block and everyone is so nice. So I wanted to do something for them for Christmas - but I didn't want to just go and buy them something. Baking it is.

Then the hubby told me that his Christmas potluck was happening at work and he had to bring something. What does that mean? It means I have to make something :)

So here's what I decided to stir up...

For the neighbors:
White Chocolate Chex Mix
Blueberry Loaf
Milk Chocolate Fudge
Cake Mix Cookie Bars

For the hubby's potluck:
Confetti Popcorn
Caprese Pasta Salad

I also had some Cookie Dough Bars left over that I had made, so I'm going to give some of those to the neighbors as well.

My baking journey is below. I have to admit - that was a lot more work than I thought. Especially when  you do the majority of it in one day :)

The ridiculous amount of candy I started with

Caprese Pasta Salad (I haven't added the dressing yet)

 

 

Confetti Popcorn
 

Confetti Popcorn bagged for everyone

 

 

Chex Mix - the beginning and the end

 

Blueberry Loaf Bread - this smells AHmazing!


 

Blueberry Loaves all packaged up

 

Fudge (used a mini muffin pan)

 

Cake Mix Cookie Bars

 

Cookie Dough Bites

 

 

We delivered these to our neighbors this morning - only one person was home though, oh well!

Merry Christmas!

Saving money, honey

When I registered for my baby shower, I went ahead and put a Baby Bullet on the list (at the insistence of my mother). A Baby Bullet is a contraption to take up space in your kitchen... and to make your own baby food. I figured I'd never use it because let's face it, it's so much easier to just go buy baby food that is already made.

Well since M is eating purees now, I thought I'd dig the thing out and give it a shot. She seemed to like certain foods that I had been buying in the little (convenient) baby food containers, so now would be the time.

Each container of baby food had two servings in it. However, M really only eats half at a time (if that sometimes) so I considered each container to be four servings. They're 99 cents a piece. So for a dollar, I could feed her four times out of one purchase. As it turns out, I'm saving buckets of money by making my own food. Sure, it takes more time, but when I can get 8 (EIGHT!) servings out of ONE banana, I'm going to consider that worth it.

I started with sweet potatoes and avocado. She loved sweet potatoes but had never tried avocado, so that was a gamble. I got one sweet potato for like 89 cents. And one avocado for 69 cents (luckily, those were actually on sale). I peeled and diced the sweet potato and boiled that sucker till it was super soft. Put it in the Baby Bullet with water and... look at that - I just got 16 servings of sweet potato. And the avocado? That got me 6 servings. So that comes out to 22 servings of food for less than 2 bucks. To get that much at the store would have been 11 dollars.

Yeah buddy.

I'm still figuring out what foods to make and when, because I don't have much storage space for a ton of food (the box comes with 6 baby bullet containers and one freezable tray of 6). So I would make some for the fridge to eat right away and then freeze the other stuff. Then just pop the frozen ones out of the tray and put them into Tupperware and save till I'm ready!

So far I've made avocado, sweet potatoes, carrots and bananas. M is loving them and I'm loving the extra money in my pockets!



The very happy looking Baby Bullet refrigerator containers

Sweet potatoes - frozen and ready to transfer to the fridge

The Baby Bullet freezer tray (carrots and bananas in this one)

Today's lesson: I like to save money.

The song does end...

We had some ground lamb at the house and decided to use it this last weekend. My husband's comment? "Well I guess the song really DOES end, doesn't it?"

Poor Lambchop.

Anyway, we decided to cook Lambchop... um, I mean, our ground lamb as the meat in a patty melt. We both love patty melts - that is the only time I will eat swiss cheese and rye bread. However, neither of us had ANY idea just how much butter was actually in a patty melt. Holy crap. Pretty sure you could use my veins to grease a squeaky door now.

What You'll Need:
Butter
1 onion (yellow or white)
Butter
1 pound ground meat (beef, lamb, whatever)
Butter
Swiss Cheese (2 slices per sandwich)
Butter
Rye Bread (2 slices per sandwich - that one might be a tad obvious)
Butter

Did you catch that you need butter?

To start, slice up your onions. Wear a snorkeling mask if you need to so you don't cry. I cry every time I cut onions. It's ridiculous.

Place them in a pan with butter and cook them for a while till they're all soft and yummy.

Get your ground meat out and spice it up however you wish. I think we used salt, pepper and Worcesterchire - is that how you spell that? Whatever, you know what I mean. Shape it into four patties once mixed. Place some butter in a grill pan (or skillet) and cook the patties however you like. Medium rare is the favorite in this house.

Once your onions and your patties are done, place yet some more butter into yet another pan or skillet to cook your sandwiches.

When the butter is melty (is that a word?), place a slice of rye bread down for each sandwich. Then a slice of swiss cheese, add the burger patty and some onions. Add another slice of cheese and another slice of bread. Cook until the bread is crispy.

When the first side is done, remove from the pan and add, yes, more butter. Then place the uncooked side of the sandwich into the pan and cook until crispy.

When finished, slice in half and EAT. So bad for you, but oh so good.

Make sure you have extra napkins available. You know, to soak up all that butter.

Let's Get It Started

I started a blog last year just to get some of my anxiety out in a semi-creative way. That turned into multiple blog posts about food ideas that I was trying from Pinterest and whining about the fact that I wasn't losing any weight. Well, if you eat too much food you may have that problem. So I stopped blogging. If you're at all interested in what I wrote about previously, here's the link to my old blog: scrumdiddleeumptious. I wasn't too fond of the format over there, so I switched forums. And I didn't really want to carry over all my old rambling posts to this page. Even though I am sure I will end up with many new rambling posts. Like this one.

Anyways...

The reason for this blog is that my sister-in-law recently started up a blog and it got me itching to start writing again. I like hers, it's funny and pretty much mirrors my own: random thoughts that you have and just want to write them down somewhere (whether anyone is reading them or not). You should check it out... It could be worse, probably.

To catch up from where my last blog left off - we moved twice within 8 months, had a baby girl, I quit my job and hubby got a promotion. Lots of changes since the middle of 2012!

I'm toying with what direction to take this blog. I may put up a page with Pinterest ideas I want to try (or have tried) or maybe just leave it as it is and just post my random thoughts when I feel like it. I will more than likely put a page up simply to post pictures of my little girl - I like to brag cause she's such a cutie.