Oh baby, baby...

It's been forever since I posted but I have a good excuse! :) I am having our first baby! I am at 5 1/2 months right now and loving it. However, I've been extremely exhausted, busy with the new school year and getting our house ready. Hence, I haven't had a lot of time to blog. 

I figured I'd share a little post about the party we had yesterday. In celebration of our first baby, we had a gender reveal party. We had the doctor put the gender in an envelope and gave it to the baker. After cutting into the cake, we found out we are having a boy and are super excited. 

Here are a few snapshots from our fun celebration.

Our invite with matching cake...

It's a boy! Blue Velvet = Deliciousness!

 

Avocado Egg Rolls with Cilantro Vinaigrette Dipping Sauce

Well, things have been a quite hectic so I haven’t had time to post. My laptop downloaded a nasty virus at the end of last week so luckily, our tech support at school was able to fix it after completely wiping clean my computer. I just got that back late Monday. What a headache! I’ve never had a virus before so let me tell ya, it was fun, having to move 2 years worth of files onto our network and my flash drive. And today and tomorrow, we have our school’s variety show which I am co-producer of so I’ve been running around doing preparations for that. As with any show, we’ve had our fair share of little nuisances but hopefully it will go smoothly today and tomorrow. 

Aside from all that, I turned 33 yesterday. In celebration of my birthday, my sweet and wonderful husband had a glass of wine, flowers and dinner waiting for me when I got home from our variety show dress rehearsal. I absolutely love Kona Grill's appetizer of avocado eggrolls so I had asked him if he could duplicate the recipe. He did quite well and they came out delicious. Although they are known as an appetizer, we had them as our dinner and they were quite filling. I couldn't get enough. I even renamed these as Guac-n-Rolls and can't wait to have them again.  The only thing he might change next time is to put them in the deep fryer so they maintain more of a rounded shape. These by far, are one of my favorite dishes he has made yet. 

Avocado Egg Rolls with Cilantro Vinaigrette Dipping Sauce

*slightly adapted from It’s a Dog’s Life

Cilantro Vinaigrette Dipping Sauce

1 bunch of cilantro

3 teaspoons honey

¾  teaspoon fresh lime juice

¼ cup olive oil

Salt and pepper to taste

Directions:

In a food processor, place cilantro, honey, lime juice. Pulse until smooth adding olive oil slowly to make a sauce. This is like making a runny pesto. Taste just a little. It should taste like sweet cilantro. You may want to add a little salt or lime juice. 

Let this sit while you make the egg rolls so the flavors can blend.

--------------------------------------------

Avocado Filling

4 avocados

½ medium tomato, chopped

3 green onions, chopped

1 clove garlic, minced

½ teaspoon cumin

½ teaspoon chili powder

½ lime, juiced

½ teaspoon salt

8 to 16 egg roll wrappers (we ended up getting 11 eggrolls out of this recipe)

4 tablespoons olive oil or enough to cover the bottom of the pan

Salt to taste

Directions:

Heat olive oil in skillet over medium heat.

This is a basic chunky guacamole. Cut all avocados in half and place in bowl. Chop the tomato, green onions and garlic. Toss into bowl with avocados. Put seasonings and lime into bowl. Mash gently with potato masher. You want big chunks so don’t over do it.

Egg roll wrappers can be bought at your local grocery store. We found them in the stir-fry vegetable section of our store.  Peel one off.

Place about 2-3 tablespoons of the avocado mixture at one end of the wrapper. Roll once. Fold in the sides.

Continue to roll. When you get to the end wet the wrapper with water. Finish rolling. Keep making egg rolls until you’ve used all the filling. Place them on a damp paper towel covered with a damp paper towel. You don’t want them to dry out.

Place in the preheated skillet. Don't over crowd the pan. Brown egg rolls on each side turning when needed. When brown on each side, place on paper towel lined plate. Sprinkle with salt.

Serve with delicious dipping sauce. 

Oatmeal Butterscotchies (kinda like Grandma used to make!)

Yesterday was kinda rough.  Just over-all stressful. The “higher-up” wanted to test out some new, assessment software in my classroom yesterday and there were a few kinks. I was prepared but “others” were not (even after I tried to make sure they were prepared.) In the end, it just left me really cranky with a bad headache. A headache which turned into nausea so yesterday, instead of going grocery shopping, I came home from work, napped and then ate half of a frozen pizza. It was pretty much a wasted day.

Today was a bit better. No headache but I had the shakes. Starbucks messed up my coffee and it was too late to turn back when I noticed it. Needless to say, since I take my thyroid meds in the morning, I already was full of energy and the coffee they gave me, must have contained 50 cups of sugar. Not sure why I still drank it but I did and I felt like bouncing off the walls of my classroom all day.

Things are a little stressful around school as well. Next week is our school variety show and I (along with 2 other co-workers) are the producers. So of course, we’ve been running around making sure everything is ready. We’re doing a circus theme and the show is called Big Top Talents. The décor is coming out pretty cute and the acts are pretty amazing. Our kids work really hard and I’m hoping everything runs smoothly. Here is a sample of the clipart we’re using for our large decorations. Aren’t they cute? We enlarged them with an overhead project and our students are coloring them in bright and bold oil pastels. I can't wait to display them around our auditorium.

With that being said, when I came home tonight, I needed sugar. Well, something sweet to eat. I checked my pantry and had butterscotch chips and oatmeal. So why not make Oatmeal Butterscotchies?!?!  This is one of my husband’s favorite cookies. Before I started making these, he told me about his grandmother’s butterscotch oatmeal cookies and how delicious they were.  I had no way of getting her recipe and probably wouldn’t have been able to make it just like her. Grandmas have their own way of making things taste extra delicious and I knew I wouldn’t be able to compete. However, after playing around with a few recipes, I found one of my own. They were a hit and my husband gobbles them up whenever I make them. It’s a great cookie if you’re looking for something without chocolate. I personally could eat chocolate every single minute of every single day and never get sick of it. However, my husband is a little pickier and prefers flavors of butterscotch, white chocolate or caramel flavored baked goods. I’ll take it all though! ;) 

Oatmeal Butterscotchies

(kinda like Grandma used to make!)

Ingredients

• 3/4 cup butter
• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 3/4 cup packed light brown sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3 cups rolled oats
• 1 2/3 cups butterscotch chips

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.
2. In a large bowl beat the butter, white sugar and brown sugar together. Add the eggs and vanilla, beating well.
3. Stir together the flour, baking soda, cinnamon and salt. Gradually add the flour mixture to the butter mixture and stir until blended. Stir in the oats and the butterscotch chips. Drop by teaspoonfuls onto an ungreased cookie sheet. I prefer to line them with parchment paper for easy clean-up.
4. Bake for 8 to 10 minutes in the preheated oven, until the edges begin to brown.

Pawsome Pretzels

I probably have over 2,000 cookie cutters. You think with all those, I’d be some fabulous cookie decorator, right? I wish. Honestly though, cookie decorating intimidates me. And what usually happens is that I get so frustrated from messing up so many times that I eat the cookies. Yet, I still try and try again. I’m getting there slowly (very slowly) with a lot of practice of making my cookies look somewhat appealing.

However, whenever I get the itch to bake something cute but I don’t want to eat inhale every cookie, I turn to dog treats. Although I could eat the dog treats because they are made with human friendly ingredients, they do not tempt me as much as sugar cookies do. 

With that being said, I picked up this cute, little Linzer pretzel cookie cutter from Sur La Table. I never had used this type of cutter before so the first one, I broke. The second one, I forgot to dry it after washing and it rusted. However, the third one I bought and works like a charm. 

I decided to use this cutter with the dog treats and I must say, they came out fairly cute. I used the recipe from my Shake your Shamrock dog cookies. From time to time, I’ll vary it up and instead of banana, I’ll use pumpkin instead. It’s an easy recipe and great for cookie cutting. The first time I made them, I melted carob and yogurt chips and drizzled them over the pretzels. I sometimes mix a little peanut butter with the yogurt chips or the carob as well for extra flavor. The second time I made them, I made them for 4^th of July to give to some of our doggy friends and used Wilton’s blue and red vanilla coating chips. All of these ingredients are dog friendly but do not overdo it. You do not want to put your pup in a sugar coma. I usually just drizzle a few of them and leave the rest plain.

These last about 2 weeks. I either store them in a zip loc container or a zip loc bag to maintain freshness. Now I did just get a food dehydrator so I’m excited to try that. I’ve heard I can get a shelf life of 3-6 months or longer by dehydrating the treats so we’ll see in the future how that works out.

Hope your pup enjoys them as much as my dog does!

Recipe: Pawsome Pretzels: Peanut Butter and Banana Dog Cookies

Adapted from Allrecipes.com

• 2 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
• 2 eggs
• 1 cups smashed banana
• 2 tablespoons peanut butter
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1 tablespoon honey

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
2. Mix together the flour, eggs, peanut butter, banana, salt, honey and cinnamon in a bowl. Add water as needed to help make the dough workable and not crumbly, but the dough should be dry and stiff. Roll the dough out onto a flour surface, about 1/2 inch thick.  Use your favorite cookie cutter to cut out cookies. 
3. Bake in preheated oven until hard, about 40 minutes. 
4. Store in an airtight container for up to 2 weeks.  

Winner of the $25 Target Giftcard Giveaway

Congratulations Anita! You are the winner!  I have emailed you so please check your email so I can get your prize out to you! 

Thank you again to all who entered and to all of my new followers!

Link Up to Fabulous Food Friday

Did you make something this week that’s absolutely delicious?

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If you can answer any of these questions, this hop is for you!

Link up here to the Fabulous Food Friday.

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Fabulous Flatbread

I love bread. I love all types of bread. Baguettes, pitas, brioche, biscuits and everything in between-I just can't get enough. However, my newest love is my husband's fabulous flatbread!

Last night, he told me he planned on making dinner for tonight. When he had asked what I want, I replied, "something delicious but healthy." And he did just that. Well, it was kinda healthy but it was so delicious, refreshing and great for a weeknight meal. 

Fabulous Flatbread with Sun-dried Tomatoes, Fontina cheese and Basil 

Ingredients:

·        1 1/2 cups warm water (105 to 110 degrees F)

·        1/2 teaspoon active dry yeast

·        4 cups all-purpose flour

·        1 teaspoon salt

·        2 tablespoons olive or canola oil, plus more for bowl

·        sun-dried tomatoes

·        fresh basil

·        1 pound of fontina cheese, thinly sliced

·        1 tablespoon (or more) of your favorite pesto

Directions:

Mix water and yeast in a large bowl and let stand 5 minutes to proof. Gradually pour in 2 cups of the flour and stir to incorporate. Mix for about 1 minute to form a sponge. Let stand, covered, for at least 1 hour.

Put sponge in the bowl of a stand mixer. Using the dough hook, add the salt and oil, and then add the flour, 1/2 cup at a time, to form a dough. Remove from bowl and knead. Place in a clean oiled bowl and let rise, slowly, about 2 1/2 hours. Divide dough into 4 balls, let rise again for 1/2 hour, and then roll out as desired. 

Flatten flatbread dough, gently press into a large rectangle or circle, brush liberally with olive oil, and throw on grill (or since it was raining, we used our electric skillet). Grill on both sides until golden brown. Spread 1 side with your favorite pesto. We used sun-dried tomato pesto for this one but I’m sure basil or others would be just as delicious. Layer with fontina cheese, fresh basil and sun-dried tomatoes. Place on grill for 2-3 minutes until cheese is melted or place in oven for 4-5 minutes at 250 degrees until cheese is melted. 

Variations: There are so many variations for this. You can use infused oils or add herbs to the dough. When we don’t have time to make fresh pesto, in our fridge, we have stocked the sun-dried tomato, a basil pesto and an eggplant-pepper pesto as well. I’m sure they would all taste delicious. Also, although my husband isn’t a fan of goat cheese, I’m excited to try that on this as well next time. 

P.S. Don't forget to enter my $25 Target Giftcard giveaway. It ends 4/23!