'Tis the season...But not really!

Yeah, I know I'm a bit early since we haven't even had Thanksgiving yet buuuuuut....the awesome Sonja, Pintester extraordinaire is doing another "Pintester Movement" that I can ABSOLUTELY get behind. The theme of this movement is Christmas (Christmas ornaments to be exact) and anyone that really knows me can tell you that I'm obsessed with Christmas and all my decorations (a whole 3 giant boxes full, not including the 5 foot tall tree)! So I immediately hopped onto Pinterest and opened my everything Christmas board and perused all my decorations to be made in the future. 

First I needed to find a kick-ass decoration to add to the very first tree of Jodee from the Cheeseblarg (follow her!) who really needs her tree not to look like a "shitty Charlie Brown tree". 

Step number 1: Look at her ornament board and try not to want to make EVERYTHING! 

Step number 2: Decide. This is actually harder than it sounds! 

What I really wanted to make were these adorable My Little Pony ornaments but there isn't a tutorial on how to make them and I don't think I'd be any good at guessing about all those little pieces. 

They're all for sale I think.

So instead I picked one that I actually could do and one that Sophia (my 3 year old) would go bananas for! 

Dinosaurs and glitter! What's not to love!?

First, I got everything together that I would need. 

Then I screwed in the eye hooks which ended up being really easy, they just screw right in!

The last step was to go glitter crazy! Which I did....

Two days later, a sealing layer of Mod Podge, and a ton of glitter layers, I was done! And it was so much fun to do! 

By the end of it I was the glitter fairy! Where I went, glitter would just fall behind me like fairy dust. But it was so worth it! 

Just look at them! 

Jodee you have one of these beauties heading your way! Sorry I couldn't find a T-rex though. I really wanted one for myself as well! 

As an added bonus and to have something cheese related I also wanted to make this bit of cheesy cuteness. 

But then I realized I have no clue how to felt things and learning would take forever and frankly, ain't nobody got time for that! 

And I liked it!

So Merry Christmas in November and leave a comment, they excite me! 

Chocolate Gingerbread Bundt Cake

Since reading about the Pintester's "Christmas Pintester Movement", I have done nothing but look at Christmas themed boards on Pinterest. So now that I successfully have Christmas on the brain I wanted to make a Christmas-ish dessert. I don't know about you but the smell of gingerbread and cinnamon always gets me in the Christmas mood. And now that I feel like I've said the word Christmas a bajillion times, I can announce the deliciousness that is the chocolate gingerbread bundt cake (with a glaze!). 

Just A Taste is a great website where you can look up recipes by what ingredient you want to use!

For the cake:
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
1/2 cup dark molasses
3/4 cup dark brown sugar
2 large eggs, whisked lightly
1/4 cup whole milk
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon allspice
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
3/4 cup semisweet chocolate chips

For the glaze:
1 cup confectioners sugar, sifted
4 1/2 tablespoons heavy cream
1/4 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

After I preheated the oven to 325ºF I went the lazy route and skipped the cooking on the stove part and just melted my butter in the microwave and added everything (molasses, brown sugar, and 1/4 Cp water) in after that. That also allowed me to skip the letting it cool part. Lazy? Yes. Will it make a difference? I have no clue!

I then mixed the eggs and milk into the mixture and mixed my dry ingredients in a separate bowl. 

I love the way those spices look and smell. 

After that, I just mixed the dry ingredients into the wet ones and mixed in the chocolate chips.

I wasn't sure if I would have enough semi-sweet. Turns out I did!

I'm not sure if you can see those tiny air bubbles or not but I did what Kelly suggested and banged the bowl on the counter. It was really cool to watch and do! 

I popped it in the oven for half an hour and then let it cool in the pan. When it was cool enough, I turned it onto a plate and mixed my ingredients for the glaze. 

Unfortunately, my cake kinda split in half so I had to patch it up a bit. 

It may not be the prettiest cake ever but it tastes like Christmas, delicious gingerbread chocolate Christmas! 

Croissant French Toast

Croissant French Toast with Fresh Strawberry Syrup. 

My Sunday morning went a little like this: 

Mimi (aka grandma): Sophia, give me a morning kiss.

Sophia: No Mimi, I have no energy for kisses.

Big words coming from a 3 year old right? 

So I made a little something, off of my Pinterest board "Breakfast". It came out absolutely delicious! The strawberry weren't mooshy and it wasn't too sweet. Just perfect! 

I started with my syrup. 

You're supposed to use a quart of strawberries, but I used a pound, cut in fourths.

1/2 Cp Sugar

1/4 Orange juice or orange liqueur (I used orange + pineapple juice).  

1 ts Grated orange rind (I used 1 whole orange for this since I love zest). 

You throw it all into a pot, let it sit for 30 minutes. And then simmer for 5 minutes. The strawberries will still be firm and the sugar would have melted. If you want soft strawberries, you can always simmer longer. 

All my ingredients in the pot. Look at that beautiful zest! 

For the french toast, (with the help of my lovely assistant B) I only had 2 croissants so I used those and a few slices of raisin bread. 

Slice 4 croissants in half, lengthwise. (Or 8 slices of bread). 

Like so!

Mix up: 3/4 Cp Milk, 2 large eggs, and 1 tsp vanilla extract.

Like so! 

Add a tablespoon of butter to a large frying pan. Dip your croissant halves into the egg mixture and coat well. Fry in your pan! 

Lovely assistant right there! Nice big hands right?

They should look a little like this after frying them for about 2 minutes on each side, with your stove on medium heat. 

Add your strawberry syrup topping, a little powdered sugar, and maybe some whipped cream and BAM! Breakfast is served.

I would have used some whipped cream as well but it turns out, if it's in your fridge for too long, it actually CAN get moldy, even if it's in a can! 

Baileys Fudge

Homemade Microwave Baileys Fudge

"Let's start at the very beginning, a very good place to start." (Yes, that was a Sound of Music quote and yes, I am a nerd and proud of it!.)

Anyway, I was into Pinterest before it was the ultimate boredom killing tool. I can spend hours just browsing and pinning hundreds of things that I'll probably never get around to doing, making, cooking, or baking. 

As luck would have it, one day I pinned a hilarious pin of a lady going around her house and getting drunk. Her name is Sonja Foust and she is the ultimate Pintester. I liked her posts so much that I now follow her religiously! How could I not after watching her set a bottle on fire right? 

So she came up with the brilliant plan called The Pintester Movement which inspired me to now keep up with my blog and actively apply myself more! It'll also, hopefully, get me some followers. 

So I answered the call of the movement and tried out a recipe. (This is the only thing that was quick enough for me to do in one day and I had all the ingredients surprisingly!) I even went a bit picture crazy with it! 

I've tried to make fudge before but always seem to burn the ingredients. So this was great for me since it's made in the microwave. So I followed the directions...

I got all my ingredients together. Even a little extra Amarula in case I didn't have enough Baileys.  Feel free to ignore my cheap Ollies vanilla extract and my vitamins and washing machine in the background.

All the ingredients in a bowl and carefully measured with a scale so there could be no way to mess this up. (That was my thought process at least).

Into the microwave (where I found out how many watts my microwave is).

Mixing at the half way point. Make sure you keep an eye on it!

Or this will happen to you too! And what a b!?@h that was to clean up!

After adding the vanilla and Baileys. Does it look glossy?

And into an 8x8 pan since I don't have a 9 inch, and into the fridge! 

I'm not really sure how long you're supposed to cool it but I kept mine in there for a few hours and when I took them out they were still a bit melty and smooshy (yes those are words) so my guess would be overnight for best results. 

End result! The Baileys actually goes a long way and one piece goes a long way as well. They make a really good bedtime (grown up) sweet treat. And hey, I freakin made fudge! Woop woop! And also...

Thanks for my kick in the pants Sonja! 

Pineapple Upside Down Cake

Pineapple Upside Down Cake

This is what Martha's cake looked like. 

I haven't posted anything in a while and I thought it would be great for me to get off my butt (so to speak) and just do it! 

This past weekend my other half (let's call him B), my daughter Princess Sophia, and I went to the beach and we happened to sit down after lunch and flip through the tv channels. I was immediately captivated by the always perfect Martha Stewart and her new cooking school show. She made an upside down peach (or maybe it was plum) cake and it was so drool worthy that I just had to try it! 
When we got home, try as I might, I couldn't find the recipe or even remember the name of it. So Instead, with the smell of an over ripe pineapple wafting around the kitchen, I decided on Martha's old fashioned pineapple upside down cake. (With a few tweaks of my own of course). 

There are just some things that I never bother to keep on hand in the kitchen so my cake had no nuts and also I switched the lime juice and zest with lemon juice and zest. It turned out pretty darn tasty if I do say so myself. 

The original post: Martha's Pineapple Upside Down Cake