pineapple jalapeño pops!

the mister and I have become quite obsessed with Steel City Pops, our local popsicle shop.

they have many awesome flavors, but one of my faves is Pineapple Jalapeño.

so I attempted to recreate it.

freshly cut pineapple (it's cheaper to buy a pineapple than it is to buy it cut up)

about half of a jalapeño pepper

you also need about 1/2 c sugar and 1/2 c water (I heated the water and dissolved the sugar in it)

blend.

pour.

freeze.

bite.

sweet and spicy.  yeah.

cake batter crispy treats

I love cake batter.  I could take a bath in it.  It's so good.

I wanted to make something fun.  Something delicious.  Something I may or may not want to share with friends.  Then I saw this pin and jumped for joy.

cake batter + sprinkles + rice krispies treats.

oh mama.

I doubled the amount of cake batter it called for... next time I add more cake batter.

I just can't get enough of that stuff.

popsicles + purple cake = my birthday!

Today is my birthday.  Mondays are not the best days to have a birthday so I'll share with you my birthday weekend...

my cute mister and me!  he's the best. can't wait to hang with him tonight.

it's always hot around my birthday, but holy crap.  110?  Really?  Thank goodness it's raining today.

Friday evening, my sweet friend Amanda made me some rosemary lavender salt scrub... the best part about this?  the yoga poses shrinky dinks!  Makes me want to time travel to 1986 for a few hours and play shrinky dinks with my 8 year old self.

after we had dinner with our favorite couple, we drove over to this new popsicle joint in town called Steel City Pops.  They have some pretty great flavors.  I got banana, which had cinnamon in it, which was amazing.

We went back on Sunday and I got pineapple jalapeño.  Equally amazing.

let's just skip over to Sunday.

I made my own cake (I always do... I like baking my own birthday cake)

My sister-in-law, her boyfriend and his roommate (formerly my husband's roommate) made dinner for us.  I bet you think we had Mexican... nope.  Pizza.

John and me.  Ready to do the birthday cake thing.

Ellen and me.  Let's blow out these candles.

Purple hombre cake?  yes!

and yes.

it's just boxed cake and food coloring.

no fancy instructions.

yay for happy birthdays!!

and feeling pudgy on Mondays!!

I scream.

seriously.  how often do you truly scream for ice cream?  maybe a yell.  or a statement... "I'd like some ice cream."  We bought an ice cream maker 3 weeks ago and have made a batch of ice cream every weekend.

The mister is a purist.  Just chocolate.  I want to make fun stuff, but he just makes a face if it's not plain chocolate.  BOR-ING (but delicious).

I finally convinced him to let me make mint chocolate chip last weekend and he reluctantly said that was cool, but he probably wouldn't eat much.

guess who was begging me to make more mint chocolate chip last night.

best flavor we've tried so far.

recipe here.

I scream, you scream

you know the rest.

We impulsively decided to buy an ice cream maker for Memorial Day.

they were kinda picked over, but we really wanted one.

I looked up several recipes online, but decided to go with one of the manufacturer's recipes.

old fashioned vanilla.

very thick.

very delicious.

strawberry margarita cupcakes

the mister doesn't drink.  he never has.  even if I make something with alcohol in it, he won't touch it.

so I made these little darlings for a cinco de mayo get together a couple of weeks ago.

and I hoarded a few for myself in the fridge.

these were made with vanilla cake mix.

I mixed margarita mix (with tequila already in it) into the cake mix instead of water.

I also put the marg mix in the frosting along with a few fresh strawberries.

There's salt on that lime... it really balances out the flavor.

nutella pops

uh oh.  someone bought a popsicle mold.  it was me.  and it cost $1.

one dollar.

one.

"but I could use Dixie cups and popsicle sticks."

you could.  but why not just spend a dollar and have this gem.

or two dollars and you just doubled your batch and you're less ghetto.

milk + nutella = nutella pops

the bottom was a little extra nutella-y.

We'll be making more soon.  very soon.

rainbow cake!

I have been wanting to make one of these for quite a while.  I've seen many different versions on Pinterest and all recipes.  I was excited to try it out for my sister-in-law's birthday.

it was the perfect crowd... no one knew what was underneath that white icing.

when out came a rainbow, there was a lot of oohs and aahs.  It made me feel so happy and excited!

beautiful and delicious!

chocolate crinkle cookies... and a boot!

I'm competitive.  Like crazy insane competitive. I try to keep it under control, but sometimes it just eats me alive.  One reason why I cook is for the love that people give that comes along with it.  So when I go to a party and someone else has brought something tastier than my dish, I get less love.

My friends had a little get together a couple of months ago and this tramp (not really, she was super nice) brought these sexy good chocolate crinkle cookies, which totally trumped my... I don't even remember what I made!  ha!  But I remembered the cookies.

so I looked up a recipe on Pinterest.

they were just as I remembered.

delicious.

here's the pin.

In other news, I developed a stress fracture last night.  ugh.

It is located in the 4th metatarsal of my right foot and I can hardly put any pressure.

Phooey!!!

I was really hitting my running stride!

okay now let's take another look at those beautiful cookies.

mm, mm, mm.

nutella lava brownies

we needed something sweet.  it was imperative that it was chocolatey and well, we kinda needed the nutella, too.

brownie mix mixed.

topped with a dollop of nutella.

topped again with more brownie mix.

ready to bake at 350 for 15 minutes.

what.  ever.

pretty.

these were super rich and super yummy.

would've been even better with ice cream (yeah, I just made it a hot cold treat.  my fave)

love hangover

yesterday was Valentine's Day... just in case you forgot.

We don't really go all out for V-day and we didn't really plan on celebrating it, but I had a little pocket of time yesterday afternoon so I made some nutella rice krispies treats and cut them out like hearts.

Mister could live in a house of these things and he'd probably eat the walls down and be homeless.

We also got a nice treat from our new culinary school friend...

orange chiffon cake.

score.

she's going to make me fat.

apple cranberry pie

so the best thing about the mister's new job is that if he makes nice with the culinary students who work the cafe, they bring him beautiful pies like this for us to fatten up on.

apples and cranberries.

so delicious.

so pretty.

I may eat this whole pie over the weekend.

yeah I said it.

then I will run several miles.

puppy chow

have you ever made this before?

I used to make it all the time when I was in high school a century ago.  I kinda forgot about it and was in the cereal aisle the other day and remembered!  So I bought the Chex cereal and went to town!

1 box of Chex cereal (corn or rice.  I used rice)

1/2 cup butter

1/2 cup peanut butter

1 cup chocolate chips

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 1/2-2 cups confectioners' sugar

(when I was young I omitted the butter and vanilla)

Melt butter, peanut butter and chocolate chips together.  Add vanilla.  Stir.

Pour chocolate mix over cereal and stir (or mix with hands) until coated.

Add confectioners' sugar to coat.  (if you put the mix in a bowl with a top that seals on tightly, you can put the sugar in and then seal the bowl and shake it up, baby!)

Next time I think I might replace the peanut butter with Nutella!

I know.  I'm wild.

;)

beware: this milkshake would certainly bring all the boys to your yard.

I have a friend who claims that she hates nutella.  I don't really fully believe her.  I mean, seriously?  How can you hate this stuff?  I think she might have something wrong with her.  I'm not naming any names, but her blog is here.  haha.

This was super easy to make.

vanilla ice cream (about 3 scoops for one serving), a heaping tablespoon of nutella (I mean, heaping), milk (I eyeballed it.  more for thin, less for thick).  Hang on to your syrup.

mix, pour in a wine glass (it will make you feel fancier, trust me) and pour a little choco syrup on the top.

so good.  SO GOOD!

Christmas dump, part 3... green velvet whoopies

my sister-in-law (not you, Deborah) was calling them Grinch pies as my nephew was downing them Christmas day.  All I did was replace red food coloring with green... maybe something to think about in March???

"my poop was green today from your whoopie pies." - Katherine, my niece