Finding My Stress Reliever

Hello my hopefully cool, calm, and collected dearies.

I came home from work after sharing the day with someone who has opposite work views and ethics than I have and I wanted to pout.  I wish I could tell you that I let it go and learned the key to letting things roll off your back... but, alas, I locked myself in my home office, turned on a few (ok, several) episodes of a good mellow drama and started sketching.

As you can see from the sketch, its been awhile!  But I have to say it was therapeutic.  I was drawing with charcoal pencil and it does not erase well.  When you draw with charcoal, you can't be perfect - misplaced lines cannot be removed, only worked with or around.  I can now see the irony! However, I honestly felt better. (and I didn't even have to eat a block of cheese!)

I do not have a good lesson here; no how-to or instant remedy.  All I can say is find something you love and do it.  Try to focus on the good things in life instead of the things you cannot fix.  I hope you are blessed and you find the strength to make it through your next rough day.

xo
Pam

Dirty Pan Cleaning Quick Tip

Hello Dearies!!

If you are anything like me, the thought of cleaning up your gigantic mess, after cooking your ridiculously delicious meal, is almost enough to deter you from cooking in the first place. Almost... Ok I admit it. There may have been one or more times this year (but Chris, it's only February!) that I have given my children PB and J's or cold turkey for dinner because I just REALLY didn't want to clean up after myself!!! 

Anyway! I do live to cook and for the times that I do, anything to help make cleaning up simpler is something is like to know about! This little trick comes courtesy of the one and only Mommy Dear! Oh the wisdom of my mother!

On this occasion I just finished frying up some Apple Organics turkey bacon. Apple Organics turkey bacon, to me, is the only turkey bacon worthy of actually being called bacon.

Yuck! What a mess in this "non-stick" pan!! Not to fear! Here is how to get rid of this mess with literally NO elbow grease! Even if you left the pan in your oven for 3 weeks! 😉

First you want to fill the pan with water and add a little dish soap.

Put it on the stove and turn the heat on high. Let it come to a boil, just keep an eye on it so it doesn't boil over. 

Let it boil for a few minutes and then VERY CAREFULLY dump it out in the sink. 

Then just take your dish rag and wipe it out! 

Wash and rinse and ta dah!!!

As my 5 year old son says "easy peasy lemon squeezy!" 

That's it! No more burnt in, dried on nasty stuff to scrub out! 

Well there is my little quick tip for today! I hope it helps you and encourages you to make more tasty food, because clean up isn't AS bad as it was before!

If you have any tips that make clean up easier, please comment below! I need all the help I can get!

Thanks for reading!

Until next time,

Christi

Cuppy Cakes

I will have to apologize for the severe lack of photos in this post.  I could supplement with selfies, but I don't know that those would contribute the subject matter here...

Anyway...

Last night, I was in the mood for chocolate cupcakes.  I didn't want just any, from a box, tasteless cupcakes, so I knew I had to make these from scratch.  I googled "homemade chocolate cupcakes" and the third link was a Martha Stewart recipe from 2003.  See here.  When I saw sour cream in the list of ingredients, I knew this was the one.

The rabbit trail begins here: I believe most recipes can be made better simply by adding sour cream.

I'm not very good at following directions or measuring, but I did my best...and then I saw the part where it says alternate adding the flour mixture and the sour cream.  Oops.  All the sour cream went in at the end. :)

The batter was somewhat thicker than what you'd get from a box recipe, but I saw that as a good sign.  I was just hoping these wouldn't turn out to be heavy and dense.

I used my ice cream scoop to divvy my batter and tossed them in the oven.  I ended up baking them for the whole 25 minutes.

While they baked, I whipped up some Peanut Butter Cream Cheese Frosting.  Here is how I made it:  I threw a softened packaged of cream cheese in my kitchen aid along with a couple table spoons of peanut butter.  Once I had that mixing, I poured in probably 2 teaspoons of vanilla.  Last but not least, I dumped in about a cup and a half of powdered sugar (I literally dumped, so I don't know for sure).  After that got creamy and to a frosting like texture, it was done.

I could hardly wait for the cupcakes to cool.  But eventually they did.  I tore off the corner of a ziploc bag and moved my frosting from the bowl to the bag.  I put it in the fridge until the cupcakes were cool enough to frost.  I started piping from the center, went out, and then up aka swirled on top.  I think they look pretty stinkin' good...and they taste even better.

Seriously, you need to make these.  They are ridiculously good.  I can't wait to get home to eat them!

xoxo,

Linda