The Resolution

Can you believe today is the last day of January? I know I can't. This month flew on by I swear. In the begin of the new year, the family and I (and by that I mean me) decided to reduce the amount of sweet and tasty (also know as high fat, high calorie)goodies in the house in an effort to eat healthy. And also to lose this fat I carry around that I can no longer call baby fat since my youngest is going to be 4 this year. Now my kiddos all have a major sweet tooth, just like their momma, so I decided to try and make a snack for them that satisfied both the sweet and healthier eating. I give you chocolate covered frozen bananas.

You can make bigger sizes of frozen bananas, I just chose to make slices for easy little pick them up snacks. I have also seen these guys done by spreading some peanut butter on top of the banana, freezing and then covering in chocolate. All I did here was freeze the banana for about 10 minutes just to make it easier to dip. While they were in the freezer, I melted some chocolate, and then using a spoon and a dipping fork, I covered the banana slice. Easy peasy right!?

I used the dipping fork to remove the banana from it's chocolate bath, tapping the fork on the side of the bowl to remove any extra chocolate.

I placed the covered slices on a cookie tray lined with wax paper. At this point you could sprinkle some nuts or jimmies to fancy the slices up. Then back in the freezer they go until the chocolate is set or you are ready to eat them.

The ones with the sprinkles were for the kids, the plain ones were for my husband and myself. :)

The Artist

This past weekend, we had a birthday party for my middle child, Mackenzie. It is so hard to believe that my little girl is five, but sure enough, in three days she will be exactly that. This year, we went with an artist theme. Mackenzie loves to draws, can spend hours doing it and is even in charge of the art area at school (probably because she is always there).

Here is Miss Kenzie's cake. It was pretty easy to make the art palette and I'm happy with how the cake turned out. As requested by the birthday girl, it was a chocolate cake with strawberry icing. The cake even had some fresh strawberries in one of the layers.

The idea for this cake came from pinterest. I really like the tubes of paint here and it even gave me a chance to break out my silver edible dust.

The picture was added because after the invitations were made and sent, Mackenzie informed me that she wanted a pink and purple cheetah party. So this was my compromise.

The birthday girl throughly enjoyed her special cake. :)

The Twelve Days of Goodies - Day 12

My last goodie of this whole adventure is not a recipe, but a decorating post. The cookies I used are gingerbread, but you really could use any roll out cookies. I picked gingerbread because of the color (you'll soon see what I mean). To start roll out your dough, cut out circles and bake like you always would.

Once the cookies are cooled, attach a red M&M, with some melted chocolate, to the cookie.

Next, pipe two small dots of melted chocolate to make eyes.

Then pipe two lines above the eyes. After that make three smaller lines on your larger line. Make the smaller line have a slight angle. You have just created an antler.

This is probably the easiest decorating you could do on a cookie, and it is just about the cutest cookies for the holiday season (at least in my opinion).

Use brown M&Ms too, and you have Santa's team already for Christmas. Merry Christmas to all of you who have followed me on this fun project the last twelve days. I hope you have discovered some new goodies to add to your Christmas celebration. Enjoy your holiday!

The Twelve Days of Goodies - Day 11

Just in case you have someone in your life who has been naughty this year, I have a goodie for them. Nothing says "you've been bad" like some coal. But it's always best to see the good in people this time of year, so how about some edible coal.

Oreo Bars

1 package Oreos
5 cups large marshmallows
4 Tbsp butter

Butter an 8x8 cake pan and line with parchment or wax paper. Make sure the paper goes up the sides of the pan.

Using your food processer, pulse the oreos to make a fine crumb.

Combine the marshmallows and butter in a saucepan. Melt until combined. Stir in the Oreo crumbs.

Grease your hands and press the mixture into the prepared pans. Let stand for at lest 10 minutes.

You can cut into squares, or to make it look it like coal, rip into pieces. Best tasting coal ever.

The Twelve Days of Goodies - Day 10

My husband only made one request for a Christmas goodie this year. I of course, granted this wish for my Honey. So in our house we now have a container full of Peanut Butter Balls. This is my Mother-in-law's recipe that she gave me when we first moved here.


Peanut Butter Balls


2 cups graham cracker crumbs
2 cups powdered sugar
2 cups peanut butter
1/4 cup butter, softened




Put all ingredients in a bowl. One tip, if you buy an 18 oz jar of peanut butter, you have your 2 cups without having to measure it all (anything to save doing more dishes).

Mix like you would a pie dough. I even broke out my pastry blender.

I also suggest using your hands to finish mixing. Check that the mixture will stay together for you. If it seems a little dry, add a little more butter.

You can make the balls any size you would like, I like to keep them closer to bite size.

Melt some chocolate coating and dip the peanut butter balls in the chocolate to thoroughly cover them. Set on a baking sheet to dry.

And that's all there is to it. No oven, little measuring, lots of yummy!

The Twelve Days of Goodies - Day 9

This goodie of the day is one I discovered back when I worked in a restaurant. I picked this recipe because it used Guinness and we just so happened to have Guinness in our refrigerator. I will have to warn you, this recipe is kind of coming from the dusty old files in the back of my mind. If you saw what I have written down as the recipe, you would wonder how in the heck a cake was going to come out of it, but here goes anyway.

Guinness Gingerbread Cake

1 cup Guinness Stout
1 cup dark molasses
1/2 tsp baking soda
2 cups flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 Tbsp ground ginger
1 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp cloves
1/4 tsp nutmeg
3 eggs
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup sugar
3/4 cup oil

Preheat oven to 350





Combine stout and molasses in a saucepan and bring to a boil. Remove from heat, add baking soda and cool.

Whisk together the eggs and sugars until lemon in color.

Whisk in the oil.

Stir in molasses mixture and combine thoroughly.

Combine flour, baking powder, ginger, cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg together. Gradually add the flour mixture into the cake batter. Pour into a greased pan and bake for 20-25 minutes or until a toothpick come out clean.

I tried my new silicone tube cake pan that I just got. I thought it would make a great cake for Christmas. Sadly, the cake didn't quite come out of the pan as clean as I would of liked it. So as the saying goes, when the world (or in this case, my oven) hands you lemons...

Make gingerbread cake pops! I let the cake cool, threw it in a bowl with some vanilla frosting and mixed it all together. Dipped the pop in some milk chocolate, topped it off with a little fondant to resemble royal icing and then embellished with some candy holly leaves and berries.

The Twelve Days of Goodies - Day 8

Thumbprint cookies are relatively easy to make and always look nice on a cookie display. And they are also easy to change up the flavor combination depending on what filling you choose.


Cherry Pecan Thumbprints


1/2 cup butter, softened
3/4 cup sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2-2/3 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 cup sour cream
3/4 cup finely chopped pecans
1/3 cup Smuckers Black Cherry Spreadable Fruit



Preheat oven to 350.



Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add egg and extract.

Combine flour, salt, baking powder and baking soda together. Gradually add flour mixture to creamed mixture, alternating with the sour cream. Beat well after each addition and make sure dough is thoroughly combined.

Shape into 1 inch balls and roll in chopped pecans. (I will say I wish I had chopped my pecans a little finer then what I did)

Place on cookie sheet and use your thumb to create a small hole in the dough. If you wet your thumb a bit each time before using it, it helps stop the dough from sticking to you. Fill with jam.

Bake for 10-12 minutes or until lightly brown. I like the deep jewel color these cookies add to the plate. Enjoy!