Saturday Morning

On Saturday mornings when Chris has to work I enjoy sitting in bed with coffee, cook books, and Food Network on tv. Some of the shows bug me, some require WAY to many ingredients and time. My favorites are RR's 30 minute meals, Sandra Lee's Semi-homemade, 5 Ingredient Fix, and Healthy Appetite. This Saturday I caught part of Giada at Home. Giada is the most cute little host anyone has ever seen...but her recipes are COMPLICATED! Lots of ingredients and time! However, today "I found a short cut"...she says so I instantly tune in. A cheese and chocolate chip danish made with frozen puff pastry dough! YUMMM! I decided to attempt the same recipe with my own spin.

Mascarpone cheese with strawberries! First you add mascarpone cheese, cream cheese, vanilla, sugar, and lemon zest. Then add strawberries and combine.

Roll out puff pastry and cut into four squares.

Put your cheese mixture in bottom right corner and roll to opposite corner.

Bake at 400 degrees for 13-15 minutes until golden brown!

Of course mine did not turn out near as pretty as Giada's, but I'd say it was a good days work! I just stored them in the fridge and popped them into the oven for a few minutes before icing and eating!!!

Two Christmas's ago Paula, Chris's mom, got me a subscription to Cooking Light magazine. They have the most wonderful ideas and recipes. They also have great pairings of dishes with desserts and wines, a very good read! I got a new one in the mail on Friday just in time for the weekend. I was planning on making chicken spaghetti when I came across a white wine marinated steak recipe. This is made with chuck eye steak, but I could not find that so I got chuck tender steak (which is WAY less fat). This was probably the biggest hit of the weekend, along with another recipe I've been wanting to try, gorgonzola bacon twice baked potatoes!

We have A LOT of ground turkey at our house, so when the word "steak" is mentioned it's pretty much always a hit. :)

Well that's all for my exciting cooking adventure this weekend! Can't wait to see what this week brings!

Much Love,
WB

Jerk Chicken Casserole and Oreo Truffles

Yesterday we celebrated accounting day at work! This consisted of lunch at Breadwinners (one of my favorite places).

Presents!

Bowling at Main Event!

Then getting off early to shop/sleep/cook...whatever our hearts desire. My getting off early meant tackling a new recipe.

WARNING: If you do not like Caribbean food you will not like this dish.....

I had printed off a dozen or so recipes the weekend before and really wanted to attempt this jerk chicken casserole.

The dish consists of chicken thighs, sweet potatoes, black beans, green onions, jerk seasoning (all spice, pumpkin pie spice, cayenne pepper, salt, thyme) and a sauce to top it off (honey, lime juice). Needless to say you can tell this dish is sweet, Chris did not dig the sweetness but I thought it turn out pretty good. All you do is rub the seasoning on the chicken and brown in a skillet (which veg. oil) for about 2-3 minutes each side. Then layer black beans, sweet potatoes, and chicken. Add honey and lime juice to skillet and add corn starch to thicken. Once it comes to a boil pour over chicken dish. Bake at 375 degrees for 35-45 minutes.

We added some crusty bread....YUM!

Luckily I redeemed myself (in his eyes) with some Oreo Truffles. This is kind of a cake bake recipe I found on Bakerella .

1 pkg Oreos

1 8 oz cream cheese

1 pkg white choc morsels

Process all but 6 or 7 Oreos in food processor. Combine with cream cheese and roll into balls. Place on wax paper for icing.

Process your last few Oreos for topping. Melt the whole package of white choc morsels on stove over medium heat. Constantly stir so they do not scorch.

Spoon over balls and top with Oreo crumbles! Refrigerate when dry and ENJOY!!! :)

Tonight I think I'll try Leanna's Gma's chicken spaghetti!!

Much Love
WB

That's no fish story...

Friday the Medical Center of Plano threw their employees a tent party! We placed top 10 (HCA wide) in the employee satisfaction survey. When I say tent party I mean air conditioned, tiki hut, non-alcoholic margaritas...the whole 9 yards. We even got a rolling cooler with speakers in the lid...awesome!!! The food was phenomenal so of course our whole accounting department stuffed our faces with all sorts of Caribbean style food.

Chris was off so when I talked to him after lunch I told him what a superb time we had and how completely stuffed I was. His tone suddenly changed when I said "We can have whatever you want for dinner because I'm not going to be hungry until tomorrow!"

I left work and headed to the grocery store to pick up some things for a brunch we were hosting on Saturday morning. When I came in this is what I saw.....

My sweet husband in the kitchen cooking me dinner! Not just any dinner...Orange Roughy and scallops with a corn relish!

Asparagus with a balsamic drip...

On top of Rice Pilaf!!! Talk about an aggressive recipe, I would have been totally intimidated! I think I'll let him take on cooking a few nights a week :) .

Saturday we had the cousins over for brunch. We try to get together every few months to keep up with what is going on with everyone. I didn't take any pictures of the food but everyone brought something, so we inhaled breakfast casserole, monkey bread, fruit, pigs in a blanket, mimosas, coffee....you name it!

Saturday night we went over to the Alexander's for a cookout! We had so much fun hanging out with old friends...too bad the game was a total downer! But I got a new dip recipe from Lex that I will def share once I attempt to make it myself. Thanks Lexi!!

Sunday morning we woke up and had coffee in bed and I decided to use the left over crescent rolls Elizabeth left for cinnamon rolls.

This is one of my dad's recipes...my FAVORITE! Yay for breakfast in bed!!! :)

Is it sad that I'm already counting down the days to the weekend?? At least Monday is OVER!!

Much Love,
WB

Cake Ball Adventure!!

So I decided to start my cake ball adventure a little earlier than planned. The G's are taking a big load of stuff to Abilene for me this weekend so I wanted make something awesome for them as a thank you. Whit K gave me this recipe last weekend after the DIVINE chocolate cake balls she brought to dinner so I switched up the recipe to make strawberry with vanilla.

Recipe:
1 cake mix - made normally in 13x9 pan
1 16oz tub of icing of your choice
1 package of almond bark of your choice (I didn't use the whole package)

First you make the cake as normal and bake it in a 13x9 pan.

Then crumble cake (while still hot) into a large mixing bowl with the tub of icing and stir to combine.

Refridgerate for 1-3 hours, the longer the better. Then roll out cake balls by hand (you can use a melon baller, cookie scoop, or teaspoon to make sure they are all the same size) and place on wax paper for icing.

Heat almond bark in glass microwave safe bowle in 30 second intervals until thin enough to spoon over top. *Next time I might try the stove top becuase mine was still a little gooey.

Then ICE!

Mine didn't turn out quite as pretty as Whit's but they still were delicious!! Enjoy G's and thanks again!!!

TGIF!!!!!

WB

Order Up!!

I was waiting all day Saturday for Fed Ex to make a stop at my house. Every time I came home I checked the front door to see if they had left me a slip that said my packages were at the office. No Fed Ex....so I solemnly got ready for church knowing that the office was closed and if we weren't home I probably wouldn't get my precious stuff. 8 pm rolled around and DING DONG!!!! FED EX HAD ARRIVED!!!

Of course I was excited to give the girls their goodies....but I was WAY more excited about all my new stuff. This is the perk of hosting a Willow House party!

My final Cinnabar canister to make a set of three!

A set of three trivets...

Galleria dessert server to match my flatware.

Cookbook stand...my FAVORITE ITEM!

Cinnabar tidbits to match my accent plates! LOVE!


Sunday night we watched the Cowboys opening game....man what a bummer that was! We made homemade pizza and invited Whitney and Ryan over to enjoy it with us. I was having cowboy fever when I went to the grocery store so I picked up some fun plates and napkins and finally bought my first Cowboys shirt!

Whitney brought cake balls for dessert. This will most DEF be my next adventure in the kitchen.....DELICIOUS!

The best part is when I came home today (Monday, which is the worst day of the week) I had another Fed Ex note waiting for me!

Chris lost his wedding ring on our vacation... I know...it had only been 7 months!!  :(  It flew off while he was tubing! So I was REALLY excited we got him re-married tonight! :)

Hope everyone has a great start to the week!!
Much Love,
WB

My Favorite Possession

One of my favorite possessions is my grandmother's cookbook. My Aunt Janice compiled our old family recipes and a few new ones to create a cookbook for the Fogle women. My grandmother was a FABULOUS cook and I enjoy cooking all her favorite recipes.

The best part is I got MomMom's old copy so if I plant my nose in the binder in the middle of the pages...I can still smell her!

"Ruth Wooten Cake" is my dad's favorite, he used to help MomMoms make it when he was a kid, it is the most divine chocolate cake with chocolate icing anyone ever tasted!

This cake is normally made in a 13x9 pan. Since we were taking this as dessert to a friend's house I decided to jazz it up and make it pretty. I cooked the cake in two 9 inch rounds and then stacked and iced them just like all my other cakes. It turned out to be the UGLIEST cake I've ever made!

MomMom's....you knew what you were doing. At least it still tasted AWESOME and Tim and Becky loved it!

We were so excited on Saturday because we got to see Gran!! We all got together to celebrate Nic's graduation, so we met in Abilene for lunch at LL&C.

She is the most wonderful hilarious grandmother any kid ever had! All of us enjoy spending time with her because we get to learn a new language..."what's that do-hiki over there?" "You gotta get a little who-who" ...you get the picture. I wish we lived closer so we could spend more time with her, but we sure do cherish every minute we get. We even go to see Aunt Pam and the cousins, plus a new one on the way!

Gran and her grand kids! We missed you Elizabeth, Uncle Dennis and Aunt Kathy!

Well I have to end my post with a new dish (perhaps I'll just turn this into a cooking blog!). Thanks to my best friend Leanna (who is an amazing cook!) I attempted my first Magherita Pizza. The best part was that we had left over pesto from stuffed bread so we added that on top of the tomatoes...let me tell you this is my absolute favorite new dish!

Before we cooked it....

Final product!!!!!

Yum!!!

Well Chris has to work this weekend, so I'm sure I'll be blogging again very soon! Many blessing to you and the rest of your week!

Much Love,
WB