Christmas Came Before Thanksgiving This Year:)

Josh was against it at first, but as soon as I heard that Kristin (my sister) had already decorated for Christmas right after Halloween I felt so behind! I had to convince him, but he likes the decorations now that they are up:)

We had some yummy hot chocolate and listened to Christmas music while we were decorating the tree...

We are both so excited to spend our first Christmas together being married and make new family traditions together:)

Chinese Recipe Was A SUCCESS!!!

I tried to make chinese a couple of months ago for Josh and it was an epic fail... I did not use a recipe and I was trying to make it "healthier" so I didn't bread the chicken or fry it and I did not fry the rice. I can't say any more. It is too painful of a memory ok?!!

Well after realizing weeks later that I am not Chinese and don't know why I ever thought I could make it without some recipe guidance, I decided to try again! I found a recipe on Pinterest for easy fried rice and sweet and sour chicken so I sucked it up and gave it my best shot.

All I can say is that it was..... Ahhhhh-MAZING!!! I am pretty sure I heard angels singing! Or maybe it was just Josh...

Take my word for it when I say "YOU MUST MAKE THIS!!!" Your husband or significant other will LOVE you forever:)

Baked Sweet and Sour Chicken and Fried Rice

The chicken coating:

3-4 boneless chicken breasts

salt + pepper

1 cup cornstarch

2 eggs, beaten

1/4 cup canola oil

The sweet and sour sauce:

3/4 cup sugar

4 tbs ketchup

1/2 cup vinegar

1 tbs soy sauce

1 tsp garlic salt

       Start by preheating your oven to 325 degrees. Rinse your chicken breasts in water and then cut into cubes. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Dip chicken into the cornstarch to coat then dip into the eggs.  Heat your 1/4 cup oil in a large skillet and cook your chicken until browned but not cooked through. Place the chicken in a 9x13 greased baking dish. Mix all of your sweet and sour sauce ingredients in a bowl with a whisk and then pour evenly over the chicken. Bake for one hour and during the baking process you will need to turn the chicken every 15 minutes.  

Fried Rice                                                                                             

3 cups cooked white rice

3 tbs sesame oil

1 cup frozen peas and carrots (thawed)

1 small onion, chopped

2 tsp minced garlic

2 eggs, slightly beaten

1/4 cup soy sauce

      On medium high heat, heat the oil in a large skillet or wok.  Add the peas/carrots mix, onion and garlic. Stir fry until tender. Lower the heat to medium low and push the mixture off to one side, then pour your eggs on the other side of skillet and stir fry until scrambled. Now add the rice and soy sauce and blend all together well. Stir fry until thoroughly heated!   

Puppy Chow Made With Corn Flakes

Josh and I made plans to have a couple of our friends over last night for a game night and we were each making a dessert for it. I decided to make puppy chow, but I did not feel like going to the store to get chex because I already had everything else. I had a huge box of corn flakes and figured they would work just as well because they taste the same and they are both corn. The only difference is the shape.

Well it turned out great! Josh decided that he likes them better than with chex and I kind of agree! I tweeked a chex puppy chow recipe and added less cereal and more chocolate so that there would be lots of clusters... Yummmm!

I melted about 1.5 cups of semi-sweet chocolate chips on the stove top and added about 1/2-3/4 cup of peanut butter and stirred them together. I poured about 7.5 cups of corn flakes in a big bowl with a lid and then poured the chocolate-peanut butter mixture in and mixed it until just about every flake was doused in chocolate. Then I always just put the powdered sugar in depending on how it looks and I like a lot:) So I will pour some in and cover the top and place the lid in the bowl and shake it for a minute or two. Then check it and keep adding more until all the clumps are covered to your liking! Pretty simple!

Fun-Filled Weekend With My Parents...

My parents came to visit this last week all the way from Minnesota and we had a blast! Well at least I did:) My mom and I went to An Affair of the Heart (craft fair in Oklahoma City), and we did not buy much of anything, but we got plenty of craft ideas so it was still worth it to make the trip down there.

One thing we kept seeing at so many of the booths was mason jars glued on to candle holders, which would be SUPER easy so we were not going to pay 4-5 times as much as they would cost to make them ourselves! Seriously! That would only be something a craft-deficit disorder person would do... So sad.

That was the only craft we made that we got the idea from the craft fair, but we had some ideas of our own! Or from Pinterest:)

My mom had found a tutorial on how to make pumpkins using velvet, real pumpkin stems, pinto beans and batting. They were so easy and fast and they turned out adorable! The hardest part was finding pumpkin stems that were twirly...

I did buy one thing from An Affair of the Heart. It was some potpourri that looks like tiny pumpkins! Sooo cute and it smells fantastic!

I also found a tutorial on Pinterest for making flower out of paper bags. I changed them up a little and stuck the leaves together by a cute diamond brad. I tacked the flowers up on my wall after I finished them. The picture online showed them on the wall around a fireplace, but my firplace already has enough going on so I decided to frame a corner of my living room window with them:)

 I just love crafts:) They are cheaper than buying the same thing and you get the satisfaction of knowing you made them! what could be better?!

Homemade Crusty Rolls

I don't know about you, but I absolutely LOVE bread! If I had to choose one thing that I could eat for the rest of my life, and I would not get fat, it would definitely be bread! Josh has the same affinity for bread.

Well I came upon this recipe on food gawker a couple of months ago and have made them a few times. They are delicious! The are crispy on the outside and soft and warm on the inside :) How could you resist?!

Makes 16 rolls

Adapted from Cook's Illustrated (Then adapted a little more by me :)...)

1 1/2   cups plus 1 tablespoon water (12 1/2 ounces), room temperature
1 1/2 teaspoons instant or rapid-rise yeast
2 teaspoons honey
3 cups plus1 tablespoon bread flour (16 1/2 ounces), plus extra for forming rolls
3 tablespoons whole wheat flour (about 1 ounce)
1 1/2 teaspoons table salt

Instructions

1. Whisk water, yeast, and honey in bowl of stand mixer until well combined, making sure no honey sticks to bottom of bowl. Add flours and mix on low speed with dough hook until cohesive dough is formed, about 3 minutes. Cover bowl with plastic wrap and let sit at room temperature 30 minutes.

2. Remove plastic wrap and evenly sprinkle salt over dough. Knead on low speed (speed 2 on KitchenAid) 5 minutes. (If dough creeps up attachment, stop mixer and scrape down using well-floured hands or greased spatula.) Increase speed to medium and continue to knead until dough is smooth and slightly tacky, about 1 minute. If dough is very sticky, add 1 to 2 tablespoons flour and continue mixing 1 minute. Lightly spray 2-quart bowl with nonstick cooking spray; transfer dough to bowl and cover with plastic wrap. Let dough rise in warm, draft-free place until doubled in size, about 1 hour.

3. Fold dough over itself; rotate bowl quarter turn and fold again. Rotate bowl again and fold once more. Cover with plastic wrap and let rise 30 minutes. Spray two 9-inch round cake pans with nonstick cooking spray and set aside.

4. Transfer dough to floured work surface, sprinkle top with more flour. Using bench scraper, cut dough in half and gently stretch each half into 16-inch cylinders. Divide each cylinder into quarters, then each quarter into 2 pieces (you should have 16 pieces total), and dust top of each piece with more flour. With floured hands, gently pick up each piece and roll in palms to coat with flour, shaking off excess, and place in prepared cake pan. Arrange 8 dough pieces in each cake pan, placing one piece in middle and others around it, with long side of each piece running from center of pan to edge and making sure cut-side faces up. Loosely cover cake pans with plastic wrap and let rolls rise until doubled in size, about 30 minutes (dough is ready when it springs back slowly when pressed lightly with finger). Thirty minutes before baking, adjust rack to middle position and heat oven to 500 degrees.

5. Remove plastic wrap from cake pans, spray rolls lightly with water, and place in oven. Bake 10 minutes until tops of rolls are brown; remove from oven. Reduce oven temperature to 400 degrees; Continue to bake until rolls develop deep golden brown crust and sound hollow when tapped on bottom, 10 to 15 minutes. Transfer rolls to wire rack and cool to room temperature, about 1 hour. (My oven cooks things at lightening speed so I bake at 500 for five minutes and 400 for five more minutes.)

Because this dough is sticky, keep your hands well floured when handling it. Use a spray bottle to mist the rolls with water. The rolls will keep for up to 2 days at room temperature stored in a zipper-lock bag. To re-crisp the crust, place the rolls in a 450-degree oven 6 to 8 minutes. The rolls will keep frozen for several months wrapped in foil and placed in a large zipper-lock bag. Thaw the rolls at room temperature and re-crisp using the instructions above.

I SCARED JOSH!!! Yippee!!!!!!

Ok! So I know what you are thinking... She is creepy and weird! Both of which may be very true! BUT, I have a completely logical explanation for this. Really! Well it is logical to me at least...
Well, I do this really fast run where I barely lift my feet off the ground and take tons of tiny steps and run at people. Only to be funny!!! Mostly it just freaks my mom, my sister (Heidi) and my brother (Daniel) out. Especially when I do it in the dark... I really am not crazy! I just grew up in a very goofy family so I have them to blame for my actions.
Well this has never scared Josh for some odd reason and I have always wished it would. My powers don't work on him I suppose... Rats!!! Well I was determined to scare him once and for all tonight. I went to the bedroom and schemed about what I was to do. (Really I just saw a blanket and the thought hit me immediately.) I got down on my tippy toes and and crouched down, like I do my creepy run, and I wrapped the blanket around me. Joshua was studying (falling asleep) and he need a little waker-upper, so I tip-toed out right below his chair and stared up at him until he looked down. ( I may have made a giggle to get his attention.) When he looked at me I started talking in a gremlin voice and started running towards him. He jumped out of his chair!!! Wowzers! It worked. I ran across the room after him, but he started karate chopping and so I had no choice, but to stop. He has some crazy moves... You don't wanna mess with him when he gets into karate mode.
Well I hope you enjoyed my story. I had to share this monumental moment with the world! :)

Asiago Cheese Bagels... A homemade version of Panera's, but BETTER!

One day it occurred to me that bagels are just like any other bread and therefore can be made at home! What a wondrous discovery and who knew?! Probably everyone but me, BUT I felt pretty wonderful when I came to this realization. Don't judge me!!! :) Hehe

Well as soon as I realized that I jumped on FoodGawker.com (only the most heavenly and addicting website I have every laid my eyes upon) and I searched for bagel recipes. I fell upon this wonderful recipe and as soon as Josh's eyes saw the screen there was no turning back. But I didn't want to:) 

As you can tell from the pictures above, we made them into sandwiches with ham, bacon, and smoked cheddar cheese. Soooo delcious! 

Asiago Cheese Bagels

• 2 cups + 2 Tablespoons unbleached all-purpose flour
• 1 package (0.25 ounce) instant yeast
• 3/4 cup warm water (115 degrees F)
• 2 Tablespoons Parmesan cheese, shredded
• 1-1/2 Tablespoons sugar
• 2 teaspoons minced dried onion
• 1-1/2 teaspoons salt
• 1 Tablespoon sugar
• 1/2 cup (2 ounces) asiago cheese or six-cheese blend, shredded

1. In a mixing bowl, stir together flour, yeast, 1-1/2 Tablespoons sugar, Parmesan, dried onion, and salt.  Add warm water and combine with dough hooks on low mixer speed until dough forms.  Add a little more flour or water if necessary to reach desired consistency. 
2. Roll out dough on lightly-floured surface.  Knead until dough becomes smooth and elastic (a few minutes or so).  Let rest in a lightly oiled bowl, covered, for 10 minutes.
3. With floured scissors, cut into six portions of equal size.  Shape each portion into a smooth ball and poke a hole in center.  Gently pull dough outwards until hole reaches 1.5 to 2 inches in diameter.  Place on greased baking sheet and cover dough with a warm, damp cloth.  Let rise 20 minutes.
4. While dough is rising, place 1 gallon water mixed with 1 Tablespoon sugar in a large, deep pot over high heat.  Once water begins boiling, lower heat until water reaches a simmer.  Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.
5. Broil bagels on low at least 6 inches from heat for 3 minutes, turning once halfway through.
6. Gently drop 3-4 bagels at a time into simmering water.  Cook 7 minutes, turning once halfway through.  Drain on paper towels.  Return bagels to greased baking sheet and bake 25 minutes.  When about 12-15 minutes of cook time remains, quickly remove baking sheet from oven, sprinkle asiago cheese atop each bagel, and then continue baking for remainder of time.