Strawberries and Cream

Local strawberries have been rocking recently. I've had an abundance of chocolate dipped strawberries, but was feeling something a little creamier for dessert tonight. I stumbled across the best cream filling recipe ever. Of course, I used it for dipping, as it requires less effort than using it as filling.

Strawberries and Cream

Excited for the recipe? Keep reading...

Just Desserts: Watergate Cupcakes

Since I was young, one of my very favorite deserts has always been Watergate Salad. Nothing tops a rich, pistachio flavor! A friend introduced me to the best combination ever, Watergate Salad and cupcakes, after there were leftovers from a wedding reception. It took months to get a hold of the recipe, mostly because the cupcakes were referred to as Pistachio Cupcakes at the time. Finally, my sister tracked down a recipe and altered it to fit our taste, which obviously makes it better than ever!

Finished product, conserving frosting before I knew there was plenty.
I promise, very tasty! 

Just Desserts: Homemade Turtles

For Valentine's Day, I felt like doing something a little special for my husband [okay, maybe for my own benefit, too...]. Back around Christmas I stumbled across directions to make your own homemade turtles (the candies, yum!). The first time around, it didn't go as well as planned, but I decided to give it another try, lining up a few new techniques. I'm very pleased to announce that they came out great!!

Cooking Tip: Toast your Pasta!

I got this really neat cookbook a little while back and have been experimenting with a few of the tips listed in it. One of my favorite new culinary tricks of the trade is toasting pasta!

Toast your Pasta!

Just Desserts: Coconut Rice Pudding

I stumbled across a bunch of coconut recipes one afternoon. My favorite (so far) is the Coconut Rice Pudding. It's come to be expected that when I cook something, I nearly always do something wrong, in some way. The first time I made this, I followed the directions perfectly, but I used sweetened coconut milk (the viscous kind, typically marketed for pina coladas, I found it on the cake isle) while the original recipe called for unsweetened milk. While checking out the "ethnic" food isle the other day I finally found a can of unsweetened coconut milk, got really excited, thinking Yes! Now it will be really awesome!! I was wrong. Come to find out, the "mistake" I made the first time was actually an improvement! So, here is what I consider the best recipe of coconut rice pudding ever!

Jalapeno Pinwheel Poppers

I found this awesome recipe on Pinterest [yeah, I'm sure you've never heard that before]. This recipe, which I will from here out refer to as Jalepeno Pinwheel Poppers, is great for many reasons. It's quick and easy. The ingredients can be bought well in advance and you don't have to worry about them going bad. They can be made [somewhat] in advance and cooked [somewhat] later.

Jalapeno Pinwheel Poppers, professional picture from recipe source

It takes about 15 minutes to get everything thrown together, and about 13 minutes cooking time. I've ever so slightly altered the original recipe to make it better.

Kitchen Drawers - Vertical Silverware Tray

When we bought our house, I knew that the kitchen would be the one thing that I hated most (after we had our bathroom renovated). I tried my best to quickly make it tolerable with a little amount of money. I've hated the cabinet setup since day one. Overall, there isn't much cabinet space, and what's there is laid out horribly! There are two small drawers the depth of silverware/junk drawers, and two deep drawers that have no good purpose (awful planning!).

Horrible layout.

When we moved in, I hurriedly found spots for things, just trying to get the boxes unpacked. I had to buy a new silverware tray because the drawers aren't of a typical width.

Homemade Dog Treats

My family really loves dogs. I mean, really, really loves dogs. So much so that my mom decided they deserved homemade treats just like the rest of us! 

Homemade with Love!

 Thanks to Pinterest and my mom's philosophy that anything could and should be homemade, we decided to try our hand at homemade dog treats. A little google search lead us to countless options, but luckily one of the first few looked promising, requiring a lot of stuff you usually have on hand! 

There are a lot of pups in my family. If my sister and I are both at our parents' house, there will be at least 5 dogs, possibly more depending on if any other family is in town or around. Some holidays we have 10 or 11 running around. Anyway, it was a good gamble on my mom's part to double the recipe. Represented here is the original recipe (not doubled).

Dinner - Wino Chicken

Cooking and I have a love/hate relationship. I love cooking when it works out, hate it when it doesn't. I'd say that, overall, my cooking turns out good about 50% of the time. Lately, though, I've been doing pretty well... knock on wood! I did get a new oven, I think this is really helping!

I watch a good amount of Food Network, but somehow seem to miss the actual cooking shows designed to help people like me, average cookers. I catch a lot of Iron Chef and Food Network Challenges, which helps me ad lib cook, but doesn't really give me a lot of recipes to use at home. Luckily, FoodNetwork.com has been awesome at helping me with this.

One day I stumbled upon an awesome recipe by Paula Deen. The official recipe title is "Lady and Sons' Chicken in Wine Sauce," which is a mouthful. I've renamed it Wino Chicken. Below is the recipe, slightly altered to fit my taste.