Spring Break: Day Five

We rounded out our spring break festivities with a trip down memory lane today. Sophie, Pop and I headed down to Storyland to ride the train and explore the park. The loud train made her a little nervous at first but she quickly warmed up to it. It was one of our favorite spring break activities last year too. After lunch and a nap, we did some Easter baking. Cookies with "lem lems" of course!

Now it's Mama's turn, I'm off to an adult dinner at Cracked Pepper. Yippee!!

Spring Break: Day One

Today started off with a trip to the park to meet up with some friends. There was climbing, sliding, swinging and a picnic.  We then we hit up our mutual favorite store, Target to pick up some Easter goodies and Sophie picked out her first set of Play-Doh. After her nap, we cracked open the Play-Doh and she sculpted away, telling me that she was making a colorful bird. We ended our afternoon by baking some yummy banana bread together. It was a great day to kick off our spring break.

The Good and the Bad

It's January and we are all coming down from our sugar highs and overindulging over the holidays. I feel like I should be taking it easy and eating healthy, like we all do at this time of the year. I still want quick recipes because, well, I'm busy chasing Sophie and pregnant and tired a lot of the time. And also sort of lazy. I found this Vegetable Lime Chickpea Chili on pinterest when I was looking for ways to use up extra lime juice. It looked hearty, healthy and yummy for a cold day so I decided to give it a shot. I chopped everything up and got it started while Sophie napped. It was super easy and smells delicious simmering on the stove right now.

By the time Sophie woke up though, I knew I wanted something a little naughty too. So she and I whipped up these Bisquick Chocolate Chip Cookies.  Ummm, yum! Soft, light and delicious. We, of course, taste-tested them immediately!

Making and Eating a Gingerbread House

Pumpkin Tested and Tasted

We're trying to fake fall around here. I've made soup, ordered jeans for Sophie in size 2T and started pulling out the pumpkin recipes. I love everything about fall and can't wait for all the fun ahead in the next few months. Here are a couple of the pumpkin recipes we've made recently.

Downeast Maine Pumpkin Bread
(adapted from All Recipes)

This is my go to basic pumpkin bread recipe. I normally don't change a thing about it, but this time I didn't have enough white sugar so I had to substitute some brown sugar and I like the way it turned out. Be warned, this recipe is huge. It makes three loaves!

Ingredients:
1 15oz can of pumpkin puree
4 eggs
1 cup vegetable oil
2/3 cup water
2 cups white sugar
1 cup brown sugar
3 1/2 cups all-pupose flour
2 tsp baking soda
1 1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp ground nutmeg
1/2 tsp ground cloves
1/4 tsp ground ginger

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees and grease/flour your three loaf pans.

In a large bowl mix together all the wet ingredients (pumpkin, eggs, oil, water) and your sugars until well blended.

In another bowl, whisk together the remaining dry ingredients (flour, baking soda, salt and spices.)

Stir your dry ingredients into the pumpkin mixture until just blended. Pour into your prepared pans.

Bake for about 50 minutes in the preheated oven. Loaves are done when toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.

Here's an amazing recipe we just tried for the first time:

Pumpkin Poppers

(found on Just the Little Things)

1 3/4 cup all-purpose flour

2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp nutmeg

1/2 tsp allspice

1/8 tsp ground cloves

1/3 cup vegetable oil

1/2 cup brown sugar

1 egg

1 tsp vanilla

3/4 cup pumpkin puree

1/2 cup milk

for the coating:

1 stick unsalted butter, melted

2/3 cup sugar

2 tbsp cinnamon

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and spray mini muffin tins with non-stick cooking spray.

Combine flour, baking soda, salt and spices in a bowl and whisk to combine.

In another bowl, mix oil, brown sugar, egg, vanilla, pumpkin and milk. Pour in flour mixture and mix until just combined. Fill mini muffin tins until almost full and bake 10-12 minutes.

Melt butter in a small bowl. Mix sugar and cinnamon together in a separate bowl. After the poppers cool for a few minutes, dip them in butter and roll them in the cinnamon sugar mix. 

I was tired the night I was making these and completely forgot to add the milk in my recipe! I realized it once they were already baking and it was too late to do anything about it. Surprisingly, they still turned out amazing! They did seem to get dry quickly over the next couple of days though so I wouldn't recommend leaving it out on purpose!

I've got plenty of other recipes I'm dying to try, all courtesy of Pinterest of course! Check these out:

Pumpkin Blondies

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

Pumpkin Cream Cheese Muffins

Strawberry Cream Pie

Last week, Sophie and I ended up doing a lot of baking. We made a fresh cherry pie, a strawberry cream pie and banana bread. She's starting to really like being a part of things in the kitchen and loves to help me when she can. We had a ton of fresh strawberries and I was looking for a new dessert recipe. This strawberry cream pie was amazing! It has a graham cracker crust and a cream cheese style layer like a strawberry pizza but then its topped with both whole strawberries and an amazing glaze that's super easy to make.

Strawberry Cream Pie
(Adapted from Your Home Based Mom)

Step #1 - Graham Cracker Crust

1 1/4 cups graham cracker crumbs.
(I crushed up one package of graham crackers in my food processor and it was just the right amount)
1/4 cup sugar
6 Tbs butter, melted

Combine these three ingredients and press firmly into a 9 inch pie dish. Bake at 7-8 minutes or until the edges are lightly browned. Let cool.

Step #2 - Strawberry Glaze

1 cup strawberries, stems cut off
1/4 cup sugar
1 Tbs cornstarch
1/4 cup water

Puree strawberries in a food processor. Combine sugar and cornstarch in a small saucepan. Add the water and strawberry puree. Cook and stir over medium heat until slightly thickened. Remove from heat and strain if you want, but you don't have to. Pop this into the refrigerator to cool.

Step #3 - Creamy Filling

6 oz. cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup powdered sugar
1 tsp vanilla
1 cup heavy whipping cream
4 cups whole strawberries

First whip your heavy cream until light and fluffy. In a separate bowl, blend the cream cheese and sugar. Stir in the vanilla, then fold in the whipped cream. Spread this mixture in your cooled crust. (I only wanted a thin layer of this filling so I used about two thirds of the mixture) Place your whole strawberries on top of the creamy filling with their cut sides down. Spoon your strawberry glaze over the top. Chill for at least 3 hours.

Baking on a Rainy Day

While the rain poured down on Monday, Sophie and I enjoyed a lazy day indoors. We cuddled in bed while watching cartoons, we had a late breakfast in our pajamas and then we did a little baking. Since Sophie's obsession with blueberries and all things blueberry related is still going strong, we found an easy recipe online and whipped up these muffins.

Eyeing the ingredients

Sampling the ingredients

Lining the muffin tins

Mixing it all up

The muffins were amazing and required very few ingredients. You probably have everything you need to make these right now aside from the blueberries. The crumbly, cinnamon top was the best part. Try them immediately!

To Die For Blueberry Muffins

(from All Recipes)

• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/3 cup vegetable oil
• 1 egg
• 1/3 cup milk
• 1 cup fresh blueberries
• 1/2 cup white sugar
• 1/3 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/4 cup butter, cubed
• 1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 
  
• Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C). Grease muffin cups or line with muffin liners.
• 
  
• Combine 1 1/2 cups flour, 3/4 cup sugar, salt and baking powder. Place vegetable oil into a 1 cup measuring cup; add the egg and enough milk to fill the cup. Mix this with flour mixture. Fold in blueberries. Fill muffin cups right to the top.
• 
  
• To Make Crumb Topping: Mix together 1/2 cup sugar, 1/3 cup flour, 1/4 cup butter, and 1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon. Mix with fork, and sprinkle over muffins before baking
• 
  
• Bake for 20 to 25 minutes in the preheated oven, or until done.