What I have made, besides a mess.

December 6 – Make. What was the last thing you made? What materials did you use? Is there something you want to make, but you need to clear some time for it? (Author: Gretchen Rubin)

I have no idea what to make of this one. The last thing I made was something that I cooked so I guess I will go along with that?

"Chocolate Covered Strawberries" Pancakes



All I did was make whole wheat pancakes from a mix. I folded 1 tbsp. of chocolate chips into the batter and instead of butter and syrup I topped them with strawberry preserves. These are amazing, healthy and they really do taste like chocolate covered strawberries.

One of the items on my 101 in 1001 is to learn how to cook some new dishes so I definitely would love to set aside some time to do that. What I know how to cook, I can cook it well but I am definitely always up for some new recipes.

Red Velvet Cupcakes

Like most people I did not get fat from eating salads and tofu all day long. I LOVE cupcakes, mainly all kinds. One day in March Dora and I had a bake-a-thon and we made awesome looking cupcakes and buttercream decorating frosting from scratch. One of my far-fetched dreams in life would be to open a cupcakery (patent?) and have Dora be like my head-decorator. Except everyone seems to be doing that now-a-days so its probably not going to happen. Anyway this post was not to talk about how much I love cupcakes, I'm not that much of a fatass… It was to give you one of my favorite recipes!

I do make an honest attempt (most of the time) to eat more healthy and lose weight so you could just imagine how stoked I was to find a recipe for red velvet cupcakes on Hungry Girl's website. These are absolutely amazing! Better than most red velvet cakes/cupcakes that I have had and what's best is they are only 140 calories per cupcake. Without further ado…



Ingredients:

Frosting

6 tbsp. Jet-Puffed Marshmallow Creme
6 tbsp. Cool Whip Free, thawed
1/4 cup fat-free cream cheese, softened
1 tbsp. Splenda No Calorie Sweetener (granulated)

Cupcakes

1 cup Devil's Food cake mix
1 cup Classic Yellow cake mix
Two 25-calorie diet hot cocoa mix packets
1/2 cup fat-free Egg Beaters
1/4 cup mini semi-sweet chocolate chips, divided
Entire bottle of red food coloring
1 tsp. Splenda No Calorie Sweetener (granulated)
1/8 tsp. salt

Directions:

Place half of your chocolate chips (2 tbsp.) and the contents of both cocoa packets in a tall glass. Add 12 ounces of boiling water, and stir until chips and cocoa mix have dissolved. Place glass in the freezer until mixture is cold (about 30 minutes). Meanwhile, preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a bowl, mix together marshmallow creme, cream cheese, and 1 tbsp. Splenda until smooth. Fold in Cool Whip. Place bowl in the fridge to chill until cupcakes are ready to be frosted. Once the cocoa in the freezer has chilled, give it a stir, and pour it into a large mixing bowl. Add the cake mixes, egg substitute, remaining chocolate chips, red food coloring, 1 tsp. Splenda, and salt. Using a whisk or fork, mix batter for about 2 minutes (until smooth and blended). Batter will be thin, but don't worry, your cupcakes will puff up once baked! Line a 12-cup muffin pan with baking cups, and spray lightly with nonstick spray (or simply spray the pan with nonstick spray). Evenly spoon batter into the pan. Place pan in the oven, and bake for 15 - 20 minutes. Cupcakes will look shiny when done. Once cupcakes have cooled completely, evenly spread the frosting over them.

G.T.L. baby. Gym, Tanning, Laundry.

Today was the first lazy day I have had since the new year. Even though I had gone to bed early and woke up by 8 I decided to just lay in bed for 6 more hours and do absolutely nothing. Yes, this day was a complete waste but I feel that I needed it since I will be going back to school in less than a week. I managed to cook though, dinner for myself and then bake red velvet cupcakes for myself and Marathoner since she stopped by to "catch up". For the recipes for the cupcakes and everything else I made today check out my cooking blog here.

One MAJOR downside to my lazy day is that it is now 4AM and I have to be up and take my car to my uncle (he's a mechanic) for an oil change by 9. Then I am having breakfast with one of my sorority sisters and then getting my eyebrows done. Since Dora the Explorer and I really need to save money I will be serving a three course (guilt-free) meal for us! Same as going out to dinner, just a fraction of the calories and um... FREE!

So here we are, January 14... Just a month away from good old Valentine's Day. I don't care if it is a played-out, commerical "holiday" - I am a true little romantic and absolutely love this day. I just hate not having a valentine and seeing everyone else so happy. Maybe this will change? I mean hey, my cousin did not know she would have a valentine last year until she met her now-boyfriend less than two weeks before. I guess we will just have to see what happens and if not, Tammy will be my valentine again this year! Last year I even took her to the groomers to have her nails painted pink so she looked the part. Its amazing how this poor dog has not run away from me yet!

Winter (not so)Wonderland

This weekend just reminded me about why I hate living in New York during the winter. I LIVE for when it is like 35-40° and the air is completely dry and just crisp. Those are the perfect hair days and I love to walk around all bundled up. I don't know what the temperature was today but it was horrifically cold and flurrying. I am sick of the snow as well, even though its only snowed twice and both times the snow did not last more than 3-4 days. I just want the weather to be nicer so I could enjoy these last few months of winter. Maybe the rest of my break won't be too bad and I can actually get to walking Tammy in the park, some much needed exercise for the both of us.

I played it very low-key this weekend. This winter break has put me on a terrible sleep schedule which resulted me in sleeping away most of the day and I was sick of it. So I stayed in this whole weekend and I must say I was not bored at once. The fact that there was an "Every Episode of Degrassi EVER" marathon on might have something to do with that. Last night I was in bed before 1AM and I woke up at 9 with ease. I got a lot accomplished today - finished cleaning my bedroom, went food shopping for the week and made homemade pizza for the first time. It was a spur of the moment thing and I found a recipe off of google. The recipe called for three tablespoons of olive oil to be drizzled over the pizza but I felt it was excessive so I only used three teaspoons. Apparently even that was too much because I found myself with a very soggy, oily pizza. The flavors were spot on though so that gave me confidence for the next time I attempt to make pizza.

I wanted to make a list of the things I want to accomplish in the future. I'm toying with making a "210 to do in 2010" list or one of those "101 things to do in 1001". I am having better luck with the second one and will post both of them when I complete them. I am still learning how to use this so hopefully I'll get the hang of it soon. I joined 20SB and I love it. I have found a lot of interesting blogs to read so hopefully that'll keep me off of FV during my down time this break. I also have to pretty much cook for myself so that will give me something else to do. One of the things I always had in the back of my mind was to be a chef so I know trying to perfect my cooking skills is going to be a lot of fun. I also wanted to be a writer so maybe writing in this blog could help me live some of that dream. I was thinking about this today. I am one of those people that is always telling stories, whether they are 100% true or not does not matter but it seems that I have a story for everything. While yes, this is an annoying trait to possess, I cannot help but wonder (Carrie Bradshaw moment!) if I do that for a reason... I am also ridiculously good at making up stories to get myself out of trouble. Like so good that it sometimes I scare myself at the shit I have been able to get out of. Maybe the little novelist (whoa dream BIG) inside of me that I have been silencing is trying to speak? I don't know. All I know is that it is almost midnight and I am exhausted. I am beginning to like this new, normal sleep schedule.

As I may (or may not) have mentioned in my last post, I want to do a "photo a day" thing and todays pictures capture my learning experience with margarita pizza.


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