Sunday, January 31, 2010

in the kitchen

i love to bake and cook - especially if it involves a cute little apron (of which i have many). i'm not as good as say Ina Garten, Paula Dean, or Elizabeth Kearns, but for the most part, i can hold my own in the kitchen.
I got a beautiful Cuisinart Mixer for christmas (thanks mom & dad) and i've been getting back into baking. when i was younger, i baked cookies all the time - family and lucky neighbors reaped the benefits. ever since i moved out of my parent's house, i haven't baked nearly as much. part of the reason for that is because i lacked the essential tool to make it fun, fast, and easy - a mixer:


and now that i have this beautiful, shiny new toy, here are the fruits of my labor:


mmmmmm. i use the Crisco recipe. i stopped using the Tollhouse recipe years ago - i just find that the Crisco one is..... better. try it - you'll agree. for these cookies i used a mixture of chocolate chips and butterscotch chips. they turned out with the perfect amount of gooey-ness (inside only) and crunch (outside only).



another favorite at our house is my Lemon Chicken. it's easy and delicious.


  • marinade Thin Sliced Chicken Breast Filets in Lemon/Garlic/Herb marinade (i just use store bought)
  • remove chicken from marinade and place in an Egg Wash
  • remove from egg wash and coat in Breading (mixture of flour, seasoning, lemon zest, and crushed Ritz crackers)
  • place chicken in pan twice coated with Olive Oil.
and voila. (with a little steamed veggies and garlic mashed potatoes.)

Saturday, January 2, 2010

christmas goodness

We had a wonderful Christmas. We spent Christmas Eve with Gabe's family. It was tons of fun! Kiera was so cute opening her presents. When she opened one of the ones from us, she said "It's a box of donuts!" (it was just in a white shirt box.)

We went a little overboard with chicken/rooster stuff for Linda... (then i watched the Food Network all day on New Years Eve - don't judge...i was cleaning too - and i learned that roosters are a sign of good luck in the kitchen.


Kiera's obsessed with The Wizard of Oz so we gave her some collectables. She loved them but we could barely get her to hold still for a picture!


Kiera loves Gabe. it's very sweet.




We got home late on Christmas Eve and went straight to bed so that Santa would come... and looks like someone did, because check out our tree on Christmas Morning!

We got so many wonderful gifts! I got Gabe a bike and he got me a new camera and a new cell phone.


We went down to Mission Viejo on Christmas Day to be with my family. They thought they were so funny playing a trick on me... (they were hiding gabe's bike for me and pretended it had been stolen!) i cried, they laughed. it was fun. We opened more presents and had a delicious lunch of carnitas and enchiladas. Gabe got a BBQ from my parents and I got a mixer!


one last bit of Christmas cheer was a little bit of crafting. I did this about a week before Christmas...










We hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas and a happy New Year!!!