EASTER

So I did a bit of baking and making this Easter. I'm sharing with you something that we made each Easter with my dad growing up. They're cream filled chocolate covered Easter eggs and they're way better than the cream eggs you can get in the stores, at least I think so. Here's a picture of the finished product.

I drizzled white chocolate over them and went crazy with sprinkles and coloured sugar. So good! There's a reason why I only make these once a year, I eat too many of them because they're so irresistible!

I gave them away to teachers, school bus drivers, neighbours, friends and family and they were a hit! Nothing better than a homemade treat made with love.

Prep Time: 40 minutes plus chilling time
Serving: 30 eggs

Ingredients:

1/2 cup (125 mL) butter, softened
1 tsp (5 mL) salt
1 can (300 mL) Regular Sweetened Condensed Milk
1 tsp (5 mL) vanilla or almond extract
Few drops yellow food colouring
2.2 lbs (1 kg) icing sugar
1.5 lb (680 g) semi-sweet chocolate, melted

For the drizzle I used about 1/4 cup of white chocolate. I microwaved it for 30secs, then stirred to get a nice smooth consistency. I poured this into a ziploc bag, snipped off the end and went to town drizzling and making pretty designs! I drizzled about 6 at a time and than put the sprinkles and sugar on as I didn't want to chocolate to harden. I also got a lot more eggs then what the recipe calls for. I was able to make 48, and they were good sized eggs as you can see from the picture. If you only make 30, they're going to be huge! I hope you enjoy making these with your family as much as I did!

So my daughter turned 4 a few months ago and needless to say she is a pretty in pink kinda girl. So I had a princess themed birthday party for her and I made her a two layer castle cake, one layer was chocolate and the other vanilla and I made real butter cream icing. We also had cupcakes and lots of candy! All the little girls in their pretty dresses had a wonderful time, getting their nails painted, dancing and eating lots of yummy treats!

BANANA CINNAMON SPICED MUFFINS

As I've said before, I love to try and make recipes as healthy as I can, but still taste good. Well this recipe does NOT fail in the tasting good department! My kids cannot get enough of these when I make them. 

 I try to use whole wheat flour as much as possible, as it is healthier for you. I grind my own wheat too and use it right away, that way it's fresh!

I usually will make a double or triple batch as we eat them up so quickly. They freeze quite well too.

RECIPE:

1 cup sugar (if using chocolate chips, use only 3/4 of a cup sugar)

3 egg whites

1/2 cup unsweetened apple sauce (you can overflow this if you like)

1 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup fat free plain yogurt (you can overflow this too)
1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt

1 tbsp cinnamon
2 large extra ripe mashed bananas or 3 small ones will do the trick

 

 Directions: Cream applesauce, sugar, egg whites, and vanilla. Add the dry ingredients. Add mashed bananas and yogurt and mix well. Mix in chocolate chips (1 cup) if you are using some. 

I prefer putting my batter into silicon baking cups. Because they're so low in fat they tend to stick to paper cups more then a batter with butter or oil in it. You could also grease and lightly flour muffin tins and pour the batter in that. 

Bake at 350F in a preheated oven for approximately 22-25 mins, depending on your oven. These turn out so moist that you might think they're not baked enough, but don't be fooled! Do not over bake these!

Yields approx 1 dozen muffins.

Enjoy!

Quick tip!

So normally when I make cupcakes I use the cake mix, i.e. Duncan Heinz or Betty Crocker It's just plain quicker and easier. When I bake I try to make things with the least amount of calories possible, but still taste good and I thought I'd share this tip with you. 

 The ingredients you add to a cake mix are oil, milk and eggs. I like to substitute wherever I can and I put water instead of milk, unsweetened apple sauce instead of oil and I normally will just put the eggs in whole, but if I have a carton of egg whites I will put that in instead. Everything I substitute is the same measurement as the regular ingredients. For instance, if it calls for 1/3 cup of oil, I'll put 1/3 cup of apple sauce. This dramatically cuts down on your calorie intake, and they still turn out super moist! One thing you need to be aware of is the baking time. Because you're substituting the oil for apple sauce it cuts down on the baking time by 2-3mins depending on your oven, which in turn gives you more time for decorating them and your power bill is less too!

Enjoy!

J.J.

Alright, I don't have a picture for this, but it's a quick and easy dinner idea.

 Take, 1 organic beef bouillon, 1/2 cup water, 1 tbsp soy sauce, 1 tbsp natural peanut butter and add put it in a pre-heated frying pan. Stir together and then add 3 cups of pre-cooked brown rice. Stir together and voila, you've got a twist to regular rice! You may have to add a bit more water depending on how hot your pan is. My kids loved it! I've tried other recipes where you've added similar ingredients to noodles, so I thought, why not rice?

Enjoy!

Happy blogging ( :

I love to bake! One of the reasons why I started this blog was to show some of the things I've made, and share them with people. I love finding new ideas on the web and so I'm sharing my ideas with you ( : 

This is a Hello Kitty Cake I made for my daughter's 3rd birthday. The only fancy thing about this cake is the fondant. LOL! It's just a basic cake mix and store bought icing. Still tasty though! One thing I do when I use a box cake mix is I substitute the oil with apple sauce and I always use water instead of milk. This helps cut down on the calories so you can "enjoy" eating your cake and feel less guilty about the calories you're consuming. It turns out nice and moist every time!

I'm a busy mother and wife who works, cooks, bakes, cleans, exercises, plays the piano, dances,  teaches, plays and dreams, among a few other things. I've never had a blog before, but decided, why not start one? So here I am,y blogging. Don't expect anything too spectacular for now, but once I figure out how to do one of these I'm sure it'll get better in time ( : 

Happy blogging!