Peru in Abilene

Happy birthday, Jeremy! We surprised Jeremy with a little family birthday party when we got to Abilene. My mom made Jeremy's favorite banana pudding! I made carrot cupcakes for his b-day (which explains the carrot baby food in the post before).

The recipes for banana pudding and carrot cake cupcakes are in other posts on my blog!

Jeremy and I stayed with Ethan and Sarah, since my parent's were hosting missionaries from Peru- Majelo and Any. Ivy and Win had a great time playing in their backyard and meeting the neighbors dog, Billy. Win got into their yard a few times!

On Saturday, my parents had BBQ to honor their friend from Peru and lots of people from church and previous mission trips came. It was a great time! And great food!

As an added bonus, Melissa was in town and I got to see her ring!!! That's right, I said ring! MELISSA IS ENGAGED!!! YAY!!!

We had such a great time meeting new people and spending time with old friends and family! Ethan and Sarah were wonderful hosts and it was great spending time with them.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, JEREMY!!!!

The ordinary acts we practice every day at home are of more importance to the soul than their simplicity might suggest. - Thomas Moore

It's just been an ordinary day and an ordinary week. Nothing too eventful to report. I thought I would share my recipe for dinner tonight. I'm posting minimal pictures of the actual dinner, because rice, chicken, and asparagus don't photo all that well. You get the idea! Instead, I opted for a few pics of Ivy and Win. They photograph pretty well!

This is a great week night dinner and fairly healthy! You could change up the chicken recipe to suit your personal tastes- I think rosemary would be delicious!

Grilled Chicken with Lemon and Thyme

Ingredients:
1 1/2 tablespoons lemon juice
1/4 teaspoon dried thyme
1/2 teaspoon dried red-pepper flakes
1 clove garlic, minced
1/4 cup olive oil
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon fresh-ground black pepper
4 bone-in chicken breasts (about 2 1/4 pounds in all)

Light the grill or heat the broiler. In a shallow dish, combine the lemon juice with the thyme, red-pepper flakes, garlic, oil, salt, and black pepper. Coat the chicken with the mixture.

Grill the chicken breasts over moderately high heat or broil them for 8 to 10 minutes. Turn and cook until the chicken is just done, about 10 minutes longer.

E’s Notes:

• Used boneless, skinless chicken breast (approx. 1 lb.).
• I let the chicken marinade for about 15 minutes, but you could do it a little longer.
• Of course, I like a little more spice, I added extra red pepper flakes and garlic.
• I used my grill pan, which worked perfectly!
  
  

Asparagus

Trim tough ends. Drizzle with olive oil, sprinkle with salt and pepper. Bake at 400 degrees for about 15 minutes. Sometimes, right when I take it out of the oven, I sprinkle on some Parmesan cheese.

Lemony Rice

I posted the recipe for lemony rice earlier on the blog. I made some modifications to the recipe when I had an electric stove. If you have a gas stove, you can follow the recipe as is. This is Jeremy's favorite rice!

Ivy and Win were in a stare down- they will stare at each other for a good 30 seconds and one of them will take off running. Then, the chase is on. They will spend the next 15 minutes chasing each other! And that, friends, is why we have 2 dogs!




Here is Ivy (post-chase), watching some TV. Doesn't she look perfectly perched on the couch?!?!



And here is a little sneak peek at what is up tomorrow for the birthday boy!!!

I Am A Bear!

It has been 7 LONG years, since I have been on the Baylor campus. Oh- how I have missed it! I went to Baylor for Homecoming during my first year of law school and for whatever reason, I haven't made it back. Jeremy has never even been to Waco. We thought Saturday would be the perfect opportunity to visit the campus and watch some football.

We made a stop in Dallas, so we could have a late breakfast with Rocky, Amy and Brinley. Little Miss Brinley was too cute for words!

She is at this really great age right now where you can look at her and talk in a baby voice and she will break out into this huge grin. It's irresistible!!!



Jeremy could not get enough of her!!! She sat in his lap the whole time we were eating. She was perfectly happy!

After breakfast with Am and Rock, we headed to Waco. Even on the drive, I started reminiscing about old times and driving to Waco and all my college days!

Our first stop in Waco was Ninfa's for lunch to meet up with Aunt Lisa. Ninfa's was one of my absolute favorite restaurants in college. They have this amazing green salsa! The food wasn't quite as good as I remembered, but tasty nonetheless!

We took a mini walking tour of the campus. It's just so beautiful and I loved being there again! It has changed so much in the past 7 years, but I could still recognize a few of the buildings.

It was really fun to share this place that is so special to me with Jeremy. I think he liked seeing it, too!

After hitting up the bookstore for a few new ts, we were off to the game. Sic 'em Bears!

Unfortunately, the end result was not in favor of BU. But we had a fabulous time cheering them on.

After the game, we drove around the campus and looked at all the places I used to live. Jeremy couldn't even believe that I lived in this little house that is falling apart. We saw my freshman dorm and too many other places to name. What a great day!

Sic 'em Bears!

Dark & Delicious

Another birthday at works means another batch of cupcakes! I decided to use Martha's book for inspiration. I stumbled across her recipe for Dark Chocolate Frosting.

It looks so rich and glossy. Kind of makes you want to just swipe your finger across the top of the cupcake and have a little lick!

I think you'll really like this frosting, but be warned- it's rich!

Dark Chocolate Frosting

Ingredients:
1/2 cup plus 1 tablespoon unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder
1/2 cup plus 1 tablespoon boiling water
2 1/4 cups (4 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
1/4 cup confectioners' sugar, sifted
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 pounds best-quality semisweet chocolate, melted and cooled

Directions:
Combine cocoa and the boiling water, stirring until cocoa has dissolved. With an electric mixer on medium-high speed, beat butter, confectioners' sugar, and salt until pale and fluffy. Reduce speed to low. Add melted and cooled chocolate, beating until combined and scraping down sides of bowl as needed. Beat in the cocoa mixture.

If not using immediately, frosting can be refrigerated up to 5 days, or frozen up to 1 month, in an airtight container. Before using, bring to room temperature, and beat on low speed until smooth again.



Delicious, dark, chocolatey goodness!!! Yum!

White Trash Addiction

Bet you thought I was talking about a new reality TV show set in a trailer park where peroxide, permed blonde women (wearing daisy dukes and desperately needing to get their roots “done”) look into the camera and tell us their darkest, deepest demons. And a counselor, high on life, helps them overcome their addictions to lottery ticket buying and meth.

Nope! Wrong show! This is a cooking blog!



I’m sure you’ve all tried some version of White Trash made with various ingredients. I forgot how good it was until yesterday! So crunchy, sweet, salty, and chocolatey- all at the same time!

You can’t beat the salty-sweet combo!

Here’s what I used:
2 pckgs (12 oz. each) of white chocolate chips
4 cups rice cereal
4 cups corn cereal
2 cups pretzel sticks
2 cups peanuts
12 oz. pckg of M&Ms

Melt the chocolate chips (I used the microwave, 30 second intervals on medium power) until smooth. Combine all other ingredients.

Pour chocolate over mixture- delicately mix well. Spread out onto wax paper and let harden.

I bet you can’t wait until it sets to try a little bite! It’s impossible.

Make sure you have a lot of people coming over or you can take this to work, because it's addicting! Before you know it, you've eaten half of it! Trust me- I know!