~Orange Flavoured M&M Cookies~

~One Year To This Day~

So i just wanted to share this with all my bloggy friends...(not 100% willingly wanting to show this per say....) BUT today is 1 year since i made a change in my life health wise....And apparently i NEED to share this because i am kinda having a hard time seeing my progress when it comes to looking at pictures...Anyway here is a letter i wrote to myself....

Dear body/self,

today marks the new beging of a life changing decision you have made and it WILL be for the best...You will have your days where you think why...why did i do this??? BUT trust me a year from now you will look at some photos and be amazed! And if you dont...We have problems! Self image problems...and your going to share your progress with friends and family whether you like it or not! You should be proud of how far you have come and how much healthier you've become! Your setting good goals for your son to see you work this hard....I know we liked to think we were happy being "big and beautiful" but your going to love being able to go clothing shopping and not have to spend hours finding something you like and then returning home being depressed because nothing fits right... Not to mention how much easier life is going to be for us not carrying the extra weight...enjoy playing with Loche running around and not having to stop because your so out of breath! Anyway I know 1 year from now you will feel so much better and your going to be so much healthier! Kick butt and reach these goals!

So there you have it a letter i wrote myself a year ago I have not reach said perfect goal weight wise but boy am i trying :) anyway i am having a few probs when it comes to looking at pictures...i still see that big girl looking back at me when i see past pictures but im working on it.... heres the pic im sharing with you all!

~Creamy Pesto Pork Steaks~

OH dont you just love my new camera! Look at those steaks *drool*

~*What you need*~

onion

pesto

garlic

heavy whipping cream

salt and pepper

chicken stock

ground fennel

olive oil

butter

grated parmesan cheese

~What to do~

In your skillet/pan add a tablespoon of butter and a drizzle of olive oil, then add your garlic and onions let them saute for a few mins, add a little salt and pepper stir then add your pesto if it starts sticking to the pan add some stock and let it sit and simmer for a few mins you want the pesto to cook a lil. Now take your steaks and place them in the pan ontop of the pesto sauce in the pan, press down a lil on each steak to make sure the steak gets a coating of the onions, garlic and pesto, now turn them over after a few mins and do the same thing to the other side, while thats sauteeing preheat your oven to about 365'F. Now take your steaks and place them in a cassarole dish, once steaks have been moved to dish add heavy whipping cream to the skillet and turn up and make a nice thick sauce. Pour this creamy sauce over your steaks and place in the preheated oven! Cook your steaks for about 45mins B4 removing for plating pull the dish out and sprinkle the steaks with your parmesan cheese and put back in the oven for a few mins! Remove and plate or put the dish on the table for everyone to see these beauties!

ENJOY!

~Cheese and Apple Fritters~

This new years eve we had a party with close friends and family! One of the things i served was my very tasty "Cheese and Apple Fritters" these were first made fall 2008 after an apple festival when i had ALOT of apples and needed to find uses for them b4 they went bad! I searched high and low for recipes that were not your usual cup of tea :) and i came across a fritter recipe that suggested adding grated sharp cheddar cheese and that was it i was all excited! What else would pear up nicely with a freshly picked crisp apple??? SHARP CHEDDAR CHEESE! I made up a batch for a special treat for the gang (Joe and Angie) And i would have to say my biggest fan for these treats is Angie's husband! He LOVES these things :) Anyway i do not have any photos of these fritters i forgot to take some but they look similar to my Jemput Jemput - Jimput Jimput only dusted with powdered sugar! Here is my recipe! Enjoy!

4 firm apples (skin on and sliced into smallish pieces)

1/2 cup to 1 cup of grated sharp cheddar cheese

1-1/4cup of sifted flour

1 tablespoon sugar

2 teaspoon of baking powder

1/2 teaspoon of salt

2 eggs beaten

2/3 cup of milk

1 tablespoon of oil

Sift together in a large mixing bowl your flour, sugar, baking powder and salt set aside while in a different bowl mix your eggs, milk and oil and cheese. Add your dry ingedients to the wet all at once, mixing until just moistened. Once you have sliced up your apples stir them into your batter.

Using a tablespoon drop the batter into a deep pan filled with enough oil to fry your fritters in! Your oil should be hot enough that once your batter hits the oil its bubbles a little and doesnt sit in the oil soaking up the grease (yuck) Fry your batter 3-4mins or until the batter is nice a puffy and golden brown! Drain the fritters then dust with powdered sugar!

Merry Christmas

Hi everyone just wanted to leave a short note wishing everyone a very merry christmas! Hope u all have a safe holiday and enjoy the company and food on this wonderful day! I woke everyone up bright and early (teheehee) I was very spoiled i got a new camera and i cant wait to show u all the pics off it! Its a Nikon D3000VR woohoo totally spoiled!

~Cookies in a Jar~

Ingredients

1 1/4 cup of all purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon of baking soda

1/2 teaspoon of salt

1/2 cup of firmly packed down brown sugar

1/3 cup of granulated sugar

1 1/2 cups of semi sweet chocolate chips

1/2 of chopped nuts (optional)

now time to pack it into a mason jar!

combine flour, baking soda and salt in a bowl, pour the flour mixture into your mason jar,

once in begin layering your other ingredients! Choc chips and nuts work best being one of the last things you place in your jar!

Instructions you attach to the jar!

Cream together in a large mixing bowl 2/3 of a cup of softened butter or crisco, 1 egg, 1 teaspoon of water, and 1 teaspoon of vanilla, mix until light and fluffy! Now take your cookies in a jar mix and empty it into the mixture youve just made and mix it all up really well! Drop teaspoon fulls of the cookie dough mixture onto a cookie sheet! Place into a preheated oven at 375'degrees bake for 8-10 mins or untill lightly browned!

This recipe makes about 3 dozen cookies!

~Good Old British Shepards Pie~

So with all the stuff im doing for chrissy gifts i decided i needed to make my boys something tasty for putting up with the mess ive made in the kitchen and dinning room this past wk :D So after i got home from Angie's (i went over there to can my Turkey Stock/Broth) I quickly rushed home and prepared and made this very simple and tasty dish!

~What you need~

Lean mince/hamburger

Salt and Pepper

Garlic

Worcestershire sauce

Tomato paste

Grated carrots

Grated/Finely Chopped onions (your choice)

Sage

Stock/broth

Cassarole dish

Potatoes

3 Egg yolks

Heavy Whipping cream (optional)

Parmesen cheese grated

Breadcrumbs (optional)

Preheat Oven 395 degrees

~How to Throw it together~

Heat pan with some olive oil throw your mince in and begin browning the meat season with S&P, once the meat is brown drain the fat if any (no one likes oily gross shepards pie! it just ruins all your hard work icky!)

Add your grated carrots and onions add a lil salt to help reduce and draw out the liquid in the grated ingredients! Add a couple tablespoonfuls of Tom paste,sage and mix well, turn the heat down to a simmer and add the worcestershire sauce and stock mix well and let sit and simmer for about 15mins it will get nice and thick and saucey :) (this mixture goes well on sandwhichs as well like "sloppyjoes" while this is simmering you should wash and dice up your spuds so they boil quicker in the pot! Cook the spuds till soft remove from water and heat i used my KitchenAid Mixer to make my mashed potatoes! Add some butter a lil salt and pepper to your mixing bowl and some heavy whipping cream (optional) slowy add in large spoonfuls of your diced cooked spuds and slowly begin whipping your spuds with the paddle attachment(if your using a KA.M) continue to do this adding more potatoes as you go along when you have them nicely mashed add your 3 egg yolks and let the mixer slowly mix them in and about 1/2 a cup of your grated parmesan cheese.

Take your meat filing and spoon it into your cassarole dish press it down firmly how much you want in the bottom of your pie is up to you :) then spoon large amounts of your mashed spuds on to till you have a nice full topping :D make it pretty if you like! sprinkle with breadcrumbs if you like then S&P then a good amount of grated parmesan cheese throw the dish into a hot pre heated oven for about 20mins and taadaa your all set for an extremely tasty dinner! I served this with biscuts (american style scones i guess u could call them :D) and a nice leafy salad!

Hope you and your fam enjoy this recipe as much as mine did!

~I Don't Know About You....BUT~

Ive been B U S Y!

i dont really have that long for this post so i am giving you all a sneak peak at what i have been up to and what kind of recipes i have installed for you all to have a look-see-at!

These and much more are going into gift bags for chrissy presents!

~*Semi Homemade Simple Chicken Nachos*~

No body i know can resist a good ole heaping plate full of Nachos!

Now ive noticed that nachos done in the states are done so many different ways! But i havent come across a style like the way we do em back home in Australia!

Now these are real simple and u can add whatever u like to the tp of your baked Nachos!

Pictured here in the blog is chicken but if u have hamburger/mince thats fine too (pulled pork shredded beef what ever u fancy really!)

I took a rotisserie chicken pulled that bad boy to bits and shredded it put it to the side while i had the home made stuff simmering in the skillet!

~What You Need For Your Meat~

Meat of your choice cooked and pulled/shredded

Fresh Tomatoes/Canned (whatever u have on hand)

Minced Garlic

Tacco Mix ( i use home made mix)

Chicken Broth/Stock

Finely Diced Onion

~What to Do~

Dice and chop up all your ingredients nice and finely have our electric skillet warming up with a lil oil, when hot enough toss your onions and garlic in, when the onions are sauteed toss in your matoes i used the last of my home grown ones for these nachos and boy was it worth it! Toss in your stock as well so they dont stick and burn to the pan make sure u have enough liquid to support the seasoning your about to add! Make sure these ingredients arent dry keep adding broth/stock if need be :)

When its all cooked down nicely mix in your meat turn the heat down and let it all simmer in harmony!

Now preheat your oven i usually have ours nice and hot when im doing Nachos! So lets say about 390ish get your casserole dish/dishes now do a thin layer each time you do this :)

Layer 1 = Tortilla Chips

Layer 2 = Shredded Cheese

Layer 3 = Chicken Mix

Now keep layering your casserole dish until your last layer ends with Cheese! You can add beans to your meat mix as well if you like i didnt not this time around!

When done toss the dish into the oven and let it all get nice and melty!

This may sound complicated but its soooooo SIMPLE! And its a great way to use up left overs as well :) I dont usually add sour cream as my boys like and dislike at the same time LOL

So Add it where u like our slop a dople on top when you have your serving on your plate!

(This version pictured here in the Blog was done on a plate and in the microwave as a simple after school/work snack)

~MIA~

I am so sorry that i have been missing in action in bloggy land...BUT i have good reasons i promise! So last week my husband comes home early from work with some sucky news... The centre he works for is being closed in March and they can either relocate or take a severance package....Now if it wasnt bad eough that was my hubbys news BUT Kevin who is our best friend and my sons god father also works for this company...so now i have both of them going threw this....What did we decide? After talking...and more talking......and searching the internet....we have decided to take the severance package and migrate home to Australia...What does this mean? I wont be home sick anymore for starters! BUT i am also very attached to everything we have here....i have spent the entire day today getting the house ready for 2morro (thursday) as our real estate agent will be here to check out the house and tell us how much he thinks we should sell our house for....this makes me a lil sad cuz even though we have had some problems with this house we have worked really hard to make it OURS! But anyway those are my reasons for being MIA i hope you all can understand why i was missing and why i may not be blogging for a lil while...i will try and keep everyone updated as we go threw this...

~Left Over Turkey? No Worries!~

So i got home from work today headed to the fridge and had a looks see and discovered a small chunk of turkey breast that i had taken out of the freezer the night b4 for my sons samiches! Knowing i needed to do something with it soon or toss it i looked in the veggie bowl for a rip avacado a small onion a clove of garlic a lime and so my lunch came about! Im not giving u amounts i will give u the ingredients everything is to taste as per usual when it comes to me :D

Avacado

Onion

Garlic

Lime

Sea Salt

Turkey Breast

Mash the flesh from the avacado finely dice up the onion and garlic toss it in with the flesh roughly dice up the turkey breast mix it up add the lime juice and sea salt and ta da! It was tasty and delish yes yes pretty much like guac but with meat! Enjoy!

~What do you do with Dough that refuses to rise??~

You make stromboli's and pizza with it!

So i had a full container of 10+ grain bread dough that REFUSED to rise...and i couldnt or should i say WOULDNT throw it out! So 2nite i tossed it on the counter added some flour to it and divided it up and rolled out pizza and stromboli sized pieces of dough!

I made up a few different kinds of both :) i had plenty of left over smoked turkey from thanksgiving to use! I made Sweet chilli sauce crab meat and cheese stromoboli and pizza at my sons request :) we had bbq turkey cheese toppings home made pizza sauce pepperoni and cheese as well i just used what was in the fridge and freezer for a very simple dinner and packed lunches!

~Non Food Related Post!~

But this post is totally worth reading! :) Head on over to Fantabulously Frugal and sign up for her awesome give away!

http://www.fantabulouslyfrugal.com/2009/11/you-deserve-best-giveaway.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+FantabulouslyFrugal+%28Fantabulously+Frugal%29

Please make sure you let her know you heard about this fab give away threw my blog!

Take a look at just one of the give aways up for grabs!