Superbowl party

Sunday was my first ever superbowl party! We had our friends Kelsey and Brandon over and Bea and Ivan.

 I tried out a bunch of recipes from the most recent issue of taste of home magazine.  The chocolate dream whoopie pies were my favorite. 

The frosting on the inside was like whipped chocolate butter and the outside cookie was soft and chewy.  It was basically like a big soft and creamy chocolate oreo.

Ingredients

1 package (18-1/4 ounces) chocolate cake mix
3 eggs
1/2 cup canola oil
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

FILLING:
2/3 cup sugar
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1/8 teaspoon salt
1 cup 2% milk
1/2 cup milk chocolate chips
2/3 cup shortening
1/3 cup butter, softened
3/4 teaspoon vanilla extract

GARNISH:
1 cup miniature semisweet chocolate chips

Directions
In a large bowl, combine the cake mix, eggs, oil and vanilla; beat on low speed for 30 seconds. Beat on medium for 2 minutes.

Drop by 2 tablespoonfuls 2 in. apart onto greased baking sheets. Bake at 350° for 15-18 minutes or until edges are set. Cool for 2 minutes before removing to wire racks to cool completely.

For filling, in a small saucepan, combine the sugar, flour and salt. Gradually add milk. Bring to a boil; cook and stir for 1-2 minutes or until thickened. Stir in chocolate chips until melted. Cool completely.

In a large bowl, beat the shortening and butter until fluffy. Beat in chocolate mixture and vanilla.
Spread chocolate filling on the bottoms of half of the cookies, about 2 tablespoons on each; top with remaining cookies. Roll sides in miniature chocolate chips for garnish. Store in the refrigerator. Yield: about 1 dozen.

 I also made foccacia bread that turned out excellent. 
 

 
 

Ingredients

1 package (1/4 ounce) active dry yeast
1 cup warm water (110° to 115°)
2 tablespoons olive oil, divided
1-1/2 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon sugar
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1 teaspoon each dried oregano, thyme and rosemary, crushed
1/2 teaspoon dried basil
Dash pepper
2 to 2-1/2 cups all-purpose flour
2 plum tomatoes, thinly sliced
1/4 cup shredded part-skim mozzarella cheese
1 tablespoon grated Parmesan cheese

Directions
In a large bowl, dissolve yeast in warm water. Add 1 tablespoon oil, salt, sugar, garlic powder, herbs, pepper and 1-1/2 cups flour. Beat until smooth. Stir in enough remaining flour to form a soft dough (dough will be sticky).


Turn onto a floured surface; knead until smooth and elastic, about 6-8 minutes. Place in a greased bowl, turning once to grease the top. Cover and let rise in a warm place until doubled, about 1 hour.


Punch dough down. Cover and let rest for 10 minutes. Shape into a 13-in. x 9-in. rectangle; place on a greased baking sheet. Cover and let rise until doubled, about 30 minutes. With fingertips, make several dimples over top of dough.


Brush dough with remaining oil; arrange tomatoes over the top. Sprinkle with cheeses. Bake at 400° for 20-25 minutes or until golden brown. Remove to a wire rack. Yield: 1 loaf (12 pieces).


 Thomas made a rasberry fruit dip. 
 

1 8oz bar reduced fat cream cheese (room temperature)
1/4 cup marshmallow fluff
3 tbsp sugar free seedless raspberry preserves
 
Combine all ingredients.  Blend thoroughly. Serve with fresh fruit.
 
And for drinks we had strawberry party punch.

I'm not going to post the recipe cause it wasn't that great.  But little Alex liked it.  That boy loves his "agua" he calls all drinks agua.

We also had velveeta cheese dip and chips, lil smokies, chex mex, and M&M's.  YUMMMM!!!!
To have enough room for everybody we brought out the futon from the extra bedroom so everybody would have a seat.

I love hanging with friends.  Thomas and I were going for the Packers and everybody else was for the Steelers (suckers :)

Saturday night I met Thomas in Idaho Falls after he got off work to play games at my old MTC companions apartment.  It was so nice to see her again, I haven't seen her in 3 1/2 years! And I got to meet her husband.  We played a fun game called Boxers or Briefs that is kind of like Apples to Apples. 
Such a fun weekend, it went by so fast!

Mango Smoothies

Thomas and I LOVE mango.  The local co-op bountiful basket offerend 10 kilos of mangos for $5.50! That's only like .50 a mango! They are normally a dollar a piece.  The mangos we got are perfectly ripe and so delicous.  They are a treat for sure. 

Tonight I made a healthy mango smoothie.  Here is the recipe:
1 frozen mango cut into chunks
1 cup greek yogurt
3/4 cup water
1tbsp sugar (you could probably go without the sugar)
Blend and enjoy.  Makes 2 small glasses of smoothie.

Grillin

We are loving our charcoal grill that I got Thomas for graduation.  Thomas is becoming a pro at grilling our dinner.  We have a little system, I prepare the food and he grills it. 
We have used it twice to roast smore's.  Seriously the last time we made smore's, they were the best smores I had ever tasted.  We went to a concert in the park with Bea and Ivan and had homemade pizza and roasted smores.  The performers were both Indie singers and I discovered the I really like that style of music.
We also made smores for the fourth of July at Beaver Dick park.
For dinner the past couple nights we have had chicken kabobs and turkey burgers.  So yummy! I found a bunch of healthy recipes from Safeway.com that I am loving. 

What a cutie.

Chicken Kabobs

The Good Stuff

Do you watch Biggest Loser? Don't you love it when they do those cheesy advertisements during the show and try to make them look all natural? For example: Bob says: "Hey Stephanie come on over here. I notice you have a really big sweet tooth. Have you ever thought of choosing Extra Fruit Sensations Sweet Tropical gum to get rid of that craving? It's only five calories and studies have shown that when you chew gum you are less likely to indulge in your cravings! That's why in the Biggest Loser house we ALWAYS have a bowl filled with Extra sugar free five calorie gum." So funny! Well I'm totally going to advertise for Costco right now. They have a wonderful cookbook called Favorite Recipes The Costco Way. I borrowed it from my mom and we absolutely love the recipes. Of course they put in there that you are supposed to buy the Costco brand of stuff but we are Wal-Mart grocery shoppers and it works. We don't have enough peeps in our fam yet to buy Costco bulk. So this past week was Costco recipe week. There was one unfortunate recipe that was gross which I won't list but the rest were ones we will definitely repeat.
Tilapia Parmesan:

Breakfast Tacos:

Chicken and Pineapple Pizza:

Cheesy Stuffed Peppers:
Southwest Potatoes and Chicken:

The following recipe is from Safeway's website. I looked under the recipes that you can make in less then thirty minutes.
Cajun Chicken Pasta: So Delicious!!! We highly recommend it! It seriously tastes like something from Olive Garden and it only takes 30 minutes to make! It looks like a ton of ingredients but most are spices.

Ingredients 4 ounces linguine pasta 2 boneless, skinless chicken breast halves, sliced into thin strips 2 teaspoons Cajun seasoning 2 tablespoons butter 1 green bell pepper, chopped 1/2 red bell pepper, chopped 4 fresh mushrooms, sliced 1 green onion, minced 1 1/2 cups heavy cream 1/4 teaspoon dried basil 1/4 teaspoon lemon pepper 1/4 teaspoon salt 1/8 teaspoon garlic powder 1/8 teaspoon ground black pepper 2 tablespoons grated Parmesan cheese

Directions Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Add linguini pasta, and cook for 8 to 10 minutes, or until al dente; drain. Meanwhile, place chicken and Cajun seasoning in a bowl, and toss to coat. In a large skillet over medium heat, saute chicken in butter until no longer pink and juices run clear, about 5 to 7 minutes. Add green and red bell peppers, sliced mushrooms and green onions; cook for 2 to 3 minutes. Reduce heat, and stir in heavy cream. Season the sauce with basil, lemon pepper, salt, garlic powder and ground black pepper, and heat through. In a large bowl, toss linguini with sauce. Sprinkle with grated Parmesan cheese.

4 weeks to go!!!

Only four more weeks until the half! Can't believe it! I'm getting pretty excited.  I really liked this weeks workouts, they were challenging but didn't kill me. 

Monday: Franklin Park, 1.41 mile warm up, 30 minute tempo run at a 8:40 pace, 1.23 mile cool down  =5.5 miles
Tuesday:  Jillian Michaels 30 day shred
Wednesday: 2 miles @ 8:30 pace, 2x1mile at 7:30 pace, and 2x800meters at 7:00 pace = 5.32 miles
Saturday: 11 miles @ 9:00 mile pace

I was a little worried that the 11 miles would be really tough since we didn't do a long run last weekend due to the 6K but Haley and I both ended up feeling really great.  We went on a new route and it was really fun.  I love being able to excercise and chat and have girl time all at the same time!

This weeks dinners:
Monday: New York Teriyaki (I'm not really a rice person and I ended up eating mostly just rice and not even eating the beef teriyaki. Weird.  I think running changes my eating habits. )
Tuesday:  Missionaries and mom came for dinner.  Sweet and Sour meatballs and rice, salad, and strawberry shortcake.
Wednesday:  Last weekend I had made this weird casserole that really wasnt very good with ground beef mixture on the bottom and noodles on the top.  We didn't want to waste the noodles so we scraped them off and made homemade mac and cheese.  I felt so inventive and thrifty saving those noodles from being tossed in the garbage.  lol
Thursday: My night to host BUNKO so we had what I litke to call Olive Garden salad, french bread, manicotti, and brownie bottoms with ice cream for dessert.
Friday: Leftover manicotti ( I made WAY too much.  I made 3 dishes and we only ate 1 at BUNKO.  So left some at the padres, and took some to grandma and grandpa.

Looking back, it was a very interesting week as far as meals.  Lol.  I don't know how it is with anyone else but I try to stretch it out as much as I can in between grocery store visits.  It's like a game I play, to see how long I can go without going to the grocery store.  Very weird I know.  But it seems like I'm saving money when I don't go for awhile.  But really it just makes it so when I do go I have to stock up and fill our empty fridge and cupboards.  And it's fun when you don't have much left in your fridge and cupboards seeing what you can scape together for a meal.  That kind of makes it sound like we are starving poor people, but I promise we aren't, at least not starving ;)

Cheese Zombies

I don't know if I've mentioned it but, I really like to cook.  I like the organization of making a weekly meal plan and buying all the groceries.  We really haven't repeated any meals since we have been married.  I keep wondering when I will run out of recipes.
The past time that we had the missionaries over I made cheese zombies.  A co-worker of Thomas' had made them and that gave us the idea.  We got the recipe online and they turned out almost exactly like the school kind! I was amazed!

I also made some home-made tomato basil soup.  It was yummy to dip the cheese zombies in but I wouldn't just make it by itself.

Notice the container with the red cap on it.  Thomas introduced me to it. It's a salad topper with sesame seeds and bacon bits and some other yummy little toppers.