Change of plans

Well, due to an unwelcome storm (see that Irene...you're not welcome in PA), the spongebob cake has been canceled because they are unable to have the party due to upcoming rain. Hopefully I can make it again some other time.


Tonight, we're doing a simple pizza or something quick because I'll be grocery shopping and running errands for a sick hubby so we'll just relax I'm sure. Maybe I could take a picture of the pizza and say I made it instead of Jigsy's?!?

By the way, the final vote for Spongebob cakes was 2 votes for Spongebob on the hamburger, 4 votes for the layers of Spongebob and no votes for the Spongebob with ocean theme. However, due to the fact that this was for my niece...her parents have the final vote and they went with the Spongebob on the hamburger so that's what I'll eventually make. Spongebob on Krabby Patty wins! Thanks for voting.

We're Italian tonight!

Well, I am proud to say that tonight, my husband made his first lasagna for dinner and is was FABULOUS! I did give a recipe and helped by chopping veggies to make it more veggie-filled but he really did everything else and we really enjoyed it. Doesn't it look good?

I had to work late tonight to present a HUGE presentation to our director at school and I think he'll pass our idea, but it also meant that I couldn't focus on dinner because I had to work late. Maybe I'll work late more often...give him some practice in the kitchen......What do you think? Maybe I should label all ingredients and get a fire extinguisher first. We just went out to eat last night for my birthday and apparently he has proved once again that we can't go out to eat without cuts, slices, splinters or some form of blood coming from his fingers. Seriously...that's the third time in a row that he's cut himself on a knife, the table or had to have minor medical support just to get through dinner.

Oh well...great dinner honey....wanna do it again tomorrow night?

Veggies, Veggies, and MORE Veggies!!!

Well as you can see from the picture-I picked up our weekly CSA box. This week we've got a ton of stuff- green bell peppers, zucchini, red onions, sweet corn, cucumbers, heirloom tomatoes, yellow squash, plum tomatoes, red round tomatoes, italian bell eggplant and yellow bell peppers. Now....the fun begins. I have to create a menu for next week incorporating all of this before Wednesday when I pick up another CSA with even more veggies.

 

Now that you've seen what we have for this coming week....let's start planning. In our weekly newsletter they normally give us recipe ideas. This week's recipes include a mid-summer salad, zucchini basil tarts, tomato soup, and grilled eggplant steaks. 

 

I'm thinking I'll do the tomato soup over the weekend with grilled cheese sandwiches and then try the grilled eggplant steak with chicken/cheese steak sandwiches for Ryan. He mentioned recently he was in the mood for a cheese steak but when we looked at the nutrition of the steak umms you buy at the store, it wasn't good...so we'll go with the chicken variety most likely and I'll just top my eggplant steaks with a little cheese. 

Anyone else have any ideas based on what you see in the pictures? I'm up for anything right now!

Dinner and Fondant

Well, last night's dinner was a hit. Ryan looked at the taco meat and deemed it "beef" even though he knew it was ground turkey. He said he likes it when I magically turn turkey into beef-reminds him of "better times" when he could eat beef without thinking of the health tragedies he was doing to his body. Well, that's the guy I married and am still in love with! I guess that part of him will never change.

Anyway, here's a picture of our dinner.....doesn't it look yummy? Virtually fat free tortillas with taco meat, CSA peppers and tomatoes, low fat sour cream (I hate the fat free stuff) and some reduced fat cheddar cheese. There's also corn from the CSA as well...very yummy dinner if I can say so myself. We also got ingredients for me to try my hand at fondant, but I haven't tried making it yet...that's for tonight probably or tomorrow morning. We'll see. I'll take lots of pics of my first attempt to see if the second time around is better. I'll let you know.... Don't forget to look at the Spongebob cake pictures and pick your favorite in the poll!

Which Spongebob cake is your favorite?

Pineapple on Ocean Cake

 

 

Layers of Spongebob

Spongebob on Hamburger

A few cupcakes....

These are a few cupcakes I've made in the last few months...enjoy.

You can find a comprehensive picture "stash" at

http://www.flickr.com/photos/belle04/.

Enjoy!

Weekly Menu and Baking Creations/Trials

Well, for this week I've decided we'll have tacos tonight (Monday), Garden Vegetable Wraps on Tuesday, Vegetable Lasagna for Wednesday (using fresh CSA vegetables that I'll pick up at 4pm) and Chicken Croquets on Thursday. Each night we'll have fresh corn on the cob that I've gotten from the CSA or at the store...mostly from the CSA though. I love Spiral Path Farms-that's where we get our CSA vegetables from and I love them! We get such a variety and I can hardly use all the vegetables each week because we get so many! I'll let you know which recipes were Ryan-rated to see what he liked and didn't really.

In our CSA last week, we got sweet corn, red tomatoes, red onions, heirloom tomatoes (so yummy), grape cherry tomatoes (great with low fat ranch dip), lettuce, cucumber and green bell peppers. At this point, we've already used our red tomatoes, cup up the onions for the freezer, used the heirloom tomatoes/lettuce/cucumbers and bell peppers for a salad last week for my in-laws and we're eating the sweet corn this week. I'll be eating the cherry tomatoes for lunches this week...or what's left of them. (They were part of my lunch on Saturday and I even tried to get my niece, Natasha to eat one, in which she replied she didn't like them...oh well, we tried)

My next creative endeavor is to create a Spongebob cake for my niece's birthday party this weekend. I've never tried using fondant, but thanks to Peggy Weaver, at whatscookingamerica.net, I found what seems like an easy fondant that I'm going to try making in the next few days to see how it works. I'll keep you updated on how that experience goes...it'll definitely be a trial run. If it works then I'll use it for the cake on Saturday, and if it doesn't I'll just try to make the cakes with icing only and recreate my design. I'll also be posting the different designs I'm looking at so rate each of them on a scale of 1-10...1 is your least favorite and 10 is your most favorite! I'll choose the highest rated one for my design. Can't wait to see what everyone likes! I'm up for a challenge and have all day Saturday to make it...which it might take that long! Wish me luck!

All New

Well, Obviously I'm new to the world of blogging, but decided that it was time to start one. As most of my family and friends know, I love to bake and cook. We get weekly organic vegetables from a local CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) so I try to get creative with the recipes each week. I've also decided to start expanding my cupcakes designs into creative cakes as well so make sure to look for some creative ideas coming soon! I'm always open to ideas as I'm sure many people are....I try to make everything healthy, cheap if possible, but of course it has to pass the Ryan-test (my husband, Ryan, has to say it's good).

Check in often to see what I've got coming next!