Acorn Bites

Acorn Bites

Whoa...who am I?! Am I really trying to come back to writing this blog after MORE THAN A WHOLE YEAR!?  First before any food talk, a little bit of insight on my life the last year for my 5 viewers :)

Well, what can I say?  I officially took a hiatus from this food blogging business for the first year of my marriage!  I got married October 26th, 2013 to the love of my life, Faraz! From my last blog (July 30, 2013...again who am?!) I was really stressed the last half of 2013 planning my wedding and moving out of my parent's house.  (Check out my friend's blog, Farhana from Engineered Baker, to see some pics from our wedding!) If you are married you know how it is, you get caught up with being married.  The first year has been quite the adventure with getting used to living with someone, getting a routine going, getting things around the apartment set up, going on trips, having dawaats, etc.  But a year later, I have to say, WE HAVE IT DOWN!  We have an amazing routine and honestly we compliment each other so well.  I cook, he cleans :) I mean, come on, how can it get better than that?!  Anyways before I get on with food talk, here are a couple pics from our beautiful 3 day wedding :D

October 25th, 2013 - Gaye Holud / Mehndi

Faraz and I :)

My bridesmaids!

October 26th, 2013 - The Actual Wedding!

     

Bridesmaid and Groomsmen can't even keep us apart ;)

Fall is definitely my favorite season now!

October 27th, 2013 - Walima / Wedding Reception!

Okay so now that I got my wedding out of the way, on to food talk.  Now that I live on my own and can't rely on my parent's cooking food, I have been cooking a lot, and I mean a lot! You know how they say the first year of marriage you eat out a lot?  Not us, we almost NEVER eat out unless it's a special occasion.  My passion for food has found a new level this last year which is why I haven't really blogged.  I cook so much that it just slips my mind to step a side and take pictures of it all.  But I promise, I will try to get back into blogging.  I have experimented a lot this past year, and I want to share it all with you all!  

So on to today's very easy recipe that requires no baking or cooking! Just a little assembling that is easy enough for kids to do.  I have made this almost every Thanksgiving for the last few years.  It's something my sister and I (and now Faraz) do together :)  Try it out as a cute little nibbler for your Thanksgiving table this year!

Ingredients for Acorn Bite

Ingredients (75-80 acorns):

1 - 12oz bag of Hershey Kisses (any kind works, I used Caramel filled ones for mine)

1 box of Ritz Bits (Peanut Butter tastes best!)

75 - 80 mini chocolate chips (milk chocolate or semi-sweet)

1/4 cup vanilla frosting

Instructions:

1. Unwrap all the Hershey kisses. Place them on a plate.  

2. Frost the bottom of the Hershey kisses, stick one Ritz Bit to the bottom of the Hershey kiss.

3. Frost a little dot on the top of the Ritz Bit, stick one mini chocolate chip to the top of the Ritz Bit.

4. Let dry for at least 30 mins.  Repeat until you run out of all the Hershey Kisses.  

5. Decorate all the acorns on a pretty plate and add them to your Thanksgiving spread! 

6. ENJOY!

 

Mint Chocolate Chip Clouds

Mint Chocolate Chip Cloud

Hi everyone! HAPPY NEW YEAR! I cannot believe it's already a whole new year! Can you believe it was only a year ago that I started this blog?! A whole year has already passed.  That's craziness! Things to be proud of: starting this blog, graduating college, starting a real job, and traveling a little more than usual. What's my new years resolution you ask? Well there are the cliche ones of losing the stubborn 10 pounds (so hard!), eating healthier (more green smoothies), blogging more than last year, maybe try video blogs for food, and finally doing something that is going to change my life forever (I'm going to keep that a secret for now).  What are your new year's resolutions?

Okay, so I made these cookies a while back, but they are absolutely delicious.  Very few calories per cookie, mostly the calories come just from the chocolate chips! My girl Gina is owner of this recipe and man did she do an amazing job! I took a bunch of these to work and it was an absolute hit.  Since starting to work, it's awesome whenever I have extras of goodies, I just go ahead and bring them to work! Anyways give these a shot, believe me you won't be disappointed!

Ingredients for Cookies

Ingredients (30-35 cookies):

3 large egg whites (room temperature)

1/8 tsp cream of tartar (spice aisle)

1/2 cup sugar

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 cup dark and mint chocolate chips

Instructions:
1. Preheat oven to 300 degrees.  Line cookie sheet with parchment paper.
2. Using a mixer (I used my Power Advantage Plus 9-Speed Hand Mixer), beat the egg whites and cream of tartar on high until soft picks.  Soft picks are when you pull up the mixer and the mixture stands up slightly.  

3. Slowly add the sugar, 1/8 cup at a time, beating the mixture the whole time.  Then add the vanilla extract.  The sugar should be completely dissolved leaving everything glossy.  

4. Fold in the dark chocolate and mint chips.

5. Drop the mixture by spoonfuls on the cookie sheet.
6. Bake cookies for about 40-45 minutes until the cookies are dry.

7. Cool on wire rack for about 10 minutes.  
8. ENJOY!

Dirt Pie

Dirt Pie

Hi everyone, okay I know I am a terrible person that makes promises about my blog and never follows through.  I have no idea what it is, but it's almost like when I was more busy, I made it a point to post blogs, but now with more free time, I just don't feel like sitting and blogging? Does that even make sense? Haha, I don't think it does.  Also, I recently got really fast internet for our family and became hooked on YouTube, I mean I have always watched YouTube videos, but at home that meant waiting 10 minutes for a video to load before being able to watch anything. Now I can just watch video after video.  And my addiction are beauty videos and cooking videos! Okay now on to the recipe!

Okay, well I made this dish way back on Halloween and I am just getting around to posting it.  But maybe this will inspire folks to make this next Halloween? Or you can get white oreo cookies and some beachy gummy worm and make it for a summer themed party?  I actually made this dish for my co-worker who kept insisting that he really wanted some dirt pie.  And while I was at it, I made two pies, one for my office and one for my friend's kiddie Halloween party.  You can just half the ingredients and make one pie, or better if you have a trifle dish, then you can layer the oreo and creamy layers!  This was definitely a hit and believe me worth EVERY calorie ;)

Ingredients for Pie

Ingredients (2 - 9inch circle pies):

1/4 cup butter

2 - 8oz packages of cream cheese

1 cup powdered sugar

2 - instant vanilla pudding packs

3 1/2 cups milk

8oz Cool Whip

1 1/2 package of Oreo cookies

1 package Gummy Worms

Instructions:
1. In a medium bowl, make the vanilla pudding according the the instructions on the box of the instant pudding.

2. Fold in thawed cool whip.
3. In another small bowl mix the butter, cream cheese, and powder sugar.

4. Mix the ingredients from the small bowl (step 3) with the medium bowl (step 2). Mix so everything is well incorporated.

5. Smash the oreos in a Ziploc bag until they are finely chopped (should resemble dirt).  I used a food processor to eliminate the mess!

6. In your first circle dish, first lay out a layer of 'dirt' (orea crumbs), then lay out some worms for a surprise for people, lay with half the whipped creamy mixture (step 4), and top with 'dirt.'

7. Add some worms here and there to make it seem like they are coming out of the 'dirt.'
8. Repeat process for the second pie.
9. Chill for at least 2 hours.  I stored mine in the fridge overnight!
10. ENJOY!

Pumpkin Spice Cookies with Cream Cheese Frosting

Pumpkin Spice Cookie with Cream Cheese Frosting

 Hi everyone! I am blogging and look it didn't take me a whole month to do so! Wow, something weird is going on right, I guess it makes sense since it almost HALLOWEEN! So since it's pumpkin season and who doesn't love pumpkins, I thought I would blog about this AMAZING cookie that I made tonight adapted from mybakingaddition.com! It's beyond delicious and sooooo easy to make! Now you can totally leave out the frosting, it still tastes awesome without it, but I prefer my cookies with a tad bit of frosting! And you can also decorate it however you want! I didn't have any sprinkles on hand, so opted with just making my frosting orange! 

Anyways, try this out and see what you think.  I am definitely taking the extra into work tomorrow.  Don't want to keep these cookies around the house or I might end up eating them all! Oh and incase I don't get to blog again before Halloween (let's hope that isn't the case) HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

Ingredients for Cookie

Ingredients (15 BIG cookies): 

1/2 cup vegetable shortening

6 tbsp unsalted butter

1 cup white sugar

1 cup canned pumpking

1 egg

1 tsp baking soda

1 1/2 tsp cinnamon powder

1 tsp pumpkin pie spice

1/4 tsp nutmeg

1/2 tsp salt

2 1/4 cup flour

----------Cream Cheese Frosting----------

4 oz light cream cheese

1/2 tbsp butter

2 cups powdered sugar

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 tbsp milk

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

2. Cream together shortening, butter, sugar, and canned pumpkin.

3. Add in the egg and mix.

4. Sift together the baking soda, cinnamon powder, pumpkin pie spice, nutmeg, salt, and flour.

5. Add in the dry ingredients (step 4) to the wet ingredients (step 3). 

6. Take 1/4 cup of mixture and place on cookie sheet.

7. Bake for about 15 minutes.

8. While cookies are baking, mix the cream cheese, butter, vanilla extract, and milk together until they are well combined.

9. Place frosting in the refrigerator for about 10-15 minutes so frosting hardens (if it's already hard and easy to place on top of cookies, then you can skip this step).

10. Let the cookies cool for about 5-10 minutes before putting the frosting or any other decorations on.  

11. ENJOY!

Strawberry and Blueberry Trifle

Strawberry and Blueberry Trifle

Hi everyone, I know, I know, I am terrible at keeping up with this! I don't know what is going on?! It's like with work and everything, I end up not having time to cook.  So this is my theory, I used to procrastinate studying by cooking and now that I don't have to study anymore, I have no need to procrastinate on anything! Makes sense?! No, yeah me neither :( No excuses, I need to get back to it!

Okay well I made this dessert a couple times already with different fruits.  The pictures today are from when I made this on Fourth of July! I used strawberries, blueberries, and a tiny bit of cherries just because we had some handy. Other times I have used kiwis, mandarin oranges, raspberries, all of which tasted delicious.  My best friend got me this dish for my birthday this year and it was perfect to showcase this beautiful trifle!  I also happened to see a skinny version of this delicious dessert on skinnytaste.com and had to try it for my self.  Oh one last thing, I always have a theory that good looking food always tends to taste pretty darn good! Anyways, enjoy!

Ingredients (10-12+ servings):

10 oz angel food cake

2 pints strawberries

2 pints blueberries

-----Cream Filling-----

6 tbsp fat-free sweetened condensed milk

1 1/2 cups cold water

1 package sugar-free white chocolate instant pudding mix

8 oz fat-free frozen whipped topping (lite)

Instructions:

1. Slice the strawberries sideways into long pieces.

2. Tear the angel food cake into 1-2inch square pieces.

3. Whisk together the condensed milk and water in a medium bowl.

4. Add in the pudding mix to the condensed milk mixture from step 3 and let stand for about 3 minutes.

5. Fold in the thawed frozen whipped topping.

6. In you trifle dish, spread evenly half of the angle food cake on the bottom layer.

7. Add a layer of blueberries (and I had a few cherries that I added too) to the top of the angel food cake.

8. Neatly spread half of the cream mixture from step 6 on top of the blueberries. 

9. Add a layer of strawberries to the top of the cream mixture. 

10. Layer the angel cake on top of strawberries, then the blueberries, and then finally the last of the cream mixture.

11. Make a pretty design on the top of the cream mixture with the remaining fruit.  You can be as creative as you want!  With your trifle dish you will be able to see the different layers of fruits, cake, and cream.

12. Optional: I put my trifle in the refrigerator for about 45 minutes before serving, but you can serve right away!

13. ENJOY!

Coconut Cookies N' Cream

Coconut Cookies N' Cream

Hi, everyone! So it's been beautiful in Seattle the last couple of days.  I dare say hot even! Now if you know anything about Seattle, you know that we cherish over 70 degree weather like none other! I remember when I had school during warm weather, over 65 degrees meant students in the quad wearing bikinis! And believe me I wish I was kidding!

Haha so anyways back on topic, the hot weather made me think of making some good old ice cream in my ice cream maker! It's been a while since I have made any ice cream, but I saw this really easy recipe online (from twopeasandtheirpod.com) and decided, alright what the heck, let's give it a go!  It turned out so delicious! In fact, my best friend came over and she might have ate about half of the batch.  I didn't make too much, because I still have yet to get a legit ice cream tub to store my ice cream after making it, so I like to make enough to just stay in the freezer for a couple days.  More days in the freezer without a proper container means more frozen ice than ice cream! Anyways, so here is the delicious and SUPER easy recipe that is absolutely DELICIOUS!

Ingredients (6-8 servings): 

13.5 oz of coconut milk (Chaokoh brand is what I used)

1/3 cup granulated sugar

2 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder

10-12 Oreos

Instructions:

1. Crush the Oreos into tiny pieces.

2. In a blender, blend the milk, sugar, and cocoa powder together until they are all well combined. 

3. Pour mixture in the canister of your ice cream maker.
4. Follow instructions according to your ice cream maker (each maker is slightly different).  This is where you will need ice and rock salt for your frozen yogurt to properly form (the measurements for this was according to the ice cream maker that I have, yours might be different).

5. Ice cream maker will churn the mixture for about 30-40 minutes before your mixture is turned into frozen yogurt. During the last 5-10 minutes of churning (mine starts to slow down slightly which is when I know it's time) add the crushed Oreos to the canister.   

7. You can eat the ice cream right away or store it in a air tight container in the freezer.
8. ENJOY!