Cream Cheese Danishes

I found this stellar recipe shortcut in my Taste Of Home Oct 2011 Magazine. And as I read the recipe I thought to myself… yes I could buy pre-made refrigerated turnovers at the store that requires only heating my oven or I can make these which is a perfect way to use up the homemade jams I have in the fridge.  What a brilliant idea this is! Why have I never thought of doing this before?!?

What I also like about this recipe is how you can easily make different flavored ones, I used raspberry jam in 2 of them and pumpkin butter in the other two and I actually liked my pumpkin ones the best.

Ok...so mine are messier looking than the picture in the magazine... I got a little carried away with the jam, I don't like to measure out ingredients

• Unroll 8 oz tube crescent dough and separate into 4 rectangles
• Beat 4 oz. cream cheese with ¼ cup powdered sugar, spread across each rectangle
• Top with jam
• Pinch the 2 opposite corners of the dough
• Bake on parchment paper at 375 degrees for 10-12 minutes or until golden brown
• Combine ½ C powdered sugar with 2 tsp milk and drizzle over danishes

Wow… as I just typed out the official recipe, I totally made this wrong! I use the cream cheese, milk and powdered sugar as the frosting and only used the jam in the dough. LOL!

This past weekend I made them again but this time I was so lazy all I did was undo the tube of dough and slapped a little jam in between each one ate them plain with no frosting. Still was delish! And I didn’t bother with the parchment paper either, which I found to be unnecessary to use.

So wake up EXTRA early in the morning, bum around and watch TV and make your husband think you are slaving in the kitchen making homemade crescents all morning and then throw these together in 10 minutes and he will believe that you went to a lot of work to make him breakfast. Just kidding, Aaron knows better… plus I was bragging about how little effort I put into them. 

My Little Pumpkin Poofers

Last weekend we had Charley's first Halloween Party at PetSmart.  The party entailed getting your picture taken, a parade and a costume contest.  She didn't win but that's because it wasn't a cutest puppy contest, if it was, she would have won for sure!  Our little Charley was a pumpkin for Halloween and her little outfit cracked us up!  We had a good time and she even got a goodie bag.  

She really is not a fan of the hat but we are!

She's just checking it all out... unsure what to think of all these dogs dressed up

This is a 80 lb golden doodle, we were told Charley will be 45 lbs max, every adult doodle we've ever met has been super friendly and this one was no different, he was so soft too!

I was trying to get Charley to sit next to this other goldendoodle but not a chance she would sit still for a picture with all the excitement going on

Time for the parade!  Her little butt just wiggles side to side when she walks, LOL!

Stiff competition right next to us, another pumpkin!  And he seems to actually like his hat more than Charley does

Gosh darn it Charley, your hat is over your eyes again!

The winner was Harry Potter, I  gotta give it to this dog, it was a pretty good costume

I'd say about 15-20 dogs were in the contest

Our official PetSmart picture that was part of our package

I think we are all set to go for when the trick or treaters come by this Sunday, Charley will be sporting her outfit performing tricks and giving the kids lots of love!

Pumpkin Cupcakes with Cinnamon-Cream Cheese Frosting

We LOVE pumpkin!  I embrace any recipe that has pumpkin as an ingredient.  October and November are really the only months I make pumpkin-inspired recipes but thank you Starbucks for serving pumpkin loaf all year round, that suffices my cravings the other 10 months of the year. And why is that!?!  Canned pumpkin is DA BOMB every month of the year!  Yes, I just said 'Da Bomb'....

This recipe came from my Kraft Foods Magazine.  And it is yummers!

Ingredients:

1 pkg spice cake mix
1 C sour cream
1 can (15 oz) pumpkin
1/4 C oil
3 eggs
1 pkg (8 oz) cream cheese, softened
1/2 C butter, softened
1 tsp vanilla
1 pkg (16 oz) powdered sugar
1 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

Heat oven 350 degrees.  Beat first 5 ingredients together, spoon into muffin cups.  Bake 20-22 minutes and cool completely.  Beat cream cheese, butter and vanilla.  Gradually beat in sugar.  Blend in cinnamon.  Spread over cupcakes.  Refrigerate cupcakes.

It's that easy!

HYDE TIP:  Make half the amount of frosting and you will have more than enough, this makes WAY TOO much frosting and I think cutting it in half will be more than plenty.  I wish I would have left some plain, a few times I found myself just wanting a plain one so next time I will leave a few unfrosted for myself.

Irresistible!

And what also made this recipe good was the fact that Charley slept the entire time making baking a lot easier! 

Stinkin' Cute

Our little Charley is so stinkin' cute, I just love her to pieces!  She is growing too!  2 weekends ago at the Vet, she weighed in at 5.6 lbs, grown one pound and we could tell!  So I have quite a few pics here but I couldn't resist, she is just so stinkin' cute!  I want to get as many pics as I can of her as she is growing because I have a feeling she is going to change in size dramatically from week to week.

I don't know how to go down these stairs so I just stare at mom

Hi Mom!

Hi Dad!

I'm just a mini friend!

Roar... mini lion!

I know how to sit and stay now... but only for a treat!

Big ball of fur!  So thankful she doesn't shed at all!

Her favorite spot... loves laying on top of our shoes

Really really likes getting to be in bed with us

For whatever reason, she loves laying on top of our heads, kinda weird 

Aaron is not going to be too thrilled when he sees I put this one out on the blog but look how cute she is!

I just want to gooble her up!  So stinkin' cute!

Stikes a pose for the camera

Loves sleeping in her kennel

Bye Bye for now!

A Rockin' 30th!

So Monday I turned the big 3-0! It really doesn’t faze me that much though, leaving my twenties and embarking on my thirties is not depressing at all. I don’t really feel 30 but I don’t feel like I’m 21 again either by no means. When we go back to UNI, we definitely feel much older than the college crowd that we see out. But I’d still like to think that I’m still considered pretty cool and hip by the youngins’!

This past weekend my parents and grandparents came up to celebrate my birthday and we had a great weekend! Saturday I shopped with my Mom and Grandma while the guys stayed back with Charley and watched football. For my bday I was looking for a new purse and found a few really awesome sweater/tops also. Successful shopping day at the mall!

After shopping we had dinner reservations at one of my favorite restaurants in town, Bonefish Grill. My chicken marsala was yummers and my Dad ordered swordfish and I was surprised by how much I liked his dish.

Aaron had ordered a whole tiramisu cake from another favorite restaurant of mine, Latin King as a surprise and my parents also surprised me by showing up with a tiramisu cake from my favorite hometown bakery Yummy’s. Holy Tiramisu!! Good thing I LOOOVEEE tiramisu! I’m determined not to let one piece go to waste.

My parents also came bearing two of the largest watermelons I have ever seen! Both grown in their own garden. Holy melons!

Almost half as tall as me!



The 2nd one was about a third the size of Aaron!


Fantastic bday weekend with my family! Aaron always does a great job of making my birthdays extra special, I scored a great husband who spoiled me especially this birthday! Thanks everyone for making this birthday extra special!


2 dozen roses from my wonderful husband!

Now a little humerous flashback… The key differences between the milestones of turning 30 versus 21…

• At 30 I’m more focused on having a nice relaxing dinner and being in bed well before midnight. When I turned 21, I hurried up and ate so I could go out with my friends and dance it up at the most popular college hot spot until 2 am.

• At 30, I have a lot of aches, pains and sports injuries when working out. At 21, I was pretty hard on my body and joints and bounced right back the next day with no pain. Now that part is depressing!

• At 30, I wear whatever I have in my closet to dinner; no special bday outfit was purchased. At 21, I bought an outfit specifically to wear for my birthday.

• At 30, I need to wake up the next day at a decent time (and did set an alarm) to get things done. At 21, I want to sleep the day away and order in food all day.

• At 30, I show up to work on my bday. At 21, I used a vacation day.

• I’m thinking this is my last bday party I’m going to do for a few years; celebrating 31-39 with just Aaron is okay with me. At 21, I was already thinking ahead to bigger and better birthday parties.

• At 30, ordering a drink with dinner isn’t even thought of as anything out of the ordinary. At 21, I ordered a drink with pride.

• At 30, I’m more into anti-aging creams and wrinkle reduction (yes I do have a few wrinkles). At 21, I swore off sun block and used acne creams.

• At 30, I'm home more often on a Saturday night and had no idea how funny SNL is and how I missed out on all those years of Saturday Night Live.  When I was 21, no way was I staying in on a Saturday night to watch something called SNL.

• And last but not least… At 21 I thought 30 was OLD, I now feel 30 is YOUNG!

Saturday Morning Ambition

It's been awhile since I've posted a recipe.  I've been disappointed with a lot of recipes I've been trying.  They are turning out they way the should but I just either don't think it is anything great or don't even like it.  But I had a hot streak this past weekend and made a few recipes worth sharing!  I'll share one today and keep the other for a later blog post.

Saturday morning I got ambitious for breakfast and made gluten-free pumpkin pancakes and mini ham 'n' cheese frittatas and it was delicious!

Mini ham 'n' cheese frittatas - super easy recipe!  From my Taste of Home Magazine:

Divide 1/4 pound cubed cooked ham among 8 greased muffin cups; top with 1 C shredded cheddar.  Beat 6 eggs and 4 egg whites.  Add 3 Tbsp minced chives, 2 Tbsp milk, 1/4 tsp each salt & pepper.  Pour over cheese, bake at 375 degrees for 22-25 minutes. 

HYDE SHORTCUT: I used pre-packaged bacon bits instead of ham.  I added two extra eggs so I could fill all my pan.  Super easy, very yummy.  Only downfall was that the pan was a bear to clean afterwards and I had it greased well and it still was pretty glued on.  Suggestion: foil muffin cup holders might be worth trying.

Gluten-Free Pumpkin Pancakes, from my Easy Gluten-Free Baking Cookbook by Elizabeth Barbone (she has the most amazing gluten free recipes in this cookbook! I highly recommend it!)

Dry Ingredients:
1 1/2 C white rice flour
1/2 C cornstarch
2 Tbps packed dark brown sugar
1 Tbps baking powder
1 1/2 tsp pumpkin pie spice
1 tsp salt
1/4 tsp xanthan gum (very important ingredient to make your gluten free recipes stick together and not fall apart, something I've learned over the past year!)

Wet Ingredients:
1 1/2 C milk
3/4 C pure pumpkin (not pumpkin pie filling)
1 Large egg
2 Tbsp vegetable oil, plus more for griddle

In bowl, mix dry ingredients.  Add wet ingredients and blend into a batter.  Cook on a griddle like you would for a normal pancake (1-2 min per side). 

HYDE TIP: I transfer all my batter once mixed up into a 2 Cup Measuring Cup that has a lip for pouring and pour it onto my griddle from there, pouring from the bowl is frustrating and makes a mess, a little tip to make your cooking go smoother.

Bath Time!

Charley's first few days as a Hyde were a little traumatizing.  Bath time was definitely one where she didn't know what was going on and didn't like it at all but overall was very good while we bathed her.  I thought she was so cute dripping wet!



I wash the front half but I let Aaron have the privledge of washing the back half :)



So traumatized right now!



I held her for a long time as she shivered afterwards



But not long before her coat poofed back out and she was off to play!