Red White and Shia with a Side Jousting

Hi Everyone! SO sorry I am been MIA the past couple of days.  With the 4th of July and traveling up the wazoo to go see BF, I decided to take what little time I had to relax and veg (ie: Women's health and Love Bites- anyone seen that? Surprisingly great!). 

Welp moving on! The 4th was amazing.  It is always so much fun to be down in DC for holidays, all the excitement of being a nice big city without all the stress of the Big Apple makes for one very happy Jessica.

The weekend consisted of all that you need for a successful trip:

1) Transformers 3D: Dark of the Moon- SCORE- Shia is a hottie.(Ok this pic may be a little more scary man than hottie, but you get the idea)

 Source

Shia is totally not my type at all but Selena Gomez has got it right with this one. BTW if you don't know what I am talking bout you are lame- please watch below: 

 2) A party involving outdoor beer pong, an inflatable jousting ring, a rooftop bar, and a lighting storm.  I will leave those images up to the imagination.

3) A little bit of (lot a bit of!!) BF and an extra long visit!

Yesterday after I got home from work I finally had a second to slow down from all the traveling, Shia worshiping and jousting (?) to relax, put up my feet and just hang out.  But nope, I most certainly did not do that. I did what I do best- I baked!!

I have been dying to make some of Julie's Peanut Butter Granola and I finally had the time. As most of you know, I always say, the best thing for a baker is when you have all the ingredients already.  WOOT! Check! Off I go. 

I made one slight tweak because I am a weirdo and I don't really like peanut butter but I would give my Right Arm (not my left, my RIGHT, the one I actually need to do stuff) for a never ending supply of Better N Butter. 

Ingredients: 

2 Tablespoons Better N Butter

2 Tablespoons Honey

1/4 Teaspoon Cinnamon

14 Teaspoon Vanilla

1 Cup Oats

Steps:

1) Preheat oven to 325 degrees F

2) Combine BnB and honey in a microwave safe bowl and microwave for about 20 seconds. Remove and stir to fully combine

 3) Add in the cinnamon and vanilla and stir to combine 

4) Add oats to the wet mixture and fold until the oats are completely covered in BnB mixture.

5) Spread oats onto a pam-ed cookie sheet and bake for 7 – 8 minutes until granola is slightly browned.

 6) Let cool until granola is crunchy.

* * using too more peanut butter does not make mixture peanutbuttery-ier-, it makes it not crunchy. 

These stuff is the bomb. Julie was not lying. Addictive. Danger. Lock the cabinet... or just dominate the bowl. Hey, I needed to try some in order to accurately starfabulously rate it. DUH. 

Star Fabulous Rating: 9/10- Mine got a little soggy. I got PB happy. Oops! 

Choco Peanut Butta Cookies For Guardian Angel George

Peanut Butter is the best. Hands down. Best. Chocolate is equally the best. Hands down. Best. TIE! Therefore when I was making celebratory cookies to give to my broker at my lease signing today, Peanut Butter and Chocolate were involved.  Yes-I made cookies for my broker, George, to thank him.  If any of you have ever lived in Manhattan, you know that searching for an apartment is like sticking a fork in your eye repeatedly while running barefoot on fire. That actually may be an understatement. Therefore, when George came along, he was my guardian angel and really bent over backwards to make sure we were comfortable and that we got what we were looking for. George obviously deserved a treat! Choco Peanut Butta Cookies, here we come.

I am not even going to make you wait until the end to learn how these were starfabulously rated. These deserve a Star Fabulous Rating of 10/10. No questions asked.  Do you have your spoon out? Got the bowl ready?  Here we go!

Ingredients:

1 cup granulated sugar

1/2 cup unsalted peanut butter (I went with Trader Joes- bargain hunters’ best friend)

14 cup unsalted butter

2 Eggs

½ teaspoon vanilla extract

½ teaspoon salt (if you use salted peanut butter cut this a smidge)

½ teaspoon of baking soda

1 cup whole wheat flour (or ¾ cup whole wheat flour and ¼ cup all purpose flour)

½ cup chocolate chips

Steps:

1)  Preheat oven to 375 degrees F

2) Place sugar, butter and peanut butter in a large bowl and with an electric mixer, beat until light and fluffy.

3) Add eggs and vanilla to sugar mixture and blend well with mixer until combined.

4) Add salt, baking soda and flour to sugar mixture and beat until completely combined with the electric mixer

5) Add chocolate chips and mix with the electric mixer until evenly distributed through the batter.

6)  Put tablespoon size blobs of the batter on a pam-ed cookie sheet. Note: Make sure to leave about 2 

inches between each cookie, they expand!

7) Bake cookies for about 7 to 8 minutes. When removing they will look slightly undercooked.  Cookies continue to cookie once removed from the oven so it is essential that you remove this early enough to allow them to be ooey gooey.

8) Makes about 30 cookies! 

Now you have two choices...

a) You can be the smart responsible person who individually packages them up for friends before they devour the whole batch

OR

b) You can be the girl like me, who ate four before she remembered that she was supposed to give them to her guardian angel broker friend. The choices is yours :)

Star Fabulous Rating: 10/10

Tickles Are Dumb and 3 Minute Better n' Butter Cookies

Hope you all had a nice relaxing (or amazingly eventful) Memorial Day Weekend! Mine was fabulous, per usual. Nice time with the family and The Best Day of the Year Beat Christmas Day proved to be filling for sure.  As promised, here is the usual picture taken on this particular day, of the entire cousin clan tickling me (there a few things I dislike more than tickling- although I do look quite happy huh?):

Well beyond this day, there are many things I need to catch you up on.  First of all, on Friday after lunch with Lisa I was craving something nice and sweet, and since I am currently trying to do the Only Eat What You Have Challenge , that I created for myself, I decided to try to make one of Tina's 3 Minute Cookie Wonders.  I went for the 3 Minute Peanut Butter Cookie that she recently posted but made a few slight changes to lighten it up even more!

Ingredients: 

2 tbsp Better n' Butter

1/2 tbsp of Splenda Brown Sugar Blend

1 tbsp Egg Whites

1/4 tsp Baking Powder

1/4 tbsp of Vanilla Extract

Steps:

1) Combine the above ingredients in a microwave-safe bowl.

2) Mix ingredients well with a spoon (make sure that the baking powder is completely mixed in)

3) Scrape batter off the sides of the bowl and flatten into a round cookie shape.

4) Microwave for 60 seconds.

5) If the mixture still look liquidy (which it did for me), or not like a cookie, continue to microwave for 60 second intervals until it has formed into a cookie

6) Cool and DIG IN

This cookie really hit the spot and tided me over perfectly before the long, 4 hour, train ride.  Isn't traveling the pits?

Well I believe that these little treat deserve a Star Fabulous Rating.  These are pretty tricky to starfabulously rate because although they are "cookies" they are not like your standard cookie treats.  They do however really satisfy a sweet tooth if you are craving a last minute, easy to whip up, nibble. I am going to give this a Star Fabulous Rating of 5/10. RIGHT down the middle.  Do you know what this means? You've got to try and make it and starfabulously rate it yourself to help me choose :)  I personally was very satisfied by it, but then again, I don't mind health food tasting treats.  Since it only made one serving I was unable to reach to my Tasters to help me starfabulously rate this so I reach out to you.  Give me your opinion love!

Star Fabulous Rating:

Pretzel Lovers and Birthday Shout Outs

 Last night Maj and Faj made their way into the city because today it is Faj's birthday!! 

HAPPY BIRTHDAY FAJ!

Tonight we are going to Crispo down town. I have been before and it is sooo good! I am sure pictures will follow tomorrow.

Of course, cupcakes were made, but those will be posted tomorrow after they are adequately devoured. 

While Faj and Maj and sibling were getting drinks last night and scurried home to make the frosting for the cupcakes. I last minute decided to also make a delicious, no-bake-quick-treat to bring into the office tomorrow. During lunch when I ran over to the grocery store to buy powdered sugar for the frosting for Faj's cupcakes, my colleague joined and went off about his love for pretzels.  All I could think of the entire rest of the day was how amazing pretzels and chocolate are together.  During my exploration I stumbled upon this amazing recipe at Blog is New Black which absolutely HAD to be made- I.M.M.E.D.I.A.T.E.L.Y. 

Also, any recipe that only involves 5 ingredients is right up my alley. Made a few small tweaks and they still came out great!

Here we go!

Ingredients: 

1/2 cup creamy reduced fat peanut butter (could use Better n Butter or Almond Butter if you wanted, I just needed to get rid of this regular peanut butter)

1/4 cup powdered sugar

1 tablespoon room temperature unsalted butter

1 cup crushed, whole wheat, pretzel minis

1/2 bar of milk chocolate and 1/2 cup bittersweet m and ms

Steps:

1) In a medium bowl stir together peanut butter, powdered sugar, unsalted butter and crushed pretzels.

2) Once combine roll into 1" balls (will make about 10) 

3) Freeze for 30 minutes, or until firm. 

4) Melt chocolate in a microwave safe bowl - (I melted the bar and rolled half the balls in the bar melted chocolate, then I melted the chips and rolled the remaining in the chips- hence why mine are two different colors)- I am sure that you could mix them together and it would be just as delish

5) Roll peanut pretzel bars in the melted chocolate until completely covered 

6) Place in refrigerator to let chocolate set in until ready to eat

These are quite scrumptious, I am hoping the office loves em but I haven't brought em out of the office fridge yet! 

I ate one at home and definitely give these a Star Fabulous rating of 9/10. Chocolate. Pretzels. Peanut Butter- where could it go wrong!

Star Fabulous Rating: 9/10

Confused Pancake Cookies

It is only because I promised to deliver both the good and the bad, the pretty and the ugly, that I am writing this post.

As I am sure many of you thoughtful people already know, this week is Administrative Professionals Week!  Our team of fab people over here decided we wanted to show our favorite person in the office how much we appreciated her so everyone got a job!  One woman grabbed a beautiful card, the team ordered a gorgeous orchid and I was in charge of bringing a tasty treat! Being comforted with the fact that I had back-up PB &J Bars, that I knew people would love considering how well they have been received, I took a simple and stable recipe from the fabulous  Tina.. and fiddled... bad move Jessica.

Now before I tell you what changes I made to this easy, simple and classic recipe, I think it is essential to make this note. 

I have learned from experience (ahem... this recipe) that certain classics can only be tweaked to be made healthy so much before you take the tweaking too far.

 

Tina's treats are both scrumptious, and healthy and should have been left alone. 

With that said, here goes nothing. 

Ingredients:

1 cup whole wheat flour

1/4 cup brown sugar

1/4 cup sugar

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 tsp baking powder

2 tbsp unsweetened apple sauce

1/3 cup liquid egg whites

1/2 cup butterscotch chips

Steps:

1) Preheat oven to 350 degrees F

2) Mix all ingredients in one bowl

3) Make into 12 portions and place on pam-ed sheet

4) Bake cookies for 10-12 minutes.

5) Remove cookies from baking sheet and allow to cool

Now it should be said that these cookies did not taste bad by any means.  The problem was simply that replacing all oils and butter (fats) with applesauce unfortunately removed the crumbly delicious texture of  cookies that makes them as good as they are.

The results... according to my taste testers, were that the cookies tasted less like cookies... and more like:

(Picture Source)

Needless to say I did not subject the office to these confused pancakecookies and they are currently under tinfoil on my kitchen counter (hoping maybe they are like Peeps and are a little better stale?)  

The team got exactly what they wanted with the rest of these goodies.

The best thing that came out of this exploration however... I feel a delicious pancake recipe brewing in this dome. 

Now, if treated like cookies, these suckers probably deserved something along the lines of 2 maybe 3 stars on the Star Fabulous Rating System (edible, but hey so is gum, doesn't mean you should swallow it).  I believe it is important, however, to recognize these for what they truly are, no matter the original goal. 

Star Fabulous Rating if treated like Confused PancakeCookies:

Asparagus Prosciutto Pizza

 **Not baking but too delicious not to share**

Last night we had a small shin-dig at my APT with some girlies.  Jvo and I have been planning to have a delish dinner date ever since our extravagant brunch at Friends of a Farmer a couple of weeks back.  She is currently is on an asparagus kick, and anything involving pizza always works for me so we tackled this Asparagus Pizza Recipe with a few slight changes.

We adventured down to Trader Joe's (my main complaint about this city is that there aren't enough Trader Joes'). Grabbed some goodies and headed back to the APT to devour. 20 min later and 17 blocks, we were starving.

The recipe that we used was a little indulgent but definitely worth the splurge! We kinda of winged everything, one of the nice things about cooking is that you can mainly just go with the flow and it will still come out well :)

Ingredients (roughly)

1oz Prosciutto (roughly one package)

Olive oil, for drizzling

1 whole wheat Trader Joe's Pizza dough

1 1/4 cups grated Monterey jack

1 giant block of Fresh Mozzarella (we went with a sort of spicy olive oil marinated block)

6 asparagus stalks

1/2 a sweet onion

2 tablespoons minced garlic

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

10 basil leaves, finely chopped

 The steps to this were very simple and perfect to do with a friend!  Jvo and I split things up and it worked out perfectly!

1) Spread dough over a pam-ed baking sheet and dust with olive oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper

2) Cut onion and saute with olive oil until cooked well but not overly brown

3) place the olive oiled dough into the oven to toast lightly while you...

4) Cut asparagus into small 3 inc pieces

5) Cut mozzarella chunk into small quarter size pieces

6) Pull prosciutto into long thin pieces

7) Chop basil into small crisp pieces

8) Remove dough from the oven and sprinkle garlic evenly throughout

9) Sprinkle Monterey Jack cheese evenly over dough

10) Add asparagus evenly

11) Add Mozzarella evenly

12) Add Prosciutto evenly

13) Top with basil!

 (deliciousness before we threw it in the oven!)

14) Put in over for 20 to 35 minutes until edges start to brown.

15) Dig in!

This recipe made PLENTY of food.  Four starving girls (roommate and roommate's fred were stuffed and there was enough for Jvo to take home for lunch today. Perfect.

What better way to end a scrumptious salty meal then with a delicious sweet treat! We dominated my PB&J Bars and then all were comfortably stuffed until about... right now.

PB &J Bars

When I was younger I was the pickiest eater in the entire world. No. I am not exaggerating.  My daily meals consisted of cereal for breakfast, plain pasta with a little bit of butter for dinner and every single day I ate Peanut Butter and Jelly Sandwich on whole wheat bread for lunch. Thank you mother for forcing whole wheat bread down my throat as I now find white bread revolting and whole wheat is better for me anyway.  

Needless to say, the epic PB & J combo is something that I often (and quite randomly) crave. Crave, as in ABSOLUTELY need.  I browsed my collection of genius blogs and stumbled upon The Sweets Life's brilliant PB & J masterpiece.  With a couple of tweaks (I am a heavy up Jelly girl, not a PB queen) I created this fantastically satisfying walk down Childhood Lane.

Ingredients: 

1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
3/4 cup creamy peanut butter (wish I had reduced fat but the Deli only had regular)
3/4 cup brown sugar
 4 tablespoons unsalted butter

3/4 cups unsweetened Applesauce

1 1/2 tablespoons egg whites
1 tsp vanilla extract
3/4 cup raspberry preserves 

Steps:

1) Preheat oven to 350F. 

2) Line 9 x 13 brownie baking pan with tinfoil and spray with cooking spray.

3) In a small bowl. whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt. Set aside.
4) Beat butter, peanut butter, and sugar in a large bowl with an electric mixer until smooth

5) Add applesauce, egg whites and vanilla and beat in slowly with the electric mixer

6) Add flour mixture, beating on low just until blended.
7) Transfer 3/4 of the dough into prepared pan smoothing out evenly with your fingers and pressing onto the bottom of the pan. 

8) Place remaining dough in the refrigerator while doing the next step

9) Spread jelly over the crust evenly. 

10) Remove remaining dough from fridge and sprinkle in grape-size pieces on top of jelly

11) Bake bars for 30 to 45 minutes, until golden brown on top.

12) Cool bars completely in the pan on a cooling rack. 

13) Lift foil from pan to remove bars and cut into 28 squares

These are fantastic.  My love/obsession with jelly was completely satisfying and the PB was delish but not overwhelming as it easily can be. 

Cant wait to serve them at dinner tonight. Hope everyone loves em :)

Personally, I give them the below Star Fabulous Rating...

Star Fabulous Rating: 9/10