For Your Birthday- I Grew You a Cat

Hi Guys!! So for those of you who noticed I was MIA yesterday its because it was my birthday! Woot! Birthday Birthday!

BIRTHDAY!!!

I had one of those days where the little things truly made everything perfect.  My co-workers brought me to a fabulous lunch and gave me cupcakes from Crumbs- NOM.  I got a hilarious card that looks like this 

 (source)

 

and Mama Nay Nay and Faj bought me a beautiful bamboo. If you knew my boss at all you would understand the hilariousness of him picking this card for my birthday... but then again you don't.. soooo moving on!

For those of you who live in this area, you know that it was kind of a dreary day but no worries. With the help of Ms. Amy and the lovely Degie and D, the evening deffinitly started off on the right foot- Pizza slices at the famous Gotham Pizza on the Upper East Side.  If you haven't been there, you need to go. The slices are amazing and pretty much any fast food restaurant that also serves fountain soda works for me! 

I wish this was a picture of my pizza but again, bad blogger so I sniped it from here but it is a quite accurate image of what I consumed.

We later went to Dorrians (eh-not fab) and then D and I had and amazing stumbleupon moment.  While walking to the subway to go to the Gramercy Theater for what turned out to be an amazing night of fabulous concerting we were chatting about In & Out Burger because I have never been and D, in her West-coastiness was appalled that I didn't go with Faj last summer when we drove the coast.  Either way, she started chatting about how much she would give her left arm for Shake Shack.  After yelping, hopstopping and giggling on the street corner we eventually gave up our search seeing as all of our technological devices were telling us to throw in the towel.  Set on Duane Reading for some Sour Patch Kids, we walked 2 steps (nope not 2 blocks, legit 2 steps) and what did we see but this!

 Well not actually that because again, I stink at remembering to take pics but this person stumbled upon that and its pretty similar to what we saw :)

Yes, the birthday Gods were looking down on me. 

This pretty much made my birthday.Yes there was amazing concerting afterward into the wee hours of the morning (and yes I am up and at work at 8:35 in spite of it), but that is another post for another time.

Funny how the simple things in life seem to make everything so much better.  Well, saving up my energy for this weekend's celebration festivities.  Sissy K is helping to throw me a party of which I know NO details.  I am a planner so as you might assume- I am stressed.  Sure its going to be fab!

What did you guys do on your bday this year?

Adventures with Amy and its Everyone's Birthday

Last night I had a fabulous evening with Amy over at Fruit Salad Life that was filled with shopping (both loehmans AND TJMaxx) grocery shopping (my favorite kind), making dinner, baking, and just general girl time hangs.   Ever since Amy moved to NYC I have been overjoyed! She has the best outlook on life and the most upbeat and contagiously happy personality. Last night's adventure was nothing short of wonderful. 


We spent most of the day online gchatting about our evening plans.  As Amy said, we are both planners which allows us to organize very fun activities on our busy busy schedules.  We decided that we could do a little shopping.  Amy was in desperate need for new swim suit bottoms- yay summer!  We hit up Loehmans, which obviously meant Jessica bought a new shirt.  Amy grabbed a shirt and a fun pair of swim suit bottoms that were a very exciting pattern (very Amy!).  On our walk over to Trader Joes (obsession!), Amy spotted TJMaxx which, of course, meant we were going in.  A full swim suit, swim suit bottoms and a cool reusable coffee mug later, we were off to Trader Joe's to get our dinner.  We had decided earlier in the day that we were going to cook dinner because we both want to avoid the going-out-to-dinner-ever-night disease that many people in the city catch.  I had chicken so we decided to grab some sweet potatoes for sweet potato fries and last minute purchased some brussel sprouts! nom nom nom.


Amy whipped us up a delicious meal:

 Sweet Potato Fries:

Baked Brussel Sprouts.


These of course accompanied some protein.  Grilled chicken with melted cheese on a cinnamon raisin bagel thing. It was phenomenal.


If you are looking for recipes for the sprouts, head over to Amy's blog and check it out!


After dinner, baking was done, Birthday Cupcakes were made!   Today is a big birthday day for a lot of this girls friends. Therefore, BIRTHDAY SHOUT OUT TIME:


HAPPY BIRTHDAY LISA!
HAPPY BIRTHDAY DEVON!
HAPPY BIRTHDAY MADDIE!
HAPPY BIRTHDAY LAURA!
HAPPY BIRTHDAY SHAR!


In honor of everyone's birthday I decided to make birthday fun cupcakes for Lisa who lives in NYC too! I am going to surprise her at work and drop them off... shhh dont tell her :)


This recipe was adapted from about a bajillion things (one of which is this go to Weight Watchers recipe) so I will just lay out the recipe for you. 


Easy Peasy Recipe for Birthday Funfetti Cupcakes.


Ingredients:

1 1/2 cup all purpose flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/8 teaspoon salt

1/3 cup sugar
1/4 cup unsalted butter

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

2 egg whites

3/4 cup fat free vanilla greek yogurt

1/4 cup fat free vanilla yogurt

1/4 cup fat free skim milk

1/3 cup sprinkles

Steps:

1) Preheat oven to 350°F.

2) In a medium bowl, combine flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt 

3) In a separate bowl, combine butter, sugar and vanilla until light and fluffy with an electric mixer

4) Add eggs and yogurt to the wet mixture and mix until well-combined with an electric mixer

5) Alternating between the flour mixture and milk, add to the wet mixture while the electric mixer continues to run until batter is fully blended

6) Blend in sprinkles

7) Spoon batter into muffin tins that have been pam-ed and lined. Each muffin should be about 3/4s full.

8) Bake until tops are slightly golden about 18 to 23 minutes. 

9) Let cupcakes cool

10) Spread on frosting. (This time I used some store bought frosting as I am going out of town this weekend and didn't want to make a huge batch of frosting)

These turned out very well. I may or may not have had 1, or 2.  Perfect dessert from Amy and my amazing meal!


And now they are all packaged up to take to Lisa at work :) Hope she is surprised!

Not going to Starfabulously Rate these as they are very similar to the birthday cupcakes made for roommate in early May

Happy Birthday Everyone!

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:

Neon, Nutella and an Addiction to Rhyming

This weekend I went to Boston to see some friends, one of whose birthday it was! Lots of birthday's in May in case you didn't catch on to that- :)

It was an amazing time. Lots of 80s style bowling followed by lots of dancing. I LOVE bowling.  I don't think you fully understand my degree of love for bowling... and the 80s for that matter. I know that my girl Amy over at Fruit Salad Life will be extremely jealous when she sees my neon orange nails that were painted for the 80s bowling occasion!  Please see the amazingness below of the ladies bowling:

On the train ride home, feeling quite gross, I decided two important things:

1) I was ABSOLUTELY going to work out the second I got home

2) I refused to let the excess frosting from Faj's Bday Cupcakes go to waste so more (different!) cupcakes needed to be made.

After my fabulous workout- it stunk, but hey, I did it!- I made these amazing creations. I had a little bit of Nutella left over from my Nutella Chocolate Chip Cookies. I had to be used up. I am pretty much addicted to Nutella so leaving it around the house is never a good idea for this girl. Therefore this creation was made with a combination of Nutella and These Easy Vanilla Cupcakes.  

Also, I made roommate take them with her to work this AM because I am pretty sure my colleagues are going to kick me if I keep bringing in baked goods and they obviously can not stay in my apt.

Vanilla Nutella Cupcakes with Vanilla Frosting- RHYMING!

These are easy as pie, or in this case- cupcakes!

Ingredients:

1 cup all purpose flour

1/2 cup whole wheat flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/8 teaspoon salt

1/3 cup sugar
1/4 cup unsalted butter

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

2 egg whites

3/4 cup fat free vanilla greek yogurt

1/4 cup fat free vanilla yogurt

1/4 cup fat free skim milk

1/3 cup Nutella

Steps:

1) Preheat oven to 350°F.

2) In a medium bowl, combine flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt 

3) In a separate bowl, combine butter, sugar and vanilla until light and fluffy with an electric mixer

4) Add eggs and yogurt to the wet mixture and mix until well-combined with an electric mixer

5) Alternating between the flour mixture and milk, add to the wet mixture while the electric mixer continues to run until batter is fully blended

6) Spoon batter into muffin tins that have been pam-ed and lined. Each muffin should be about 3/4s full and 3/4s of the batter should be gone from the bowl

7) Add a dollop of Nutella on top of each cupcake

8) Add the remaining cupcakes mix on top of each cupcake evenly so Nutella is no longer visible

9) Bake until tops are slightly golden about 18 to 23 minutes. 

10) Let cupcakes cool. 

11) Once cupcakes are cool frosting with Buttercream Frosting 

Below the frosting domainted them:

After frosting dominated them:

NOM NOM NOM.  I ate one for dessert and I would deffinitly give them a Star Fabulous Rating of 7/10.  They are quite delicious and hit the spot.  When warm, we are probably looking at a Star Fabulous Rating of 8/10. Nothing like warm melting Nutella- OOPH I am making myself hungry!

Star Fabulous Rating: 7/10

Cupcakes, Birthdays and Family Nights on the Town

Last night was a fabulous adventure with the fam!  We went over to Sissy K's apartment for much Pinot and cupcakes (my creation) and then headed out to dinner at Crispo downtown which was amazing! I got a delicious prosciutto cheese platter- yes for my meal, I have been CRAVING prosciutto recently so gotta satisfy my craving and move on!  They also had the most amazing artichoke heart appetizer. So amazing that we got two orders!

Well the cupcake creations were an absolute hit! Dad loved them so I believe if the birthday boy enjoys them you can classify those as a hit! Wahoo. And yes, we ate them before dinner- it felt very indulgent and fabulous :)

These are a little trickier to make than your standard cupcakes and frosting but not by much. They are worth ever step! We will do the cupcakes first and then tackle the frosting.

Cupcakes

Ingredients:

1 1/4 cup all-purpose flour

2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

6 tablespoons unsalted butter

1 cup granulated sugar

3 large egg whites

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1/2 teaspoon almond extract

1/2 cup milk

12 tablespoons sugar free strawberry preserves (I went with Trader Joes- OBVI)

Steps:

1) Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F

2) In a medium mixing bowl combine flour, baking powder, sugar and salt.

3) Add butter to try mixture with an electric mixer

4) In a separate large bowl combine mill, egg whites, and both extract.

5) Slowly add the dry ingredients to the large bowl of wet ingredients and beat slowly until there are no lumps.

6) Fill pam-ed muffin tins 1/2 way

7) Scoop one tablespoon of sugar free jam on top of each cupcake

8) Top with one more scoop of cake batter

9) Bake for 15 to 25 minutes, until top of cupcakes begins to brown slightly

10) Remove and let cool!

While the cupcakes are cooling, you can create the frosting!

This frosting was stolen from here and is absolutely delicious! Note tho: It makes SO much frosting that I think I'm going to have to bake tonight because I have an entire bowl left! If you are trying to make frosting just for the above cupcakes, I would suggest cupping the below recipe in 3!

Frosting:

Ingredients:

1 cup unsalted butter at room temperate

6 cups powdered sugar

1/2 cup milk

1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Steps:

1) In a small bowl cream butter with an electric mixer

2) Add 4 cups of the powdered sugar and the milk and vanilla and mix at a low speed until combine (add powdered sugar a little at a time)

3) Add two more cups of the sugar and combine until light and fluffy!

After the cupcakes are cooled completed spread the frosting on top of the cupcakes and dollop with red cakemate. Swirl around with spoon for effect (if you desire)

These are amazing cupcakes.  The strawberry filling really adds the extra omph to make them over-the-edge-superior-to-your-standard-cupcake-kinda-treat. 

The frosting was a little too sweet for this girl but all in all the creation was quite delicious.  I give these a Star Fabulous Rating of 8/10!

Star Fabulous Rating: 8/10

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

Vanilla Cupcakes with Chocolate Frosting

This weekend was some FABULOUS ladies birthday celebration weekend.  7 people in one apartment on Saturday night is obviously the sign of a successful birthday.  Other key components a successful bday, Mexican food, margaritas... and BIRTHDAY CUPCAKES! 

These cupcakes are a staple in my life.  They were also made back in the day for my other roommate's birthday in January but this time I changed things up a little bit and just to make things better, the frosting, which is amazing, is completely made from scratch and a Jessica-vention. 

Cupcake Ingredients: (Adapted from Weight Watchers)

1 cup all purpose flour

1/2 cup whole wheat flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/8 teaspoon salt

1/3 cup sugar
1/4 cup unsalted butter

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

2 egg whites

3/4 cup fat free vanilla greek yogurt

1/4 cup fat free vanilla yogurt

1/4 cup fat free skim milk

Steps:

1) Preheat oven to 350°F.

2) In a medium bowl, combine flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt 

3) In a separate bowl, combine butter, sugar and vanilla until light and fluffy with an electric mixer

4) Add eggs and yogurt to the wet mixture and mix until well-combined with an electric mixer

5) Alternating between the flour mixture and milk, add to the wet mixture while the electric mixer continues to run until batter is fully blended

6) Spoon batter into muffin tins that have been pam-ed and lined. Each muffin should be about 3/4s full.

7) Bake until tops are slightly golden about 18 to 23 minutes. 

8) Let cupcakes cool. 

Frosting Ingredients:

1/4 cup chocolate chips

1/4 cup water

1/4 cup skim milk

1/2 tablespoon of cocoa powder

2 tablespoons of powdered sugar

Additional: White Chocolate Chips

Steps (continued):

9) While cupcakes are cooling put chocolate chips in a microwave safe bowl and microwave for 30 seconds.

10) Remove and add water and place back in the microwave for 1 minute

11) Remove, stirx (add more water if necessary), and put back in the microwave

12) Add cocoa powder, powdered sugar and milk and stir until frosting-like consistency.  If it appears too think place in the microwave a little longer.

13) Once cupcakes have cooled frost and add white chocolate chips for decorations!

  Decorating these was the most fun.  Actually, late night eating them was the most fun. 

I believe all in all, SUCCESS!

My roommate (whose birthday it was) gave them this great rating!

Star Fabulous Rating: