(I love Uncle Si! ) Introducing...

The Si Tai!

I'm a huge huge huge Duck Dynasty fan. The show makes me happy happy happy.

During the season finale, the family went to Hawaii. My favorite character, Uncle Si, grabbed one of the woman's Mai Tai and declared it a "Si Tai".

That was it for me. I knew I had to create it.

I based the ingredients off a Mai Tai recipe that appears in Racheal Ray's magazine.

Mix together:

3 oz rum
3/4 oz curacao
dash of either amaretto or almond extract
1/2 oz simple syrup
1.5 oz lime juice**



And pour into a glass of sweet iced tea. If you're not sure how much an oz is you can use the lines on a red solo cup to help you measure.

Garnish with

** Omit the lime juice if you're sweet tea has lemon in it.

I tried the sweet tea with lemon and didn't care for it as much as I think I would like the lime juice.

What do you think?

S'moreo Ice Cream

I just love my yonanas machine.

Tonight I experimented a bit and made my own flavor- I call it S'moreo.

Its part Oreo and part S'more.

I started by putting 4 oreos in my banana base.

I stirred mini-marshmallows into the "ice cream", melted half a Hershey bar and poured it on top.

Next, I crumbled a graham cracker square  on top of it all.

Deliciousness!

Do you have a Yonananas machine? Whats your favorite flavor?

Successful Day of YARD SALES

 The hubby and I both like to go yard sale shopping.

There were a few community yard sales in our area today so we decided to give it a go. Despite the overcast weather, we had quite the luck.

For $3 I walked away with:

• a work shirt (tied with the purse for my favorite, although the purse was by far the better deal)
• a brand new gift for my secret pal
• a brand new purse and matching wallet
• a dessert pedestal
• and a book about dino poop for a special kiddo!

That's about .60 cents an item!

My husband spent a bit more, but still got some good deals. For around $12 he came home with:

• a beer gass
• a 3 drawer filing cabinet
• a power pad for his Nintendo  (his favorite score)
• brand new insoles

That's an average of $3 an item. But the filing cabinet really makes up the majority of the total.

Did you go yard sale hunting today? What's your best ever yard sale find?

Pinterest Love

If you're like me and addicted to chocolate and Pinterestt then perhaps you'd like to join my "Everything Chocoholic" board on Pinterest.

If you're interested shoot me an email (rrwrites at hotmail dot com) and include your pinterest ID and I'll invite you to the board.

I'd love to have a board dedicated to all sorts of chocolaty goodness. If you blog, feel free to include your own recipes.

Please be sure all pins link to the original source.

Happy Pinning!

Friday Fav Day-Sweet Summertime!

Happy Friday!

Today I'm linking up at  Finding Joy in My Kitchen

Here's a collection of recipes that I discovered this week:

No Bake Boston Cream Pie Strata


Better Than Sex Chex Mix (camping?)


Strawberry Nutella French Toast


Strawberry Mint Lemonade

Bacon Ranch Potato Salad


It looks like if it contains chocolate, strawberries or bacon you can count me in!

** All recipes and pictures belong  to the linked websites

S is for Southern Hospitality

Some say you're born and bred with it.
Others say its a skill you learn.

As for me? I love it. I think its part practiced skill, part natural love .

A lot of things have been changing inside me lately, thanks to my growing relationship with the my Father through His Son, Jesus Christ.

One of those things is a growing sense of hospitality. A desire to love through taking care of people- feeding them, talking to them, making them feel at home.

Reading Bread and Wine started to ferment these feelings and ideas.

At our bonfire last weekend, someone commented to me that I always have plenty of good food around when we have company. Wheels turned a little further down the track.

Today, a godly woman at work remarked that she sees me  as being in the hospitality ministry.

And then it clicked. That's who I want to be. Who I feel God is leading me to be.

I am shy. When I am in my element, I am more open. More likely to share the Word of God or voice my opinion.

I love feeding people, sharing and laughing with them.

My new dream is to be the one who invites the newcomer (at work, church etc) over for dinner. The one who holds old groups of friends together by hosting gatherings

God has blessed me greatly and I can't wait to share them!

What talent, skills and desires has God blessed you with?

Summer Drinks

In my last post I mentioned that we were drinking pink bikinis and love and peace cocktails. I thought I'd share the recipes with you. They are both yummy but the pink bikini was the all around favorite.

Pink Bikini

1.75 liter raspberry lemonade (we used Simply Lemonade)
1 3/4 cup coconut rum
1 cup amaretto

Mix together and shake.

Love and Peace

Pour the following ingredients into a 1.75 liter container. I used the empty Simply Lemonade container from above.

4 scoops of pink lemonade
1 cup strawberry vodka
1/3 cup Triple Sec
1/3 cup coconut rum

Using cold water, fill the rest of the container up to the base of the neck. Cap and shake gently to mix.

By The Light of the Moon

We held a bonfire party last night. It was a beautiful night, an almost full moon, a toasty fire, good food and even better friends.

We laughed, we talked and laughed some more. The comment I heard the most this morning was "my cheeks hurt". That's the sign you had a good time!

We sipped on pink bikinis and love and peace:

Everyone pitched in with the food and drinks. We had quite the spread, from fruit and veggie trays to jalepeno boats, chocolate pie, pasta salad, lucky salsa, banana boats and s'mores.

After everyone left, Mike and I sat alone by the fire. We shared thoughts about our jobs, our society, the Bible, and our future family.

 His sentiment "And then there were two", brought a quick tear to my eye, as it was a modified version of one he shares with his army buddies, "The Triad", as they call themselves.

It was a fitting end to a magical night.

And it all happened underneath the Pennsylvania moon. (which strangely enough, when you're with the right people feels just like home)

Book Review: Bread and Wine by Shauna Niequist

Bread and Wine is an excellent book.  I love how Shauna relates memories of people, places, events to the tastes and smells of the food she enjoyed while experiencing those moments. I can relate quite well. She writes beautifully about her families and friends, sharing engaging stories from different times in her life. She then shares a recipe for a dish that she thinks captures the moment for her. Her memories come alive as she takes in the smells, tastes and textures of certain foods.

I really enjoyed the way Shauna relates faith and food. Friends, family, faith and food. She stresses that important moments often happen around the kitchen table. And although the book doubles as a cookbook, she urges us not to forget that the moments make the meal, not the food. You can serve frozen pizza as long as you do so with love.

With love, with love, seems to be the reoccurring theme in this beautiful book. The book includes a good portion of recipes for breakfasts, sides, mains and dessert. Each one is written in a easy conversational style, that makes me want to whip up a risotto, and feel comfortable doing so, even though I could barely identify it in the grocery store. I have not yet tested any of her recipes but they all look simple and detailed enough that I want to try every single one of them.

Also, for those of you who have read and enjoyed Molly Wizenberg’s A Homemade Life, this book is stylistically similar and equally delightful. I love the book club discussion guides and the extra sections on party planning and weeknight meal planning.

Basically, I love this book and look forward to reading her other two.

 

PS: I recieved a free copy of this book from Booksneeze, in exchange for my honest opinion.

Are you going to Heaven?

We discussed this at last weeks Bible study and my boss encouraged us to discuss this concept with all of our friends. Since I've come to think of many of you as blog buddies, I decided to discuss this here.

So, I'd like to hear your thoughts. Do you think you are going to heaven? Why?

Here, I'll go first.

I believe I am going to Heaven because God sent his Son, Jesus, and that he died on the cross and in doing so saved me from all of my sin. I accept that Jesus did this for me, as my Savior. I believe accepting Jesus' sacrifice is the only way to spend eternity with God.

If you agree, or not I invite you share your thoughts below or email me at rrwrites at hotmail dot com and I'll do my best to explain my beliefs.

In a similar vein, I am looking for guest bloggers to fill in so that I can spend some more time working on my novel and finishing my tshirt quilt. Feel free to comment or email me if you'd like to help.

Book Review: Unleashed: Release the Untamed Faith Within by Erwin McManus

This book relates the way Jesus lived his life to the way we out to live our lives when we profess ourselves as Christians and claim to follow Him. To sum up the book, Jesus never promised this following him would consist solely of sitting in church pews in pretty clothing. The author reiterates that the Christian path can be a hard, dangerous and surprising one- but that because we have Christ we have no need to fear it.  Rather he suggests we embrace it.

I love the author’s ideas and he writes with great passion. I believe, like the author, that we often put Christianity in a nice safe box and don’t experience life to the fullest because we don’t unleash our untamed faith.  I very much want to live as a disciple, and not merely a Christian, to go where Christ calls me, no matter what the cost.

However, I did find flaws with this book. The authors style is somewhat disconnected. It’s almost as if he published his first draft, without undergoing any editing process. He has passion, but lacks finesse (much like me in the kitchen haha). I’m not sure that I would recommend this book because there are several other good books out there with a similar perspective-like anything by Mark Batterson. However, the passion behind this book could make it a faith changer. Overall, I think I have a fairly neutral opinion of this book  (which is pretty rare).

PS: I was given a free copy of this book (via BookSneeze) in exchange for my thoughts.

Once a Month/Week Cooking Review

If you remember, a few weeks ago I tried my hand at freezer cooking. I opted to try just a weeks worth of meals to see how the process worked for my family.

Boy am I glad I let me husband talk me into that! Otherwise we would have wasted a huge amount of food.

I made 7 recipes and only 5 came out edible and only 3 were enjoyable.

The pasta tasted terrible, although it had smelled amazing on cooking day.
The pizza crust refused to bake, but the toppings and sauce were delish.
The chicken cordon bleu, was so-so.
The breakfast burritos were a hit with the hubby.
We both enjoyed the breakfast and bean burritos.
The meatloaf tasted okay but took almost 2 hours to cook.
I like the taste of the frozen fruit cups, but they take a good 20 minutes until they are thawed enough to get a spoon into. Maybe my freezer is too hard core. Because they take so long to thaw I have been eating them as dessert instead of breakfast.


I think I'll try the pizza again, make it, bake it and eat it all in the same day.

Overall, I think I will just strive to do my chopping and prepping in advance but leave everything to be cooked the day of.

How have your once a month cooking experiences gone?

PS: I'm going to be looking for a few guest posters soon. Email me at rrwrites at hotmail dot com if you're interested!

Stash Busting Monday: Taste of Home Cannoli Cake (2 for 1)

Yummy! I found this recipe in Taste of Home and had been waiting to try it. A coworker offered to bring in chicken scampi the other day, so I offered to bring in dessert.

I thought this would be the prefect combination.




The Taste of Home recipe calls for a french vanilla cake mix but since I shy away from cake mixes I baked up a buttermilk vanillabean cake that I found in Molly Wizenberg's A Homemade Life. (I highly recommed her book. Its full of lovely stories and recipes)

To turn the vanilla cake into a  cannoli cake, you need to make the filling and frostings and chill until spreadable:

Filling:
16oz ricotta cheese
1/2 cup confectioners sugar
2tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp almond extract
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 oz semisweet chocolate, finely chopped

Frosting:
16 oz marscapone
3/4 cup confectioners sugar
1/4 cup whole milk
2 tsp almond extract
1 tsp vanilla extract

Because I used Wizenberg's recipe, I had thinner cake layers and thus had extra icing which I think I will use to make hummingbird bread.

After filling and frosting the cake (place filling on top layer of cake, to within 1 inch of edge and then use frosting on the edge and sides) press almonds around the sides of the cake and sprinkle chocolate chips on top of the cake. Chill until serving.

PS: If you want to pick the next recipe I make, post a comment with a number from 1-329!

Cooking Through Christmas: Spiced Fruit Bowl

I made this for our Christmas celebration and it was super easy and tasty!

Ingredients:

2 cans (29 oz each) sliced peaches
1 can pear halves (29 oz)
1/4 cup cider vinegar
1/4 tsp salt
4- 3in cinnamin sticks
1/4 tsp allspice
1/2 tsp cloves
1 pound red grapes, halved

Instructions:

Drain juice from peaches and pears into saucepan and set aside. Add vinegar, allspice, cloves and salt to juices. Add cinnamon sticks. Bring to a boil and simmer for ten minutes. Remove from heat and cool 15 minutes.  In a large bowl, combine the peaches, pears and grapes. A dd juices and cinnamon sticks. over and refrigerate at least 12 hours. Sir occasionally. Remove cinnamon sticks prior to serving.

I found the leftovers made a great (and fairly healthy) breakfast.

I would definitely plan on making this again. To pick the next recipe I try, comment with  a number from 1-329

PS: This recipe is from TOH's Treasury of Chrismas recipes

He's a Turkey!

Last night I pulled back the covers, and found....

I ran downstairs and asked my husband what he meant by this. He siad "Happy Birdday!" and died laughing. (No, it wasn't my  birthday)...He's just a turkey.

Guest Blogging Today

I know its a little late in the day, but I'm the guest blogger today at Life Blessons. Won't you join me as I discuss the ways Christ helps me overcome my fear?

Freezer Cooking

Has anyone ever tried Once A Month cooking? I've been contemplating it for some time. And then I was introduced to Once a Month Mom. Its a subscription based site, but does offer quite a few free menus to try before you buy, including diet and whole foods. 

After discussing this with my husband, he suggested that we try cooking only one week worth of meals, to use during the my 5pm week. I spent about 2.5 hours preparing 5 dinners and about 14 breakfast servings.

I made:

BBQ Pizza
Pasta Primavera
Pizza Stuffed Meatloaf
Beef Burritos
Chicken Cordon Bleu Casserole
Frozen Fruit Cups (breakfast)
Chorizo and Egg Burritos (breakfast)

Since I was cooking for a only a week I was able to make a menu pieced together from several of the sites menus. I'll update you later in the week on how the recipes tasted.

Any freezer cooking tips?

Friday Favorites!!!!!

Oh man!

I almost forgot it was Friday. What a week. Sheez.

Anyway. Here's what you came for today- a list of things I discovered this week that I'd love to make. Linked up at the lovely Finding Joy in My Kitchen, of course. All recipes and pictures belong to the linked blogs.

1. Spicy Buffalo Cauliflower



2. Chocolate Hazelnut Baklava



3. Avocado Truffles

 

4. Chocolate Avocado Milkshake

 

 

5. Dark Chocolate Avocado Cookies

 

6. Macaroon Kiss Cookies

 

 

Looks like avacado's the thing.

The Book That Totally Creeped Me Out

...As in floating fairyheaded nightmares...but we'll get back to that in a minute.

I went to a book club a few weeks ago where everyone brought a book that they had read and liked and were willing to swap.

I took Nora Robert's  Daring to Dream (the first of three) and came home with Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenegger.

I was about 3/4 of the way through the book and was really into the story. It was strange, mysterious and holding my interest and then it got creepy.

********************SPOILER ALERT*****************
Towards the end of the book you discover that the twins (two of the main characters) are daughters of their father, and his wife's twin. The adult twins switched places to try to test the husbands fidelity, the wrong one got pregnant, and they switched again. The true mother to never see the children twins again until after her death when she remains in the apartment that she bequeathed to her nieces/daughters as a ghost. One of the twins falls in love with the mother/ghosts/aunts former lover and decides to fake her death so that she can separate her life from her more controlling twin sister. Only the plan isn't to fake her death but to actually die, have her mother, the ghost, catch her spirit and put it back in her body later and then move away. Well the mother goes along with the plan up until the point of putting her daughter back. The daughters ghost doesn't have enough ghost strength (which the mother knew all along) and so the mother puts her spirit into her daughters dead body and goes on living with her former lover and has a baby through him and her daughters body

***************END SPOILER********************************

I'm not sure if it was the lack of God in this novel that upset me so much or what but the whole conniving ending and exploiting of others just really stuck a cord with me.

Back to the floating fairy headed dreams. As a child I had a dream that fairys kidnapped me, made me pepetually wash dishes and eat cake. Non stop. I woke up with my hands numb, stiff and pulsating. And then I promptly vomited. From all of the cake, of course.

I've had an occasional experience that gives me the same feeling. The night after I finished this book, I had a dream that the mothers ghost was trying to get into my body. And this produced the same "floating fairy headed" feeling. And I awoke several times feeling quie nausous.

I normally try not to not recommend a book, but I can not encourage anyone to read this. Just because I don't want you to be creeped out like I was.

Have you read this? What did you think? Am I overreacting to the creep factor?

Chocolate Disaster

What the actual name for this dessert is I'm not sure.  I call it chocolate disaster because it can easily wreck havoc on your diet, resolutions and pearly whites  all in one sitting.

But boy are they scumptious!
Or fandamntastic, as a long lost friend once said.

Bottom layer chocolate chip cookie dough.
Middle layer peanut  butter  stuffed Oreos
Top layer, gooey, fudgey brownies.

And if thats not enough, top it with vanilla ice cream or homemade whipped cream. oooooooh.

The original  recipe comes from this blog that I found via Pinterest.