And in that moment, I swear we were infinite.

We celebrated over the weekend. First, there was a dress:

There were risotto balls (white truffle risotto balls with lemon confit and basil aioli):

There was a salad that was too yummy it didn’t last long enough to get its picture taken (local greens, Maytag bleu cheese, candied pecans, sliced local applesand bourbon bacon vinaigrette).

And then, there was the main course (petite filet served with steak sauce & horseradish crème fraiche, yukon gold mashed potates, and roasted asparagus):

and as if that meal wasn’t enough, there was dessert (split) of molten chocolate cake with vanilla bean whipped cream. 

And finally, there were flowers:

(LOTS more here). 

But the best part, was this:

(I’m under the blanket). 

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Greetings! It’s Sunday again, and I’m back with my adventures in the world of baking. Today I tackled a classic recipe that everyone loves.. chocolate chip cookies! Except this time, they are 1 point plus (the weight watchers new points system) per cookie!I am currently in the middle of my weight watchers journey, so any new recipes I find with a low points value and still tasty is a go!

I found this recipe from the blog of Eat Yourself Skinny.  I found her blog this week, and she is a fellow Virginian blogging about food! Her pics are way better than mine, and I’m not very original in recipes, so definitely check her out!

Without further ado… here we go!

Ingredients this week were very standard… I was lucky because I decided about 5 min before I started baking on what to bake… and I had everything!

2 Tbsp salted butter, softened

2 tsp. vegetable oil

1/2 cup packed dark brown sugar

1 tsp. vanilla extract

1/8 tsp. table salt

1 large egg white

3/4 cup all-purpose flour

1/4 tsp. baking soda

3 oz. semi-sweet chocolate chips, about 1/2 cup

I used mini chocolate chips, as that is all I had. I also subbed out the ‘dark brown sugar’ with splenda brown sugar blend. I followed the recipe to a tee, except I might have added a little more egg whites, but that was an accident. The batter was SUPER creamy and sweet:

A lot different than normal cookie dough. 

I preheated to 375, and started to scoop out the dough. Using the 1/2 tsp measure and a knife I scooped out about 63 cookies onto 3 nonstick baking trays. 

Baked for about 6 min each (the recipe says 4-6, but I found my oven needed 6 min). I like my cookies darker.

I don’t have any wire cookie racks so I improvised. They are small, but it’s all about PORTION SIZE! Since they are 1p+ each, you can add easily and make sure you know what you’re eating!

I also found these to be REALLY sweet, which is good because you wont eat more than a few at a time. In the future, I would use the regular brown sugar and egg beaters instead of egg whites, I find it needed that eggy taste.

All in all these turned out to be a great, chewy, yummy cookie and I had a lot of fun baking, and I’m excited have for a dessert/pick me up this week, without feeling super guilty.

Stay tuned later this week I’ll be posting about my first Pinterest Challenge DIY project… it’s harder than it looks in the pics! 

Hello! 

I am starting a new ‘section’ on my ‘blog’ (I guess that is what this thing is), wherein I post things that I have made (that are somewhat edible). This is tentatively titled Playing With Food, because I do not consider myself a cook or baker. I’m pretty sure only my mother and The Boyfriend would say they LOVE anything I make (and I love them dearly for it). But I like cooking and baking, and with every recipe I tackle, the better cook and baker I become. Here’s my attempt to chronicle a few. 

First up is Nutella Cupcakes. I originally found this recipe from Babble via Pinterest . I baked it a few months ago following the directions exactly. They turned out great, but I found I had a problem with swirling in the nutella to where it marbled throughout the cupcake, instead of just the top, which is what was happening with me. Since today is Sunday and the desire to bake usually overcomes me on Sundays, I decided to give it another go, seeing as I had all the ingredients. 

1/4 cup butter, at room temperature
1/4 cup canola or mild vegetable oil
3/4 cup sugar
3 large eggs
1 tsp. vanilla
1 3/4 cup all purpose flour
2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
1/4-1/2 cup Nutella, at room temperature

Mixed them all together according to the directions (wet first, added the dry) in this guy:

(Birthday present from The Boyfriend)

This is what the mixture looks like after the wet and dry ingredients are mixed together

Here is where I deviate from the recipe. Instead of separating into muffin pan and adding nutella, I decided to add about 1/4-1/2 cup nutella to the mixer and have the stand mixer do all the work (I’m all about delegation and efficiency). 

Look at the creamy chocolate/nutella-ey goodness. Who wants to stick their finger in?? 

The batter is thick, so it was easy to scoop into a muffin tin. I was out of mini muffin liners, so I just used some olive oil cooking spray. 

Bake for around 25 min on 325 degrees and this is the final result:

As you can see from the pictures, they did turn out a bit dry. To counteract this, I spread a bit of nutella on the top. Which defeats the purpose of ‘self icing’ in the original recipe, but they still taste amazing. 

I think if I try this recipe again, I would use regular yellow cake mix, so it isn’t so thick and maybe a bit easier to spread nutella at the end. Either way, this makes for a yummy treat :)

Anyone else playing with their food?

(You can comment on this post using Disqus. If you hit the Login button, you will be able to sign in via Google or Facebook, or any other account, or just comment as a guest). 

-I just posted about my completed Project 365 for the year 2011. See below. I’m immensely proud of the collection of photos, and proud of myself for completing it. I am currently working on a photo collection book that will be printed in a hard copy. 

- I’ve been feeling the need to blog more, the itch to write about things going on in my life. I’ve been very blessed to have some amazing experiences and sometimes I feel that if I don’t write about it, it gets stored in my memory and not shared with anyone, and only if I think about it will I remember. I want this to change. 

- A new years resolution for this year is to finish editing and upload all the unedited batches of photos that I currently have sitting on my hard drive. Some from as far back as July of 2010. Woops. 

- I’m pretty sure only like 3 people read this, but I don’t care!! this is more a personal journey than anything, but if a few people read, that’s great too. 

More photo pictures behind the cut from Mike’s gorgeous bouquet. I can’t get enough! 

Read More →