A Smoothie Love Story

When green smoothies hit Pinterest, I was skeptical. It wasn't until a friend posted a photo on FB raving about how her children were TOTALLY cool with sipping spinach through a straw. So, I gave it a try. I whipped one up, called it the neato "Hulk Smoothie" moniker and set it in front of Josh. It wasn't until he was halfway through that I bravely asked him "Sooooo... ya wanna know what's in it?"

Why not leave well enough alone?! Right?! I know. But, it miraculously worked in my favor because homeboy did not care that there was spinach in there. These days he asks me to put the spinach in there and when I tell him we're out, he's the one that adds it to the grocery list. I shit you not. If you know Josh, you know the amount of insanity that this situation holds. 

Anyways, I still usually don't put spinach in them anymore because often when I buy it, it gets slimey before we can use it; the two recipes I'm about to share don't have it either. You could easily add it - just add maybe 1/4 or 1/3 cup more liquid (water, juice, almond milk, lake water, whatever. Don't add lake water.) 

I have the recipe saved in my notes on my phone & I'm totally taking the easy way out and just posting a screenshot of the note.

F Words: Figs & Fun!

Nana is the best nana I've ever had. Grown-up-Jessica especially agrees. Before she (Nana, not G-U-Jess) left recently to move closer to the rest of our family, we crammed in a lot of quality time! And while I think we might argue about who received the better end of the deal, I know I did :) 

Almost a month ago Josh and I went over to alleviate her fig problem and made a couple of delightful dishes with them, and froze the remaining THREE pounds of figs. Yes. 3 pounds - and that was being picky and throwing out the barely-over ripe fruit. So much yum growing on that tree!

Josh's first recipe request was fig newtons. The recipe I found on MyWholeFoodLife.com indicated they would not be as sweet as packaged Fig Newtons but I tried them anyways, knowing Josh would prefer them sweet. 

Have another!

Bethany Frankel, God love'r her sassy mouth, has done a super freaking fantastic job with her new line of adult beverages, SkinnyGirl Cocktails, and I'm always ready and willing to try any of her flavors of the week! I've had the pleasure of imbibing on the White Peach Margarita & regular Margarita mix, Cosmo mix, and three of her flavored vodkas:  Tangerine, Cucumber, and Coconut.

The mixes are a no-brainer. A delectable no-brainer! The flavored vodkas are pretty easy to get mixy with too, save for the cucumber.

We go back a few weeks to our vacation to Litchfield and I was facebooking while Q was in the grocery store. I saw a post from Skinnygirl regarding a Cucumber Mojito recipe. "I like mojitos" I thought. "And I'm right here by the liquor store, too..." I started to plan. "Here comes Q! I've got to fill him in on this!" I exclaimed to three confused little boys.

So I snagged the main ingredient I would need - the Cucumber flavored vodka - and forgot about one ingredient: the soda water. Here's her recipe:

"Skinnygirl Cucumber Mojito"
7 mint leaves
1 lime wedge
1.5 oz Skinnygirl Cucumber Vodka
3 oz soda water
Squeeze lime wedge into rocks glass, muddle lime wedge with mint leaves and vodka. Add ice. Top with soda water. Garnish with lime wedge.
* can add 1/2 tsp. agave nectar for sweetness


The house being full of (of-age) drinkers, I thought there'd be some soda water and didn't worry with it.

There wasn't. Only after I made my drink instead with tonic water did Q inform me that they are VERY different beverages. Womp womp.

My drink sucked dick. Not to mention I remembered almost instantly that I HATE cucumber. WTF was I thinking?! When I eat cucumber all I burp up for the next 17 days is the taste of damn cucumber; I try to stay away from it, and am pretty successful at it.

Anyways, I tried not to waste the bit of beverage that I did make and I can say with nearly complete lack of concern that I comitted a serious crime of alcohol abuse. It was just disgusting. The drink, that is, not my lack of reverence for the juice. So I poured it out for my homies and stuck to the White Peach margarita mix for the remainder of our travel.

Fast forward to this weekend when I wanted to revisit the cucumber nasty. Not the mojito recipe again, but just generally figure out what to pair the vodka with.

I found a bottle of Tropicana Trop50 Raspberry Lemonade and decided it would do. I had no idea what would happen.

I'm going to tell you now what happened. Not everyone believes in it, but refreshing, only a mild hint of cucumberish majic happened.  Maaaaajiiiiiic.

My Recipe:
I filled up a short glass 1/3 way with ice, poured one shot of Skinnygirl Cucumber Vodka over it and filled the empty space with the raspberry lemonade, a splash of lime, and sprig of mint.

LOVES IT.
Make it hap'n, cap'n.

Olo! No, no; it's ROLO! ....Cookies!

These were first brought to my attention by Stephen last Christmas-ish. He mentioned his mother always made them and I was going to love them when she made them during our visit to Anderson. Of course I looked up the recipe immediately and proclaimed "easy peasy!" and then he explained how his mom usually made them... I required a nap after hearing the trouble she went through to make these cookies.

Now, usually I'm not one for shortcuts; the recipe I found - in comparison to his mother's - is a mega shortcut. I knew I would not feel like less of a woman for using the recipe I found, which required only four ingredients and - again, in comparison - a skoesch of effort.

Anyways, she never made them so I used a recipe I found online. I can't remember where I originally found it but this morning I referenced this site,SixSistersStuff.com, and got busy!

You'll need a box of Devil's Food cake mix, 2 eggs & 1/3 cup of oil. Oh, and a bag of Rolos :)

While you're de-foiling your candies, preheat your oven to 350 and go ahead and set out your ingredients - Rosie at Sweetapolita.com insists that you/I/we bake with eggs that have been brought to room temperature. So, ok :)

Mixing the ingredients as a one-pot throw in: mix your dry box-cake mix, the oil, and the eggs (slightly beaten). Stir until incorporated and then get to stuffin, yo!

I bought a cookie baller JUST to make these special cookies. They're special this time because I'm making them for the bestie's birthday, so instead of adding cookie-flare via traditional powdered sugar method, I grabbed some simple sprinkles and ground some sea salt, to make them all adult cookie like and stuff.


Anyways. Scoop about 1 tbsp of cookie dough into your palm.

Squish Rolo into the middle, and then cover the Rolo so it kinda looks like a brown eye. Don't get distracted and grossed out. Press through - this is all worth it; scout's honor.

Decorate the cookies. Or don't. These don't bake for long (7-8 minutes) so I didn't hesitate to put the sprinkles or sea salt on before baking.

These cookies don't spread much, if at all; here they are with only 1 minute left in the oven:

Yank those suckers out at the 7ish minute mark and then, this part is optional, I smush them down a little bit. I feel like I'm really cracking into that Rolo and getting the caramel goo allll up into the cookie perimeter.

That's it, I guess. They don't take long to cool and are delicious even if they are completely cooled.

oh, and HAPPY BIRTHDAY (dinner night), SARAHBEAR!

Thai'ng one on at Litchfield Beach

Do you see what I did there... in the title... clever bitch, huh? (it'll actually make sense in a minute)

It's been a few days but the family "just" returned from vacationing in Pawley's Island, SC @ Litchfield Beach. Stephen's uncle is generous enough to let all 14 of us shack up for a week and get ourselves as waterlogged as humanly possible. ...waterlogged? sounds dangerous - and gory - if Mr. M. Knight Shamalamanalan got his hands on a rough plot base...

doin hoodrat stuff at Brookgreen Gardens

loitering.

Anyways, I'm here to share a few photos, and a recipe for the Thai inspired dinner that Stephen and I made whilst there.

A while ago Q (his street name. literally) revealed his lust for some red curry something or other. So I searched MyRecipes.com and found this, originally from from Cooking Light mag: Thai Coconut Curry Shrimp. First go was easy, fast, and quite enjoyable - who doesn't prefer that, anyways? ;) The second time we made it we added a few more ingredients: red bell pepper, snow peas, and mushrooms. Again - it was scrumptious.

It's common for us to sit and talk about what we'd do differently with the recipe the next time we make the dish(hence the addition of veggies) and after this particular time, we decided next time we would simmer the veggies in the coconut milk longer and we would add pineapple! Well, we remembered to do both at the beach house (albeit in the process forgetting to add the snow peas and omitted 'shrooms) and it rocked! Like, for real, rocked!

We served the thai shrimp with jasmine rice, chicken sate with homemade peanut dipping sauces, and some purchased dumplings from The Fresh Market (y'all - this place is straight dope.)

Now, for the main event, just as it was served last, minus the quantities for serving 6ish adults:

Thai Coconut Curry Shrimp
serves 2 (easily doubled, or for us tripled!)

1 tsp canola oil
1/2 cup chopped onion
1 red bell pepper, sliced and then cut crossways
some pineapple, eye ball it.
1/2 tsp red curry paste
1 tsp sugar
12 oz large shrimp, de-nastified
1/3 c lite coconut milk
1 tsp fish sauce
1/4 c chopped green onion
1 tbsp chopped (fresh) basil

Heat oil in a large non-stick skillet (one with tall sides) over med-high heat. Add onion, bell pepper, & red curry paste and saute for a minute. Turn the heat down and stir in sugar, saute for 15 seconds. Slowly pour in the coconut milk and fish sauce and let your veggies cook until crisp-tender, or to your crispy preferences. Add shrimp and saute for 3 to 5 minutes - you know, until these shrimp look like the shrimp you normally eat. Remove from heat and stir in green onion and basil. (*side note - i served this green mix as a "topper" for the dish and really enjoyed it - it intensified the fresh to def'ness!)

That's it.

I mean, unless you were awesome enough to take the jasmine rice challenge, too.

Or you were lucky enough to have someone grill the chicken sticks for you AND fix the accompanying sauce you messed up for said chick'sticks. AND make another peanut sauce that suited his desire for fiiiyaaahhhh!

She Scarfs Sea Salt Scookies by the Sea Shore

Cookies and cakes are just too much fun to make the same thing more than once. Or twice, if you're into caramel and cake. These however, will be my forever go-to chocolate chip cookie. A lil' on the fancy side, but still quickly scarfed by those not old enough to get a job.


This particular cookie - Sea Salt Double Chocolate Chip - was originally brought to you by Leslie @ The Cozy Little Kitchen. I surprisingly didn't really do anything to change the recipe so here are some pictures & side notes - follow the link to snag the original recipe!

always willing to help when cookies are involved!

When Leslie says to be patient and put the dough back into the fridge to "set" - DO IT. This isn't a cruel joke to keep you from gaining that 5 lbs you can't live without - it's for real. For real, for real.
I, like her, didn't wanna wait the hour for my cookie dough to sit - laughing and taunting me from the fridge the whole time - so I slapped that first batch in the oven hardly before I got the mixer turned off.

And they didn't look right.

The butter was too soft and cookies spread and browned entirely too much. Not too much for consumption, mind you. But I prefer a dense - even if smaller - cookie, and so I heeded warnings and chilled my cookie dough until the next morning.

The wait was worth it, not only was the texture "right" - they were gorgeous, too. See, all sparkly and shit from the sea salt: