Category: Food

Categories
Food

Homemade Banana Pudding

My coworker friend Kim is from Mississippi. That means when it comes to southern food, she & her mom are going to have the best recipes. My work made banana pudding one day & I mentioned it was my favorite dessert. A couple of weeks later she made her family banana pudding recipe & brought a little sample in for me! I brought it home & Jason & I LOVED it!
Luckily for us (& you!!), she shared the recipe with me.
I made it tonight to take to the NCSU Chi O house for their skit preview party tomorrow night. It makes so much that I made a smaller container for us.


Kim’s Homemade Banana Pudding
Ingredients
1 large pkg instant vanilla pudding
2 c cold milk
1 can sweetened condensed milk
1 container Cool Whip, slightly thawed
4-5 bananas. sliced thin
1 box Nilla Wafers

Directions
Make pudding as directed on package: Using wire wisk, mix pudding into cold milk for 2 minutes in large bowl.
Continuing whisking while pouring in condensed milk then Cool Whip.
In 2+ qt container, place layer of wafers, then thinly sliced bananas. Top that with pudding mixture. Continue to layer until all gone. Enjoy!
I used a 1 1/2 qt container & a 1 qt container & almost filled both. I did add some extra Cool Whip that I had left over from when I made the Chilly Pomegranate Pie.


Jason & I couldn’t resist & had some tonight. I crushed up my wafers in the cup. It was so good!!

Categories
Food

Chicken Burritos

I’ve been craving Moe’s Joey Jr for a while. I love that place! But I was looking at my pantry Sunday night & realized I had just about everything to make our own Joey’s at home. I loved them! Jason thought they were good. Good enough that he ate the leftovers instead of me taking them into work. They were easy & delicious. I’m pretty sure this will go on our dinner rotation now. They can be made with the stuffings of your choice. I’ll list what we did. You could easily switch out chicken for beef or ground turkey. We also ate ’em up before I had a chance to photograph them.

Ingredients
Soft taco/burrito sized flour tortillas
~ 1 lb boneless skinless chicken breast tenders, diced
1 pkg taco seasoning
1 can black beans
1 pkg Spanish rice mix
salsa of your choice (we used Newman’s own Mango Salsa & Tostitos Chunky Mild Salsa)
shredded cheese

Directions
Saute chicken until no longer pink. Add 1/2 c water & the seasoning packet. Continue sauteing until water is absorbed (around 4-5 minutes). While chicken cooking, warm black beans in a small pot & follow directions on Spanish rice mix. We warmed torillas for 20 seconds in the microwave to soften. Once everything ready, we made our own burritos by scooping chicken, rice, beans, salsa & cheese into the tortilla. We were prety laid back & served with scoops & a beer. Enjoy!

Categories
Everything Else Food

Eat Pray Love

I went to see that movie tonight with a group of very fun & super nice girls. The group is more my friend Beth’s friends. I’d met a couple of them while at her house while watching The Bachelorette this season, but some I met for the first time tonight. We first grabbed dinner and some of us a quick beer at Fox & Hound. The food was good & so was the conversation, but our waitress not so much. Beth & I ended up leaving to get the rest of us seats, another two bought tickets, & the remaining ones waited for our bills & forged our signatures. Needless to say, she didn’t get great tips from us (aka Nicole!).But the movie, it was good! I’d heard the locations were fabulous & they were. Italy was cool, but even stuffed as a I was from my chicken wrap, that pasta, the buy-bigger-jeans pizza, the wine! I loved this scene. Does that look yummy & cool?! {borrowed photo from here}

The pray part was the slowest for me (I remembered it being that way for me in the book also), but I loved the elephant scene & Richard from TX. I’m like her that I’d never have the patience grace whatever you call it to be silent! God would call me to be the Suzie Cream Puff greeter too! {borrowed from here}

But Bali, it was worth seeing to movie to get to the Love part. The scenery there was amazing. I doubt I’ll make it there, but I’d certainly love to! {borrowed from here gotta love google image!}
I thought Julia Roberts was great. I just love her & pretty much all the movies she makes. I’m also a sucker for a good ending!

I’m finishing my night with a little baking…which might incorporate a little of Eat (breakfast & late night snack anyone?) Pray (I don’t burn them like I did last weekend’s muffins) & Love (its almost midnight & I’m baking for my husband). I promised him that I’d make muffins for us to have for breakfast tomorrow. His breakfast being around 3 hours from now since he goes into work at 4am this weekend. He’d be fine if I didn’t make them, but he would probably stop at McDonald’s. And while not made from scratch, Duncan Hines 100% whole grain Apple Cinnamon muffins (with a coupon!) are cheap, easy & relatively healthy. The timer just buzzed so I’m off. I’ll try to post a photo of them later too.

Categories
Food

Chilly Cherry Pomegranate Pie

I’ve never made a pie before & I was a little nervous. But I found this recipe on Kraft Foods & thought it sounded good & easy. I decided to change it up a little bit. I’ll post it the way I did it, but also the way on the original recipe. I was thinking of trying to incorporate Elissa’s blueberry pie in this also, but I decided that was too much on my first try. I meant to take a photo of the whole pie, but we ate it too quick. Here’s the last bit of the last piece!


Chilly Cherry Pomegranate Pie (originally Kraft Foods)
Ingredients
1/2 c boiling water
1 pkg (3 oz) Cherry flavored Jello
1 c Pomegranate juice (I used Minute Maid Blueberry Pomegranate juice)
1 c Cool Whip, thawed
1 pie crust (I used graham cracker crust. Kraft suggests Oreo crust)

Directions
Add boiling water to Jello mix & stir two minutes or until dissolved. Stir in pomegranate juice. Refrigerate 25-30 minutes, or until slightly thickened.
Whisk in 1 c Cool Whip until well blended. Pour into pie crust. Place in freezer.
Freeze 4 hours or until firm. Can top with more Cool Whip (& Oreo cookies if use Oreo crust). I served with blueberries. Enjoy!
Categories
Food

Sunny Morning Muffins

I was first introduced to these fruity muffins from Alena on twitter aka Mrs Charmingly Chandler. I copied the food network recipe down that day. Then while on Waking up Williams, I realized Lindsay had also made these muffins with rave reviews! I was sold. I think they’ll be perfect for this weekend when my parents are coming into town. I thought I’d make them tonight so we could have them for breakfast & snacks starting tomorrow! I plan to make a mixture of mini muffins & regular sized ones. I also plan to use 1/2 oil & half applesauce to make them a little healthier.

Sunny Morning Muffins (originally from Food Network)
Ingredients
1 cup strawberries, chopped
1 cup sugar, plus 2 tablespoons
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
Pinch ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1 teaspoon salt
1 ripe banana, mashed
2 large eggs
1/4 cup canola oil (I used 1/8 c oil & 1/8 c applesauce)
1 lemon, zested (omitted because I didn’t have one)
I added 1/4 tsp vanilla because I love it in all baked goods
1/2 pint blueberries
1 cup chopped walnuts (We not like a lot of nuts in muffins, so I used 1/2 cup)

Directions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
In a small bowl, mix together strawberries and 2 tablespoons sugar. Let sit 15 minutes until strawberries give off juices.
In another small bowl, mix together flour, cinnamon, baking soda, nutmeg and salt.
In a large bowl, whisk together the mashed banana, eggs, oil, 1 cup sugar, strawberries, and lemon zest.
Mix the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients until combined. Do not over mix.
Fold in blueberries and walnuts. Scoop batter evenly into muffin cups.
Bake until a toothpick inserted in center of muffin comes out with a few crumbs but not wet, about 30 minutes. Cool on a rack to room temperature.


I cooked the mini muffins for around 13 minutes and they were perfect. I was busy cleaning and overcooked the regular-sized muffins. So I’d recommend setting the timer for 20 instead of 30 minutes.