Brookie's Cookies and More

"Make Yourself a Dang Quesadilla!"

Bonus ponits if you know what movie the title is from. :)

Tonight I made quesadillas for the second time in about a week. The first time, my photo didn't turn out so well, so I waited to post until I had a better one. Ryan and I really like these and have decided to put them into regular dinner rotation. I also think they'll be a great quick meal when/if we ever have children or have our nephews over when they're older.

Quick and Easy Chicken Quesadillas

Ingredients:

3-5 oz. can of chicken
1/4 cup salsa
4 8-inch flour tortillas
1 cup finely shredded cheese (I used a Mexican mix)
Sour cream and extra salsa for serving (if desired)

Directions:

Mix chicken and salsa in a small bowl.
Layer two of the tortillas with 1/2 of the chicken mixture and 1/2 of the cheese. Top each with the remaining two tortillas.
Cook each quesadilla uncovered over medium heat for 2 to 3 minutes on each side until golden brown.
Cut quesadillas into wedges and serve with sour cream and salsa.

That's it! I told you it was super simple!

Ryan actually prefers his with only chicken and cheese, so I made his and then mixed my portion of the chicken with the salsa. I also found that I prefer to use less salsa than the recipe calls for.

Sometimes You Have To Think Inside the Box…

Today I am making desserts for our Easter celebrations tomorrow. I am taking the easy route and making boxed cakes and brownies. Sometimes you just need to graciously accept the help of others, and I’m accepting help from Betty Crocker and Duncan Hines!

For my side of the family’s get together, I’m making a simple Duncan Hines White Cake Mix with chocolate frosting and sprinkles. For Ryan’s family get together, I’m making Betty Crocker Hershey’s Supreme Brownie Mix (per Ryan’s request) and a Duncan Hines’ recipe for Old Fashion Applesauce Spice Cake with a box of Betty Crocker Spice Cake Mix. I’m only going to include the recipe for the applesauce cake because it doesn’t follow the box directions exactly.

Old Fashion Applesauce Spice Cake
http://www.duncanhines.com/recipes/cakes/dh/old-fashioned-applesauce-spice-cake

Ingredients:

Cake

1 pkg Duncan Hines Moist Deluxe Spice Cake Mix
3 large eggs
1 1/4 cups applesauce
1/3 cup vegetable oil
1 cup chopped nuts

Frosting

1 container vanilla frosting
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

Glaze

1 cups confectioner's sugar
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/2 Tbls milk or cream

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degree F. Grease and flour 13x9 inch pan.
Combine cake mix, eggs, applesauce, and oil in large bowl. Beat at medium speed with electric mixer for 2 minutes. Stir in nuts. Pour into pan.
Bake at 350 degrees F for 40 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool in pan 15 minutes. Invert onto cooling rack. Turn right-side up. Cool completely.
For frosting, combine vanilla frosting and cinnamon. Stir until blended. Spread over cooled cake.
For glaze, whisk together confectioner's sugar, cinnamon, vanilla extract, and milk or cream. Add only enough cream to make a spreadable glaze. Top cooled cake with cinnamon glaze before cutting.

This time I made the cake in a Bundt pan and used the glaze. I have made this before with the vanilla-cinnamon frosting, and it’s also wonderful!

I'm Baaaaaaack!

I have been a bad blogger.

My good friend and fellow blogger, Jess, slapped my wrist a few weeks back for not posting more. Then this week, she put me in the corner with a dunce cap when she posted this. I guess it's finally time for another post!

The last time I wrote, I spoke about my new found obsession with coupons. I still have the obsession even if I'm not obsessed about blogging it.

So here is my first attempt at breaking down my grocery shopping visits to Target, Meijer, and Kroger for the week ending March 27, 2010:

I spent $56.24 and, according to my receipt, saved $32.33. That's a savings of 36.5%! Not too shabby!

Some highlites from this trip were:
Woolite - on sale for $8.99
- $1/1
- $1/1
- $1.50/1
Ended up getting two for $7.99 ea and one for $7.49 ea.

Arm & Hammer Clean Shower Spray - $1.97 reg
- $0.75/1
Snagged it for $1.22 - this stuff is awesome!

Post Honey Bunches of Oats (my fav!) Value Size - on sale for $3.29
- $1.50/2
I ended up buying these for $2.54 ea which is close to the $2.50 sale price for the smaller family sized box. (I have close to ten boxes of cereal in our pantry right now. I thought my husband was going to have a stroke when I grabbed two more boxes, but he knows how much I love my Honey Bunches of Oats!)

McCormick - on sale for $2.51
- $1/1
- $0.75/1
- $0.75/1
Ended up getting one for $1.51 and two for $1.76 ea.

Arm & Hammer toothpaste - on sale for $2.79
- $2.50/1
- $2.50/1
Ended up getting two for $0.29 ea.

Biore Pore Strips - $8.99 reg
Biore Face Wash - $5.94 reg
- Buy one pore stips, get one face wash free
I ended up getting the pore strips for free. I told the cashier that she highlighted the wrong item, but she said the computer took it, so she wasn't going to change it. Fine with me! I ended up getting the pore strips and face wash for $5.94 or $2.97 ea. Would anyone like the face wash? I use prescription stuff.

So that was my Target shopping trip in a nutshell. I think we did pretty well!

I spent $27.09 at Kroger this week and saved $32.16 according to my receipt, which turns out to be 54% in savings. Also, printed on my receipt is how many items I purchased. Well, I purchased 28 items and only spent $27.09 - that's under $1 for each item!!

Here's the breakdown of the best deals:
Coca-Cola 2L bottles - on sale for $0.79 (when you bought eight participating products)
I got eight for $6.32 + deposit

Snickers candy bars - on sale 2/$1
- $0.50/1
Kroger doubles coupons up to $0.50, so I snagged two for free!

King Size Reese's PB Cup - price unknown
- Free King Size Reese's for playing the March Madness game on Kroger.com
Got it for free!

Ken's Salad Dressing - on sale for $1.99 (when you buy eight participating products)
- $1/2
I picked up two for $1.49 ea.

I also received $5.00 off for playing the March Madness game. It was loaded directly onto my Kroger card and applied to my purchases. Free money is great!

I spent $31.53 at Meijer, but only saved $9.10 overall. 22% savings - it could have been better, but I bought some produce that wasn't on sale and picked up some things for my parents.

Here are the highlights:
Meijer Canned Tomatoes on sale for 2/$1 x 4
$0.50 per can!

Ziploc Freezer Bags - on sale for $1.89
- $0.40/1
- $0.40/1
My Meijer doubles coupons up to $0.50, so I saved $0.80 off can box. I paid $1.09 ea.

Stouffer's French Bread Pizza - on sale for $2 ea
We love these pizzas. I think we bought two. There's like five more in our freezer. :)

Overall, I spent $114.86 on groceries this week, but saved $73.59. That's a total savings of 39%. Not too bad. I look forward to doing even better. I know it can be done because I had a taste of it the other day. I was able to purchase three bags of Reese's Miniature PB Cups for $2 at RiteAid and four cans of Pringles for $1 at CVS. You just have to keep your eyes pealed and your coupons organized!

Stay tuned for my CVS, RiteAid, and Walgreens deals for this week. I just made out my shopping list today.

Also, stay tuned for a new recipe! Tonight we are trying Chicken Quesadillas. :)

Maybe tomorrow?

So being more diligent about watching what I eat did not start today. We went to Antonio's for 1/2 off pizza tonight. That's never good. Well, actually it always tastes amazing, but it's never good for the diet. Their garlic bread is to die for. Seriously. Between the two of us, we finished off two baskets. Oops. Now I don't exactly feel like working out. My stomach is protesting a three mile walk, so I'll start tomorrow. :) Famous last words...

Tomorrow we will be having leftover pizza (sans bread, thankfully!), so food blogging will have to wait until later in the week. However, I don't believe we're trying anything new this week. I do hope to have my grocery shopping breakdown ready to post soon!

Super Simple Chicken Alfredo

I made this recipe up all by myself! Seriously though, it's nothing really to be proud of. A monkey probably could have put it together, but the important part is that we enjoy it!

Chicken Alfredo

Ingredients:

1/2 box of pasta (whatever kind you'd like. I've used bow-tie and penne.)
Jar of alfredo sauce (I use Ragu)
1/2 bag of frozen broccoli
1 can canned chicken, drained

Directions:

Prepare pasta as directed on box.
While you're making the pasta, defrost the broccoli and then mix with pasta sauce and chicken. Heat well.
Drain pasta and mix with sauce.
Serve. :)

That's it! I told you it was super easy. :) You could probably make it a little fancier with some mushrooms or sun-dried tomatoes, but all I had on hand was broccoli. Oh, and some garlic bread would be good too! I made this on Saturday for just me and Ryan. We had no leftovers. I'd say that's a successful meal!

More Sugar Cookies and Chocolate Covered Pretzels

So it was gently brought to my attention that I've shared my sugar cookie recipe, but not the recipe for the icing I use. Oops! It's very simple. I just use the recipe on the Wilton Merinque Powder can. :) To make things even more simple, I use squeeze bottles instead of pastry bags. I find them easier to use and clean. However, if I was ever going to try and make fancy flowers or something, I would definitely use the pastry bags and icing tips that are sitting in one of my drawers.

Once I've outlined the cookies with the stiffer icing in the bottles, I fill them in with icing that I've thined a bit with a couple drops of water. I just use a spoon for that. It makes things go much quicker! I forgot to take a photo of the filling in process, so I'll be sure to take one next time!

My latest sugar cookie decorating adventure was for my friend Maria's baby shower. I think the baby blocks turned out really cute! Of course, I decided on the design that required more work since I had to fill in each side of the cookie with a different color, but I really think it looks nice. I was surprised how easy it was to make the letters. I really didn't have any trouble with them at all. I practiced on a piece of paper beforehand, but pen and paper doesn't always translate well in frosting. Thankfully, this time it did!

For Christmas, my friend Sarah and I made chocolate covered pretzels to pass out with our Christmas presents. We made them last year after Maria (see above) made them for my bachelorette party. They were so tasty, Sarah and I decided to make this a yearly Christmas tradition.

They're super easy to make too! All you need to do is buy a few bags of pretzel rods, some caramel, and some melting chocolate (we use Merckens). The pretzels are easy to find at the grocery store and the caramel and chocolate can be found at bakery/candy making supply stores.

First, roll out the caramel into a thin sheet. Then use a knife or a pizza cutter to cut thin strips. Spraying a little Pam on the blade helps it not to stick! Then take the caramel strips and twist them from the top of the pretzel down about 2/3 of the way.

Next, melt the chocolate. We use large plastic cups that are tall enough for the pretzels. Dip/roll the pretzels in the chocolate and place on a piece of wax paper to harden. While they're still gooey, sprinkle with whatever topping you'd like. This year we used sprinkles, decorating sugar, crushed candy canes, and walnuts.

We then just put three to a treat bag which I picked up at Joann Fabrics and tied them up with a twist tie.

Don't forget to dip the broken pretzel rods in any leftover chocolate you have. The pretty pretzels are for your friends and family, but the broken "ugly" ones are just as tasty!

Sugar cookies

It's been a while since I posted, but I really haven't been cooking that much. Ryan has been out of town a lot for work, so it's been a lot of cereal and frozen leftovers for me. :)

I did work on the Christmas cookies my mom is giving out this year. I think they turned out pretty cute!