Pantry Revisited

I'm late with this post. It's Christmas season. Give me a break. I'm stressed like the rest of you! It's what. . .three days until Christmas and I'm not ready. Today I went to Walmart. Not Walmark. Not Walmarts. Just Walmart. (You might have to be southern to know what that comment actually means). Traffic was backed up for miles. Everyone is out shopping and they are driving crazy!! My grocery list was two arms long. Walmart did not have everything I needed of course, so tomorrow will be another trip to Publix for more supplies. You would think a big snow is headed my way if you saw my list of food. But it is just Christmas fixins! On top of all that, I need rehab. I am totally addicted to homemade chex mix. Addicted I tell you! I started eating it this morning with my pumpkin spice coffee before I ate my cereal. Then the hand continued to go into the chex mix every half hour or so the rest of the day. I'm making more tomorrow. The maple mustard thighs were s...

Happy Holidays and a big thank you to all of you who cooked with me this week! I am the hostess this week for our Barefoot Bloggers group. We cook with the Barefoot Contessa, Ina Garten, enjoying every delicious morsel her foods provide for us. After much deliberation, I chose Ina's Croissant Bread Pudding. I chose it for three reasons. First, because I love bread pudding, second, it seemed a festive thing to make here in December, and third, since we are in the midst of the busiest season of the year, I knew it would not be too time consuming. I made two additions to the recipe. I added about a teaspoon of cinnamon and about 1/2 cup of pecans, for the simple reason that I love cinnamon and pecans. If you are having guests over this month, don't hesitate to prepare and serve this. You cannot go wrong with this bread pudding. It is the yankee's favorite dessert and he complimented me not once, not twice, but after each bite. He did say, however, that the pecans did not add a...

It's my favorite time of the year! This week especially. My birthday is Wednesday and Thanksgiving is Thursday and all that food we can consume!! Happy Birthday to Me! On our Tuesdays with Dorie group, we had the option of posting our recipes this month in any order we chose. This week I am posting the All in One Holiday Bundt Cake chosen by Britin of The Nitty Britty . Use this link to jump over to her website to get the recipe. This is one you do not want to miss. It is called all in one for a good reason - it has everything but the kitchen sink in it! While I thought the cake would taste more pumpkiney (is that a word?), it really tasted more like an apple cake to me. It is filled with pumpkin, apples, cranberries, pecans, and lots of yummy spices. I took it Saturday night to my birthday bash at our dance club and everyone really enjoyed it. The comment I heard the most was how moist it was. My DH ate a big hunk of it this morning for breakfast with our Starbucks Pumpkin Spice L...

Here's a movie quote. One of my favorite movies of all time. Do you know what movie it is from? I'll have the answer down below in case you don't. "As God is my witness, as God is my witness, they're not going to lick me! I'm going to live through this, and when it's all over, I'll never be hungry again - no, nor any of my folks! If I have to lie, steal, cheat, or kill! As God is my witness, I'll never be hungry again." Em of the Repressed Pastry Chef chose Cran Apple Crisps for the month of November and what a great choice that was. It filled my home with the most wonderful fall smells. One might think Thanksgiving has already come! I am not really sure I did the crisp part right. I just sort of blobbed it on there. I'm writing this before I taste it, but I'm sure it tastes superb if it is anything like the smell. Yum. Check out the recipe at Em's blog and while you are there browse around. Em has some wonderful foods to sha...

This week's Ellie recipe was chosen by Jessica of Singleton in the Kitchen . Check out her blog. I always enjoy reading Jessica's adventures. I have to admit, this week's recipe, however, did not excite me initially. However, I changed my mind after making it. We loved it. I think the only change I would make next time is I would like to have raisens in it. Also, the mint did not thrill me so I might leave it off. The dressing, however, was delicious! I am not sure what the difference is in regular yogurt and greek yogurt, but I loved the taste of this. We enjoyed it with some rotisserie chicken and a vegetable concoction I came up with at the last minute consisting of corn, peas, turnip greens, and pinto beans. I mixed all those together and heated it up and it was very tasty. The carrot salad was a crisp and delicious side. Thanks Jessica for choosing this! I felt I had made a very healthy dish. I'll leave you with a favorite quote, "The sooner you fall behind ...

It hasn’t been my best day and yet here I am blogging. You know what they say, some days you are the bug and others you are the windshield. Well you guessed it - today I’m the windshield! And sometimes it only takes a good cookie to turn your entire day around. Or a good laugh at Walmart. Have you ever really looked at the people walking around Walmart? Some of them need to ask Scottie to beam them back their clothes! Half naked is never a good look for shopping. But then, maybe their gene pool could use a little chlorine if you know what I mean! This week in our Tuesdays with Dorie group, one of my favorite bloggers, Pamela of Cookies With Boys chose Sugar Topped Molasses and Spice Cookies. I was not excited about making these cookies, but I did like the way they turned out. I thought they could do with more spice though. I also plan to use them as a topping for the Apple Cranberry Crisp that I will be making tomorrow night which is another TWD dessert. Check out Pam's blog becau...

First, please check back with me on Friday to see my Tuesdays with Dorie treat of the week. Cranberry Apple Crisp. Second, coming Thursday will be CEiMB's Carrot and Apple Salad with Fresh Mint. And third, there always has to be a third, right? Third, is Ina Garten's Pot Roast. All coming soon to a blog near you - namely mine! Movie recommendation - Pinkstripes recommended "Once" to me and I watched it this afternoon. If you are a fan of musical type movies, you should definitely check it out. We also watched State of Play with Russell Crowe and Ben Afleck and it was a very good drama. Happy week and again, please check back later in the week.