Valentine's Day

I'm not sure what it is about our Loblaws store, but every time I am in there grocery shopping, even if I'm in for a quick trip, I always find myself down the aisle with all of the "seasonal" stuff. I admire the cool serving platters, the BBQ stuff (cos that means summer is coming!!) and then there is the odd baking thing. And there they were, right at my eye level; Valentine's themed muffin cups! Now ordinarily one wouldn't be so excited to see these pretty red cups, me however, I had to have them. My wheels started turning, all these Valentine's ideas.

I remember watching my mom in the kitchen when I was little, she had all these jars and fancy little tools to make the coolest looking cakes! I always thought I wanted to do that someday. I have collected icing kits, icing colour jars, sprinkles and sparkles and all things decorative.

With my wheels still turning, I created these!

My first works of art with a piping bag and Wilton icing colours. I have to admit I used Betty Crocker Rainbow Bits cake mix for the cupcakes, and the Betty Crocker French Vanilla frosting, but added colour to make it fancy. And of course, no baking adventure is complete without at least one trip to the Bulk Barn, which is where the heart shaped jujubes came from!

I decided to save the full out baking for my next idea: cookies! I came across a Martha Stewart picture with Valentine's cookies. (Who am I kidding, I didn't just "come across" it... I was on the Martha Stewart website). I did, however, find her Sugar Cookie recipe, that had an attached recipe for her Royal Icing.

Royal Icing? Martha Stewart? Okay... I'm getting in way over my head here, right? Surprisingly wrong!!

With 3.5 hours of baking under my belt, egg whites in my hair, icing on my glasses and weirdly enough icing on my cupboard doors, I created my masterpiece. Not bad for a first timer with the piping bag! Some are a little wonky, but just ignore those ones. Royal Icing is not that easy to work with!!

There are a few cookies missing, apparently my dad couldn't leave the kitchen alone.

I would definitely make these sugar cookies again, now that I've figured out how to use a number of things during this experiment, including: a rolling pin, icing pastes, icing bags, creating royal icing and using a cookie cutter with ridiculously thin dough!!

A Love Day success!!!!! xoxo

Christmas and New Years

2011 already, really? I should definitely be a pro at cooking by now, since for the last few years I've secretly had a New Year resolution to know how to cook. I'm slowly achieving this resolution...still needs some work though.

The week we were snowed in, before Christmas, Kevin and I decided we would make use of all my Betty Crocker cookbooks/magazines I had accumulated. We picked a couple recipes and had at. The results were delicious. Confetti caramel bars, chocolate dipped candy canes, Christmasy rice krispee squares and shortbread cookies. All were major hits, except for the chocolate dipped candy canes, which were actually a helluva lot harder to dip in chocolate then we thought! They would crack and break. There was a lot of candy cane consumption that time around.

In the last couple months I have also been building up my "kitchen collection". I am now the proud owner of the apron from the Sex and the City 2 movie, Charlotte wears it while making cupcakes with her girls, a pretty pink cupcake apron.

I have acquired some ridiculously cute snowflake plates, you know, for when I have company over around the holidays and need to entertain and feed people :) I like to think in advance!

Kevins parents generously gave me the Rachael Ray cookware set. It's sitting downstairs beside my other boxes of accumulated kitchenware, I admire the box with the bright orange cookware on it daily.

A few other bits and bobs have been added to my boxes, but I figure I need to have everything in order to properly learn to cook!!!! It's just the science of things, I need all of these things you see.

And if I still can't figure out how to cook by the time I get my own kitchen again, I will at least look the part in my apron :) xoxo

I caved...Banana bread anyone?

Ok Ok, so I wasn't going to take a picture of my banana bread because it didn't seem so spectacular, but after my mom decided to paint this wonderful picture of how I could set up the picture for my banana bread, I started to hum and haw on it a little. Tonight I was getting things set up for dinner when I noticed the plate of banana bread sitting on the table, already sliced and ready to be eaten.

So... as requested, here is my banana bread!! (or what's left of it)

Chicken Broccoli Pie

yum yum yum!!

I have been trying to get the opportunity to make this recipe for the last couple weeks, I stumbled across it one night while surfing through the betty crocker website. Of course as soon as I saw chicken and cheese in the same recipe I was sold. (My name is Krystina.. I am a cheese-aholic *Hi Krystina!*)

During a recent visit to Costco, I came across a massive display of Bisquick. Normally something like this wouldn't excite me, however a few recipes I have come across in my betty crocker cookbook plus on their website, has called for Bisquick. I pick up this Costco sized box and what do I find on the back? The recipe for the Chicken Broccoli Pie i've been dying to make for weeks! It's fate!!!!!!!!!!!!! (well... sort of)

The last couple nights I have wanted to make this pie, but without enough hours in the day, my pie has been pushed to the back shelf. Until tonight. I hauled out all my ingredients, which have been waiting for me for a couple days now, switched on our goofy little kitchen tv and cranked the oven. Wooo hooo we're in business now.

To be completely honest, I didn't think it was going to turn out. I have this problem, I don't like measuring things. I know it's almost impossible not to have successful baking without proper measurements but for the amount of chicken, broccoli and of course cheese.. I just eyeballed it. 1 1/3 cup of shredded cheddar by the way, is a lot bigger when I eyeball it then I think it's supposed to look ;)

So after an hour (prepping, concocting, and baking in the oven) I had Chicken Broccoli Pie successs!!!! I think I should have left it in for 30 minutes instead of the full 35 minutes. However, it was absolutely delish! Observe and enjoy!

Until my next adventure!! xx

ps. made banana loaf yesterday, everyone says it tastes delish, I am not pleased with the look, therefore no pictures are being posted hahaha

Red Velvet Cake

I have to admit, I have cheated with this Red Velvet Cake. Although, I did look the recipe up on my trusty Betty Crocker website. With a few added ingredients to make this simple boxed cake a "Red Velvet" cake, it didn't turn out bad at all. However, if you can see from the picture that it looks kind of big... well the picture doesn't do the size of this cake justice. It wouldn't fit in any of the tupperware containers in either my house or Kevins house. 2 round pans of cake that kept rising..and rising..it wouldn't stop. I performed surgery on the bottom layer to cut the rounded part off but this cake was monsterous. And took an awful lot of icing. I am going to have to tweak this for the future. And I'm planning on making a Red Velvet cake again in the future, but from scratch next time, as originally I had planned to do. Need more hours in a day!!

My cooking has slacked lately, immensley. I'm disappointed in myself! However, in a pinch, I did make some killer tuna melts last night for dinner, and chicken fettucini alfredo tonight for dinner. Must get back to my cookbooks!!

Until then.. xo

Cheer me up cupcakes!

Gotta love the back to school cold, it's that time of year when the cold migrates around all the kids and parents and of course, into businesses for us to pick up and get sick! I've been feeling lousy the last couple days but I've been busting to make some thanksgivingy/autumn themed cupcakes. So enough moping around with the "oh woe is me" attitude, I decided to get to it!

Gotta love my betty crocker recipes, although, the recipe says it makes 24 cupcakes. Maybe 24 anorexic ones, because this recipe only made 16. I just like to think that they're a little more voluptuous then most cupcakes.

Devils food chocolate cupcakes, french vanilla frosting, and Michaels "accessories". That Michaels store is dangerous, so very very happy we don't have one in Collingwood. I would be one broke betty!!

Mmmmm...!!

Sizzling fajitas!!! ...minus the sizzle part

They're quick, they're delish, they're pretty healthy I think.. they're fajitas!! Yum yum. Something I've made before (a number of times actually), but I just wasn't feeling all that creative tonight. I did however try to make them a bit healthier then usual as I am trying to slim down a tad. All of this cooking is taking a toll on my waistline. Eeesh! That's usually how it goes, isn't it? I used a bit of chicken broth instead of adding a lot of oil to the pan to cook the chicken and veggies in.. although I did something wrong towards the end of the cooking process. I let things simmer to try and keep warm and ended up with my fajita sauce liquifying. eeeeeek! Take it off the burner next time completely perhaps? Hmm...

Hopefully feeling a little more creative tomorrow! xo