Toffee Cheesecake Bites

Two words: 

Toffee-Cheesecake!

Need I say more? 

My super sweet Mother-in-Law made mini cheesecakes 

for our Christmas Eve Party last year

 and I have been craving them ever since. 

So here I am 6 months later,

 about to die if I don't get me some of that 

bite-sized cheesecake goodness! 

Cheesecake happens to be one of my 

all-time favorite desserts,

but the thought of making an entire cheesecake

 is kind of intimidating.

However when I was researching mini-cheesecake recipes, 

I discovered, there's really not much to it!

You've got the crust:

Courtesty of my four-year-old.

(Note to self: make sure the lid's on tight!)

I think it's safe to say anything in the 

graham cracker/cookie family 

would work wonderfully. 

We went with a handful of 

Goldfish Grahams "Smores" 

and a handful of 

Golden Graham cereal.

Add 1/2 Teaspoon of crumbs to 

mini-muffin pans. 

Next time I think I'll skip the liners.

Now for the cheesecake filling:

Start with 8 oz. cream cheese 

at room temperature. 

Mix until smooth.

Nobody wants a lumpy cheesecake!

Add in a Teaspoon of Vanilla,

1/2 cup of sugar,

and 1 egg. 

Mix!

At this point I did a taste test 

(Don't consume raw eggs, I know!)

and it tasted like cheesecake, 

albeit a bit runny. 

Since I'm a rebel,

and I insist on putting my own spin 

on everything,

I added a splash of this:

Sugar free white chocolate syrup

Mmmmmm...

Fill those cups!

Bake for 15-20 minutes at 350 degrees.

While they're cooling

make a tasty topping!

I melted down 

Health Milk Chocolate Toffee Bits

I'm betting you could top these babies 

with just about anything...

Cherry pie filling, 

white chocolate,

dark chocolate ganache...

the options are endless.

Now spoon the topping 

onto the cheesecake bites

and chill for a couple hours.

Enjoy!

DIY Body Scrub

Chances are you already have the ingredients 

to make your own body scrub.

If so, I strongly urge you to do so.

Trust me, your body will thank you! 

I've had my eye on a few different DIY body scrubs 

on Pinterest for a while now.

So today when my Dove ran out, 

in hopes of avoiding using my hubby's "man soap" 

and smelling like an Irish spring,

I checked to see what ingredients I had on-hand.

Here's what I came up with:

1/4 cup Folgers Chocolate Silk coffee grounds

1/8 cup dark brown sugar

1/8 cup light brown sugar

1 tablespoon granulated (white) sugar

1/8 cup honey

1/8 cup coconut oil 

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

1 tablespoon vitamin E oil 

So far I tried this on my arms and hands

and I seriously cannot wait to scrub up tonight. 

This stuffs smells amazing!

Sweet Hawaiian Bread

Sometimes I surprise myself. 

 I have never had any luck at all with bread. Honestly, I made a banana bread once that could have been used as a weapon--it was bad! However I seemed to have turned over a new leaf or should I say, loaf! 

Although I must admit, I owe it all to my KitchenAid stand mixer. Ever since I bit the bullet and jumped on the KitchenAid bandwagon, I've managed to produce loaf after loaf of super tasty bread. I'm also happy to report that after a few "mushroom clouds" I've finally managed to get my bread to actually look like bread! 

I really hope this is not just a fluke!

Here's a recipe I adapted from Allrecipes "Amish White Bread" but I'm calling it Sweet Hawaiian Bread because I think it tastes exactly like those sweet Hawaiian rolls we all know and love except in loaf form. 

Start with 2 cups of warm water, 

2/3 cup of sugar, 

and 2 packets of active dry yeast. 

Let those ingredients foam up in large KitchenAid bowl. 

Am I the only one who is totally weirded out by yeast? 

It's kinda creepy, am I right?

Add 1 1/2 teaspoons of salt 

and 1/4 cup of vegetable oil.

Attach the dough hook and mix at the lowest speed. 

Next Add 6 cups of bread flour, 

a half cup at a time. 

Alternate between speeds 1 & 2. 

This process seemed to take forever. 

But boy was it worth it! 

Now I'm certainly no expert but after adding all the flour, 

the dough seemed a little dry to me. 

So I added a splash of coconut milk. 

This may have been the secret ingredient!

Take out the dough, knead it by hand a bit,

and form a big dough ball.

Oil the bowl 

and roll the dough ball around in the oily bowl.

Then seal the bowl up with plastic wrap 

and drape a towel over it. 

Since it was a pretty cold day, 

I tried this trick I read in one of the reviews: 

Turn on the oven for about 30 seconds, 

just long enough to warm it up,

then turn it off and 

let dough rise in the oven for an hour. 

After the dough doubles in size, 

punch it down and 

knead it a bit more by hand. 

Divide it into two ovalish loaves 

and place in greased/floured loaf pans. 

Let those babies rise for 30 more minutes. 

Then bake for 30 minutes at 350 degrees.

Now eat your delicious sweet bread!

I served the bread with bbq chicken, mashed potatoes & corn 

and my family gobbled it all up!

Purple Kale Smoothie

Purple Kale, Where have you been all my life? 

For this smoothie I blended: 

Purple Kale, Raspberries, Bananas, Peaches, Peanut Butter, Protein Powder, Coconut/Almond Milk and ice. 

I love my blender! 

I've been blending up a storm lately and I've created some pretty crazy concoctions. What do you blend? Share your ideas in the comments!

Better than Subway's White Chocolate Raspberry Cheesecake Cookies

Sure you can buy these at Subway 3 for $1, 

but don't count on them being very fresh after sitting out for who knows how long. 

OR...

For about $5 you can make a few dozen at home, 

then proceed to eat them ALL because they are so darn tasty! 

I took a batch of these beauties to a BBQ and they were GONE within the first hour. 

You may already have these basic ingredients on hand: 

1/2 cup Butter (aka one stick) 

2 Tbs. Shortening (Crisco) 

1/2 cup Brown sugar 

2 Eggs

3/4 cup of All-purpose flour

Now you're probably wondering why only 3/4 cup of flour? 

There's no way I can make 3 dozen cookies with that! 

You're absolutely right, that's why you're going to want to pick up 

the secret weapon: 

2 Boxes of "Jiffy" muffin mix

Don't forget the cream cheese (4 oz.) and the white chocolate chips (1 1/2 cups). 

And milk because, let's face it after scarfing down a dozen of these, you're going to need it.

Step One: Let your butter and cream cheese soften while you make dinner. 

Okay you don't have to make dinner. 

Yes, you can just have these cookies for dinner, I won't judge. 

Step Two: Beat together the cream cheese, butter & shortening.

This is the part where you hug your husband 

thanking him for buying a KitchenAid stand mixer, 

which literally takes ALL the work out of beating cream cheese! 

Thanks, you get the first cookie! 

Step Three: Add brown sugar and Beat some more. 

Step Four: Add an egg and Beat some more. 

Step Five: Repeat Step Four.

Step Six: Fold in flour along with the secret weapon.

Step Seven: Stir in white chocolate chips 

Go ahead, give a couple chocolate chips to the four-year-old 

who refuses to let go of your leg. 

Step Eight: Let the dough chill out in the fridge for a half hour. 

This is the hard part, 

you may need to go watch an episode of Mindy or something. 

I suppose if you're a glutton for punishment, 

you'll wash the dinner dishes. Booo!

Step Nine: Preheat the oven to 350 and line a cookie sheet with parchment paper. 

If you're paranoid like I am, 

spray that sucker with nonstick spray for good measure.

Step Ten: Roll dough into 1-inch balls and place on cookie sheet.

Be sure to leave these guys some room because they're going to spread. 

Step Eleven: Bake for about 12 minutes until the edges turn golden brown. 

Step Twelve: Let them rest on the pan for a minute, 

then cool on a baking sheet until you just can't take it anymore. 

Then eat them, 

give some to family and friends, 

or just eat every last one and pretend nothing happened.

What cookies? I don't know what you're talking about! 

Adapted from Six Sisters Stuff, who adapted from Bakergirl

Meatless Monday: Veggie Burritos

No animals were harmed in the making of these burritos.

Today for "Meatless Monday" I grilled up some veggies, cooked basmati rice with lime, heated a can of organic black beans, topped it all off with a little cheese, homemade guacamole & salsa we had leftover from the weekend, then wrapped it all up in a tasty tortilla. MMmmmmmm......



I was so excited to try out my new grill/griddle and let me tell ya, that thing works like a champ! I foresee a lot of grilled veggies in our future. It was so easy! Just brush on a little garlic olive oil, lightly season, and rotate the veggies every few minutes then after 10 minutes, when you start seeing those beautiful grill lines you know it's grilled to perfection.

So I cheated and used the raw flour tortillas. You can find these at the grocery story in the refrigerated section. They're almost as good as homemade and WAY better than the pre-cooked kind.Top it all off with cheese, guacamole, salsa, sour cream, olives, onions, lettuce, tomatoes, pretty much whatever you want--Just NO meat, it's Meatless Monday!

Adapted from The Pioneer Woman LOVE HER!