Jill Can Cook: Coconut Almond Cookies

I still have some coconut flakes that I'd like to use up, so a few weeks ago I looked through a couple recipes that require them and came up with this one. I started pulling all the ingredients down from my shelves and realized that I was missing the almond extract. Everything went back into the cabinets and I completely forgot about wanting to make these.

About a week ago, I was at my mom's house and she opened up her spice cabinet. It randomly made me think of this recipe and my missing ingredient.

"Do you have any almond extract?" I asked her.
"That's random. Yes, I do. You need it?" she asked right back.
Well, duh, mom, of course I need it. I know I'm pretty random in general, but sometimes there's a method to my randomness. Anyway, I gladly took the almond extract off of her hands.

Thanks, Mom, for saving me from making a trip to the store! Now that I had my missing ingredient, I couldn't wait to make these.

Coconut Almond Cookies

Ingredients                

Remind me I need to buy flour and sugar! Those levels are dangerously low!

        

1 cup butter, softened

1 1⁄2 cup white sugar,

1 egg,

2 tbsp water,

1 tsp almond extract,

2 1⁄2 cup all-purpose flour, sifted

3⁄4 tsp baking powder,

1⁄2 cup flaked coconut, pinch of salt

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
2. In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar until smooth. Beat in the egg, water and almond extract. Combine the flour, baking powder and salt; stir into the creamed mixture. Stir in coconut. Roll the dough into walnut sized balls. Place the cookies 2 inches apart onto the cookie sheet.
3. Bake for 12-15 minutes in the preheated oven, or until lightly browned on the bottom. Allow cookies to cool on baking sheet for 5 minutes before removing to a wire rack to cool completely. Makes about 24 cookies.

 

This turned out to be a super easy recipe. I made them in no time!

The batter just before I dropped spoonfuls on my cookie sheet.

Maybe I was able to make these so quickly because I didn't take a whole lot of pictures! Hahaha, actually, I did take a couple more pictures, but I didn't feel like boring you with them all. I wanted to get right to the finished product:

These are the most boring looking cookies EVER!!

I pulled the first batch out of the oven. I took a nice big inhale and didn't smell almond or coconut. I found that to be pretty odd considering the almond smell of the uncooked batter was almost sickening!

I knew what I had to do.

I had to eat a cookie, ya know, just to be sure they were the right ones.

No idea why they have craters in them, but they're not too noticeable.

The first bite didn't offer as much almond/coconut flavor as I would've thought. I was starting to become concerned that maybe I only imagined borrowing the almond extract from my mom. Maybe it was just a dream. Maybe.. maybe... maybe not, because by the time I got to the second bite of my fresh-out-of-the-oven cookie I started to get that flavor. It was very subtle. It was very satisfying. It was exactly the intensity I was hoping for actually.

Delish!

I considered adding chocolate chips to these cookies while I was putting the batter together. While they were baking, I kind of regretted not adding them, since they looked so boring. But once I tasted one, I was glad I'd left them out.

I don't want to sound like I want to live in a museum, but by not having chocolate chips in them, I'm more apt to let the kids devour them! I love that they won't make a big mess in the hands of little kids!

I give this recipe an A. Very tasty. Not too sweet. Plus they're a nice chewy consistency.

 

Jill Can Cook: Parmesan Chicken Pesto Stuffed Shells

As you all may know, we've been getting an insane amount of snow in our area recently. It really takes the fun out of doing stuff. In fact, there was an entire week this month that I didn't leave my house at all! And to top it off, last weekend was both Valentine's Day as well as Joe's and my 8th year Dating Anniversary. Unfortunately, we weren't able to go anywhere for either of those special occasions because we'd just gotten a foot of snow a day or two prior and then got another foot of snow on Valentine's day.

So, my mom decided to throw a party. It was kind of a late Valentine's party, since hardly any of us really got to do anything then. It was also a potluck. Everyone offered to make/bring some type of food. Joe and I decided to make stuffed shells. I found this recipe at Riches To Rags By Dori,.I thought it sounded pretty delicious and didn't seem too off the wall... And...

Parmesan Chicken Pesto Stuffed Shells

Ingredients:

 

• 20-25 jumbo pasta shells
• water for boiling pasta
• 4 oz cream cheese, softened
• 1 cup freshly grated Parmesan or Asiago cheese + 1/4 cup for topping (I used Parmesan)
• 3 tablespoons prepared pesto (homemade or store bought, I used store bought)
• 2 cups shredded cooked chicken
• 2 cloves garlic, minced ( I used minced garlic out of a jar)
• salt and pepper to taste

 

 Directions:

 

1. In a large pot over high heat, boil water and prepare pasta shells as directed on package. Cook pasta shells only until al dente. The pasta will finish cooking when the dish is baked. Drain the pasta shells and set aside.
2.  In a large bowl, combine the rest of the ingredients, except the 1/4 cup of cheese for the topping. Fill the pasta shells with the filling and place in a baking dish.  Sprinkle the remaining 1/4 cup of cheese over filled shells. 
3.  Preheat oven to 350 degrees and bake shells uncovered for 30 minutes or until shells are bubbling hot and cheese melts. I did mine for 35. You can put it on broil for a minute to brown the tops if you want. 

This is another one of those recipes that makes a lot of dirty dishes. I used a frying pan to cook the chicken (it could've been boiled, but Joe felt like frying it), a large pot to cook the shells, and a small pan to make the pesto. I also used a cutting board to cut the chicken, a bowl to mix everything in, and a baking dish to cook it! I probably spent more time cleaning up afterwards than actually cooking!

Here are some pictures of all my dirty dishes in use:

Joe salt and peppered the chicken. I also salt and peppered the finished shells.

All the prepared ingredients getting ready to be mixed.

The filling after it's been completely mixed.

The shells right before they went into the oven.

The recipe I originally followed only called for 16 shells, but I just cooked the entire box of shells and figured I could use the extras for something else. I'm glad I did since I accidentally cooked the shells a little longer than I meant to. The over cooking made them a little flimsy and a lot of them broke.

Oddly, this actually worked in my favor because the shells stayed nice and soft during the cooking in the oven part afterwards. For once, screwing up a bit actually didn't ruin anything! Woo hoo!

Quinn decided to just eat the mangled shells as is. Fine by me!

I popped the finished shells into our oven for about 20 minutes, just to get them mostly done. Then we drove a half an hour to my parents' house and I popped them back in the oven for another 5 or so minutes, just to reheat them.

And.

They.

Were.

A.

HIT!!!

Everyone seemed to like them. I saw a couple people going back for seconds. A few people mentioned that they were really good. And my best compliment of the night was when my mom told me, "You're becoming quite the chef!" That might be taking it a little far, but I'll gladly accept it!

And not to be outdone, my mom put out quite a spread. A few other family members brought some delicious items as well. I'm surprised I didn't gain 10 lbs!!

And that's not even all of the food!!!

Notice a little something in there? Well, besides Quinn's head...

My niece begged me to make these.

I made a tiny batch of Bacon Wrapped Weenies. My niece texted me the night before and asked me if I could make these for the party. I was only too glad, considering they're extremely easy. I only made one package of weenies and I didn't use the butter this time. They still came out great and everyone still loved them.

This party turned out to be a great party! I'll take any excuse to hang out with family (well except for helping anyone move. If you're moving, I'm busy that day! Haha).

My siblings and I are all adults and even half of my nieces and nephews are adults. We all have our own schedules and lives and it sucks that it gets tougher and tougher to get together as time goes on. I'm really glad we had the chance to do this! And you know what? While we were there, we got more freakin' snow!! Haha!! At least it was less than a foot for once!

I love you guys!! Let's do this again for St. Patrick's Day!

 

DIY: A Very Quick Refashion!

We've been experiencing some really horrid weather conditions lately.

 

This is my back deck.

Do you know how depressing it is to look out your back windows to see your grill, red cooler, and cute little bistro set reminding you of summer and sun completely covered in snow!?!

 

The answer is: Extremely depressing!

 

The weather has been super snowy for about 2 weeks now. I've pretty much been cooped up with the kids in the house that entire time, only going out twice. Once, to bring my kid to the dentist. And the other time was to go to the thrift store where I purchased this dress:

 

It's from Fashion Bug! I loved that store!

I immediately fell in love with the print on the fabric (I'll show you a close-up later!). It was only $0.25, so I barely inspected it as I threw it into my cart. You could imagine my surprise when I got home and tried it on to find out that it fit me perfectly! It just needed a little tweaking.

 

There were two parts to the dress that needed some attention:

 

The front of the dress was open to reveal more fabric.

 

I don't know if you can tell, but there are 10 brass/black buttons on the chest.

 

 First, I tackled those buttons...

 

Buttons on.

Buttons off!

 

Next, I pinned down those two flaps of fabric on the front of the dress.

Here's that close-up of the fabric I promised you!

And then I sewed each side down...

Nice view of my sewing machine!

And I guess that's it. That was a pretty easy refashion. I didn't even take my scissors out of my little basket of sewing/mending supplies. I wasn't expecting to be done so quickly and I had a few extra minutes, so I grabbed my iron to iron my semi-wrinkly dress.

Hi, little iron! Haven't seen you in a while! Lol...

I always forget what a little bit of ironing can do to a garment. My dress definitely benefitted from those few minutes of extra attention.

And here's my finished dress:

My camera is obviously in "blurry" mode...

You know, half the fun of doing these refashions is getting to style my article of clothing. I imagine the person who gave this frock away thought, "This dress is so dated!" Not anymore, I hope!!!

Hmm, there's a weird little light orb on my belly button from the flash.

There were 2 reasons that I fell in love with this pattern:

1. I don't have any winter dresses that aren't solid colors. Not that I'm complaining, but I definitely had a hole in my wardrobe begging to be filled with a "Winter Floral." ya know? 
2. It reminded me of something Angela or Rayanne would wear on my favorite '90's TV Show "My So-Called Life!!" Of course, they'd be wearing a flannel shirt over the dress instead of a cardigan and they probably would've paired it with some Doc Martens instead of suede booties, but I think you get my drift. It's an updated version of that!

 

Showing off the fact that the dress is all one piece now!

Now if only the snow would take a break for a day so I could go out and enjoy myself! I need my thrift fix! Plus I need more cute clothes to upcycle!

I always look like a creeper in my "before "pictures! Lol.



DIY: Big Black Dress Into A Little Black Dress

I got this lovely black dress from the thrift store for $0.75, making this my most expensive refashion yet!

My make up looks pretty decent in this picture. That makes me happy.

You'll see less and less refashions in the $0.50 and $0.75 price range because I've completely given up on that thrift store since the new thrift store in my area sells clothing for as little as $0.25 per item! Obviously, this dress was purchased before I started patronizing the new thrift store.

So, yeah, this refashion better come out worth the high price! Lol.

There's really nothing all that wonderful about this dress. It's a thick t-shirt material. No adornments. Nothing special to see here. But, I saw it and imagined it being a really comfy LBD (That's "Little Black Dress" for all you dudes reading this!). The only thing that sucked about refashioning this dress is that I knew I'd lose these awesome guys in the process:

No, not my leg, these awesome pockets!!

On the plus side, it looks like this dress came missing something already:

See those white/beige things? Those are the remnants of some shoulder pads!!

I wasted no time hacking into this dress myself. First up: the bodice..

Separating the bodice from the skirt.

I definitely needed to take the top portion in quite a bit. I figured this would be best accomplished by taking the skirt off so I could concentrate on the top.

My mom gave me some of her sewing stuff, including a chalk pencil do-hicky.

I tried on the top and thought I might have to take it in about 2 inches on each side. I marked it and pinned it before I realized that it would still be too big. So, I took off the shirt I was wearing, that fits me pretty nicely and used that as a guide as to how much I should take in:

Thank goodness I did this. Looks like I'd need to take it in 4 inches per side!

Once everything was pinned and ready to go, I got out my sewing machine which was threaded with white thread!!!! AAHHHH!!! Crap, I hate rethreading my sewing machine. But, it had to be done.

And I did it on the FIRST TRY!!! Woo hoo!!! I'm so awesome!

Instead of sewing a straight stitch, I sewed a zig zag stitch. Maybe that would be good? I don't know.

I cut off the excess fabric and then took a blurry picture of it.

At this point, I thought I might try on the top, just to make sure of the fit before I go any further. This is what I ended up with:

Doesn't look too bad like this!!

How cute! A little crop top! So far, so good! The top portion of my dress looks like it'll do the job, so onto the dress...

There goes those utilitarian pockets!! Boo hoo!!

I decided it would be less work to keep the original hem even though by cutting length from the top portion, I'd lose the pockets. Oh well. I'd rather save myself the hassle of attaching the dress and sewing a new hemline. I cut off the top 6 inches. I was in the mood for a slightly longer dress than what I normally wear.

Now the top portion looks so tiny!!

I almost took in the dress part of the dress, but laziness kicked in.

It took a couple of tries, but I finally pinned everything the correct way!

My last bit of sewing!!!

I checked that my kids were still alive since I hadn't really been paying them much attention. I noted that not only were they alive, but they were having a good time! I grabbed my dress and put it on (along with some shoes, a belt, and a necklace) and this is what I ended up with:

Hey there, Good Looking!

 I think I totally nailed the length! It's not too long, not too short. I think it's really flattering and gives the dress a really casual feel.

 

There's about 100 feet of snow outside. I won't be able to wear these shoes outside for months!

 My only issue is that I would've liked the top a little more fitted. When I tried it on, mid-refashion, it fit really well, but I think the weight of the rest of the dress fabric makes it seem more nightgown-y. Luckily, belts were invented to hide my sewing/fitting mistakes! The belt also adds a bit of interest, so I'm  killing two birds with one belt, so to speak.

I swear I have eyebrows. Not sure where I left them though!

I have, I'd guess, 5 or 6 LBD's but this one is the most comfortable, by far! The others are mostly above the knee. One of them is made of very wrinkly fabric. A couple of them are very fitted and at least 3 of them have low necklines! I'm so glad I found this dress because now I have a casual LBD. The perfect dress to wear during the day or to a family event where I don't want to be too sexy (like a Baptism or bridal shower or something).

I had a great time during this refashion. I ended up with a really comfy dress that I really love!

Jill Can Cook: Chicken Apple Sausage Breakfast Burritos

A few years ago I fell in love with these pre-made Chicken Apple Sausage breakfast burritos. They were a great quick breakfast or snack on days that I was in too much of a rush to put more effort into cooking than running the microwave for a couple minutes.

When I first started buying them, they cost me $1.25 a piece. It was a little more than I like spending, but they tasted so good that they were worth the price. And it was just my luck that soon after I fell in love with them, the price on them kept going up and up until they got to be $1.89 a piece. I refuse to buy them at that price. They're good, but not that good, ya know?!

That's when I got the bright idea that I could possibly recreate their goodness on my own. And that's what I did over the weekend, with no recipe. I remembered what was in them and hoped I could recreate it with a little ingenuity. Here goes nothing!!

 

Chicken Apple Sausage Breakfast Burritos

Ingredients:

• 1 package (5 links) chicken apple sausage
• 4-5 egg whites
• half a bag of frozen hash browns
• 1/4 of a red pepper
• 1/2-3/4 cup grated cheese
• 7 tortillas
• salt and pepper to taste

Directions:

1. Prepare hash browns as directed on package.
2. In a medium frying pan, fry sausage until thoroughly cooked. Cut into small pieces. Put into a large mixing bowl.
3. Cut up red pepper, fry in frying pan. Put into the same large mixing bowl.
4. Separate egg whites. Discard yolks. Fry egg whites in frying pan. Season with salt and pepper. Place in the same large mixing bowl.
5. Once the has browns are cooked through, add to mixing bowl along with cheese.
6. Mix everything together thoroughly.
7. Place desired amount of mixture in tortillas and wrap like a burrito.
8. Put burritos on cookie sheet and bake in a preheated 350 degree oven for a few minutes just to get ingredients warm and cheese melted.
9. Serve and enjoy!

I have no idea what measurements I used because I just kind of guessed and added what I thought looked good and had a few tastes just to make sure everything was seasoned nicely. Sorry for not being more exact, but I think this is one of those recipes that can only come out terribly if you burn something, not if the measurements are a little off!

Frying up the chicken apple sausage.

The cut up red pepper.

Frying the red pepper.

The separated eggs.

The cooked hash browns

The filling all mixed together

So, this is another one of those recipes that you can substitute ingredients as you like. You could use any kind of sausage, add any kind of vegetable, any flavor of cheese, and you don't even have to separate the egg whites. I love that the recipe is so versatile. It is just a great starting off point, especially if you're picky like me!

The finished burritos!

This ended up taking a long time to make, even though it seems so easy. This is mainly because I cooked everything piecemeal. It was more worth it to me to waste time cooking everything in the same pan, one after the other, than to cook everything at the same time in different pans. I hate doing dishes! But you don't have to do it that way, unless you want to.

Joe was really impressed, not only because these came out so deliciously, but because I didn't even have a recipe! I finally have a little bit of imagination! Woo hoo!  Haha, anyway, these didn't taste anything like the prepackaged ones (I blame the Mexican cheese and the fact that I used red pepper instead of green pepper), but neither Joe nor I cared. They tasted a whole lot better. I ended up making 7 super filled burritos (twice the size of the store bought ones) and I worked it out that they cost about $1.00 per burrito (that's almost half the cost!). Joe and I ate 3 of them that first day and I put the 4 remaining ones in the freezer, to be heated up when we need a simple meal in the future.

Definitely worth all the trouble!!!

The best part of this whole meal was when Joe said, "I can't wait to make these for the guys at work! I only hope I can do a good a job as you!" Aww, that's the best compliment EVER!

This recipe definitely gets an A+ in my book. I don't think the 4 in the freezer are going to last too long so I'm sure I'll be making these again soon!