01 09 10

Monday, May 26, 2014

Oink Oink

Wanna see the best, most easiest, most delicious recipe ever??
It's Kalua Pig. Where has this been all my life!!??

I found it over at Nom Nom Paleo. Seriously 3 freaking ingredients? This can't be real life. Anyone is capable of making this and the only way you could not like it, is if you have no taste buds.

I made the slightest of changes to her recipe.


LET'S BEGIN!

You'll need a 3 pound roast, a crockpot, 5 cloves of garlic, and 2  tbsp sea salt or Himalayan Sea Salt. I cooked mine for 11 hours. I usually hate waking up to the smell of food cooking in the crockpot, but THIS! I woke up hungry!!


1. Make 5 deep punctures in your pork with a steak knife. Literally push the knife all the way into the pork.
2. Insert your 5 garlic cloves, or minced garlic, into the punctures.
3. Rub the sea salt over the whole pork. Really be careful of over salting. The pork will make a lot of juice and you don't want it to be too salty.
4. Place your pork in the crockpot, skin side up, and turn on low for 11 hours.
5. When your pork is done, remove it from the crockpot and shred it with 2 forks. Do not shred in the crockpot!! The juice is super salty and you'll ruin your masterpiece. Taste the pork, if it needs more salt add some of the juice from the crockpot.



My sister made this too and she served hers as BBQ. We served ours with sweet potato fries and grilled pineapple. I can only imagine the possibilities!




*HEY! You see me down here?? If you click on a link and purchase something I may earn a few dollas'. Thanks, youdabest!"

Friday, May 23, 2014

"It's my house, and I live here"

This post is in reference to unwanted pests. And the need for them to get out of my *&@*#^$ house!
I do not play with bugs. Point, blank, period-end of story.
Now laugh if you may, but I also don't want to go around killing all the bugs. They too are God's creatures. So, sometimes I feel bad after a squish fest.

And, does anyone else remember "Hey, Little Ant". Now that's how you teach kids how to kick peer pressure in the rear end.

But anyway, I would rather just keep them out of my house than kill them. And, since I have a dog I really want to do it without chemicals. I did read up a little on the benefits of tea tree oil and I know that's safe for dogs because I used it last year to help get rid of fleas that Milo got playing piggyback with a deer. Just let that happen, don't ask questions.

I mixed 10 drops of tea tree oil in water in this little 3 oz bottle, I bought out the dollar bin at Target years ago. I sprayed it around the door and window frames and have been cleaning the counters and any spills with the mixture. Plus, it smells great!




A few of my other favorite uses for Tea Tree Oil include household cleaning, scalp moisture/massage. I found a list of 80 things here that I thought was neat. You can buy tea tree oil here. I paid like $9 for this measly bottle so you are getting a real steal on Amazon.

Try out a few uses and tell me about it in the comments section!


*HEY! You see me down here?? If you click on a link and purchase something I may earn a few dollas'. Thanks, youdabest!"

Monday, May 19, 2014

You may be in Maui, but I'm eating coconuts

If you sensed a tinge of jealousy in the title, you would be correct.
Top Mary Kay sales directors and National Sales directors are currently in Maui on the company trip. And I'm jelly. How could you not be!!?? I follow these fabulous women on instagram, so I'm oozing over their pictures.
But hey, I'm making lemonade out of lemons and we've got Homemade Coconut Cream Pie Larabars!

Larabars are delicious and nutritious. What more could you want in a snack?? The brand name bars were good, but the ones I made are fricking out of this world. Oh my goodness I could probably eat the whole batch.
I wanted to make these because I saw a tutorial for some of the fruit ones over at One Good Thing By Jillee. I like sweet, creamy and rich. So Coconut Cream Pie was calling my name. Another huge factor was price. You would have to pull a second mortgage to afford one of these everyday. At a $1.39 per bar at my local grocery store, that was not doing it for me. I already keep coconut oil, shredded coconut and almonds in my cabinets. So cashews and pitted dates were the "investment". I did break down the price total (including the things that were already owned).

ACTUAL COST                                              RECIPE COST
Almonds 36oz $13.99                                                     Almonds 8oz $3.11
Cashews 34oz $13.99                                                     Cashews 8oz $3.29
Coconut Oil 30oz $7.99~ (don't remember!)                     Coconut oil 2 tbsp $0.27
Coconut 8oz $2.50                                                        *Coconut 2 dry cups $1.85
*I literally do not understand how this happened. I measured 2 cups, the bag says 8oz, there is still coconut left in the bag. Let's just say I got lucky with extra in my bag. 
Dates 16oz $5                                                                 Dates 12oz $3.75
TOTAL $43.47                                                TOTAL $12.27


Now obviously if you do not own any of these ingredients, this is super pricey. To cut down on costs you could buy just the amount you need. We use a lot of these things so buying them in bulk makes the most sense for us. I will add links to Amazon to try to save you a few dollars.



OK, now past that super long explanation and on to the good stuff >>>>>



INGREDIENTS


This recipe does call for a high powered blender or food processor. I love my BlendTec
don't be a dummy and buy salted cashews that you'll then have to rinse. already made that mistake for you.



1. First add your nuts to the blender jar/food processor jar. Grind these to a very fine meal. You may have to stop a few times and use a rubber spatula to scrape the sides of the jar.
2. Now I added all the rest of the ingredients after this. I suggest you add the ingredients in stages. My blender was overheating and I had to stop and go back a few times. Blend until you have a crumbly mixture, resembling apple pie crumb topping or wet sand - you pick.
3. To the real fun! Lay out plastic wrap and pour out the contents of your blender. Top it with another layer of plastic wrap.






4. Roll your bars to your desired thickness with a rolling pin, or flat with your hands. I did them about 1/4 inch thick so they weren't such a high calorie snack. Then I broke off pieces from the edge that were making the shape very irregular and filled in the space to make it close to rectangular.






5. Move the mixture on the plastic wrap to a cookie sheet and refrigerate for at least an hour.

6. After refrigeration, remove both layers of plastic wrap. You can cut them on the cookie tray now.


7. Cut whatever size bars you'd like.


tell me that doesn't look like Virginia. I dare you.

 8. Then place individual bars inside wrapper of your choosing. I cut squares of Press N Seal and wrapped the bars individually. Put some in your fridge and put the rest in the freezer so you don't eat every single one in the same day. That would be shameful.







22 beautifully, individually wrapped bars of culinary perfection



*HEY! You see me down here?? If you click on a link and purchase something I may earn a few dollas'. Thanks, youdabest!


Saturday, May 17, 2014

Fish and veggies for breakfast. How Irish of you.

I have no idea how accurate/politically correct that is. I know my mom always said that about me though. And, she was a funny lady. And, pretty smart. So, I'm taking it at face value and calling it Irish.

I believe my love of vegetables, versus fruit, at breakfast stemmed from the Avocado Breakfast Salad. I have never been a huge egg fan, so omelets were not a vegetable vehicle for me. Also, rarely will you catch me snacking on vegetables throughout the day, but you will certainly catch me with a handful of berries. So this was an attempt to get more veggies in my diet. If you need more veggies, want more veggies and gotta gotta have it- this is for you.

INGREDIENTS

To make Grain free English muffin, you can follow the recipe over at Beauty and the Foodie, or follow this. Let me save you from the mistake I made AND DO NOT, I REPEAT DO NOT, use Almond Flour. Blech, just blech...

1/2 tbsp coconut oil 
1 egg beaten
1 tbsp milk (I have used skim milk and homemade Almond Coconut Milk-preferred the skim)
1 tbsp coconut flour 
1/4 tsp Honey
Pinch Sea Salt
1/8 tsp baking soda with 1/4 tsp Apple Cider Vinegar in a small bowl (this will help the rise)

1. Melt the coconut oil in your dish, in the microwave. I used a large cylindrical mug, like this one)
2. Place the baking soda and apple cider vinegar in their little bowl. It'll fizz.
3. Add all your ingredients to the mug, and whisk until well mixed and smooth
4. Add the baking soda and vinegar mixture. Continue to mix until smooth
5. Now the best part!! Cook it for 1 min and 30 seconds in the microwave, yes the microwave!
6. Take your muffin out of your dish and slice it in half, bun style.
7. Lightly brown the muffin top and bottom, on both sides, in an oiled skillet.


Yay your English muffin is done!!!

Now poach an egg, slice a tomato, an avocado, some smoked salmon, top it with some capers and fresh cracked pepper and enjoy the best breakfast you've ever had.








*HEY! You see me down here?? If you click on a link and purchase something I may earn a few dollas'. Thanks, youdabest!"

Friday, May 16, 2014

Grain Free Cookies

Um, YUM. That is the end of the story.



But, seriously, these were so delish, they were consumed in just a few days. So good.

So why grain free you ask? Well, super long story short, I had not been feeling well for a while. Lethargic, upset stomach, everything was making me nauseous and I was literally STARVING all day every single day. Something had to change. I've known for years that I have PCOS, but I have not done anything about it. So I started doing some research and am making what I hope are the necessary changes to my diet. And I can say I feel so much better.

So while I will not let my taste buds suffer at the hand of PCOS, I am dedicated to changing my diet. And of course cookies were the first PCOS friendly food I made.
Here you go!!

This recipe is not my own, I'm merely sharing it. I found it here and I didn't change anything except the amount of vanilla.

Since I don't know much about grain free cooking, a lot of recipes will just be ones I'm sharing.

INGREDIENTS

1 cup super chunky peanut butter (I really like Crazy Richard's)
1 cup brown sugar (I used dark)
1 egg
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips

1. Preheat oven to 350F

2. Mix all ingredients together, minus chocolate chips.

use these awesome recycled bowls my sweet aunt got me for Christmas

3. Add in chocolate chips.


3. Form 1 tbsp balls of the dough, with your hands.

4. Place on parchment paper lined cookie sheet.


5. Bake cookies until they puff, about 12 minutes


6. Cool and transfer to cooling rack.


made 20 scrumptious cookies



 What's your favorite grain free dessert?

*HEY! You see me down here?? If you click on a link and purchase something I may earn a few dollas'. Thanks, youdabest!"