Oven Baked Fajitas

Posted on March 3, 2014 by Georgina

Oven Baked Fajitas

This is one of my favorite fast and easy go-to recipes. You can throw it all together (even ahead of time if you want) and just let it do it’s thing! I’ve made this a few times when we had company coming to visit for Friday night as I don’t really feel like slaving away after a day of work and want to hang with the guests too! 🙂 My only adjustment to this was that the first time I made it added the whole can of Rotel without draining at all and it was reallllly juicy so now I try to drain the tomatoes/chilies as much as possible. I’ll usually accompany this with my special homemade guacamole (to.die.for) and chips and just tortillas for the fajitas. Jake likes a little cheese on his, I don’t- so just pick whatever you want! Hope you enjoy!!!

This is a separate time making this. But just proving you can use any ingredients you have on hand!

Ingredients:

1 pound boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cut into strips
2 Tbsp vegetable oil
2 tsp chili powder
2 tsp cumin
1 tsp garlic powder
½ tsp dried oregano
¼ tsp salt
1 (15 oz) can diced tomatoes with green chilies (Drained as much as possible)
1 medium onion, sliced
2 large bell peppers, seeded and sliced (I use any color I feel like/have. Sometimes I even use those fun little colored peppers too!)
flour tortillas
Toppings such as cheese, sour cream, cilantro and guacamole – if you want

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Place chicken strips in a greased 13×9 baking dish.
In a small bowl combine the oil, chili powder, cumin, garlic powder, dried oregano, and salt
Drizzle the spice mixture over the chicken and stir to coat.
Next add the tomatoes, peppers, and onions to the dish and stir to combine.
Bake uncovered for 20-25 minutes or until chicken is cooked through and the vegetables are tender. Serve on tortillas with desired toppings.

See ?!?!? Easssssy Peassssy

xoxo

Easy Chocolate Lava Cake

Posted on February 22, 2014 by Georgina

Chocolate Lava Cake

Happy Saturday! 🙂 As we all know Valentines Day was recently. Now, we(Fiancé and I) don’t really do much for Valentines day, just a sweet card to each other usually. BUT I did take the day this year as an excuse to make and extra special meal for me and my fiancé- AND I actually make dessert which is something that I never do. It was relatively easy, and tasted really decadent. Here it is!

Ingredients:
5 tablespoons (plus more for greasing ramekins) butter
1 cup dark chocolate chips
2 egg yolks
2 cage-free eggs
3 tablespoons sugar
1 heaping tablespoon unsweetened cocoa powder
4 tablespoons A.P. flour
pinch of salt
1/4 teaspoon of vanilla
raspberries for garnish (optional)
vanilla ice cream(optional)

Directions:
1. Pre-heat oven to 425. Grease ramekins well with butter and coat with a layer of sugar. (This trick works wonders and those babies will slide right out!)

2. Melt the butter and chocolate together in a medium sized bowl either in the microwave (make sure to only this is on 50% power and in 30 second increments so that you don’t burn it!!) or double boiler method.

3. In a large bowl whisk together the egg yolks, eggs, and sugar until frothy.

4. Then stir in the melted chocolate mixture into the egg and sugar mixture and whisk ,just until combined. Set aside.

5. In a small bowl combine cocoa powder, flour, and salt. Then sift into the chocolate mixture and whisk until combined.

6. Stir in the vanilla.

7. Pour the mixture evenly into the ramekins, you can use 5 oz ramekins to make 4 servings or use 8 oz ones to make 2 servings. Tap them lightly on the counter to remove air bubbles.

8. Refrigerate them for about 30 minutes.

9. Place the ramekins in the casserole dish and carefully pour hot water (can be hot just from the faucet or boiled) into the casserole dish until it goes half way up the side of the ramekins.(Careful not to get them IN the ramekins… not that that happened or anything… 🙂 )

10. Bake for about 18-22 minutes.(Ok the recipe I read said that you’d know they were done when the middle still looked a little jiggly but the rim was firm- I didn’t find that to be true(see pic below)- my whole top looked and felt completely cooked, but the underside and middle was still gooey. I think you may just have to trial and error the time with your oven….) When they’re done, remove ramekins from the casserole dish and let them cool for about 5 minutes. Turn it upside down over a plate and tap the bottom firmly until the cake slides out. This should happen easily with your coating of sugar, but if it doesn’t just slide a knife around the edge to loosen things up.

11. Garnish with fruit and or ice cream and any other topping you’d like. Enjoy!

This was amazing. I couldn’t finish mine. I’m not a huge chocolate person(don’t hate me) and I used 8 oz ramekins which is actually a pretty big serving. Jake however had no issues finishing his. He was very impressed 🙂 Kept asking what it was, I kept answering Chocolate Lava Cake but he kept wanting more details. He was like ” no but it’s all gooey and perfect. I mean this is like so good, you could charge $10 for this at a restaurant and it would sell out”….awwww what a good fiancé 🙂

Hope you all enjoy!

xoxo

Caramelized Pear, Prosciutto & Blue Cheese Pizza

Posted on February 15, 2014 by Georgina

Caramelized Pear, Prosciutto & Blue Cheese Pizza

Ingredients:
1 semi-ripe pear(still want it a little hard) – thinly sliced
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 tablespoons butter (I prefer unsalted)
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon nutmeg
2 tablespoons brown sugar
6 ounces fontina cheese, freshly grated (could sub grated mozzarella too)
2 shallots, sliced
2 garlic cloves, minced
4 slices prosciutto
6 ounces blue cheese, crumbled
balsamic glaze for drizzling

Oh and a pizza crust of your choosing 🙂

Directions:

Preheat your oven to 400 F (this is a little dependent on the pizza crust you choose so make sure to check the packaging/instructions).

Heat a large skillet over low heat and add olive oil and butter. Add in the pears with the salt and nutmeg and cover, cooking for about 10 minutes and stirring occasionally. Reduce the heat more if they begin to brown too much. Stir in the brown sugar and cook for 5 more minutes or so, until golden. Set aside.

Add about three fourths of the fontina on the crust along with the garlic and shallots. Spread the pears all over the pizza and cover them with the prosciutto. Crumble the blue cheese over top and add the rest of the fontina. Bake for 10 to 15 minutes, or until the crust is golden and the cheese is bubbly. Remove and drizzle balsamic on top.

Um. Then die and go to heaven. So freaking tasty.

I adapted this recipe when I made it and did a smaller portion and just did a mini pizza for me, Jake was hanging out with some guys friends so I got to enjoy this beaut all on my own. Seriously I could have eaten like 4 of the the mini pizzas. Deeeeeeee-licious. If I do say so myself 🙂

Hope you enjoy too!

xoxo

POMEGRANATE, KALE, AND WILD RICE SALAD

Posted on February 9, 2014 by Georgina

POMEGRANATE, KALE, AND WILD RICE SALAD

Ummmm, seriously you guys, this is one of the best things on planet earth. It caught my eye at first just becuase of how pretty it was but then once I made it, ohhhh maaaaannnn oohhh mannn. Probably could’ve eaten the whole thing myself. The dressing to this is amaze-balls and I’m gonna make it for my regular salads all the time!

INGREDIENTS
For the salad
1 cup pomegranate seeds
2 cups chopped(not tiny)baby kale
2 cups cooked wild rice (you can use leftover rice or buy precooked)
¼ cup toasted walnuts
¼ cup feta or crumbled goat cheese

For the dressing
½ cup minced onion or shallot
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 tablespoons water
2 tablespoons honey
½ tablespoon apple cider vinegar
½ teaspoon salt
1 squeeze lemon or orange juice

INSTRUCTIONS
Prep the salad ingredients (chop, rinse, toast, etc). Chill the ingredients in the fridge while you’re making the dressing if you want a cold salad.

This is more walnuts than I used for the salad, but I toasted about a cup to use for various things, while I was at it anyway 🙂

Mince the shallot or onion and saute in ½ tablespoons olive oil to reduce the ‘bite’ of them. When soft and fragrant, remove from heat and transfer to a food processor. (If you want a stronger flavor for your dressing, skip the sauteing altogether. The shallot in particular works well for not sautéing method as they are milder)
Pulse the onions or shallot with the remaining olive oil, water, honey, apple cider vinegar, salt, and orange juice until smooth and creamy. Taste and adjust. Add additional olive oil or water to keep the mixture moving through the food processor.
Toss the salad ingredients together with the dressing just before serving. I prefer to serve this at room temperature or chilled slightly.

Then: Eat. It. All

Please tell me you guys like this one as much as I did!!!!

xoxo

Glitter State Artwork

Posted on February 5, 2014 by Georgina

Glitter State Artwork

So here is another one of my Christmas presents I made. I have had my eye on this craft for a while. I actually love state artwork, there are so many fun ones I want to try but how many pictures of states can a girl have in her house, I believe the answer is too many. What better way to have fun making them and not look like a hoarder- than making them as gifts! 🙂 This one took a little bit more time simply for the fact that I a) needed daylight (to trace the state outline on my paper) since I don’t have a lightbox I needed daylight and as sad as it is, that is hard to come by in the winter during the hours I’m at home. and b) I wanted the glue and glitter to completely dry and set before framing.

Here is what you’ll need:

a print out of your state of choice. I obviously chose the best state in existance, Wisconin.
Thicker paper, like cardstock, poster board, this really depends on how big of a state or picture you are making
Scissors
Plain ole regular modge podge (mine in honestly still from when I was like 17 years old. still works, but I’m running low and need more soon!
Glitter. I got mine in the card making section at Micheals(you can see the pic below for deets) but really any craft glitter will work.
Paint brush
Containter to coat your cut out in to avoid a glitter catastrophe 🙂
Double stick tape
Frame and if you want, colored paper to line your frame.

Optional:

You can use a sticker of a heart or if you don’t have on I just painted a heart in red/pink paint on a peice of paper and cut it out and stuck in on.

Here is a picture of some of my supplies:

Clockwise: My modge podge and glitter I used- an illustration that you really want to not be shy with the modge podge in order to get a good coating of glitter to stay on the paper, my cutout in a glass container covered in glitter, then once it had dried a little and the exess glitter shaken off.

Here is what I did:

1) Print out an outline of your state. I mean I guess you can freehand it but I would suggest printing 😉

2) I taped my thicker cardstock over the outline and held up to my patio door (this is where that daylight is needed) and just traced the shape. then untape the sheets.

3) Use scissors and carefully cut out your state from your thicker cardstock.

4) place the outline in your container and use a paintbrush or spongebrush thingy, to coat your paper in modge podge. See my picture above about how you should really put a good coat on. Otherwise the glitter won’t stick nicely and it will be alittle thin, but be careful to not overcoat otherwise it will probably never dry. No harm in doing a little test run on a peice of scrap paper like I did above too.

5) When modge podge is still wet, coat generously with glitter, making sure to get a nice even coat and no “bald” spots.

6) Let the glitter and modge podge set for a while, probably like an hour and then pick up carefully(as it’s not all the way dry yet) and shake excess glitter from the cutout. Then I placed the glitter state on a piece of scrap paper and allowed to dry completely. I waited 4 days because I went out of town but I’m sure it doesn’t really take that long, but I’d for sure wait a full day.

7) You can pour your excess glitter back into it’s container and save for another glitter craft 🙂

8) This isn’t a necessary step but once my state was dry I took it outside and sprayed it with a high gloss arcylic sealer. Basically just because I wanted to set the glitter a little more. I didn’t want to have specs of glitter coming “free” and getting all over the glass of the frame because that would be a pain in the ass to deal with. I had purchased it for a different craft and thought, “hey why not try it”. Like I said, it’s not necessary but if you have anything similar lying around it worked great. ( Here is a link to the product that I used)

9) Once dry, if you choose you can place a heart over a particular locatiaon of the state that holds any significance to you. Then I put a couple peices of double stick tape on the back and taped it to a peice of black paper and placed in the frame.

TA DA!

Ignore the reflection in the glass of the frame. It was nearly impossible to not get my hands or face ! 🙂

I was so pleased with this craft! I made it for my best friend who is originally from Wisconsin but moved to Minnesota. I told her this was so she could always see “home” 🙂 I miss you B!That’s pretty much it. I mean this had so many endless possibilities not just in states but any shape you could think of. I think an outline of a stag head and antlers or something like that would be really cool too. Experiment and let me know what awesome things you all create 🙂

Thanks for reading!

xoxo