A Little Bit About a Lot of Things

Every once in a while I get inspired to cook/bake. It’s rare, but it happens – mainly on party cloudy, sixty degree days – you know, the not too hot, not too cold, not raining, days – kind of like the days I went to class in college. I’m generally a baker over a cook because let’s be honest, I have a sweet tooth. So I thought I’d just give you a look into what has been cooking in my kitchen since I’ve been off the radar lately.

It’s apple season and I love a good apple crisp. Plus, we have been apple picking so many times this season that I literally have more apples than I know what to do with. While I love apple crisp, I love it even more in these individual ramekins because you can just pull one right out of the fridge and have a single serving ready to go. Whenever I make a big batch in a pan, I always get disappointed if there isn’t enough toppings to apple ratio in my serving, so this makes sure that each one has the right amount of both! I used the recipe from Allrecipes and they always turn out perfect. I actually prefer my apple pie and apple crisp cold – anyone else out there like it that way too?

Next up, lemon blueberry cake using the recipe I found from Natasha’s Kitchen. Super light and simple to make. I wish it were just a tad more lemon-y in flavor, but all in all, a big hit in our house.

Fall calls for easy dinners and we love to make our own pizzas. The kids get into it because they love to sprinkle on the cheese and other toppings. We buy the dough from the market but you could very well pick some up from your favorite pizza shop too. Important to let the dough sit out and warm up to room temperature if it has been in the fridge, it will spread out a lot easier. We just go with cheese pizzas these days, but we make sure to add some parmesan cheese with out mozzarella to make it a little more dimensional. We add basil and oregano and bake at 450 for 10 minutes for the perfect pie! What are your favorite pizza topping combinations?

I feel like we  either have no bananas or a dozen bananas at our house and we can never eat them fast enough. Just throw those almost too ripe bananas in the freezer and save them until you are ready to make banana bread. We always make two, one with nuts (for the hubby) and one without (for the kids). I used the Simply Recipes version, and it came out great!

I find that eggs are a super easy way to make a family friendly meal. My kids love them for a hot minute and in the blink of an eye they tell me they don’t like them anymore. I try to make them in different ways so that no one gets bored. My sister in law makes a delicious casserole version that is always fluffy and so tasty for Christmas Eve, I suppose I should ask her for the recipe, but know that mine won’t come out as good. There are so many ways to make them – we usually add cheese and potatoes – sometimes ham or veggies if we are feeling adventurous. These are great for parties as well – they are easy to make and you can feed a bunch of people with minimal effort!

Staying on the theme of eggs, I make these single serve eggs and my husband likes to take them in the morning as breakfast on the go. Also a great way to empty the fridge! I use 12 eggs for a 12 muffin tray – and fill it with anything I want to get rid of – some popular flavor choices in our house are bacon and cheese, broccoli with onion and cheese, and of course ham and cheese. Make sure to spray the muffin tray with nonstick spray and cook at about 350 for 20 minutes or until the eggs set.

What have you been cooking in your kitchen?

Tags: recipes