Hot fudge pudding cake

It's my birthday so I made myself a yummy dessert I haven't had in awhile. Hot fudge pudding cake! It is gooey fudgey goodness.

Looks like this out of the oven:
Cake on top with gooey pudding stuff underneath. Plated up looks something like this:


Hot Fudge Pudding Cake

In medium bowl combine:
3/4 cup sugar
1 cup flour
3 TBS cocoa
2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt

Blend in and beat until smooth:
1/2 cup milk
1/3 cup butter melted
1 & 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Pour batter into square pan, 8x8 or 9x9

In small bowl combine:
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup light brown sugar
4 TBS cocoa

Sprinkle dry mixture over batter in pan.
Pour 1 & 1/4 cups hot water over the top- do not stir.
Bake 40 minutes or until center is almost set. Let stand 20 minutes. Spoon into dishes and spoon sauce over the top. Top with whipped cream.

Soup!

I made chicken pot pie the other night (wasn't my best hence no post although my first attempt at homemade pie crust came out decent :) and then tortilla soup today! Yup totally ignoring the fact that its still in the 90's here! If I keep cooking fall food it means its fall right?!?! I dream I know. Anyway I made this today. It turned out pretty good. Wasn't blow my mind amazing but yummy and I would make it again until I find another promising recipe. I tasted it along the way and was concerned since it tasted like just the enchilada sauce but in the end it all worked together and was tasty. Mine ended up on the spicy side... The enchilada sauce didn't say a heat level on it so I'm guessing the heat came from there. Tortilla soup is all about the toppings too. I added Monterrey jack cheese, avocado, sour cream and crushed tortilla chips. Nom Nom Nom! Tasty eatin! And easy peasy too.

Zukes

I miss my zucchini this year. Last year we got a ton of zukes! This year I think the probablem was mainly we have no bees. There was a giant tree behind our back wall that was full of bees. We called it the bee tree but it blew over in a storm last winter and our HOA never replaced it so our bees have left us. Our zuke plants looked amazing up until about last month, they just only produced a couple fruit. So disappointing. They've since started looking a little sad but that could be because its been so stinkin hot here. Actually we had a rough gardening year all around. Nothing really produced well. Tomatoes stayed tiny, jalapenos and bell peppers never went anywhere. Beans died early. The onions and carrots are the only thing hanging in there that might produce. Oh well. Live and learn I suppose. Here is one haul from last years zucchini plants. These were all hiding so they got big. Excuse the gnarly hand haha I was trying to show my parents how big they were :D

Chex Mix

Is it the holiday season yet?? I try and refrain from making this other than during the holidays since its like crack :) Love Chex mix. We use an old school recipe that we've used since I was little. I far prefer it over the newer recipes out there. We love to add a good amount extra of salt and Worcestershire to make it "spicier". Also the wheat Chex tend to soak up more of the butter "sauce" so sometimes we pour the butter mix over just the corn and rice Chex, mix and then just sprinkle the Wheat over the top along with peanuts. Depends what you like. I love the wheat ones that get all soaked and marvelous tasting but my brother hates them. Oh and we always double the recipe. Always.

Chex Mix

1/2 cup butter
1 & 1/4 tsp seasoned salt
4 & 1/2 tsp Worcestershire sauce
3 cups corn Chex
3 cups rice Chex
2 cups wheat Chex
1 cup salted peanuts

Preheat oven to 250. Melt butter. Mix in salt and Worcestershire sauce. Pour Chex into shallow roasting pan and pour butter mix over. Stir to coat Chex. Sprinkle peanuts over the top. Bake 1 hour, stirring every 15 minutes.

First Birthday!

Had a ton of fun making things for my daughter's first birthday! We did Minnie Mouse theme :) I wanted red and white Minnie and that is impossible to find decor for so I ended up making most things with my handy dandy Cricut! I made a few centerpiece style decorations, banner, door sign, invitations, 12month picture frame thing and cupcakes. Hubs made the cupcake stand and I decorated it and I love the way it turned out! I'll dig up pictures of the rest of the stuff later.

Decorations:




Cupcakes:

Card

Fun card I made for the hubby

Front of card


Back of Card

Smoked Turkey

Mmmm is it Thanksgiving yet? Not the greatest picture of the bird but smoked turkey is ahhhh-mazing :) We use this recipe but we smoke it instead of roasting. Trust me. We use it every time. I get sad when we are elsewhere for holidays and I don't get it haha.

Entertainment Center

So I am slightly addicted to http://ana-white.com/ and the hubs is currently building an entertainment center off of there for our loft. I think its called Classic Storage Center or something like that. This is the middle bottom unit. It will have doors hopefully soon. It is a blue-ish gray color. We wanted to stain it but ended up with trim in a different wood and it just wouldn't have matched (and would drive me insane even if just slightly different colors) so alas it was painted. It has 2 side units as well and he still has to build the hutch. More pictures as it goes along :)

Easter Card

Super simple Easter card I did a couple years ago I believe. Ah if I only had all the fun tools and such back then :) Sorta cute in a plain sorta way I spose.

Baked Zucchini Fries

Had some zucchini that needed eatin' so thought I'd try out something different. Saw something similar over on Pinterest. I just did peeled zucchini cut up in strips, dipped in egg whites and then rolled in roasted garlic bread crumbs. I'd tweak it if I made them again. Probably use whole eggs, throw a little Parmesan into the bread crumbs and add a little salt too. They didn't rock my socks off but weren't bad for using what I had on hand :)

Mmm Mmm

Here's what's cookin!



Arg excuse the "lovely" picture quality. Its steak but the flash super washed it out... almost looks like chicken. But anyhow its steak sammy night! Throw some marinated steak cut in strips in with some onion and bell pepper and cook it on up. Toast some deli rolls on up with some cheese (provolone is super de duper yum, hubs prefers swiss) pile on the steak mix and indulge! Normally I would do that for the hubs and then do a separate pan for me and add in mushrooms, zucchini, yellow squash and tomatoes but alas the veggie drawer was empty! Oh the humanity. So I dealt with less vegs and it was still yummy in the tummy! Nom nom nom :) Oh and sorry for no pic of the sammy... we were far too hungry!

Scrap scrap scrap~

I've been such a spastic crafter lately! I guess that's what happens when ya have a baby :) Hoping to get back on track sometime but a 6 month old will probably make projects take a wee bit longer. But that's ok!

Projects on deck... finishing off the nursery. Stop snickering at the fact that she's 6 months old and I have yet to finish her room! I hear you out there! Its not like the kid doesn't have furniture or paint on the walls. Just need to finish cutting some wall decals with the cricut and get them up. Also have 2 small boards to do soooomething with. Need to make a bunch of cuts and get some stuff fun decals on my craft room wall. Have a picture frame to be painted and put up. Another picture frame to cricut-ize and put up in the nursery (you can really stop laughing now). Ohhh and then theres Christmas scrapbook pages to do for 3 different scrapbooks. And 2 other scrapbooks that need to be started. Nah not much to do around here! And people think all I do is sit on my booty, watch soap operas and eat bon bons. **snort** I don't even know what a bon bon is!