Pumpkin Streusel Bread

Happy Fall! 

Yes, I know it isn't technically fall yet, but the as soon as Labor Day is over it's fall in my mind.  Fall means changing leaves, crisper weather, and the need for all the cozy comfort food and treats. One of my favorite fall treats is pumpkin bread. I've been making this version since 2014, when a friend gave me a loaf of apple bread with streusel, and I thought it would be perfect on my pumpkin bread. Spoiler alert, it is amazing.

Pumpkin Bread Batter
1 can pumpkin puree (not pie, the regular 15 oz size pumpkin puree)
3 eggs
1/2 cup butter
1 tsp vanilla extract (I use the vanilla bean paste)
1 cup sugar
1 3/4 flour (I do 1 1/4 reg & 1/2 whole wheat)
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 1/2 tsp pumpkin pie spice
1/3 cup milk
optional chocolate chips - I usually do 1/2 plain & 1 cup of chocolate chips in the remaining batter.

Mix the pumpkin, eggs, butter, vanilla & sugar until smooth. Then add the rest of the ingredients and mix until smooth. Preheat oven to 350.

 

Once smooth pour into pans - makes 1 2lb loaf & 1 mini loaf, 2 1lb loaves, or 4 mini loaves. 

Once you've poured into the desired pans, make your streusel topping.

Streusel Topping
6 TBS butter
2/3 cups rolled oats
1/2 cup flour (I use whole wheat)
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 tsp cinnamon

Hand cut together to make a crumble, or toss it in your mixer or food processor -it's such a small amount I hand cut/mixed it. 

Press the streusel onto your bread batter. I really pat it on so less will fall off as it rises in the oven. 

Bake at 350 for about 45 minutes for full loaves, 30 minutes for mini loaves or 20 minutes for muffins. Since all ovens cook differently I would check at 35 and 20 minutes on loaves. Once your tooth pick pulls clean you're ready to pull. Let cool about 20 minutes before popping from the pan.

Enjoy!

Quick Baking Time Guide - 350 degrees
for full loaf cook for 45 minutes
for mini loaves cook for 30 minutes
for muffins cook for 20 minutes

Spicy Pretzels - the perfect party snack

Happy Independence Day!

Did you forget to make something for a (socially distanced) gathering this Holiday weekend? If' so I've got the perfect, easy snack for you. Spicy Pretzels! When I lived in North Dakota we had the most amazing little company that made these seasoned pretzels, they were so good, but hard to find. So I did what I do, tinkered in the kitchen, and came up with my own. They are so good! My family prefers them to the name brand ones, and honestly, so do I.

I make these pretty much year round, but I especially love to make them as neighbor treats during the holidays.

Ingredients

1 large (party) bag of pretzels - i like Snyders sticks or 2 bags of the Winco braided sticks (shown here) 

3 TBS Ranch seasoning powder or 1 Packet

1 tsp Lemon Pepper

1 tsp cayenne or 2 tsp or Trader Joe's chili lime seasoning

1 tsp seasoning salt

1/3 cup vegetable oil (I use canola)

The Assembly 

In a large ziplock mix up the spices 

Then add the oil and "massage" it until you have a smooth past.

Next add the pretzels, shake them up a few times, let them sit for 2-4 hours, shaking them every so often. 

Finally spread on a backing sheet and  bake at 200 for 20 minutes (I then leave them in the oven to cool for another 20 minutes). Trust me, they need to be baked, the flavors just don't pop the same without a quick bake.

Don't forget to share the pretzel love. Happy Quarantine Summer Friends. 

The Best Queso Ever

Happy Cinco De Mayo!
When we lived in Oklahoma I was introduced to queso - real queso. Before that all I knew of queso was from a jar in the chip aisle, which was always a hard pass from me. In OKC all the best Mexican restaurants started the meal with house made chips & tortillas, fresh salsa, and white queso. This my friends was one of the worst food discoveries ever. You know why? Because I learned that queso is good! When we moved to Texas it was even worse, because the queso was even better.

When we moved back to the Northwest good queso was hard to find. So I did what I do. I tinkered in the kitchen, tried this recipe, and that recipe, mixed it this way, and that way, and boom. Perfection. First things first, here's what you need to whip up the perfect queso.

16 Oz of Velveeta (I know, I know, but trust me)
12 Oz Roasted Salsa
1 4 oz can of Diced Green Chilies
1/2 Cup milk
1/2 Cup Greek Yogurt (again - trust me on this)
1/2 Cup roughly copped cilantro
1/4 Cup Queso Fresco (optional but next level)
1 tsp of garlic salt
1 tsp of chili lime seasoning

This is a super easy one pot recipe!
In a sauce pan over Medium heat add Velveeta, milk, greek yogurt, and seasonings. Once smooth add in salsa, and green chilies. Once well combined add cilantro and queso fresco.

Top with an extra sprinkle of queso fresco and boom, perfect queso!

Lucky Little Leprechauns

 Are you team "Irish I was Irish" or team "what's with all the green"? I grew up in a town with a very heavy Irish Catholic populations, so we celebrated St. Patrick's Day big time. We got out of school early for the St. Patrick's day parade, and main street was decorated in green for weeks. St. Patrick's Day Mass was the second largest Mass of the year, that's how important it was to my home town. So I was shocked when I graduated, went away to college and learned that it isn't huge everywhere! So obviously I'm team celebrate big! Wether you're Irish or not, it's still fun to get into the celebration.

And as previously discussed, celebrating things with kids is my jam, and it's way more fun than grown up celebrations! Our tradition is pretty simple. When the kids go to be the night before St. Pat's (St. Patrick's day is always March 17th) the leprechaun runs wild. He dyes the milk green (2 drops of food coloring), leaves rainbow candies, gold coins, and lucky charms cereal as their surprise. 

The leprechaun also "tattoos" the kids while they sleep. This is the hardest thing about our tradition! I get the temporary tattoos really wet and place them on their little arms while they sleep. I do my best to pat them on, but I have one light sleeper who makes it more of a challenge. The surprise on their faces when they notice them is the best! Even my non-believer still thinks it's cool.

For breakfast they get to have Lucky Charms, a fresh fruit rainbow, and green eggs. To make the green eggs I put a handful of spinach and 1/4 cup of milk in my Vitamix, blended until smooth and then added 6 eggs. Blend until smooth and make as normal scrambled eggs, I added some thick sliced ham and white cheddar.  The kids love having special breakfast, it really makes the day more fun.

And of course you've got to have Corned Beef for dinner! I make mine in the slow cooker, which is pretty fool-proof.  But my favorite thing to do with corned beef is to make corned beef hash breakfast for dinner the next day! Fine chop some potatoes, 1/2 an onion, and some corned beef, fry it in a cast iron pan until crispy.

 Top it with an over easy egg and it's pure perfection.

However you choose to celebrate St. Patrick's Day, I hope the luck of the Irish is on your side. 

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Cranberry Sauce with Orange Zest

I love Cranberry Sauce! It's tart, tangy, and the perfect thing to bring balance to an overly salty Thanksgiving meal.  And bonus, it's so easy to make!

The Deets
1 lb Fresh Cranberries
1/4 Cup Sugar (1/2 cup if you like them really sweet)
Zest from 2 Clementines
Juice from 2 Clementines
Pinch of Salt
Zest for garnish

The How To
Add sugar, zest, pinch of salt, and celementine juice to a sauce pan over low heat until it turns to a light syrup. About 3 minutes.

Rinse and add cranberries, stirring every few minutes. Cooking time depends on how smooth you like your cranberry sauce. I prefer mine more of a relish style with chunks.

Here's what it looks like about 5 minutes in.

And at 10 minutes. This is how I prefer mine - still chunky, but no intact cranberries. Top with additional orange zest for garnish.

It's the perfect easy side dish for your Thanksgiving meal.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Halloween Traditions + Skeleton Wreath Tutorial

Can you believe Halloween is only a week away?

Are you a Halloween loving ghoul? or a I'm just her for the candy dandy?
I'm going to be real with you halloween is not my favorite holiday - I am not a dress up for Halloween girl - I've never really been in to it - but I LOVE celebrating and making magical fun for my kids. One of my biggest role model parents is my friend Jen, when we met  I did not have children yet, and she had 2 beautiful daughters who were 4 and 2, and she celebrated everything! I mean, decorations, fun food, perfect costumes, and she loved every minute of it - she did all those things for her and her children, and only for them - not because she felt she had to or was trying to be pintrest perfect - but because she loved it. I was in awe of it, but never thought I would be that kind of a mom - then again I was working 45-70 hours a week when I became a mom, so I'm sure that had something to do with it). Anyway I loved Jen's house, she made everyone feel welcome, she made everything fun, she really is just one of those incredible women you need in your life. I wanted my house to feel like Jen's house, like my house growing up, where everyone was welcome and there was always something fun happening.

I remember my first Halloween as a mom, I bought the perfect costume (which all three of my babes have worn), and we did pumpkins and handed out candy, which was just enough for me. Then one year I hung up a little banner for some random holiday I bought at Target, and my oldest who was about 18 months said "oohhh pretty, mommy, I love your decorations" and that right there turned me into a crazy decorating lady! For some reason my kids love holiday decorations - so I decorate for all the holidays. This year we added this awesome dude, inspired by Anna McFarland of Annaistheworst. Isn't he amazing?!?! Bonus he was so easy to make.

I bought the skeleton at Michaels for like $12, the flowers were around $20 from Michaels, and $4 from DollarTree. I used a piece of cardboard from a shipping box, and cut it to the desired size. I tied the skeleton on with some bakers twine and hot glued the holes closed.

Then I popped the flowers off the stems & cut the little plastic part off the back so they would be almost flat. I laid out the flowers - it took a few layouts to find the look I was going for.

Then I just started hot gluing the flowers on. I also added some leaves to fill in the background.

 This is such a fun and easy craft because there's no wrong way to do it - you just keep adding stuff until it feels right! I can't tell you how many people have come to my door asking about this guy, do yourself a favor and make a skelly wreath ASAP.

Now that the decor is complete we are ready to play. One thing I love to do for different holidays and seasons is read books that coordinate. We have a decent stash of holiday books, but I always hit up the library to get more so we can read them all month leading up to the holiday - in this case halloween.

A few of our favorites are: Happy Halloween Curious George,  Room on the Broom, Where is Baby's Pumpkin,  Duck & Goose Honk! Quack! Boo!, Goblin Moon, How to Scare a Ghost, Monster Trucks, Skelly's Halloween, Dino-Halloween, B is for Boo, Pick a Pumpkin, to name a few!

Time to Dress up! Other than the first year or two I let my kids choose their costumes. My oldest has been 1. Peacock, 2. Shark, 3. Tiger, 4. Dinosaur, 5. Astronaut, 6. Police Officer, 7, Darth Vader, and this year he is too cool for a real costume, so he will be a football player.
My daughter has been 1. Peacock, 2. Ruth Bader Ginsberg (yup Attorney mom here - this was the only year we did a family costume - I was my hero & first woman on the Supreme Court Sandra Day O'Conner, she was RBG, my son was a police officer, and husband was a prisoner - it was so fun!) 3. Fox, and this year she is going as a kitty.
Baby is celebrating his second halloween, he was a peacock for his first, and will be a shark this year. Gotta get my moneys worth out of those costumes 😉.

As for events, we will attend our Church's Trunk or Treat Halloween Party,  I'll volunteer for my second grader's class party, and attend my preschooler's halloween program (which I cannot wait for, her school has the cutest programs & and she's been practicing her songs all month). Then we will do a simple trick or treat around the neighborhood. One of my beloved childhood memories was trick or treating to my own house. My mom always had something special for us when we knocked on our own door. My kids will trick or treat to our house and will get a new book and a special treat. Here's what they are getting this year.

Big Book of Stars & Planets, Deep in the Ocean, Nibbles, Kinder Eggs

Food! If you know me, you know I love food! The bigs will both have school on Halloween, so they will get a special lunch of Spider Sandwiches, pumpkin oranges, hard boiled egg ghosts, and Trader Joe's ghost chips. For dinner we usually do mummy dogs - we wrap pizza dough around a chicken sausage to make it look like a mummy. I do the classic halloween mars mix for "normal" trick or treaters, and then I have special treats for our friends (pirate's booty for friends and kinder eggs for our besties).
Once they get all their candy we go through it, make sure everything is safe, let them choose a handful of things they don't have to share, and then everything good goes in a communal container in the pantry. The things we don't like get dropped off at our dentist's buy back event. How you handle treats is a totally personal decision, and we allow a fair amount of treats in our house.

However you choose to celebrate I hope you have the best Halloween yet! Make it Magical in your own way! Happy Halloween friends!

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The Perfect Shrimp for Any Recipe

There are so many amazing shrimp recipes out there, but so many fall flat on getting the shrimp just right. Here's my tried and true, perfect every time shrimp recipe. Short sweet and to the point.

First, you need good shrimp. One of my favorites is the Argentine Wild Shrimp from Trader Joes.

Defrost your shrimp and pat dry.

Toss with olive oil and sprinkle with salt.

Spread out on a baking sheet and bake at 400 for 9-10 minutes.

Voila! Perfect Shrimp every time.
Tonight we had shrimp tacos so I added a little sweet paprika & garlic salt.

RECIPE

1 pound of Shrimp

Olive Oil

Sea Salt

Preheat Oven to 400 degrees

Pat shrimp dry

Toss shrimp in olive oil

Spread on baking sheet

Sprinkle generously with salt and any other desired seasoning

Bake on 400 for 9-10 minutes.

Promptly remove from oven and add to any recipe.