Chocolate S'mores Cookies: A Guaranteed Hit

I hope everyone has had a wonderful holiday season! I know I have. I honestly can't believe it is over already. I am definitely ready for a detox though. My body is going through sugar shock. For someone that doesn't eat a lot of sweets but has an extreme sweet tooth, this time of the year is so difficult for me. It is definitely time for a detox. But for now...we talk cookies! A couple of weeks ago, they had some cookie recipes in the county newspaper. I adapted from a rocky road cookie recipe to make these.

I made these Chocolate S'mores cookies for work and for my family for Christmas day. A hit in both places. I heard repeatedly how good they were. My boss is "super work out guy" and eats VERY healthy and rarely picks up any sweets. When he went back for another cookie, I knew they were delicious. I put them in the work kitchen at 9am and by noon there were only 2 left. These are easily adaptable to be gluten free. However, I think it would be hard to make them egg free unless you could find a good replacement for egg that would go with chocolate. Powdered egg replacer will not work. Maybe a flax seed mix would work, but I wouldn't recommend that unless you have experience with it, which I do not.

The best part about these cookies? You make them with cake mix! You want to use a double fudge or triple fudge mix. Even a devil's food cake mix would work well. To make them gluten free, you just sub in a gluten free chocolate cake mix. Betty Crocker makes a wonderful mix that can be purchased at a regular, non-specialty grocery store.

The recipe:
S'mores Cake Mix Cookies (makes about two dozen cookies)

1 box chocolate fudge cake mix (or gluten free chocolate cake mix)
2 eggs
1/3 cup vegetable oil
1/2 cup mini marshmallows, cut in half
1/2 cup semisweet chocolate chips (or enjoy life chocolate chips for dairy free)
4 squares graham crackers (gluten free graham crackers can also be used)

1. Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
2. In a large bowl, combine cake mix, oil, and eggs. Mix until well blended. The batter will be very thick.
3. Cut marshmallows in to small pieces (I used kitchen scissors and cut in half). Add marshmallows and chocolate chips to batter. It may be tough to mix. I used a thick wooden spoon to stir. 
4. Break up graham crackers in to small pieces. Sprinkle on top of batter and mix carefully. You can also wait and put a couple of pieces of crackers in cookies after scooped.
5. I recommend a cookie/ice cream scoop to scoop 1 inch balls of dough on to cookie sheet. Roll each ball to make cookies more uniform.

6. Bake cookies on middle rack of oven for approximately 10 minutes. (9-11 minutes) Remove from oven and let cool for a couple of minutes before transferring to cooling rack. Make sure they are cool enough to pick up with spatula without falling apart. A cooling rack will help cookies cool quickly and evenly.

I stored mine in a plastic bag and then inside a Tupperware container. It keeps them moist a lot longer than if they were just sitting on the counter.

If you want an easy recipe that will impress people with how amazing the cookies taste, these are the ones for you! Happy baking! Make sure to comment and let me know if you make these yourself. I would love to know how it went.

Gingerbread Granola: A Bowl of Nutty Goodness

Well, it's been quite some time since I last posted. I apologize for my lack of consistency. I have no good excuse. Just pure fall-time laziness. I can't tell you how many times I put my blog on my list of things to do. What is it about fall weather that makes you so tired? Let's talk about the time change while we are at it. Is it really necessary??? I don't think so. Especially not in California. I get out of work at 5 and it is pitch black outside. It makes me want to do nothing more than go home, eat dinner, put on pajamas, and go to bed. Which is exactly what I have been doing. A lot. But huzzah! I have a list going of projects I want to do. More about that later. Let's get to the yummies!

Gingerbread Granola. You read that correctly. I love granola. I eat it almost every day. My go to is Kind brand of granola. They have great flavors, it's gluten free, and you can find it at almost any supermarket. Once in a while though, you just want something different. Bonus: the house will smell amazing!

As I have said before, Pinterest is a love of mine. Why wouldn't it be? With all the wonderful recipes and crafts? So of course, the recipe I used was from Pinterest. You can find the original recipe here. I switched out some of the nuts to use what I had in the house, but essentially kept the recipe the same. 

You will need:

1. 1 cup almonds
2. 1 cup cashews (walnuts or pecans)
3. 2/3 cup pepitas/pumpkin seeds (or other small seed)
4. 1/2 cup coconut flakes (optional)
5. 1 tsp cinnamon
6. 1/2 tsp ground ginger
7. 1/2 tsp salt
8. Pinch of ground cloves
9. 1/3 cup maple syrup
10. 1/4 cup coconut oil
11. 2 tbsp molasses
12. 1 tsp vanilla extract

Preheat your oven to 300F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper. Add the almonds, cashews, and pumpkin seeds into a food processor and pulse to break the mixture into smaller pieces. If you do not have a food processor, you can chop them up in to smaller pieces using a chef's knife. I chose to have mine in larger pieces as seen below. Smaller pieces might even be better.

In a large microwave-safe bowl, melt the maple syrup, coconut oil, molasses, and vanilla together for 30-45 seconds. You don't want it too hot, just warm enough to melt together.

Remove from the microwave and stir the mixture until mixed together. Add the cinnamon, ginger, salt, and cloves. Stir well and make sure it is well combined. Next, add in the nut mixture from the food processor, and stir gently. It's best to use a large, sturdy wooden or plastic spoon for this step as it will make it easier to scoop and stir.

Add shredded coconut. Transfer the granola mixture to the lined baking sheet and spread it out in an even layer. I used an offset spatula to make sure it was thin and even.

Put the pan in the oven and bake for 20-25 minutes until golden. The liquid mixture may still be liquid. This is because it is hot sugar. When it has cooled, it will harden so don't over bake the mixture or it will taste like burnt sugar. Remove granola from the oven, stir around to make sure sugar coating is mixed in, and then let sit and cool completely. Break into chunks and store in an airtight container or resealable bag for up to a week.

If the mixture is over baked, it will probably give it a smokey/burnt sugar flavor. My oven is a bit temperamental so unfortunately mine was slightly overcooked. It still smelled and tasted amazing. 

As you can see, this is a pretty easy recipe. You can substitute the nuts for what you have or what you like. The spices and molasses are what makes it taste like gingerbread. Just don't over cook it and it will be amazing!

In other news, I have many things on my list to blog about. I will try to get a new post out to you each week. With the holidays it has been hard, but it is my goal. I am going to finally try making a Jamberry application video, I have some holiday cookie baking to do, AND I was just introduced to needle felting. I am going to try out the needle felting before I decide if I will blog about it, but it seems awesome, inexpensive, and it turns out adorable results! So for now I will say Happy Holidays, Merry Christmas, and Season's Greetings. Keep baking and keep crafting!

Pumpkin: It's That Time of Year!

Pumpkin: pro or con? I think I might be both. I love this time of year because you can find pumpkin flavored EVERYTHING. But I agree with many people that it can get a little ridiculous and overwhelming. There are some pretty random things that they make that are pumpkin flavored. Here are just a few odd ones that I have come across: Pumpkin Spice Kale Chips, Pumpkin Pie Kettle Chips, Pumpkin Pie Chocolate Bark, and Hershey's Kisses Pumpkin Spice. Personally, I like to stick to the classics...bread, pie, cupcakes, cheesecake, and cookies. I will taste some of these other odd creations unless they sound TOO weird (I'm talking to you Pumpkin Spice Kale Chips). 

Last weekend I had planned on making a new recipe of raw vegan pumpkin no bake cheesecake bars for my friends Jenn and Elijah. How yummy does that sound? Unfortunately, the day I was to visit them, I forgot to soak the cashews so no cheesecake for them. (Sorry Elijah!) The next day I woke up with two cans of pumpkin in my cupboard calling my name. So I went to the Internet for an easy gluten free, dairy free, egg free pumpkin bread. I found the perfect recipe! (original recipe here courtesy of dontmesswithmama.com)

Per usual, I made some modifications to make it perfect for me. 

Ingredients

• 1 and 3/4 cups of all-purpose gluten-free flour
• 1 and 1/2 tbsp organic coconut flour
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp gluten-free baking powder
• 1 tsp salt
• Egg replacer equivalent to 2 eggs (I use Ener-G)
• 1 cup baking sugar (you can use coconut sugar or raw organic sugar)
• 1 cup pumpkin puree
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup organic coconut oil
• 1/3 cup filtered water
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
• 1/4 tsp ground ginger

-Preheat oven to 350 degrees. 

-Mix all dry ingredients together with a whisk in large bowl.  

-Mix up your egg replacer in a separate container. I prefer to use a whisk for this to get the powder completely mixed with the water.

-Mix all wet ingredients together (make sure coconut oil is in liquid form before mixing. I did not do this and it came out a little lumpy).

-Add egg replacer to wet ingredients mixing well.

-Now incorporate dry ingredients to wet ingredients without over mixing. **You want to make sure it is completely mixed, but if you over mix the batter, the bread can come out a little tough versus soft and moist.

-Scoop batter in to loaf pan that is completely greased (I used dairy free butter in a glass loaf pan and it worked extremely well).

-Place in the oven and bake for 60 min and then test with toothpick. Can be baked for up to 70 min depending on oven.

After removing from the oven, let cool completely before taking out of pan. Gorgeous!

Gluten free baking is an art. This is a fairly easy recipe if you don't over-mix the batter. It came out moist but a little crumbly. Such is gluten free baking. The only thing that the original recipe did not mention is the addition of xanthan gum which helps bind gluten free items. My gluten free flour mix did not have it already in the blend. Next time I would probably add a tad bit of xanthan gum. However, I was surprised at how well this worked without it. So if you are not a fan of gum additions, you could probably leave it out like I did and be just fine. 

So if you are looking for a gluten free, dairy free, egg free recipe for the holidays, this is a great idea! You can add chocolate chips, nuts, or dried cranberries if you so desire. This recipe can also be put in individual size loaf pans or a muffin tin. Baking time would be a lot less, so adjust accordingly.

Happy Baking! Today I made a Gingerbread Paleo Granola. Keep an eye out for that entry soon!

November: Clean Eating Begins!

The last two weeks have been fun celebrating my (yikes) 40th birthday! One weekend I had one of my best friends come down from San Jose to visit and we got to spend some time together and with other long time friends. Then this weekend another best friend took a group of us to Glen Ivy Spa for a day of lounging and pampering. It has been a fun time of celebrating with some of my favorite people. I have the best friends and family! Needless to say, I haven't been eating the best the last couple of weeks. I woke up this morning and decided it was time to get back on track. Enter Pinterest. 

Oh Pinterest I love you and loathe you. Pinterest makes me excited about everything and makes me feel inadequate in the same minute. Crafting, drawing, creating, baking, cooking...you name it, I look it up and pin it.

I am not the best cook. When you cook for one, you tend to go the easy route versus the healthy route. With the Santa Ana winds blowing through Southern California the last couple of days, coupled with trying to stay cold free when everyone likes to cough on you in public, I have been a little under the weather this weekend. I immediately thought crock pot cooking! Easy, yet can still be healthy. I have a ton of food issues, mostly food allergies. I try to stay on the healthy side when searching for recipes and I always have to modify to be gluten free, dairy free, and egg free, as well as something I actually like. The recipe I found ended up turning in to something completely different when I was done so it ended up being my own recipe. 

It was so tasty and simple, I feel like I forgot something!

What you need: 

Chicken (I went for organic, free range chicken tender strips from Trader Joe's)

Chicken stock (again, Trader Joe's. They have gluten free stock)

Sweet potatoes (I used two smaller ones)

Organic Brown Sugar (Trader Joe's)

1/2 Sweet Onion

Garlic salt or chopped garlic

Layer chicken in bottom of crock pot. Top with cubed sweet potato and sliced onions. Sprinkle approximately 2 tablespoons of brown sugar and garlic salt to taste. Fill almost all the way with chicken stock. Cook on high for approximately 5 hours (until chicken is cooked thoroughly). I cooked on high 3 hours and then turned to low for a few more.

The plan was to have it more like a chicken and potatoes meal, but it quickly turned in to a stew that smells amazing. The brown sugar is mostly for the top of the sweet potatoes, but I wanted to make sure there was enough liquid that the chicken and potatoes would cook and be tender. So, I may have gone a little overboard with the chicken stock. But I am happy! The sugar probably could have been left out since the potatoes soaked up the stock, but then the sweetness would be gone. The sweetness makes it taste amazing!

The best thing about the crock pot is you don't have to measure. You just throw it all in and turn it on. I just made a healthy chicken and sweet potato stew with minimal effort and amazing taste! Substitutes are easy. You could easily change out the sweet potatoes for pumpkin, regular potatoes, or even another type of squash or root vegetable. Want it a little spicier? Add black pepper and cayenne? It's whatever you want to make it and it's easy!

Happy healthy eating! Bring on Fall!

Halloween Crafting: A Glitter Mania

I don't know what it is about this time of year that makes me want to craft. With glitter. Messy, sparkly, stuck to your butt for a week glitter. The beginning of the holiday season reminds me of sparkles, I guess. I will find any excuse to make and decorate with it. This brings me to this weekend. CRAFTING! I made only a couple of items for Halloween, but there is now glitter all over the house. (Shhhhh....don't tell anyone. Maybe they won't notice).                          

Michaels is my favorite place for easy, DIY projects. You can buy items and do everything complete from scratch, or you can buy semi-finished items and add your own touch to them. My choice usually depends on how much time and money I have. This year I went the easy route. I bought three wood items that were in various stages of finished. The first is the BOO sign. You can pick up the letters unfinished or you can do what I did and purchase the BOO already attached together and painted black on one side. All it needed was a little embellishment... and glitter! The small glitter pumpkins are scrap booking stickers. I am sure you can purchase wood pumpkins and decorate yourself. The next step is the fun part!

First, gather all of your supplies:
Newspaper
Craft glue that will work on wood
Small paintbrush
Container of glitter color of your choosing 

I like to lay the newspaper out so the glitter can be gathered in to the crease when I am done for easy pouring back in to the container.

Take the small paint brush and dip it in to the craft glue and brush it on generously to desired area.

Liberally pour the glitter to the glue-brushed area (make sure you are doing this quickly so the glue doesn't have time to dry).

Let sit for a minute or two and then tilt piece and tap to remove excess.

Voila! Done!

I may still go back and glue on some spiders but I think it turned out pretty cute. 

The next item is a simple Happy Halloween sign with the same technique as the spider webs inside the BOO. However, instead of glue, I used acrylic paint in relating colors to make the glitter stick.

 

 

The last project involved a little more effort. However, it's a cute light up pumpkin decoration that is perfect for the front window. Since I am new to this blog thing, I forgot to take a picture of it completely unfinished. 

Supplies: 

Various sized paint brushes

Acrylic paint in desired colors

Recollections fine glitter in desired color (link to glitter I used)

Newspaper

Craft glue (optional)

I decided to do three different colors, one for each pumpkin. I love using acrylic paint because it is smooth and inexpensive. My number one tip when using acrylic paint on porous wood is to do thin coats. Each color has a different opaqueness so some colors (mainly yellow and orange) require more coats. When working with acrylic paint it is easy to get it clumpy, so work quickly with those thin coats. 

There wasn't much to this piece. I painted each pumpkin a different color and let it dry. Once dry, I used the black acrylic paint as glue and painted the stripes and pumpkin top and sprinkled with glitter with the same technique as the above projects. 

The second picture is finished with the light feature turned on. To be honest, I wasn't completely thrilled with this one. If I could redo it, I would choose one color, most likely black, and I would do the teeth and eyeball pieces with different colors or glitter. However, it was a fun and easy way to make our front door area more festive.

Tip: If you are going to put these projects outside, be sure to spray with sealer or shellac so the morning dew or rain does not ruin your masterpiece.

Hopefully this has sparked your creativity. Even those without artistic abilities can do these projects! These are easy ways to make your space more festive for the holiday. Happy crafting!

JAMBERRY: AN OBSESSION

I should start by sharing one of my constant sources of happiness. Jamberry! I was introduced to Jamberry about a year and a half ago and I instantly became obsessed. So obsessed that a few months ago I signed up to be a consultant. I was always lazy about my nails. Polish would chip within a couple of hours, gel manicures at the salon would always cost so much money, and the designs and colors always seemed so boring. Nevertheless, I LOVE having my nails looking fancy. Enter Jamberry Nail Wraps. They have hundreds of designs that are easy to apply and something to match every mood! I now constantly get compliments on my nails. I am my own walking advertisement for my side business! 

So, I dove right in. I haven't found one product made by Jamberry that I don't like. (They have wraps, nail lacquers, hand care products, and a new gel polish system). My favorite time of year is NOW. The holiday wraps have made their arrival. First up: Halloween! Halloween is not my favorite holiday as it tends to interfere with my birthday which is two days before. With Jamberry, though, I have begun to love Halloween. I plan out what I want to have on my nails. I laugh at myself because I was never like this before when it came to my nails. But, I can do them myself, on my own time, and they look great. Here is my current manicure. It is the Halloween Double Trouble wrap with the Mulberry lacquer accent nail and our new TruShine gel system clear coat over the top for even longer wear. I usually get a minimum of 14 days with the gel top coat.

Aren't they cute?? I will post periodically about Jamberry to show off how much fun I have with it and maybe a tutorial or two. If you want to check out my website, feel free. HarmonyStar.Jamberry.com. There are application videos on there too, if you so desire. 

AN INTRODUCTION IN TO THE CHAOS THAT IS MY BRAIN

So it was brought to my attention that I should start a blog; a thing that could be a creative outlet for all the fun stuff boiling up inside of me. Problem? I like too many things!

A little about me:

I grew up in the arts. Dance and music were a huge part of my life. I was a band geek and pretty much lived in the performing arts building in high school. I played the cello in orchestra, took choir, was in the colorguard/marching band, and even took drama at one point. (I even marched drum corp when I was in college). I was exposed to the arts from all different directions. So as I became an adult, my love of the arts kept going. Some of my favorite things are movies, music, art, crafts, books...if it is created by someone, I probably love it.

A few years back I went to pastry school. It didn't pan out as a career, but it developed my love of art (drawing, painting, creating) and baking. I learned to create in many mediums taking traditional art classes along with learning pastry techniques. I also worked along side an amazing cake decorator and artist that I can only hope a small amount of her talent rubbed off on me. She is an incredible artist that has been on TV many times and even won a cake challenge. Her abilities were above anything I could even imagine and she was so nice about teaching me how to do anything I asked. Just having her there in the same room while I was creating taught me so much.

Among all of these things, I also have health issues and food allergies that have led me to a love of homeopathic and natural remedies as well as allergy free cooking and baking. I also recently became an independent consultant for Jamberry Nail Wraps. (harmonystar.jamberry.com) Beauty? Yup! That too! I know...my brain and likes are all over the place.

So, my randomness has led me here. I want to share my love and passion for all of these things (and maybe more). I will post my thoughts, reviews, projects, attempts, fails, and anything that strikes me to write about. I hope to keep the chaos as coordinated as possible.

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