Thursday, December 30, 2010

Snow!

It snowed today! I love the snow, and how it makes everything look. I went to the Air Force Base that is about 8 miles away from my house to get some supplies to make some ice cream. My car is supposed to handle well in the snow. My uncle told me that the Dodge Caliber handled well in the snow when he drove one. Well he lied, or my Caliber just doesn't fit in with the other Calibers. I almost crashed into our house trying to park in the garage, because my car didn't want to go up the drive-way that didn't have more than probably 2 or 3 inches.
I have been working on homework, my application for spring tri, and my resume. Since I procrastinate a lot, it will probably wait until the last minute to get done, but I'm trying to not procrastinate.
Just a short post today, posting more would allow me to procrastinate longer and I need to try to work.

Wednesday, December 22, 2010

Doubles

I haven't posted in a little while, and I'm sorry, but once you read this you will understand why.

Tuesday this week started out with me waking up at 10 am to get ready for class at noon. Which normally I don't get up until much later in the day, especially if I have class until midnight. Well I had class from noon to midnight. It was pretty bad. I would get up, go to class and then come home and sleep. Sometimes I would shower before bed sometimes when I got up. But still I was exhausted. My feet are still hurting.

I was tired and didn't finish the post. See its taking me a few days to write just a few paragraphs. With Christmas right around the corner I have been trying to do things to get ready for Christmas, which involves making some presents or going shopping for presents. I am usually a person to wait until the last minute to figure out presents for everyone and then get them.  Also it seems like I have become a mom, the kitten, Holly is quite demanding sometimes. She'll poop and step in it so I have to keep cleaning her off. She cries a lot. And she won't eat unless someone is in the room.

I'm not an artistic, which sucks because for one of my two classes right now I need to design a sugar showpiece. In other words I need to draw something and then make it in sugar. Which making it might be harder than designing it.

On a whole other note, this morning/late night I kept hearing this weird sound. Also it sounded like one of our dogs was throwing up. I went to check it out.  Before I turned the light on it had sounded like one of our dogs was having a seizure or that someone was patting the couch like in a come here motion. Then the sound seemed like it was coming from the couch, like our cat, Lexi was inside the couch and scratching at it. Well it wasn't her, and the dogs weren't throwing up. Holly was asleep in the room with my brother. (Oh yeah, my brother is staying with us for Christmas... Joy.) We had no idea what was making the sound. I let the dogs out and the sound stopped. We figured out that Max was eating the carpet. That's right, he was munching on the carpet. I gave him some food and he hasn't been eating the carpet since.

I swear one day during break I will put up a bunch of recipes, ones that I've been making in class and love. (The recipes would come from my Cookies and Petite Fours class, not Sugar Artistry.)

Friday, December 10, 2010

Holly

I have bronchitis... Joy. I decided to drop my lab so that I could get better and ready for doubles...I went to the doctor's both on Wednesday and today. I went again today because I still wasn't feeling any better with the meds that I had gotten. So I went back and got some different meds. While I was there my mom found a kitten on our front porch. She is adorable. We decided to name her Holly, because it is the Christmas time and we wanted a name that went with the season. The bad thing is that we don't think that we can keep her because of our other animals. The dogs are curious about her, but they would adjust to her like they did to our other cat. Lexi on the other hand seems to be afraid of her. I don't get why, Holly is just this tiny little ball of fur and probably doesn't weigh more than a pound or two. She is very vocal and purrs a lot. I mean she is like a motor boat the way she purrs. So I don't know what we are going to do. That's about it for me this week. I post more when I feel better and when we know what we are going to do with Holly.

Monday, December 6, 2010

Sickness

I am sick. It started out with a sore throat and has slowly progressed into like a full on respiratory system disease or sickness whatever you want to call it, maybe I want to call it a failure to breath properly. Now when a normal person gets sick it probably isn't as bad as when I get sick. My lungs are pretty bad from previous illnesses like swine flu and pneumonia along with asthma that I was born with. My asthma usually is not apparent, except when I get sick. Which means that I have to do my inhaler and if the inhaler doesn't work then I get to use a nebulizer. Both contain steroids, and those make me jittery. If my body actually moved the way it feels like it should be somebody would think I had hypothermia or the chills something to that affect. The best way to describe the feeling is that you were outside streaking in the middle of winter in the middle of the night and how cold you would be, and shivering, but my body doesn't actually shiver it just feels that way when I have to do the nebulizer thing. My throat got better and now its starting to get bad again because of all the coughing and sneezing. That's another thing, I don't just sneeze like once or twice ever so very often. I sneeze at least three times in a row, and this cold has probably doubled that and I sneeze often.

I have to stay away from my parents for the most part right now so that I don't get either of them sick. I can't get either of them sick because if I get my mom sick then she would get my dad sick and if my dad gets sick then the doctors won't operate. And they need to operate so that my dad can stop showing me his hernia. Its gross. Most of the time you can see it sticking out of his shirt that is how big it is.

My mom bought me some saline nasal spray stuff to try and help with the congestion. I was reading the bottle and it says that it helps moisturize the nasal passages. I don't understand that because it contains salt which dries things out like slugs. The other thing I don't understand is why ice packs help migraines. If a migraine is a constriction of blood vessels in the brain, it doesn't make sense to put something that constricts them even more on your head.

I missed class Friday night because 1). I didn't sleep well, 2). I'm sick, 3). I got a massive migraine. Now if I miss another class in the next five class periods then I drop the lab and will have to make it up. Like the next segment I have two labs, meaning I got to go to class from noon to midnight. Usually we don't have Friday class but since it is the beginning of the term then we start on a Tuesday and end on Friday the first week. If it had been a normal week then I wouldn't have missed class, though I can't change the past. I think that I made the right decision though to stay home, because I wouldn't have been able to make it through class.

I've been trying to write this post since Friday, obviously I haven't done that great of a job. But I've felt so crappy the past few days that I kept putting it off. I'm feeling mostly better, but it still feels like someone is sitting on my chest or something is running around in my lungs. I'm glad that I'm going to be able to go to class later on, because I really don't want to drop this lab, as a matter of fact I don't want to drop any labs.

Here is a chocolate molten cake recipe, unfortunately I can only put it in ounces because I don't know the cups and such, because I made it in class and it is from my school book which does ounces and pounds... Sorry.

12 oz Semisweet chocolate
12 oz Butter, unsalted
12 oz Eggs
3 oz Sugar, granulated
3 oz Flour, bread
Hershey Kisses as needed
Extra butter and sugar to line the ramekins.

Preheat oven to 350*F Chop the chocolate into fine pieces. Melt butter and chocolate in a heavy bottomed pot. Lightly whisk sugar and eggs in a separate bowl then add to butter chocolate mixture.  Whisk in flour. Fill buttered and sugared ramekins and fill 3/4 full. Bake until sides are set (about 10-12 minutes). Shove a Hershey Kiss in the center, place back in oven for an additional five minutes or until center of cake has begun to set. Serve immediately after taking out of oven.

As a side note, because I don't want to be accused of Plagiarism I got this recipe from Baking and Pastry Formulas for Johnson and Wales University College of Culinary Arts Volume 2

Wednesday, December 1, 2010

Labs

I tried to write something after I got done with class and got home... this is what I got before I feel asleep:
I started labs today. Lab didn't go as badly as I imagined for the first day trying to be awake until at least 1 am. I'm in plated desserts, where we learn to make desserts presentable. My feet hurt, well more of my right foot than my left foot. But I expected that. My right foot doesn't like to behave and not hurt me. We have the new chef, and she seems to be pretty awesome.

I was more tired than I thought. My throat hurts a lot. I don't know what is wrong with it. I'm eating ice cream and cough drops to help it out. It is kind of helping, but not really at the same time. I feel like a really old person because I have to eat before 4:30 pm in order to get ready for class and get there on time. I'm going to take a nap so I'm energized for labs. First I have to do my homework of designing a plate for tonight's class. Last night We made sauces, creme anglaise, chocolate ganache and chocolate molten cake. The cake turned out pretty awesome, although I think that we needed to put more ganache in the middle for the moltenness. Recipes up later, I'll put them up this weekend.

Monday, November 29, 2010

Rant about life among other things

Since it is almost three o'clock in the morning it is officially Monday. Which means that I have the rest of today and until 6pm tomorrow until classes start. I am prepping myself kind of, for the late nights. But I know that it will still be hard. I'm excited though. I love learning in labs, I hate doing the classroom shit. I know how my brain works and it doesn't do well with trying to read something off a page and memorizing it. It does well when I do something with my hands. I'm a kinesiology learner or whatever it is called. I learn by doing. I learn not to put too much nutmeg in a carrot cake by putting too much in the cake and having it taste badly. And I can do math better than some because I can just do it, I know it may sound weird but most of the time I can just see how to do the problem and then do it. I may not be able to solve it in my head but I can figure out how to solve and then use a calculator to solve it. My dependency to calculators is kind of sad though. Many simple math problems get confused in my head, and I have a hard time trying to do math in my head. I hate that degrees require people to have English credits or have Leadership credits. I'm not good at English and I'm not that good at trying to lead. I have a hard time trying to teach someone something. Like I tried to help a friend in math last year and I don't know if I helped or not because I could see how to do it, but I couldn't explain how she should do it.

I need to go to sleep and stop ranting about random shit. I need to find a few pictures, and decide what I want for Christmas. Okay so that was brought to you by the sleep deprived blogger. Now back to our regularly scheduled programing.

This time tomorrow evening I shall be in a baking and pastry lab. I will be exhausted and just starting with actual lab work. But I don't really know since this is a chef I haven't had before. Some chefs like to do lecture at the end, some like to do it in the middle of class while stuff is baking.

I don't have a recipe for cheese fondue, other wise I would put it up because we had delicious cheese fondue for dinner this evening. Although we didn't have a waiter with cow pants on. We were in Switzerland and we went to a restaurant and got the three different kinds of fondue and our waiter had on pants that were white with black splotches, like a cow, thus the cow pants. I want cow pants... but I could just deal with the comfy black and white checked pants that I have to wear to class. I hemmed my pants for class today, normally my mom does it because I don't know how to sew. But I'm learning how to slowly, with the help of my mom. Tomorrow before I go to class my dad and I are going to go do shanagins and Christmas shopping. So that's what I've got going on. Oh and I'm making a scarf for my mom's mom. (Which is not my Grandma Jo). The scarf is really soft and I only worked on it for like four hours today and it is probably a little less than half way done, which is amazing because I get distracted easily with crafts like that.

Friday, November 26, 2010

Turkey Day

Before I get to Turkey Day I'm going to to blog about Wednesday. And that I have a new page.
Jesse and I hung out. We went to visit his sister Chasity. She has two boys named Bradley and Christian. They are cute boys and funny too. Bradley is almost ten and Christian is five as he reminded me over and over again while I tried to hug him. We just stayed for a little while but then we had to get back to my Grandma Jo's house to meet with Jesse's brother Ricky. Ricky also has two boys named Riley and Devon. They are cute too. And full of energy. Jesse plays with them a lot. Like he was making Riley walk on the ceiling. I'm really glad that I got to see Ricky, Diane (his wife) and their cute boys. Riley is a little bit more open to me than Devon is. I think it is because Riley can remember me but Devon can't.
On Turkey Day my Grandma Jo went to Church and I stayed back and made some carrot cupcakes. And the best frosting that I have ever made. I don't know what made it different from other times I made frosting but it was delicious. We then went over to my Auntie V's house for dinner. When we got there Auntie M was trying to make mashed potatoes. I say trying because she left the potatoes in her trunk over night and they were frozen. So when she put them in the boiling water thinking that they would thaw out and then cook. Well they kind of didn't follow her plan. They instead turned to sponges and felt really gross. She then scrambled around to find other potatoes and cook them. It seemed like everything my Auntie M touched food wise didn't turn out as planed. Because not only did the potatoes turn out how they did but when she was working on the candied yams the marshmallows were messed up. Jimmy and Sara brought their baby boy Cayden who is absolutely a mommas boy. If he saw his mom he would start to cry until you gave him back to his mom. John and Stevie brought their baby girl Lily and she is absolutely gorgeous. She found fart noises funny and would laugh when I would make them with my mouth. There were lots of funny things that were said but you had to be their for them to be funny.
I flew back at about 10 am this morning and I woke up at about 6 am to get to the airport on time. I hate getting up early, that's why I would rather have ppm labs than am labs. On the airplane the flight attendant said some funny things. She started out with "if you could pretend to give us your attention for a moment." She then went on to say that "there maybe 50 ways to leave a lover but their are only 6 ways to leave this aircraft." Also she said "if we expected to lose cabin pressure then we wouldn't have come to work today, but if we happen to lose cabin pressure. In order to live stop screaming, let go of your neighbor and grab on to the yellow masks that fall down." It brightened my day a little bit because I was mad because there were annoying little kids that were screaming and older teens behind me that were talking and were annoying as well. And it wouldn't have been a problem had my iPod been charged or I had the charger in my bag.

Cayden


Lily


All the snow that got dumped the day I got to Utah


My Grandma's cat trying to close the computer

Riley walking on the ceiling.


Wednesday, November 24, 2010

Snow, Snow and More Snow

Last night there was supposed to be this big huge blizzard and the news stations and what not were trying to scare us into being prepared for a HUGE snow storm. It lasted for a few hours didn't dump as much snow as it did on Saturday. Whatever.
On Monday my cousin Jesse came over and we went to see my cousin Lily. I had promised my mom that I was going to get lots of pictures of Lily, but me being the genius that I am I forgot my camera. Oh well I'll see her again soon and I'll get pictures of her then. The funny thing about Lily was that she didn't seem to like Jesse. I was holding her and like every time she would look at Jesse she would start to cry and get upset. At one point she gave him THE saddest look a baby could give you. I thought it was really cute and kind of funny. But she warmed up to after she got her bottle. After the bottle it was nap time so Jesse and I went to the movies. We went to see the movie Due Date. It was pretty funny. My cousin and I need to stop going to R rated movies together... lets just say it get awkward.
Tuesday started out with my Grandma Jo and I going to see Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1. It to me was kind of a let down. My favorite Harry Potter movie is still the third one. However I still can't wait for the second part. My aunts Monica and Vera were supposed to come over with their grandchildren. But since there was supposed to be some huge snow storm they decided against it. My cousin Jesse also was supposed to come over but also decided against it. So instead we just got ready for the storm to hit and prepared to lose electricity. I read a book and listened to music. My Tuesday was a little boring, besides the movie. Oh well, that's how it goes sometimes. My cousin Jesse is going to come over later on today and we are going to do something, I don't know what yet. I've only seen two of my cousins and one didn't even know that I was here. Most of my cousins work and what not, and I understand that they are busy. I just would like to know that you would like to see me while I'm here, whether or not you actually can come is a different story...
We just looked out the back door at my Grandma's house and you can barely tell it snowed in one area because of the amount of leaves that fell on top of the snow. I will upload pictures later.

Sunday, November 21, 2010

Church

I apologize ahead of time if my post today doesn't make sense in parts, I'm really sleepy for no reason. I can't seem to fall asleep though so here I am blogging.
We woke up this morning to probably about a foot of snow covering the ground and trees and all that stuff. I'll have pictures at the end. And because today is Sunday my Grandma Jo goes to church every week. Well my Pappa Eddie has pneumonia and my Grandma doesn't want him to go out in the cold and what not. I ended up shoveling a pathway and a place for the dog Baby to go out and go potty in. Then my cousin Jimmy came over with his wife Sara and their baby boy, Cayden. They shoveled the driveway. I took my Grandma Jo to church, something that I don't do. We went to church, made Grandma feel good, and then went shopping. Now let me tell you something, my Grandma Jo spoils me, a lot. I'm her favorite, well at least her favorite granddaughter. Anyway, we went shopping and then came back home and started watching Harry Potter. She continued her work on knitting a hat while I figured out how to knit a scarf with a loom. Grandma Jo stuck her tongue out at me because I was able to pick it up quickly and she still doesn't really know how to do it. And now its only 8 pm and I want to go to bed. Well I've wanted to go to bed since about 6 pm when I ate dinner.  So I'll upload pictures and say good night. I was going to upload pictures but I can't seem to get it to work right now...

Saturday, November 20, 2010

Grandma's House

Since I got to Utah today, I won't be posting recipes until I get back to Colorado, since I didn't think to bring recipes with me. The plane was delayed about 10 minutes to begin with and then we hit like 130mph headwinds is what I think that captain said, so that delayed us even more. Also it was a very bumpy airplane ride. And as I have stated before I'm not good with flying, the actual flying wasn't so bad because I slept most of the way. But before hand I decided to toss my cookies, (I was contemplating the different ways of saying I barfed. Tossed my cookies seemed as good as any of the others). Also random people were trying to talk to me. I was just trying to listen to my music and read my book. But no they had to try and ask me questions and what not, and would not leave me alone, no matter how evil I tried to look at them. Whatever. I'm just glad that I didn't puke on the person next to me on the plane. (Which I have done before, not on purpose.)
I finally arrived at my Grandma's house and she decided that we would have chicken salad sandwiches. I was hungry so I said sure why not. Only to discover that what she calls chicken salad is just chicken from a can with mayo. In my house its got all kinds of stuff in it, like pickles, celery, and even onion. (I love me some onion). So she scooped some out and let me make it how I wanted it. It was good I ate my whole sandwich, (which is unusual for me because I don't really eat that many sandwiches, except a number 1 with onion from Jimmy Johns). And then we were supposed to be going to a wedding celebration party. We got already to go and then looked outside and it was snowing. We decided not to let us getting ready go to waste. We went down the street to Artic Circle and got shakes. Then came back and watched Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, because Grandma had never seen it, and we plan on going to see Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1 on Tuesday. I have to catch her up on all the Harry Potter movies she has missed. As I sit here typing this it is still snowing, and there is already probably a could four to five inches accumulated. I love snow. I just wish I could be snowboarding, oh well I'll enjoy my time with my family.

Friday, November 19, 2010

Update: Bruchetta

So a few things went wrong with my bruchetta. First off I didn't have mozzarella, and then I didn't have french bread. I ended up using hamburger buns because thats what we had. I also ended up using Parmesan, but I kind of had planned on that anyway. And when I finally had it finished it was not that great. I was eating the tomatoes with the sauce by them selves, and it was pretty good, but I think that you need to have french bread. I mostly think that you need the french bread because while trying to eat one piece it completely fell apart in my hands. Oh well. It was a good try. Other than the bruchetta kind of being a let down dinner was delicious. The chicken was delicious as always. I'll post the recipe at a later date.

Sorry if it doesn't make sense at parts, I'm sleepy.

Bruchetta

So I leave for Utah tomorrow... I'm excited! I packed yesterday, and then decided that I needed to do laundry so I had other clothes to take. (Let me clarify, I don't do laundry, my mom does.) Still I'm packed and ready to go. I can't wait to see my cousins and my grandma and my aunties and uncle. I think I'm most excited to meet my newest cousin (if its my cousins baby does it still make it my cousin or is it my second cousin or what?). Anyway its a baby and she is really cute from the pictures I've seen and from what I've read on the blog Lily Makes Three. Also I'm excited to go see the Harry Potter movie, which I'm taking my grandma to.

I wanted to go snowboarding today, but I was not allowed to go. :( So I'm stuck in the house doing nothing but being lazy and lounging in my pajamas, like I usually do when I have nothing else to do...
My toes are really cold today and I have no idea why.

I added a new page to my blog and this page is just going to be a bunch of links to pages in my blog so you can find a recipe that you want faster. Instead of trying to search through the whole blog to find one.

I decided to do the bruchetta recipe that I found online because I was reading a magazine and they had recipes for bruchetta, but they weren't the typical bruchetta recipes. And it made me want to make bruchetta, so I found the recipe and I'm going to make it for dinner with some chicken on the side, (let me clarify again, I'm just going to help make dinner, my mother is going to do the chicken). I'll let you know what I think of it later, but for now here it is.

It says 6 Roma tomatoes, but I think that I'll just use whatever tomatoes I can get my hands on/what my mother buys
3 cloves of garlic
1/4 cup olive oil
2 tbsp balsamic vinegar
1/4 cup basil (it says fresh basil but I'm using the kind that comes in a jar and isn't fresh)
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper
2 cups mozzarella (but again I'm just going to estimate and I might use parmesan)
1 French baguette

Preheat the oven on broil. Dice or chop the tomatoes (depends on how big of pieces you want). Then combine tomatoes, garlic, oil, vinegar, basil, salt and pepper in a bowl and allow to set for about 10 minutes. Slice the bread into about 3/4 inch slices and then broil for about 1-2 minutes on sheet pan. Take out of oven and then place the tomato mixture on the bread. Sprinkle the cheese over the mixture, and broil for about 5ish minutes or until cheese is melted.

Wednesday, November 17, 2010

Muddy Buddy Chex Mix

Recently I have been watching Big Bang Theory online since I can't find it on actual T.V. and  I wanted to make sure I like it before I bought it, well I love it. It is a hilarious show. My newest favorite quote is from the show. "Did you know that pumpernickel comes from the German words pumper and nickel which loosely translates to fart goblin." I have a final tonight at about 6 and then I have two more finals to do tomorrow and then its off to Utah for Thanksgiving. I'm excited for Thanksgiving. The only problem I have is flying. I get motion sick and it seems to happen a lot on planes, not so much in cars (if I'm driving) or buses. You would think with all the flying that I have done that I would be use to it by now, well I'm not. I have medicine that can help with it, but I usually fall asleep with it, so I kind of don't want to take the medicine, because its only an hour flight.
I REALLY want to go snowboarding, like I don't know how to express how much I really want to go.

Something that kind of ticked me off is that I did something very nice for someone and I wasn't thanked. I get it that I shouldn't do something nice for someone and expect them to thank me or appreciate what I did. Its just that I would like to be appreciated and thanked for things I do more. I try my hardest to make sure that people I know that do things for me are appreciated and thanked. I enjoy doing things for people, but I also enjoy being thanked and appreciated for the stuff I'm doing. I guess that its mostly that I did something nice for someone and I wasn't thanked. Now I wouldn't be so ticked if it was the first time that it had happened. I guess that I'm going to stop doing nice things for that person, but that doesn't mean that I'm going to do mean or bad things to them it just means that I'm not going to be as nice as I have been previously. Like making them stuff or taking them somewhere or sending them things.

Sorry for the little side rant. I just had to get it out there. Also for people that I haven't thanked for something that you have done for me. Please consider this as a make up thank you for previous actions, and I shall try harder to make sure I appreciate you in the future. And I'm sorry if I have made you mad because I did not previously thank you.

Today's recipe is from the Chex Mix homepage, I had been wanting something that we use to get in high school called puppy chow. I don't know why it was called that, but it was always delicious. Anyway I found this recipe and it was just like what I wanted. So here it is in all its Chexiness.

9 cups chex mix
1 cup chocolate chips
1/2 cup peanut butter
1/4 cup butter
1 tsp vanilla
1 1/2 cup powdered sugar

Measure out the cereal and place in a large bowl. In a smaller bowl place the chocolate chips, peanut butter and butter. Microwave for 1 minute. Stir and then place back in micro and heat for another 30 seconds. Add more time if it is not smooth. Add the vanilla and stir. Pour over the cereal and stir. Place in two gallon bag and add powdered sugar, shake until blended.

I personally added more powdered sugar because it didn't coat it enough. But that up to you.


These were taken on two different days, but I think they are both pretty. The second one was from today on my way to class and I can't remember when the other one was taken.

Sunday, November 14, 2010

Chocolate Eclair Pie

Today's recipe comes from somewhere. I can't remember where we got it (I wanna say it was from my aunt). We ate it and it was good and then we got the recipe and made it for ourselves. We have company that is coming over today, (which basically means my grandparents and their friends Dick and Glenda).
The picture below is of my fore arm and my latest injury. I was obtaining corn bread to eat with potato soup. My mom makes excellent corn bread and thus me wanting to obtain it quickly. She makes it in a skillet in the oven and while trying to obtain it I hit my arm on the handle and got the lovely burn shown below. Because of where the lovely burn it I tried to keep a band aid on it so that I wouldn't rub it on everything. Well when I took off the band aid to allow it to breathe for a little while, I apparently had an allergic reaction to the adhesive on the band aid.



Random burn, (center) allergic reaction on the sides

So not only did I have an allergic reaction to the band aid adhesive, but my lip did some random thing. I don't know what happened but all of a sudden it became swollen. My lip was itchy and I was using my teeth to scratch it. And then it felt weird and I went to look in the mirror and this is what I saw. 


If you can't tell its on the left side of the photo.

I have no idea what happened. Its really annoying. On other news I have decided what to do my persuasive speech on, and its Not being a Vegetarian. And for the third speech in a row I'm going to take in food, but instead of it being my favorite cookie, I'm going to take rice crispy treats. I mean who doesn't like rice crispy treats? Vegetarians, thats who!

And as promised here is the recipe of the day.

Chocolate Eclair Pie
1 cup water
1/2 cup butter
1/4 tsp salt
1 cup flour
4 eggs
8 oz. cream cheese
1 large package vanilla pudding mix
3 cups cold milk
12 oz. whipped topping
chocolate syrup

We have used fat free/light or low fat cream cheese, pudding (other flavors are good as well, like chocolate, or white chocolate) and whipped topping. We have also used hot fudge sauce instead of chocolate syrup. (Its up to you, what variations you want. Its not hard to vary).

In a sauce pan over medium heat bring water, butter and salt to boil. Add flour all at once and stir until smooth ball forms. Remove from heat and let stand for 5 minutes. Add eggs one at a time, blending well with a wooden spoon with each addition. Beat until smooth. Spread into a greased 13x9x2 cake pan. Bake at 375 for 30 to 35 minutes or until puffed and golden brown. Remove from oven and cool completely.

In a mixing bowl beat cream cheese, milk and pudding mix until smooth. Spread over puff and refrigerate at least an hour. Just prior to serving spread whipped topping over the top and drizzle with chocolate syrup.


Friday, November 12, 2010

Lazy Americans

So today, well this evening really, we were being lazy Americans and not cooking dinner for ourselves. Instead we turned to the trusty old favorite of Dominoes Pizza, one of only about three restaurants that actually deliver to our house. And over the last year or so that they have been in business we have order from them numerous times and enjoyed it. Not once have we been told that we had to tip a certain amount, until tonight. My mom only tipped $2. A little while after we had gotten the pizza and were enjoying it. We got a phone call from the manager at Dominoes Pizza. Apparently there is a minimum tip amount that we must tip because of where we live and it is SO far away from the store. So we are now down to two places to order from that deliver so we can be lazy Americans. Don't get me wrong I love being a lazy American a lot of times. I just wish we had more options than pizza or Chinese food. That's my little rant about how stupid Dominoes Pizza is. I mean come on, you are going to call a loyal customer and tell them that they didn't tip enough, when it was the employees fault for not notifying us. Also, who the hell sets a minimum tip limit because of how far a customer lives?

I have been watching all the Harry Potter movies over and over again this last week in preparation for my trip to Utah. See I'm going to take my Grandma Jo to go see the first part of the last movie. I've tried to take her to see all the movies in theaters, but I haven't really succeeded in that. It was kinda hard to when we lived on opposite sides of the world. And I'm really excited to see it, the commercials make it look awesome. I just hope that the commercial doesn't make it look more awesome than it actually is. My favorite movie is the third one, I don't know why. I just think that it is the best one.

I only have four days left of class, eight days until I fly out. I'm excited!!! I also made myself a scarf and hat that match. To go with my Dominoes rant, well kind of. Its more of something that happened because we got Dominoes. We had a coupon to get a free chocolate crunch lava cake thingy. Anyway, I put some of the chocolate sauce on my finger and my white cat, Lexi, was sniffing my finger and I may have smashed it into her face. Well it made like a little Hitler mustache. It was cute. I wanted to get a picture of her, but she was being unreasonable and squirming. I still had chocolate on my finger and while trying to hold her to try and get a picture I ended up smearing more chocolate on her face. OOPS! Max was very interested in trying to clean it off and she wasn't having it. Max is really cute, when I'm messing with Lexi and she isn't happy he get all worried about her. And when I let her go he has to sniff her and make sure she is okay.

Thursday, November 11, 2010

Veterans Day

Today is Veterans Day and its kinda a big deal to me. My mom, dad, grandpa, and uncle are all veterans, I'm sure I'm forgetting someone in my family that is also a veteran, but I have poor memory. Many of my friend's parents are veterans and even some of my friends are veterans. I guess what I'm trying to say is that I am trying to think of all the people that I know who are veterans and thank them for their service and keeping the country the way it should be. I'm very proud to say that my mom is a veteran and she served 22 years. She is a really awesome person and I think I get that awesomeness from her. I love my mom and everything she has done.
I don't have a recipe on me since I am blogging in between classes. It seems that this year I am more affected by the cold than previous years. I am currently wearing three layers on my body with a jacket on top (so really four layers I guess). I am also wearing long socks, like ones that go up to my knees when normally I wear ankle socks (I'm also wearing ankle socks on top to try to keep my toes from freezing off). Suffice to say I am freezing. I started making a scarf last night because I know its only going to get colder, whether or not I actually use the scarf is another question.
I still have no idea what I'm going to do my speech on. In speech class today we were having a discussion about the Jersey Shore show, for whatever reason I don't know. But Brian said this hilarious joke and I wanted to share it with you guys.
"The Situation": An umpa loompa after the factory closed.
We were talking about how this one girl didn't know "what" a Snooki was (its a Chilean whore or skank, apparently). And we some how landed on how she didn't know "the situation" and when she went to google images, she said that a shirtless orange person popped up. So Brian said "the situation: an umpa loompa after the factory closed." We all had a good laugh.

Wednesday, November 10, 2010

Corn or banana bread?

I don't know which recipe I want to put on today. My family has a really awesome banana bread recipe and my mother made me some recently. But she also has an awesome recipe for cornbread, and we had cornbread tonight with our potato soup. We had potato soup for dinner earlier today because if you haven't seen the news or heard about it, IT SNOWED!!!!! I am so happy that it is snowing, but it does make me worry quite a bit. This year I'm a commuter student, and so when it snows I have to drive in it. Now it wouldn't be such a problem if my car was either heavier or I had a different car entirely. See the thing is that my car is really light and doesn't like driving in the snow. If I drive the Volvo, my mom's car it isn't bad at all, but that's because her car is like two or three times as heavy as my car, making it easier to drive in the snow. I either need to figure out how to make my car heavier or to some how convince my parents that I need a new car (which would be difficult since my car is pretty new, I've only had it for a little over a year). Also a random though occurred to me today when I was getting in my car to drive home from school. My car was covered in snow and I hadn't yet put the ice scraper back in my car. I thought that it would be awesome if cars had a button you could press and the car would shake like a wet dog, and throw off all the snow.

Another random thought that occurred to me. Why is it called Overeaters Anonymous or Alcoholics Anonymous, when you have to get up and say "Hi, I'm Sara and I'm an Overeater. That is not anonymous, you just said who you were! So why call it anonymous when you aren't? I have a lot of random thoughts, sometimes I don't remember them. Oh I rememer what I was going to tell random people, that I may or may not know. I had to be fingerprinted on Monday, I think, so yesterday. Nope, not yesterday. It was Monday. Actually I think it was Saturday because thats when I sent the package. Anyway. I had to be fingerprinted. It was NOT for doing something illegal. I just had to do it for when I go on to the AFB later on they are going to scan the ID cards. So I was being fingerprinted and I made a joke that I couldn't remember how to be fingerprinted because it had been along time since I was fingerprinted. And we had a good laugh, but I guess you may have had to been there to have it be funny.

Also I need help on what I should try and persuad my speech class to like or dislike or to understand. My point is that I have to give a speech (if you can't tell its a persuasive speech) on Tuesday next week and I have no idea what to do it on. My last two speeches were on my favorite cookie. Someone in class told me that I should do my last speech on the cookie as well. But I already know that people like it so I can't really persuade them to like it. Something that I find quite interesting and funny is that I can't seem to speak for more than 2 minutes and 42 seconds. Seriously all three speeches that I have given have been 2 minutes and 42 seconds exactly. What should I persuade people on?

Some how I got addicted to playing Tetris. I rock at Tetris Battle.

Sunday, November 7, 2010

Dump Cake

I have my first follower!!! I'm excited. Haha. My best friend, Kendra, told me about Disney College and now I think that I'm going to check it out and maybe go. Yes I realize that may sound a bit funny, but its an internship that you get paid for, and with my degree I have to do an internship anyways, so why not get paid for it? I got on here to say something funny and witty, but I forgot. I have been forgetting a lot lately. Like I told my mom that I wanted to have something for dinner sometime soon and now neither of us can remember what it was I wanted.

Something else that is annoying is that I have a habit of picking at wounds. And right now I have a pimple on my forehead that has been annoying me and I have already gotten all the gross stuff out of it, but it is still annoying, and I keep trying to pick at it. So now I am walking around with a band aid on my forehead like some kind of weirdo. But I figure it is better to not pick at it and look weird than to pick at it and have yet another scar. See the thing about me is that the smallest cut or poke will leave a scar. I have so many that I have forgotten how most of them happened. The interesting ones of course I remember but ones from like a mosquito bite, I don't remember. I have these four small like scars on my left arm that are from a girl who got angry at me and decided to dig her nails into my arm. She is also the bitch who dug her thumb nail into my chin. One of my newest scars, is one on my leg from I ran into some wood. (I'm sure you wanted to hear about my pimple or about my scars. But whatever, this is my blog and if you don't want to read about my life then why are you reading my blog?)

The other day I was looking through my pile of recipes to find something delicious to make and I thought of my best friend, and I think Kendra's family were actually the first people to introduce me to this kind of cake and so I made it. Its a really easy cake to make and is really easy. All you do is have a pan that is lightly greased, dump all the ingredients in and then bake. Simple as that.

21 oz can of Cherry Pie filling
20 oz can of crushed Pineapple(don't drain)
1 yellow cake box mix
1 cup melted butter
7 oz. coconut

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Put the pineapple and pie filling in the bottom of the 9 x 13 in. lightly greased pan. Sprinkle the cake mix over the filling, evenly. Pour the melted butter over the cake mix as evenly as possible. Sprinkle the coconut over and bake for 50-60 minutes.

Friday, November 5, 2010

Sugar Cookies

Max has to wear a bag around his leg when he goes outside, he also has to be walked on a leash. Whats funny about Max wearing the bag is that when he comes back inside he holds his foot up like he is saying "Take it off, I don't want it on anymore." It is really cute. I've been trying to get a picture of him doing it, but when I am around with the camera he doesn't do it.
I turned on my t.v. today and there wasn't really anything that I wanted to watch. So I just left it on the channel it was on and started doing things on my computer. Well after awhile this show called Sister Wives came on and it is really interesting. Its about this polygamist family. This guy named Kody has three wives and twelve children with one on the way(I think). He is also starting to court another lady. And one of the wives actually wanted to be a sister wife and she had it planned out as to which sister wife, she wanted to be the third wife. But anyways I don't really know how anyone could be a polygamist because its to much like cheating but allowed because he is married to all three of them. I can understand how polygamy started. At least I think I know how it started. I may be wrong, I don't know everything. I think it started when a husband would die then the wife would be taken in by a man, even if he was already married. That way the woman would be taken care of.
Also what I don't get is how some people can have 19 children and still want more. I have always wanted a bigger family, but I would much rather just have like two more siblings, but only two. I guess I'll just have to deal with the crappy older brother that I have now. He is a crappy older brother because he has never really done things like an older brother should. I think that we are just too close in age to get along. Both of my parents came from four children families and somehow I ended up with just one sibling... Oh well.
I'm counting down the days until I go see my Grandma Jo, but at the same time I don't want Thanksgiving break to come because then after break I will have the worst labs ever. I will have to go to class from 6pm to midnight...

Yesterday I found out that in my English class I was going to have to do a group project. Which I believe is the stupidest class to have a group project in. Basically what we have to do is write a paper together. Because I missed class on Tuesday, I got put in the group of people who are least likely to show up for class. The only class that I have that won't have a group project is speech. The only group project that I feel is actually validated was my Menu Planning and Cost Control class. Which had so much stuff to do in it that it needed to be a group project.  But my leadership class if the teacher made the requirement of time to talk to like four to five minutes then it wouldn't need to be a group project. I only have two weeks of class left. Meaning there are only eight actual days I have to go to class. Also I have fifteen days until I go to Utah to visit my Grandma Jo.

Sugar Cookies


1/2 cup butter (softened)
3 cups flour
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp baking powder
2 tbsp milk

Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs one at a time, beating after each egg. Stir in vanilla. Mix flour, salt and baking powder, in seperate bowl. Mix into butter mixture alternately with milk. Form dough into flattened ball and refrigerate till thoroughly chilled. (like at least 3 hours). After chilling preheat the oven to 350 degrees faherenhiet. Roll onto well floured counter to 1/4 to 1/2 inch thickness. Cut with cookie cutters. Place on greased sheets. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes.

Frosting

1/3 cup shortening
1/4 cup milk
1/2 tsp vanilla
1/4 tsp almond extract
dash salt
4 cups powdered sugar

Tuesday, November 2, 2010

Max

I don't have a recipe to share today. I haven't made anything interesting recently, well besides the Nieman-Marcus cookies, but I already shared that recipe. Halloween was on Sunday, as if you guys didn't know that, but I didn't do anything besides hand out candy to the cute little kids in our neighborhood. There were these two little boys that were really cute, one was wolverine and the other was spider-man. They were really cute and I gave them a lot of the candy. I'm a sucker for cute little kids.

On Mondays and Wednesdays I have one class from 6pm to 8pm. Well apparently the teacher was sick and didn't notify the class that she wasn't going to be there. It would not be such a problem to me if I lived on campus. But I don't. I live about twenty minutes away from campus, and that is on a good day without traffic. Oh and this is the second time that a teacher was sick and didn't notify the students, so I'm kind of pissed off. If class is canceled I would much rather save gas and not travel to campus. At least I'm not like my friend Benita who travels about 45 minutes to campus. So class was canceled, which ended up being a good thing. We have three animals, two dogs and a cat. Max and Skippy are the dogs and Lexi is the spoiled cat. (I joke around with my mom that I've given my cat a complex, where she thinks she is fat when she isn't. Like I've told her that she is such a fatty and she won't eat as much as usual.) Max, my brother's dog (the dog lives with me and my parents, my brother does not), cut his paw somehow. He ended up needing to go to the vet to get stitches. The poor thing now has to wear a cone. His foot is all bandaged and he looks pathetic. Its his back right foot that got injured, which is interesting because when my cat broke her leg, she broke her back right leg. She was 10 weeks old when she broke her leg, while Max is now 10 years old and hurting his leg. Those are the two similarities that I can think of, but there might be more. I think that it is kind of spooky when things are similar, like it being both back right legs and the whole thing with 10.

Saturday, October 30, 2010

Rice Pudding

For one of my classes we are required to to do ten hours of community service. I decided to go to a place called International Hearing Dogs, Inc. (pawsforsilence.org) They work with dogs and teach them to hear for those who can not do so for themselves. Today they had a dog-o-ween where you dress your dogs up and you can dress up too. The dogs were really cute in their outfits. One of the dogs was dressed up as a caveman, there was a bumble-bee. The dog that won the contest was dressed as Austin Powers. (I didn't have my camera on me so I didn't get pictures, otherwise I would post them.) That's pretty much all I have to say today... Oh and my mom made some awesome rice pudding today for dessert and I now thought I would share the recipe with you. Also my mom told me that I have pretty crappy grammar, but I don't care because I'm not an English major and because I don't like English class.

2 1/2 cups of cooked rice
2 cups milk
4 egg yolks
1/2 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla
cinnamon
nutmeg
raisins

Place rice in medium saucepan, add milk stir carefully and cook over medium heat for 10 minutes stirring frequently.
Beat egg yolks, stir in sugar, the add to rice and milk slowly while stirring. Continue cooking about 3 minutes, stirring constantly. Add vanilla and remove from heat. Sprinkle with cinnamon and nutmeg. And raisins if desired and how many you want. Serve warm or cold. Keep refrigerated.

Friday, October 29, 2010

Carrot Cake

I recently saw another blog where this girl had a list of 100 things she wanted to do before she died. It got me thinking about the things that I want to do before I die. I haven't got 100 things yet, but I have accomplished some of them previously to putting this list together. If anyone actually wants to give me ideas or help me accomplish goals, feel free to comment and tell me what you think.

1.       Parasail
2.       Go to Australia
3.       Get Married
4.       Have kiddos
5.       Go to South Africa and swim with sea turtles
6.       Make a recipe famous
7.       Go to Vegas again
8.       Go to Alaska
9.       Scuba Dive
10.   Pyramids at sunset
11.   Ride a camel
12.   Travel to over 30 countries:25 so far
13.   Travel to over 100 cities outside of the U.S.: 75 so far
14.   Travel to all 50 states: 24 so far
15.   Go white water rafting again
16.   Learn to snowboard fully
17.   Jetski in Hawaii
18.   Own a boat
19.   Own a house near a lake
20.   See a glacier in Antarctica
21.   Dance with my father at my wedding
22.   Go skydiving
23.   Race a sports car
24.   Fire a gun
25.   Go Zorbing
26.   Oktoberfest
27.   Test drive a Ferrari
28.   Own a Mustang (car not horse)
29.   Go bungee jumping
30.   Visit the Acropolis
31.   Visit the Pantheon
32.   Visit the Parthenon
33.   Visit the Great Wall of China
34.   Start a blog
35.   See Steve Irwin’s Zoo (modified since his death)
36.   Ride in a hot air balloon
37.   Take a canopy tour
38.   Ride the 10 largest roller coasters in the world
39.   Visit the Fjords of Norway
40.   Visit the Great Barrier Reef
41.   Visit Niagara Falls
42.   Visit Easter Island
43.   Go to Stonehenge
44.   Make a Koi Carp out of a Dollar Bill
45.   Try oysters
46.   Try escargot
47.   Try caviar
48.   Heli-snowboarding
49.   Snowboard into a different country(Austria to Switzerland)
50.   Hang Gliding
51.   Collect a  100,000 pennies: 1091 so far
52.   Actually finish making a blanket
53.   Learn to sew
54.   Drive at 100+ mph
55.   Learn to write calligraphy
56.   Learn to write with left hand
57.   Get tattoo
58.   Volcano Boarding
59.   Complete my Bucket List
 * And yes I do realise it is kind of silly to put complete my bucket list, but whatever I'm a strange sort of person who does that sort of thing.

And now to the recipe. I actually created this recipe myself.

2 cups bread flour
1 tsp baking powder
3/4 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cinnamon
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1 1/4 cup granulated sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
3 whole eggs
3/4 cup raisins
2 cups carrots
1 cup coconut or drained crushed pineapple (optional)

This is pretty simple. Preheat oven at 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Grease pans. Mix sugar, oil, and eggs until blended. Add rest of ingredients and mix until blended. Bake for 35-40 minutes. (Makes 2 9-in. cakes)

For the frosting:
1 lb of cream cheese
1 pint of heavy whipping cream
2 tbsp butter
2 cups powdered sugar
1 tsp of vanilla

Soften cream cheese before hand. Beat ingredients together. Allow cakes to cool off completely before frosting.

Monday, October 25, 2010

Kendra Marie

So this isn't going to be about baking and pastry its not even going to have a recipe. Right now I just want to talk about my bestest friend and why I love her. Kendra moved into my neighborhood the last year I was in high school. And this was the first American that was actually the same age as I was. Sure there were older people and younger kids but never someone the same age/grade as I was, until Kendra. Not only did I get to be best friends with Kendra but her sisters as well. I was accepted into the family like another kid. I guess you could say that we became sisters in a way. We did practically everything together. We went on a ski trip to the Alps. And if we hadn't gone skiing then the tumor would never have been found. Its been two years and not the tumor is back again. Kendra had fallen while we were skiing and had to be rescued by ski patrol. When we got back home Kendra had to go to the doctor and that's when they found out that she had a tumor in her knee. She had surgery to remove it. And it came back. So they did surgery on it again. Now it has come back for the third time. She is in Florida right now and I have no way of being there for her. I can't leave to go visit her because I have school. I just want to be able to do something for her, but I have no idea what I can do for her. I love her more than my own brother. But that's not saying much because I greatly dislike my brother. So maybe I should say that I love her more than I dislike my own brother.
I miss you bunches Kendra.


Its supposed to say Fire! Fire! What Now?! (inside joke)




Saturday, October 23, 2010

Neiman-Marcus

I actually have no idea what to title my blogs so I guess I'm just going to call it whatever the recipe of that day is.
Right now my life isn't that interesting. I'm not in the interesting classes, the classes that I choose Johnson and Wales University, I'm in the boring academic classes. The ones that make you do homework almost everyday. I miss the labs. The classes that you have to stand on your feet for six hours at a time and you get to bake and have fun.

The funny thing right now is probably my cat. She has become fascinated by medicine cups. I mean she just goes crazy over these little cups. She will climb up on the counter and steal the medicine cup to play with it.

I'm getting excited as more snow piles up on the mountains. I really love snowboarding. I can't explain why I love it so much seems how I'm not the greatest at it. I am also getting excited about going to Utah for Thanksgiving. I originally wanted to go for Christmas but my mom felt that she couldn't let me go for the big holiday. The reason that I wanted to go for Christmas is because my Grandma Jo has never had a Christmas with me. And I really love my Grandma Jo. I know it sounds weird that I have never had a Christmas with one of my Grandmas, but when you learn more about me and my history then you will understand. First off my Papa Eddie doesn't fly and my Grandma has never really been comfortable flying alone. And the reason why they would have to fly to visit me and my family is because up until last year my mom was in the military so we would move around a lot. Second for eight years my grandparents wouldn't even have been able to drive to see us since you can't drive over the ocean ( we lived in Germany from the time I was ten to the time I was eighteen). I have absolutely no idea why we didn't go visit my Grandma Jo for Christmas, but I guess it was maybe because its expensive to travel at the holidays? I don't know. But this year I get to go for Thanksgiving, which is something.

I know this blog is called My Life as a Baking and Pastry Student and I haven't spent much time talking about baking and pastry student life and that's because right now all of my baking is done at home and its not really a studying. But I think that maybe each time that I blog that I might share one of my favorite recipes with you guys. So this time I think that I am going to share my take on the Neiman-Marcus cookie recipe.
This recipe makes about 6 dozen cookies and can be halved very easily. This is the original and at the end will be my modifications.

2 cups butter, softened
4 cups flour
2 tsp baking soda
2 cups sugar
5 cups blended oatmeal
24 oz. chocolate chips
2 cups brown sugar
1 tsp salt
1 8 oz. Hershey Bar
4 eggs
2 tsp. baking powder
2 tsp. vanilla extract.

Instead of the Hershey bar I buy a bag of mini or fun sized Snickers and I freeze them the night before.
Preheat oven to 375. Cream butter and sugars. Add the eggs and vanilla, mix in the flour, oatmeal, salt, baking soda, and baking powder. Add the chocolate chips. Use a food processor to chop the Snickers into really small tiny pieces. You can also either make them into bars as I do or bake them into original cookie shape. Original cookie shape would be baked at 375 for 10 minutes. And the balls should be placed two inches apart. In the bar shape I place the dough into an 8 x 10 inch pan and bake the pans for about 25 to 30 minutes or until a toothpick come out clean and the cookies look golden brown.