Easter cupcakes

I had a few cadbury eggs (like 50) left from last Easter. so, I made some cadbury cupcakes.

Ingredient List:
one box chocolate cake mix
eggs
oil
water
cadbury eggs
frosting, vanilla and cream cheese
green food coloring
reeses eggs
cupcake liners
oven set at 350F

Take cadbury eggs out of foil. Freeze until solid (I did mine over night). Prep chocolate cupcakes as box states. Put liners in cupcake pan and small spoonful of batter. Put in cadbury egg. Pour more chocolate cake batter over, to cover. Bake as box instructs. Cool, then frost with green frosting and eggs. I mixed vanilla and cream cheese frosting together in the mixer with green food coloring then spiked it on cupcakes for grass.

Look at all that Cadbury goodness deep down inside! :)

Baked Beans

My dinner tonight? Baked beans and corn muffins!  Talk about a perfect (solitary) meal.

 

 I started out with 1.5 cups of dried beans.  As you can tell, I have a variety in there.  Pinto, Black, Northern White, Kidney, and Cranberry beans.  I cooked them at a slow boil for about 2 hours, then threw in about 2 cups of frozen crinkle cut carrots and 1 cup of frozen diced onions, then boiled another 7 minutes and drained it all. I then preheated the oven to 325F and greased a large baking dish (with a lid if possible, or wrapped with tin foil). In a separate bowl, I combined 3/4 cup (ideal) brown sugar, 1/2 cup ketchup, 1 TBS apple cider vinegar, 1 TBS yellow mustard, 1/4 cup crumbled bacon, 1 tsp maple syrup extract, and several cups water (as it cooks, you may have to add more water. I started with 2 and added 1 cup later).

Everything set to be combined into deliciousness.

Meet my beans. Aren't they fabulous?

I mixed everything up in my baking pan, sealed it tight, then put it in the oven. All the recipes online told me I should bake for about 3 hours. I kept peaking at it, though, and finally got so hungry that I had to sneak some out for dinner. It was great, but still needed a bit of time to soften up.  The beans are currently back in the oven with some extra water.  I served my huge scoop full of beans with fresh corn muffins. (See my corndog recipe. Add 2 TBS frozen corn for each 3 TBS of corn meal mix)

Sorry the picture is so dark. I was too busy wanting to eat this to try and take a magnificent photo.

BBQ Steak Sandwich!

Hello all.  With the beauty of spring surrounding us, I have started cooking up again.  That, and it is spring break, so I have excess time on my hands!

For lunch today, I made myself a steak sandwich. Eye of round steak was on sale at Meijer this week. That was my poison!

I started with 1 TBS flour, a little salt, and a little black pepper.  After my steak came to room temperature, I dredged it in the flour mixture. (I read online that letting your steak come to room temperature before cooking helps it to be more juicy).

Steak, sitting in a lovely bath of flour, salt, and pepper

Then, I fried it in a little pam on a skillet. (It got a bit smokey, and YES, my fire alarm went off! Oops).   A minute or two on either side was all that it took to cook the steak, as it was a very thin slice.  I dropped some frozen, pre-sliced onions into my flour mixture and tossed them around, then got rid of the extra flour. Once my steak was happily resting on my plate to be eaten later, I threw the onions (about 1/4 cup) and 1 TBS bacon crumbles in the skillet to brown up.  I topped the steak with a slice of reduced fat muenster cheese, plopped the onions and bacon on top, poured on a little bit of Sweet Baby Ray's BBQ sauce and put it all inside a toasted English Muffin that had a bit of mayo on it.  I served it with asparagus (pop off the ends and steam for 7 minutes), carrot sticks, and Special K cracker chips - sour cream and onion flavored.  Yum!

Such a happy plate!

Look at all those onions, bacon, and BBQ sauce sitting happily on top of my steak and cheese sandwich! YUM!

Yes, this was officially FOOD!