Mexican Rice

I just want to start off by saying, thank you! Thanks to every single one of y'all that takes time out of your busy days to read my blogs and try out my recipes. I really do appreciate it. I felt like I wasn't getting many views on the blog, but my husband assured me I'm doing pretty decent for someone who just started blogging :) So really, thank you so much for the support and all the suggestions! I will do my best to do a post for every suggestion/request!

I had a really good friend of mine text me, and ask for a good mexican rice recipe. I make mine pretty much the same everytime, I just switch out the veggies, and spices. Sometimes I use tomato sauce, sometimes I use a flavor packet. Sometimes I put onion and bell pepper, sometimes I add some carrots. Sometimes, if Ben isn't going to have any, I'll even throw a jalapeno in there whole. It gives the rice just enough spice, and soaks up all the yummy rice flavor.

I am by no means claiming that this is the best rice in the world, or the best rice in town. But I like to think my rice is pretty good. My mom always says hers is the best, and that my grandma's rice is too mushy. I love both. So here is my take on Mexican rice, I hope y'all try it out next time you make mexican food for dinner at home :)

----Mexican Rice----
yeilds about 3 cups of cooked rice (approx 4-5 servings)

1 tbsp oil (any oil, even butter will work)
1 cup of uncooked long grain white rice
1/4 cup tomato sauce
diced onion
diced bell pepper
1 tbsp Knorr Chicken and tomato boullion
sprinkle of cumin (to taste)
salt (to taste-- I didn't add any.)
1 3/4 cups water (chicken broth works too)

In a medium size pan heat your oil at medium heat. Make sure your pan is somewhat deep, because the rice will triple in size once it absorbs all the liquid. Once your oil is warm, add cup of rice, and stir to coat the rice in oil. Be sure to keep an eye on the rice, and stir about every 30 seconds, so the rice doesn't burn.

The key here, is for all your rice to be white, or even LIGHTLY browned, not burn, and no longer translucent.

Once you see the rice turning white, add onions and bell peppers (and whatever other veggies you'd like) and sautee for a minute or two, still stirring to prevent the rice from burning.

Add tomato sauce, water, cumin, and boullion. I would try a bit less boullion to start, then stir and taste. If you feel you need more, add it. I did the full tablespoon, and realized I didn't even need to add salt because the boullion added plenty.

Allow your rice to come to a simmer, and cover. Let the rice simmer for 3-4 minutes, and stir, just enough to mix the rice around. Cover again, and turn heat down to low. After about 5 minutes, check the rice BUT DO NOT REMOVE THE LID! This steam trapped inside is cooking the rice! If you see that most of the liquid is gone, turn the burner off. If you leave the burner on, the rice at the bottom of your pan will burn.

Leave your rice COVERED on the burner (which is now off) for about 10-15 minutes before you uncover it. Your rice should be perfectly tender, not burnt on the bottom, and have no liquid left at the bottom of the pan.

VOILA! There you go guys! This is my recipe, it always works for me! I will go ahead and add one thing:
** If you don't like tomato in your rice, omit the tomato sauce, and just use water in its place.**
 I know my mom isn't a huge fan of tomato-y rice or soups, so I wanted to throw that out there :)

Scratch made Mac & Cheese

If you don't already know, Bennett is an absolute macaroni and cheese addict. He always says yes if I ask him if he wants mac and cheese for dinner, and he gets so giggly and excited. I tried to give him kraft mac and cheese once, and he spit it out on his plate! He doesn't mind the velveeta shells and cheese, but honestly, I feel like thats just noodles coated in plastic... so unhealthy!

So it took me a few times to perfect my cheese sauce, and I think this is pretty close to perfection. It's so gooey and flavorful, and it takes about 12 minutes to make, (the time the pasta takes to cook) which is awesome!

So I won't make you wait any longer, here it is.....

----Perfect Mac and Cheese----

1 cup of macaroni (elbow) noodles (cooked according to package)
1/4 cup of pasta water

2 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons flour
3/4 to 1 cup of milk or cream ( I used half & half )
1/2 cup shredded sharp cheddar cheese
salt, pepper, onion powder, paprika TO TASTE

Boil your water and cook your pasta. Be sure to reserve 1/4 cup of the pasta water before you strain your pasta.

While your pasta is cooking, heat a saucepan to medium heat, and toss in butter. Allow the butter to somewhat melt, and add equal parts flour. Whisk continuously, the mixture will become a paste, KEEP WHISKING.

This paste is called a roux. A roux is used to thicken sauces and soups. After whisking and cooking the flour taste out of our roux (about two minutes), go ahead and add your seasonings. I put salt, pepper, onion powder, and paprika in mine.

 No specific measurements with the spices, just to your liking. I usually use garlic powder too, but I'm all out.

Now, lower your heat to low, and add your 3/4 cup of dairy. Milk, cream, or half and half work just fine. Be sure to whisk the whole time you slowly pour it into the pan, otherwise your dairy could burn and curdle. You will see the mixture thicken as you whisk the liquid in. Add the 1/4 cup of pasta water, and whisk. Once incorporated, add 1/2 cup shredded cheese and whisk until cheese is completely melted.

 If you feel our sauce is too thick, add a bit more milk. Otherwise, that's all there is to it! Throw your cooked pasta into the sauce and stir to coat!

Totally delicious, flavorful, quick and easy, scratch made mac and cheese!

It's Bennett approved ;)

Lemony Crinkles

When we first got to Hawaii, I was looking for new recipes to try. I cook so often, that I feel like I had fallen into a bit of a rut. I know what my husband loves, and I know what is easiest to make. So I found myself making the same 10 or 15 dishes, and the same cookies all the time. Since Bennett isn't in day care yet, I'm always home hanging out with him, and pinterest is my favorite hobby.

Bennett loves all things lemon, and I found a really simple recipe for cookies on Pinterest. I read the recipe and almost couldn't believe that there were only 3 ingredients in the cookies. So I decided to give it a try.

I love only needing a few things to make something so delicious. And BOY OH BOY are these babies good! They're so light and perfectly sweet and soft, I could probably eat 10 before I even realized what was happening!

I even made a batch of these cookies for our good friend Dylan to take home to Rhode Island. I thought he was going to ask for chocolate chip cookies, but these lemon ones are his fav!

----Lemony Crinkles----

1 box lemon cake mix
1 egg
1 container of whipped topping (room temp)
for rolling:
1/2 cup of powdered sugar

Preheat oven to 350. Combine room temperature whipped topping with egg, and make sure they are well incorporated. Pour in the cake mix, and stir until lumps are gone.

Take spoonfuls of the batter and drop into a bowl of powdered sugar. This batter is much stickier than a typical cookie batter, it's more like a thick cake batter. So you aren't really rolling these as much as dropping them in the sugar and using your hands to gently shake excess sugar off. Once completely coated in sugar, dust off any extra over the bowl, and place on a pan lined with parchment paper or sprayed lightly with cooking spray.

* I actually ran out of parchment paper right before I made these, so I did one pan with no spray or paper, and one pan with spray to show you what a difference it makes*

Bake at 350 for 10-12 minutes, and let cool atleast 5 mins before removing from the pan to a cooling rack.

It really is that easy! Hope yall love these as much as we do!

A little holiday DIY inspiration

With Christmas apporoaching, I have been in such a cheerful mood. I think now that Bennett enjoys the trees and lights, I love the holidays so much more. He loves the decorations, and the music and the tv movies, just everything! And I LOVE that he loves it! SO since we're home a lot while daddy is at work or away, we have been crafting up a storm!

I look to pinterest quite a bit for inspiration, but I also enjoy looking at the cute decor that Target and Pier 1 have to offer. Then I think to myself, How can I make this myself, and will it be cheaper than buying it? Usually I can, and almost always, it is cheaper.

So here they are, my creations. Not perfect, but totally enough to make this base housing feel more like a home.

DIY Tree Skirt

I purchased two yards of burlap, one tan, and one red. I believe each yard was around $3.50 at Walmart. I also purchased a small hot glue gun, and a small pack of glue sticks, the two together totalled about $6 at Walmart also. The woman in the DIY video I watched used a felt tree skirt from the Dollar Store, and glued her strips of burlap on top of that. BUT here in Hawaii, we don't have any sort of dollar store, and the most simple tree skirts I could find were $15 (aka WAY more than I was willing to spend.) So what I did, was cut two yards of yellow (it was the only color the craft store had) felt, and glue other part to it, to make the biggest working area. Then I traced a circle, and cut it out. I cut the center hole, and the slit, like a traditional skirt, THEN I glued my burlap to that.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uCkuy9V1W0U
(This is the video I followed, She is pretty good about explaining the process...)

DIY Stocking Hanger

Pretty simple and self explanatory. We found a 3' x 1' piece of wood at Lowe's, and I sanded it as smooth as possible. I painted it green, twice, then I used a paint marker ($2 at Walmart) to write on the board. We bought some hooks and threw them on, and also bought a hanging kit for the back, and that's that! Pretty easy! I love it , except my handwriting is kind of terrible, I just can't find a stencil I like here :(

Holiday Canvases

These two were inspired by other artwork I found on Pinterest. I just used a pencil on the blank canvas and took my time, sketching and erasing until I was happy with it, then used about 20 different brushes to paint each one. Again, I hate my handwriting here, but whatever. Still cute ;)

Chalkboard design

Just typed in "Christmas chalkboard" on pinterest, and tried to make mine look like those. This chalkboard isn't actual chalkboard, so chalk won't write on it. I had to use crayon chalk, which is more waxy, but still wipes right off. I might change this soon, but I thought I'd show y'all my first design. This isn't really anything special, but this chalkboard is the only 'holiday' thing in the kitchen/dining area, besides my snowflake dish towels HAHA...


Arrows (not Christmas decor)

These aren't Christmas decor, obviously, but we made them, and my arrows I painted are kind of messy. I still love them though :) and had to share them with y'all!


That's what we've got right now. Bennett and I did some salt dough hand print ornaments the other day, but we haven't gotten around to painting them. I guess I'll post those when they're finished :)

Hope this inspires you all to try some DIY decor for Christmas this year!!

TTFN loves!

Sweet and Creamy Iced Coffee

Alright guys, so anyone who knows me KNOWS I'm a coffee addict. It's no secret, I love me some coffee, warm, cold, hot, frozen, slushy, cake, candy... WHATEVER. If it's coffee, it's MINE. Well, it's getting to the point where, if I see a Starbucks, I stop and buy a drink. It gets pretty expensive.

We got a keurig last year, but we kicked it to the curb recently, because it just wasn't making good coffee anymore, no matter what we tried.

We got this new coffee maker, called a Brew Station, by Hamilton Beach. And let me just say, THANK YOU SWEET BABY JESUS. This thing is awesome! You can brew as much coffee as you want, and instead of brewing into a pot, it brews into the other side of the coffee maker. There's a timer you can set to keep it hot for up to 4 hours, or not at all. I prefer to not leave the heating element on because I don't like burnt coffee. BUT if I'm in the mood for a cup of hot coffee, I do pop my cup into the microwave for a minute, which I don't mind doing at all.

The super super PLUS about this coffee maker, is that I can take whatever extra coffee I don't drink, and pop it into a cup and throw ice in there for a great iced coffee! I just discovered this yesterday and I'm totally and completely head over heels in love..... YES! IT'S REALLY THAT SERIOUS!

I won't make you wait any longer! Here you go!

----Sweet and Creamy Perfect Iced Coffee----

So, What I did was I brewed my coffee like I normally would, with just a bit extra coffee. The ice cubes will eventually melt down and water down your coffee, If you let it sit that long, which I don't. :)

So I poured in water for 5 cups of coffee (the 5 line on the coffee maker) and In the coffee filter, I scooped 6 tablespoons of coffee. I let the coffee brew, and let it cool to room temp. Then (you don't have to do this) I poured the coffee into a large mason jar, and put it in the fridge for an hour to further cool, so the ice cubes won't melt as soon as I drop them in.

Then, once I'm ready to make the drink, I split the coffee into two cups. I put two heaping spoonfuls of sweetened condensed milk into each coffee cup, and stirred it really well. This stuff is thick and sweet so make sure you stir really well. I then added just one spoonful of sugar and an additional splash of half n half. The additional sugar and cream are not necessary, but I really love my iced coffee sweet and milky, and this just does it for me.

Stir.

Add lots of ice.

Welcome to heaven.

YOU. ARE. WELCOME. 

Until next time, my loves!