Chocolate Chip Banana Muffins

I decided to combine the Chocolate chocolate chip muffins with the Banana muffins and created an amazing chocolate chip banana muffin. They turned out really good and I got several compliments including "this is my favorite thing of all the things you've made" and "this is the best muffin I have ever eaten".

So here it is:

Ingredients
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1 egg
• 1/2 cup butter- melted
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour*
• 4 medium size banana's (or 3 large)- mashed
• 1/2 bag or 6oz chocolate chips**

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degree's and grease a 12 reg. muffin pan or a 6 jumbo muffin pan
2. Blend together banana, sugar, egg, and butter
3. In a separate bowl mix all the dry ingredients together, including chocolate chips, really well
4. Combine dry ingredients into wet ingredients. Do not over mix.
5. Bake for 20 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean.

TIPS
* If you really do not want to use whole wheat flour (even though it makes it taste like a yummy muffin and not a wimpy cupcake) you can use all purpose flour, just use one less banana or you will have soggy (cupcakes) muffins

** I love chocolate more than anyone else I know but the perfect balance between banana flavor and chocolate is what makes these muffins so good and that is why I recommend only 6oz

Best Ever Brownies

I was dragging my feet on making another batch of brownies after the first ones were just ok and the last ones completely flopped. I didn't even bother to post them. But this batch turned out perfect.

Rich fudgy center with a nice flaky top and ever so slightly chewy sides. Well, now I'm off to the gym ;)

* 1/2 cup butter
* 1 cup white sugar
* 2 eggs
* 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
* 1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
* 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
* 1/4 teaspoon salt
* 1/4 teaspoon baking powder

DIRECTIONS

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour an 8 inch square pan.
2. In a large saucepan, melt butter. Remove from heat, and stir in sugar, eggs, and vanilla. Beat in cocoa, flour, salt, and baking powder. Spread batter into prepared pan.
3. Bake in preheated oven for 25 to 30 minutes. Do not overcook.


Recipe via Angie

Summer Days

Mark and I initiated our new grill this weekend at MayJ's. We grilled burgers, ate chips, fresh strawberry's and May's delicious brownies. I was so full I felt like I might burst. I can't wait to make hobo burger, and smores, and corn on the cob, and kabobs, the list really just goes on and on.

Banana & Chocolate chocolate chip muffins

I may not be a believer in diet cake but I do believe in the benefits of whole wheat flour so I adjusted the original recipes for the Banana muffins and the Chocolate chocolate chip muffins. They turned out really good and tasted more like a true hearty breakfast muffin rather than a super sweet cake. I also added in just a tiny bit more fat so they wouldn't be dry.

Banana Muffin
3 Large bananas, mashed

3/4 cup white sugar

1 egg

1/2 cup melted butter

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

3/4 cup all purpose flour

3/4 cup whole wheat flour

Blend the mashed banana, sugar, egg and margarine together. Set aside. In a separate bowl, mix together baking soda, baking powder, salt and flour. Combine wet and dry mixtures all together. Do not over-stir! Pour into greased muffin pans, and bake in 350 degrees oven for approximately 20 minutes. Makes 6 jumbo muffins or 12 regular muffins.


Chocolate chocolate chip muffins
1 cup all-purpose flour

3/4 cup whole wheat flour

1 cup chocolate chips

3/4 cup granulated sugar

1/3 cup cocoa, sifted if lumpy

1 tablespoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 egg

1 cup milk

1/2 cup cooking oil

1 teaspoon vanilla

Combine flours, chocolate chips, sugar, cocoa, salt and baking powder in a mixing bowl. Create a well in the center.Beat egg in a small bowl. Add milk, cooking oil, and vanilla. Stir and pour into well. No not over mix!. Grease 12 muffin cups (or 6 jumbo) and fill cups 3/4 full. Bake at 350°F for 15 minutes until golden.

Rainbow Cake

I ditched the recipe I linked to in my weekly forecast because I realized it was diet cake and I don't believe in diet cake. I used a white cake mix and separated the batter into six equal parts. I used gel food coloring to make the muted rainbow. It's really easy to get the brighter colors with the gel dye but I'm just more partial to the pastels. Plus they matched the sprinkles. It turned out really cute. I'm going to make it again soon from scratch instead of the box mix. I'll let you know if it works out.

Carrot Cake

On Sunday I made the best ever carrot cake for Mark's last day of school. I also took him out to dinner which left us no room for cake afterwards. It finally got sliced open this evening and tasted for blog worthy approval. I have to say, I've never had better carrot cake.

Best ever waffles

I don't use the words "best ever" lightly and if there is one recipe I should keep secret it is probably this one. But I love sharing too much to keep it to myself. I use to make waffles on a regular basis until my waffle maker died right before I moved to Los Angeles. Lucky for me I got a wonderful gift card from my Sara and purchased a brand new one. I had to play around to figure out the right amount of batter to make a big (but not overflowing) waffle. For this recipe I just mix everything together in the end unlike every other recipe where I slowly add the ingredients. I'm not sure if it really matters but why fix something that's not broken ;)

p.s. click on the first photo to make the recipe bigger.

Cake

I just finished reading In Defense of Food by Michael Pollan which Mark's Mom let us borrow. It is a fantastic book that offers a refreshing insight on the western culture, or should I say the lack of. It is about food but it is about so much more. I wanted to share an interested excerpt from the beginning of the book:

In one experiment, [Paul Rozin] showed the words "chocolate cake" to a group of Americans and recorded their word associations. "Guilt" was the top response. If that strikes you as unexceptional, consider the response of the French eaters to the same prompt: "celebration."

Interesting, huh? Above are pictures of my birthday cake making in my new super cute apron that was a present from May.

Weekend photos

Mark and I getting ready to go to an art show with May and J. Mark wasn't actually mad, he just likes to make this face.





Kathie Olivas sculpture. Pretty cute, huh?





A car outside of the art show. I'm sort of in love with this. If I had a car I would want it to be this one ;)





Flowers at the Farmers Market on Sunday.





The Vegetables





My Daisies from the Farmers Market in a tin can.





Oscar enjoying the flowers.





My new awesome $5 hamper set that I scored at this weeks estate sale.





Mark made hamburgers and french fries Sunday night and we watched Son of Ranbow. Such a cute movie!

Espresso Beer Chocolate Cupcakes with Cream Cheese and Salted Caramel Frosting!

Phew! I know it sounds like a little much but I promise that these cupcakes taste amazing. I made them for craft night last week and they were a huge hit.

p.s. Bake them at 350 degree's for 15-25 minutes
p.p.s. Thanks Sara for this recipe link!

Best Ever Chocolate Chip Cookies

I made these chocolate chip cookies yesterday and they turned out amazing. I will never use another recipe.

WARNING: These cookies are incredibly delicious (a.k.a. incredibly fattening) and will cause you to break whatever diet you may be on.

May Day

Yesterday was absolutely wonderful. It started out with a trip to a local animal shelter where I may volunteer at making some flyers and cleaning up the facilities. It's a no kill shelter with tons of cats roaming around. The sick ones are separated but still treated with lots of love and even the feral ones are cared for. Cats just kept coming up to me and wanted love an attention. I was in heaven.

The rest of the day was spent with my friend May. I helped sew up these throw pillows for her apartment. Then we walked around the neighborhood and I found this amazing dress at a local boutique. Mark made us another mind blowing meal with baked chicken, potato's, mushrooms in a reduction sauce, and salad. May and I iced yummy sugar cookies that she made and then we watched countless cat video's.

I will be doing lots of decorating today so there will be more pictures soon.

Making easter peeps

May had the brilliant idea of making these Easter peeps. It actually worked and the marshmallow tasted better than store bought. There should be a warning though: Will cause huge mess.

Yes, yes we can :)

Andrea sent me this blog and I must agree with the title.

mennonitegirlscancook

Bacon & Pancakes

There seems to be something magical in creating a house full of the smell of bacon and pancakes. My mother use to create this magic every weekend and it's so strange that now I'm the one behind the scent.

Ali and Levi arrived late Friday night. We slept in and ate our hearty breakfast. Mark headed to school and we spent the day in the warm weather walking around. We caught "Sunshine Cleaning" at the Vista, a historical theatre down the street. Once Mark got home we went out for Italian and did some baby shopping for Ali's baby boy, due in August.

p.s. I've tried quite a few pancake recipes but none have been as good as my mothers so I thought I'de share:

2 cups flour
1 tsp salt
3 tsp baking powder
2 Tblsp sugar
1 egg
2 Tblsp vegetable oil

Blend together and add milk as needed, usually somewhere between 2 and 3 cups. Heat a flat pan with a little oil and add batter once the surface is hot. Wait until bubbles have formed on all areas of the top then flip.

Weekend Forecast

What is everyone up to this weekend?

Here are my plans:

• Clean our apartment with eco friendly cleaners.

• Buy peonies from the farmers market, even though I already have a fantastic boyfriend.

• Last week May mentioned that she had never had macarons so we to a local ice cream shop that use to carry them. They not longer have them and a lady in line with us said that the best place to get them is at Laduree in Paris. That not going to happen any time soon so we are going to attempt to make macarons them. Not sure which flavor to go with yet though.

•Paint a mural in our bathroom inspired by Lisa Rupp

(photo via my polaroid blog )