KITCHEN STORY: BAKED BLUEBERRY LEMON DONUTS

One of the best parts of summer is berry season. I have so many great memories of going berry picking with my family and friends. My parents would tell this story to everyone of one time, when I was little, we went berry picking and my clothes and face ended up covered in berry juice after we finished picking. People joked that they should've weighed me before and after since I probably ate more than I picked! Good thing I was cute enough to get away with it!

Anyway, I wanted to bring a treat for my friends' house warming party and it was such a beautiful Chicago summer day so I decided to make something light. For some reason, lemons come to mind when I want something light. Then I thought I'd add blueberries to the mix since I had some in the fridge. And then these baked donuts came to be!

KITCHEN STORY: NUTELLA SWIRL CUPCAKES

Lately I have been back to being a Nutella nut. I put it on everything or just have sudden cravings to eat a spoonful (or two...or more...). I was set loose on the Speculoos (cookie butter) obsession last year so Nutella was on the back-burner, but now it has returned to the forefront of my consuming thoughts. (Oh, so witty.)

One morning while making simple vanilla cupcakes for my friends' birthdays, I was craving another spoonful of Nutella. And while licking the spoon clean I thought, "if I'm craving Nutella so much, then my friends must be craving it too." (Obviously. Because that is how everything in life works.) So I thought I'd dress up the plain cupcakes with Nutella and these came to life. Honestly, I thought these turned out looking ugly since I haphazardly piped the Nutella on top in a rush. But I guess someone's ugly is someone else's beautiful since my sister saw them and wouldn't let me frost them. I'm glad she said so since now I can see the beauty in their imperfection.

Ingredients: Makes 18-24 cupcakes (adapted from Spoonful)
2.5 cups all purpose flour
2 cups white sugar
1 (3.4 oz) package of instant vanilla pudding mix
1 cup milk
1/2 cup vegetable oil
4 eggs
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup Nutella (put in Ziploc bag or pastry bag)

Preheat oven to 350 F. Line regular cupcake pan with liners or grease cupcake pan.

In a large mixing bowl, combine sugar and eggs together with electric mixer (or if you are too lazy to clean a mixer, like me, use a fork to mix). Add the flour, vanilla pudding, milk, oil, baking powder and vanilla and mix until all ingredients are well incorporated.

Fill cupcake liners or pan until two-thirds full.

Microwave Nutella in Ziploc/pastry bag for 10 seconds, cut off a small corner/tip with scissors. Pipe swirls or any design on top of each cupcake. Carefully tap cupcake pans against the countertop a few times to let the Nutella settle slightly in the batter.

Bake for 18 minutes or until tops are a light golden brown and bounce back to touch.

Buon appetito my fellow Nutella lovers! Hope you enjoy this recipe & leave comments if you have any questions.

Kitchen Story: Peanut Butter Blossoms

Hope you all had a wonderful Valentines Day & weekend! My 24 hour surgery call Valentines date was not ideal, but I got a glimpse of the misery patients go through with having to spend a special day cooped up in a hospital room. And contrary to my teammates' wishes, I did not meet my valentine when we were consulted by the ED. The only contenders were elderly men...sadly all taken. Oh well!

Since I knew I'd need a sweet pick-me-up to get me through call, I decided to whip up a batch of peanut butter chocolate candy cookies. Peanut butter anything makes this girl happy. And since I was making them, I thought I'd make a double batch to share with my colleagues.

Kitchen Story: Simple Chocolate Chip Pumpkin Muffins

I have finally had a moment to breathe and attempt a few Fall recipes just in time for Thanksgiving! Who else is as excited as me for the excuses we have to stuff our faces this time of year? Specifically, stuffing our faces with Fall flavors. One of my favorites is pumpkin. PSL anyone? If you aren't up to speed on Starbucks lingo, that stands for the pumpkin spice latte. Yum.

I came across this recipe and had to make them! They are so delicious, quick, simple & perfect to serve at parties, church, etc.

And while I say this recipe is quick, it really is, but be careful and read the labels on your spices or else you might be adding a few tablespoons ground black pepper to your batter instead of cinnamon...oops! (I scraped off the top layer of the batter and lost a couple muffins.) This is why early morning baking is not for me. If you don't make a similar mistake as mine, these will be delicious & will disappear in no time!

Life Story: Fall Friday

Fall is all around! I must say, it's one of my favorite seasons, but I was trying to figure out why, so I came up with a list of my five favorite things about Fall. Which fits perfectly with my usual Friday linkup with Lauren for High Five for Friday!

1. Fall leaves

This picture of the alley behind my house is all I need to say.

Kitchen Story: Magical Gluten Free Peanut Butter Cookies

Usually when I hear "gluten free" in the name of any dessert it's a total turn-off. I've eaten a few gluten free baked goods and spit them right back out. I always want to cry for anyone who says they have gluten intolerance because they miss out on wa lot of amazing desserts I could not live without.

However, I can't spend all my tears on these sad realizations and being a "fixer", I had to fix this situation. So I decided to challenge myself and trek to the ends of the earth to find THE best gluten free dessert so that my gluten intolerant friends can enjoy a dessert of mine. And by "trekking" I mean "Pinterest-ing".

Some recipes were boring. Pudding? Anyone can do that.

Gluten free breads requiring a million types of flour substitutes that I never knew existed and sound scary/gross? No thanks.

Peanut butter cookies that require only THREE ingredients? YES please!! Match made in heaven.

It took me a couple tries before I got these perfect & I had to add a couple ingredients, but I am so happy with the result & I hope anyone who is or isn't gluten intolerant will enjoy these with me!

Recipe (adapted from AllRecipes)
Makes about 36 cookies
Ingredients:
1 cup Peanut Butter
3/4 cup Brown Sugar
1 egg
1 tsp baking soda
Dash of cinnamon

Optional:
Mini chocolate chips (semi-sweet or dark)
2 Tbsp White granulated sugar for decoration

Preheat oven to 350 deg F. Prepare a baking sheet by covering it with foil.

In a medium mixing bowl mix peanut butter, brown sugar, egg, baking soda, cinnamon and optional chocolate chips with a fork until mixed well.

Cover dough tightly and place in the fridge for at least 30 minutes.

When ready to bake cookies, remove dough from fridge. Roll dough into 1-1.5 inch balls. Make sure they are no bigger than 1.5 inches. Do not flatten dough.

Bake for 6 minutes, remove cookies from oven. Place the white sugar in a shallow bowl and dip a fork in sugar and lightly press fork on a cookie in an "X" pattern as shown below. Do NOT press too hard because cookies will flatten too much. Re-dip fork and repeat on each cookie. Place cookies in oven for 2 more minutes.
(If you do not want to do this optional step, bake the cookies for 8 minutes straight through.)

Remove cookies from oven and let them cool COMPLETELY before moving them because they will fall apart if they are still warm.

Hope you enjoy these gluten free delights!

Life Story: A Bittersweet Friday

Normal people love Fridays. I used to, but I'd say today is more "bittersweet". The bitterness stems from the fact that it's the last day of blissful electives month and I'm back to 3.5 months straight of actual rotations (exams? yuck).

The sweetness rises from all the memories I've made this past month. I'm so thankful for all the time outside of school I've had to meet up with friends, new and old, and try new things while not have a nagging voice in my head telling me I should be studying instead.

I'm linking up with Lauren for High Five For Friday for the first time to highlight my favorite 5 things this past week! Although it's supposed to be this past week, I'm going to make this 5 highlights from this past month instead, just to make it more challenging for myself...Here we go:

1. Favorite Eat

Au Cheval's burger. I'd give it a 15/10. It's that good. Oh, and I also ran into Andrew Belle while I was there (no big.) and he carried on a conversation with me.

2. Favorite Sounds

My first favorite transitions me nicely into this topic. I'm loving Andrew Belle's new album Black Bear! It's so good even when you consider it follows his last full album, The Ladder, which was stellar. If you haven't bought it, get it now. I mean it. My favorite song of his at the moment is "Pieces".

Ben Rector's new album, The Walking in Between, came out the same day and charted top 5 on iTunes for a while! Well deserved, Ben! Take a listen to a snippet of one of my favorite songs from his album and you'll know why I'm obsessed with this guy's music and voice!

I know I'm totally cheating so far in this category with more than one favorite, but this song is too powerful & beautiful to miss. This week I heard an acoustic version of "Oceans" by Hillsong United and since I first heard it it's been on repeat. Such powerful words & a great reminder that "where feet may fail and fear surrounds me, [God has] never failed." And it renews my heart's cry to trust God without borders wherever He has called me and for my faith to be made stronger.

3. Favorite Outfit

Hands down my blue lace Anthropologie dress I wore to my friend's wedding. I think my favorite part was the fact that I got it for $40 when it was originally $328. Score! I paired it with Forever 21 accessories that people always comment on saying that they look more expensive than they actually are (under $10). Now I need to find more occasions to wear this dress!

4. Favorite Memory

If you follow me on Instagram, you've probably seen the few pictures I posted getting my hair and makeup done. I had a fun opportunity to model for a future feature on The Urbaness, one of my favorite Chicago lifestyle blogs. It was a blast hanging out with the other models and the talented people behind the scenes. For more details you can check out a fellow model Erin's perspective of the fun day.

Behind the scenes: Photographers Katie & Lynn hard at work while The Eventful Life creates the beautiful scene

5. Favorite Quote

"Do small things with great love." - Mother Teresa. A beautiful reminder of my purpose in life and how I should walk everyday. With overflowing love for people no matter what I'm doing. I think the world needs more love, a selfless love that extends mercy & grace to those around us.

Source

Thanks for reading! Please follow me with Google connect for more stories! I also just joined Bloglovin', so if you'd like, please follow me through that media! :)

I have a really fun series of posts starting tomorrow!! I'm excited to share it with you guys!

Kitchen Story: Baked Cinnamon Sugar Buttermilk Donuts

This month, I made it a goal to try at least 1 new recipe per week that I've pinned to my sweet recipe Pinterest board. Thankfully I've had wonderful guinea pigs taste testers willing to try my initial attempts and give me feedback in as little words/sounds as "Mmm..." just so I got an idea if the recipe was blog-worthy or if I needed to tweak it. This one got a big "Yum" so I decided to share it!

Recipe adapted from Crumbs and Chaos. Makes about 1 dozen donuts.

What you need:

For the donuts:
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup buttermilk (OR 2 Tablespoons lemon juice + fat free milk to make 3/4 cup total)
• 2 eggs, beaten
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 Tablespoons butter, melted
For the topping:
• 1/4 cup (1/2 stick) butter, melted
• 1/4 cup sugar
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 2 tablespoon cinnamon

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Spray a donut pan with cooking spray.

In a large bowl, mix flour, sugar, baking powder, nutmeg, cinnamon, and salt. Then add buttermilk, eggs, vanilla, and melted butter until well combined.

Fill your donut pan 3/4 full and bake for 8-10 minutes or until the donuts spring back when touched. Allow to cool slightly before removing from the pan.

To make topping, mix together the sugars and cinnamon in a bowl wide enough to hold one donut. Dunk each donut quickly in melted butter to completely coat and place in bowl of the cinnamon sugar mixture to coat.

*TIP 1: For easy transportation and nice presentation, find a clothes gift box, line with wax/parchment paper and place donuts neatly inside. If you need to add a layer, place wax/parchment paper between layers.

*TIP 2: Donuts are best when served fresh out of the oven (hence why the clock on my oven says 5:44 am...*yawn*), but you can always just make these the night before and serve them the next morning if necessary.

How simple & drool-worthy are these donuts? I hope you try out this recipe & comment below to let me know what you think! Enjoy! :)

Kitchen Story: Chess Squares / Gooey Butter Cake

Oh. My. Yum.

Ever since I've had my first gooey butter cake courtesy of free lunch at Google (Thanks, Tiff!), I've been craving it a lot. Since this isn't exactly the healthiest recipe (read as an understatement), I have been putting off making it. But I finally caved the other night and decided to make it, including all the sugar and "butta". Good thing this recipe stayed true to the necessity of being quick & simple!

This recipe is adapted from a recipe I found on Pinterest by Kevin & Amanda.

What you'll need:

1 box yellow cake mix

3 eggs
8 oz cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, melted (I made it "healthier" by using 1/4 cup butter, 1/4 veg oil)
4 cups (1 lb) powdered sugar (If you don't like sweets too sweet, I would cut it down to 3-3.5 cups)

Preheat oven to 300 and spray a 9×13 dish with cooking spray.

Mix cake mix, melted butter and one egg to a soft dough with a fork. Press into the bottom of the pan. 

Mix powdered sugar, softened cream cheese and remaining two eggs with a mixer until smooth. Pour on top of crust. 

Bake for 40-45 minutes or until top is golden brown.

Then...ENJOY the gooey buttery-ness. Yum.

Thanks for visiting! Follow me on Bloglovin' if you'd like to follow along on my adventure!

Kitchen Story: Peanut Butter Chocolate Bars

You had me at peanut butter.

I've been going through so many jars of PB from baking everything with it. But I'm not complaining!

I found this recipe for Peanut Butter Chocolate Bars and it sounded too good and too simple to pass up! And I ended up with a rich and decadent dessert that melts in your mouth and disappears when shared with friends.

Ingredients:

Yellow cake mix (I used Pillsbury)
1/3-1/2 cup Country Crock Spread or unsalted butter, melted (I skimped a little on the butter and used 1/3 cup)
1 cup creamy peanut butter
2 eggs
1 (12 oz) package semi-sweet or dark chocolate chips
1 (14 oz) can sweetened condensed milk
2 Tablespoons Country Crock Spread
2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 325 degF. Line a 9x13 pan with foil (It saves you from cleaning another dish).

Mix cake mix, melted butter, peanut butter and eggs in a medium bowl using a mixer. Once well incorporated, the mixture will be moist but slightly crumbly.

In the prepared pan, use your hands to press 2/3 of the mixture to cover the bottom of the pan. (I worked in the middle and pushed the mixture to the edges). Get the layer as thin as possible, but make sure there aren't any holes.

Place the chocolate chips in a medium microwaveable bowl and microwave at 30 second increments, mixing in between, until the chips sweat (get glossy). Add the sweetened condensed milk, vanilla and butter. Mix and microwave again at 15 second increments. Mix in between and microwave until the chocolate fully melts.

Pour the chocolate mixture into the pan over the cake mixture. Crumble the remaining cake mixture on top.

Bake for 20-25 minutes or until the top is a very light golden brown (Do not let it brown too much).

Let it stand and cool completely (2 hours) before cutting it into bars.

ENJOY! I hope you try this out!

Kitchen Story: BAKED Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Banana Donuts

I was searching my pinterest board for some recipes for baked donuts and found this delicious and semi-healthy looking recipe. It looked super simple and I decided to give it a try and make my team at work my guinea pigs ;-) Lo and behold, I did not poison them and they did not spit/vomit it out and claim to have dysphagia, so I think these are a winner!

Fun fact: Little did I know that it also happened to be National Donut Day when I shared these! My instincts just knew.

I changed up the recipe a bit to what I thought would taste better and used ingredients that most people will find in their kitchens or at least are ingredients everyone would know how to find at a grocery store or at a neighbor's kitchen (do people still borrow ingredients from neighbors?). 

If you don't have a donut pan, I highly suggest the Wilton pans. You can find them at Bed Bath & Beyond (and use those coupons shamelessly) or Amazon for super cheap! Your local Marshalls/TJMaxx/Homegoods may also have these.

Ingredients

Makes 16 donuts

2 mashed ripe bananas (about 1 cup)

1/3 cup white sugar

1/2 cup fat free vanilla greek yogurt

1/4 cup melted Country Crock Spread (or unsalted butter) -- microwave for 10-15 seconds

2 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 cups AP flour

1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup peanut butter chips

1/2 cup milk chocolate chips

Topping:

2 Tablespoons cinnamon

1/8 cups brown sugar

1/8 cups white sugar

Now let's get started:

Preheat your oven to 325F. Prepare you donut pan by spraying it lightly with EVOO spray.

In a medium/large mixing bowl, mix together the mashed bananas, sugar and yogurt with an electric mixer.

Add the melted butter, eggs and vanilla extract and mix well.

Add the flour, ground nutmeg, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Do NOT overmix. Only mix until everything is incorporated. 

Use a spatula to fold in the peanut butter chips and chocolate chips.

Use the spatula to transfer the mixture from the bowl into a large freezer ziploc bag. Squeeze out extra air and seal the bag. Use clean scissors to snip 1.5 cm off one of the bottom corners of the bag.

Slowly pipe the mixture into your prepared donut pan, only filling it 3/4 of the way up. 

Pop the pan into the oven for 15 minutes. Mine took exactly 15 minutes to bake.

While the donuts are in the oven, mix together cinnamon, brown and white sugars together in a bowl wide enough to fit a donut.

Remove the donuts from the oven when they are ready. On a cooling rack or a large piece of foil. Flip the pan over to remove the donuts. Wait 5 minutes and then dip the donuts in the cinnamon mixture. Set the donuts aside to finish cooling or enjoy them warm!

Since I had to carry these to work, I used a gift box for clothes, lined it with wax paper/parchment paper, and placed the donuts inside like they do at donut shops :) Makes for a great presentation!

Aren't these simple? I hope you try this recipe! I promise they will be snatched up in no time if you bring them to any get-together :)

Entertaining Guide: Indoor Garden Party

I was flipping through photos reminiscing about my last-ever summer break (does anyone miss it as much as I do?) and realized I never got around to sharing about a fun little party I threw for a few of my friends. So just to bring back the good memories, I thought I'd share some fun party ideas with those of you who love hosting parties as much as I do!

To celebrate the end of the school year & the beginning of summer, I decided to throw a garden party themed potluck brunch and invited some of my classmates. My rules were the following:

• Floral attire
• Floral-themed food (or at least an attempt!)

Luckily, Kim, one of my good friends from my second home state who is a baker-extraordinaire & also loves to throw parties was visiting me and helped me throw this party together in no time!

I found DIY instructions on how to make your own giant paper flowers & instantly knew I had to incorporate these into my party somehow. I've always wanted to do a DIY photobooth because who doesn't love fun photobooth pictures? So I made these giant paper flowers as a fun photobooth backdrop instead of having a boring off-white wall background. I loved the whimsical look of it!

I also found free photobooth prop templates of glasses & mustaches and printed them out. Kim helped me cut them out on construction paper and stuck them to stirrer sticks. They turned out so great!

I also made medium sized versions of the flowers and attached "stems" to them with a stirrer stick. I bought $1 planters from Target, lined the insides with foil, then filled them with corn chips, mango-peach salsa (from Costco), & homemade guacamole. Then, I stuck one medium flower into each planter as if they were potted plants. They turned out super cute and doubled as table decorations!

Next came the food. Kim made delicious Red Velvet Cupcakes with cream cheese frosting. I found cute flower-topped food picks at a nearby boutique and we used those to decorate the cupcakes. We also made a Tuna-filled Crescent Wreath which was scrumptious.

My favorite floral-themed dish made by one of my friends was a delicious & beautiful peach cake decorated like a rose. Beautiful right?

Thanks for reading!

Kitchen Story: Two Ingredient Banana Oatmeal Cookies

YES! You read that right. TWO ingredients for these simply delicious treats. Plus, they're healthy! No butter, oil, or sugar. Love handles, no love for you! Sorry, I'm not sorry.

When I came across this recipe on The Burlap Bag, I scooted right into the kitchen to make them. Literally. That never happens! I'm always pinning recipes to my dessert Pinterest board to make later...as in, there's a 99.999% chance it won't happen. But this miracle recipe was worth it & I've made it three times in one week! I hope you go do the same and make these right now. You'll thank me 20 minutes later!! (Plus, it's another great way to get rid of those overripe bananas instead of making banana bread!)

I came up with delicious mix-ins you MUST try.

Ready...BREAK! GO MAKE THESE!!!

Ingredients:
     

2 large ripe bananas

1 cup oatmeal

+any mix-ins (or none!)

My favorite mix-in combos: 

• 1/4 cup of Speculoos (Biscoff/Cookie Butter) + chocolate chips + cinnamon --> Amaze-balls.
• 2 Tbsp brown sugar + cinnamon (aka. a bowl of oatmeal in cookie form!) --> Mmm.
• 1/4 cup Nutella + chopped hazelnuts --> Hazelnut-y heaven.
• 1/4 cup PB + chopped peanuts --> Peanut-y perfection.
• 1/4 cup PB + chocolate chips --> YUM.
• 1/4 cup PB + Nutella --> Who wouldn't love this combo?

Preheat your oven to 350F. Line your baking sheet with foil and generously grease the foil (I used spray cooking oil) since these babies like to stick! Trust me. 

Mash the bananas with a fork and add the oatmeal. Mix everything together with the fork. Once it's all mixed well, drop dollops of your cookie mix onto the oiled baking sheet. My dollops were a little over a Tablespoon in size. You don't need to leave much space between the cookies since they won't spread.

Pop them in the oven for 15 minutes or until the oats have turned a golden brown. 

Remove and let them cool a bit.

TADA! There you have it, another foolproof recipe :)

What are you favorite combos? Did you try something different?

Kitchen Story: Caramel Apple Speculoos Parfait

I'm back!! What a crazy past school year...got sick more than I ever do in a year probably due to the crazy stress and lack of sleep, but I survived & grew a lot through everything. If you want to know more, just ask & I'd gladly share my experience with you, it's just too much for me to write here. I'll kick off my return with another recipe...

It just so happens that when I'm studying 24/7 my brain's creative juices flow a lot more than normal...AKA. it loves to do anything besides cram insane amounts of information into it. So...lots of posts that I wanted to post but didn't have time to will be coming shortly!

This recipe came to my head on a rough day of studying and it was the perfect mood changer! Super simple & sweet! As always, you can add your own twists to it, but here's what I did!

Caramel Apple Speculoos Parfait

What you will need:

For the Baked Apples (I adapted this part from Salad in a Jar):
One medium apple (I used a Fuji apple, but anything works)
1 teaspoon sugar
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon cornstarch
1 tablespoon water
1 Freezer Ziploc bag (make sure it's not a sandwich bag, but a thick freezer bag)

For the Toasted Oats:
1/2 cup of old fashioned oats
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
Spray cooking oil
A dash of vanilla extract

A few scoops (or however much you want) Haagen-Dazs Spiced Caramel Biscuit Ice Cream**
Caramel syrup ice cream topping
Whipped cream

**If you can't find this ice cream at your store, you can grab vanilla ice cream, leave it out 5-10 minutes to let it soften a bit and swirl in a couple Tablespoons of Speculoos spread (from Trader Joes...or Biscoff spread from a local store). Then stick it back in the freezer to harden a bit.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. In a small bowl mix the oats with the cinnamon and vanilla extract. Line a baking sheet and spray with cooking oil. Spread the oats out in a single layer on the sheet and bake for 10 minutes (stir with a spatula every few minutes for even toasting) or until the oats turn golden brown. (A great trick I learned is to leave out a few oats on the counter so you can see the color difference.) Remove the oats.

Peel & dice the apple. In the Ziploc bag, add the apples with the sugar, cinnamon, cornstarch and water. Zip the bag and shake until the contents are well mixed. Open the bag a bit to allow air to vent and cook in the microwave 2 minutes and 15 seconds. Be VERY careful when removing the bag since it will be steamy!

In a single serve cup layer in the following order:

Ice cream
Caramel
Oats
Apples
X2 (or however many layers you want!)
Top with whipped cream

Now go enjoy your sweet creation!!

PS. Like what you see? If you aren't already, follow me via email by entering your email where it says "Follow My Blog By Email" in the left column! Thanks for visiting! xo

Kitchen Story: Three Ingredient Nutella Brownies

I found this amazeballs recipe on Pinterest for Three Ingredient Nutella Brownies and it is ta-die-for! Plus, I'm almost sure you have the 3 necessary ingredients in your house, or you can just ask a neighbor to borrow some :)

I hope you try these! They're as simple as my 15 Minute Banana Chocolate Chip Cookies, but take a smidge more time. But the ooey-gooey chocolate-y hazelnut-y goodness you end up with make the extra few minutes worth it! This is another foolproof recipe, and with Valentines Day coming up, you can make these as a sweet gift for the special someone in you life! ;-) These stack nicely so you can stack a few in a pretty cellophane bag and tie it up! Or you can make these pretty pastry boxes if you have a some more time!

Ingredients:

1 cup Nutella

2 eggs

10 Tbsp flour

(chopped hazelnuts, almonds, heart shaped sprinkles, chocolate chips, etc. to sprinkle on top)

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 deg F. Line a muffin/cupcake pan with cupcake liners (I suggest doubling the paper ones or using the foil ones for this recipe). 

Mix everything well in a medium mixing bowl. (I used a fork to mix). Using a small ice cream scooper or a regular spoon, fill each liner about 2/3 full. Sprinkle almonds or whatever you want on top.

Pop them in the oven for 20-24 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean when poked through the center.

Enjoy!

Kitchen Story: 15 Minute Banana Chocolate Chip Cookies

Time needs to go by A LOT slower. Reality is setting in too quickly and is getting too comfortable in my life. I can't take it! Can we rewind back to the good ol' M1 days?

Reality is also setting in my tummy...stress eating is striking hard and I just cannot stop. Studying is SO bad for your health. It should be outlawed. This is why children are obese these days, they're just studying too hard. Never mind, I should probably just drop that case since no one's buying...

Anyway, I was studying yesterday and craving something sweet. We also have a million bananas at home (If you follow me on Instagram, you have your proof) and they're getting ripe so I wanted to make use of them. While I could've made my Banana Bread, I didn't want to wait an hour for it to bake,  nor did I want more than 3 dishes to wash.

So I put my quick-thinking cap on, looked in our pantry and got an idea. I grabbed a box of cake mix and came up with this recipe for Banana Choc Chip Cookies! All it took was 15 minutes and left very few dishes to wash (1 bowl, 1 fork, 1 spoon)! These cookies were a delicious accompaniment to my studying. I hope you enjoy them too!

Ingredients (makes about 1 dozen cookies) 

1/2 box of Yellow Cake Mix
1 mashed banana
1 Tbsp oil
1 egg
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/4 cup semisweet chocolate chips
 Preheat your oven to 350 deg F. Set aside a prepared baking sheet (I used foil on a baking sheet).

Mix all the ingredients together in a medium mixing bowl until well incorporated. As usual, I used a fork to mix everything.

Drop tablespoon sizes of the mix on a prepared baking sheet about 2 inches apart (they will spread).

Bake for 11-14 minutes or until the tops spring back when lightly pressed with your fingertip.
Let cool for a few minutes and transfer them to a cookie rack to cool completely.

Go bananas with these cookies & ENJOY! :)

Kitchen Story: Egg Waffles

One of my favorite street snack foods in Hong Kong are Gai Dan Jai, otherwise known as Egg Waffles or Mini Egg Puffs. They are never too sweet, perfectly crunchy on the outside, but fluffy on the inside and so delicious. This past visit to Hong Kong my mom and I searched for an egg waffle pan and then looked for the perfect recipe and I think we succeeded! It takes some practice, but once you get a hang of it, you'll be making these often.

You can buy your own Egg Waffle Pan if you live in the US and won't be traveling anytime to Hong Kong anytime soon from Williams-Sonoma. It's more pricey, but according to the reviews, it works pretty well. Does anyone know of another place to buy the pan for less in the States?

Egg Waffles

Ingredients:

5 oz. flour (Use a scale to weigh)
1-1/4 (1.25) tsp. baking powder
1 Tbsp. custard powder 
1 oz. corn starch (Use a scale to weigh)
2 eggs
5 oz. sugar (Use a scale to weigh)
2 Tbsp. evaporated milk
5 oz. water
2 Tbsp. vegetable oil

In a metal bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder, custard powder and corn starch.

In a separate medium sized mixing bowl, beat the eggs and sugar with a whisk very well. Add the evaporated milk and mix well.

Add the dry ingredients and water to egg and sugar mixture in small batches and mix well. Once you have added all the dry ingredients and water and mixed well, add the oil. The mixture should be runny, but slightly thick.

Close your egg waffle pan and heat both sides of the pan over your stove on medium heat for 2 minutes on each side. Open the pan and lightly spray each side with oil spray. Fill one side of the pan with the mixture. The mixture should reach the top of the molds. Quickly close the pan tightly and flip the pan over. Cook on medium low heat for 2 minutes on each side. Once finished, remove the waffle. If it does not come out by itself use a toothpick to remove it.

Then, enjoy it! They usually sprinkle powdered sugar on it when I buy these from the street vendors, but I like spreading a bit of peanut butter on it instead. Mmm :)

Kitchen Story: Pumpkin Goodness Cake

Just finished another block of M2 year and as always, I've lost too much weight from the constant stress despite my really great eating habits aka. McDonalds, Thai takeout & frozen Costco chicken nuggets. So how do I gain it back? By baking scrumdiddlyumptious goodness, of course! Well, I'm not positive that it tastes quite as good as a Scrumdiddlyumptious Bar, but my stomach definitely thought it was great :) It has just enough pumpkin taste and it's not overly sweet which I prefer since it tastes "healthier" and I don't feel too guilty eating it :)

And the best part of this Pumpkin Cake is that it's easy peasy and uses only 6 ingredients that you don't need to measure out (Less dishes to wash! Hurray!). But be sure to leave at least 4 hours before you need to serve the cake to let it marinate to the "goodness" it will taste. Shall we get started?

Ingredients:

1 box yellow cake mix (any kind)
1 14.5 oz. can pumpkin PUREE (I used Libby's 100% Pure. Do NOT use pie filling)
1 Tbsp cinnamon
1 Tbsp nutmeg
1 14 oz. can sweetened condensed milk
1 8 oz. tub Cool Whip
1/2 bag of Heath Bar pieces
Caramel sundae sauce

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 350F. Prepare a 9X13 baking pan by spraying well with cooking spray or greasing it with butter. In a medium bowl mix the yellow cake mix, pumpkin puree, cinnamon and nutmeg until well incorporated. (Do NOT add the ingredients on the cake mix box!) I used a regular spoon to mix. The batter will be very thick! I got worried and read and reread the recipe to make sure I got it right. So don't worry, it's all good!

Then pour (or rather scoop) the batter into the prepared baking pan and spread it with your spoon. This may take extra effort because it's so thick, but just push the batter towards the edges and it will spread :) Pop it into the oven for the time suggested for a 9X13 pan on the back of the cake mix box.

Once it's done, let it cool for 5 minutes and then take out a handy dandy hole maker aka. a chopstick or anything of the sort to poke holes in your cake. It should look like this:

Then, pour the condensed milk over the entire cake and let the sweet goodness seep into the cake. Once the milk has seeped through the holes and the cake looks glazed, smother the cake with Cool Whip, top it off with crushed Heath pieces and as much caramel sauce as your heart desires. Place the cake in the fridge to let the goodness marinate at least 4 hours (or overnight for even better results). Then enjoy it! :)