Oh yet another dessert post. But come on, who doesn't love cookie dough? And here you have the perfect chance to enjoy your raw cookie dough without that pesky salmonella!
Cookie dough without eggs. And yes, it does work. It's really quick to put together and is all from stuff most people have in their pantry.
This tasty treat from Family Fresh Meals is super simple. It's suppose to be for two, but *ahem* you might not want to share. My only note is I found it a tad flour-y, but a touch more vanilla to moisten the mixture and a really good stir should do the trick.
You could use any type of chocolate chip you want. I used regular and white chocolate, but a peanut butter or butterscotch would be awesome too. Get creative!
WE MOVED!
Oh how I hate moving.
Really REALLY hate moving.
So we're finally settled into our new home and are slowly making it our own. It's difficult, especially because before we took possession we had never been inside our new home. A risk of moving across the country is buying a house sight unseen, and well...that was us. But we have lucked out and landed a lovely home. Sadly, this one as a much smaller kitchen and no desk space. As I type I'm using a small couch table as my desk and typing on my lap while sitting on a stool. This also means that all of our mail, cellphones, and other stuff end up in the already packed kitchen.
Luckily Pinterest is FULL of organization inspiration. I decided on going for a 'command centre' style area since it was the best option for what we needed and it was something I could throw together quickly. It seriously took me 2 days of crafting and shopping and it's done. And the whole thing cost about $100 total!
How to make a command centre?
Pick an area - We chose the hallway leading to the kitchen. It was preferable over the front door since we don't have much of an entry way and it's accessible by all three doors into the house.
Get an idea - figure out what you need. I needed a space for my son's homework, our mail and other papers, plus a calendar, and a spot for notes and random papers. Figure out your basics and go from there
Get crafty - I enjoyed this part! I got a large letter from Michaels and painted it. I was originally thinking chevrons, but I found stencils in my scrapbook box and used those instead. I also used the scrapbook paper I had stashed away too.
I dug into my online stash of printables and framed up some of my kid's art work to add a personal touch.
In addition to my mail slots, I have my calendar which I can fill in every month using dry erase markers, my weekly menu planner, our cleaning schedule, a magnet board, and buckets for the markers, phones and sunglasses, and hooks for backpacks and jackets.
Most of my inspiration for the heart of my command centre came from here at Girl Loves Glam. There are some great ideas and it's very simple.
The calendar is a 12x12 piece of scrapbook paper with a calendar drawn directly on it with sharpie. I then placed it in a cheap glass picture frame from Michaels. This allows me to change it each month and keep things up to date. The cleaning schedule and menu were also taken from Girl Loves Glam, but I modified them for our own needs. Again, both are on scrapbook paper. Note to self - don't put glitter paper through the printer.
Live and learn.
This is just an early draft. As we update our new home and paint, or as our needs change, I can change out the scrapbook sheets easily. It only took me a few hours to make up everything.
I hope this helps give you some ideas for your own command centre and help you realize it's not as hard as you may think!
Happy Crafting!
Update Below!
Ah, bananas. Always something I have around. But either we eat so many I can barely stay stocked or they sit around for a week until they're all brown and mushy. There is rarely an in-between. Last week I ended up with two lone ripe bananas. So not enough for banana bread. I could freeze them but since we're moving I'm trying to DECREASE my freezer stock, not increase it. So I looked through my pin boards and came across a recipe that just might work.
Flourless Chocolate Muffins.
A perfect excuse to procrastinate on a rainy Tuesday.
Now I'm going to be honest, I totally thought these were going to fail in some way. Nearly no dry ingredients involved, no flour, no sugar, no egg. I thought they were going to be a gooey mess post-baking.
Boy was I wrong!
These muffins are super simple to make and just require four ingredients. FOUR! And nothing nuts that you'd need to run to a health food store for. Yes the batter is sticky as the instructions state. I was unable to find too lazy to use muffin liners, so I was very generous with the cooking spray and the muffins popped out without a problem. And be prepared for a bit of a mess when scooping the batter from your blender/mixer. But it's still tasty raw!
This recipe made about 9 muffins using a regular muffin pan. Since they don't rise, you don't have to follow the usual rule of filling the muffin cups 2/3 full. You can go most of the way up and they won't bake over. And adding a few chocolate chips on top adds a nice touch.
The taste is great, a nice balance between banana, chocolate, and peanut butter. The texture is like a dense cake, very moist, but not overly heavy like a brownie.
As I said, I was pleasantly surprised by this recipe. These are perfect for a healthy chocolate fix, and I don't feel TOO horrible giving my son a chocolate muffin. And these muffins can be gluten free or even vegan with the right ingredients.
These are a definite win in my book and I'll be making them again.
Happy Baking!
UPDATE
So I made these a second time. I'm not sure exactly what happened, but I have a good idea, however they didn't turn out the same. This time I was SLIGHTLY under the amount of coco powder, and used REALLY ripe bananas when before they were sorta ripe. I may have also over-blended. They still taste fantastic, but after baking for nearly 30 minutes they still are very mushy and aren't holding together.
So learn from my experience! Be precise with your measurements, don't over mix, and use slightly ripe bananas. If I do this again with really ripe ones I would probably increase the coco powder to offset the moisture content.
Good luck!
