Anything Cookie Bars
2 sticks of butter
1 1/2 c. brown sugar
1/2 c. white sugar
2 eggs
1 t. vanilla
2 c. flour
3/4 t. baking soda
1/2 t. baking powder
1/2 t. salt
2 c. of add ins (chips, candies, raisins, etc.)
1 c. of nuts (optional)
Beat the butter and sugar until fluffy, for 3 or 4 minutes. Add in the eggs and vanilla and beat for 2 more minutes. Mix in the dry ingredients until just incorporated. Fold in the add ins. Bake in a greased 9 x 13 pan for 40 minutes. Let cool before cutting.

Meat Muffins

1 pound ground meat(beef,chicken,pork)
Spices(I used Mexican,but you can spice the meat how you like)
1 cup chopped onions
1 cup chopped mushrooms(optional)

Fry all that together till brown and yummy. I let it simmer for about 30 minutes. Then drain the fat out. Put in paper towels to squish the rest of the grease out. Let it cool down.

Make some pancake batter. I used Krusteaz’s buttermilk pancake mix(found it at Costco). You want whatever mix you make to be a bit runny so it pours. Take a muffin pan and fill the bottoms of each just so they are covered. Then spoon in the meat  and cover with the rest of the batter. Makes 12 muffins.

Put in preheated oven(375c) for about 20 minutes or until the tops are brown. Remove let cool and then….

NOM NOM NOM!!!!

It’s that easy!

When I lived down in South Carolina for a couple years I learned how to make Sweet Tea. This is something that can be found every where down in the South. If you ask for it here, people look at you like you have something growing on your face. I make this every summer.  I was surprised that Gregg knew what it was. He used to drink it all the time when he was living in Idaho. Only he calls it Sun Tea.

This is the recipe for Sweet Tea.

• 3 bags of Tea-can be any kind but I use Orange Pekoe
• 12 cups water
• 1-2 cups sugar-I use Splenda

Boil the water. Remove from heat. Add the tea bags. Let steep for 7 minutes. Remove tea bags. Put sugar in a big pitcher and pour the tea in. Add a tray of ice cubes. Let cool, then put in fridge. When you serve it, have lemon or limes wedges on the side. I like a bit of lime in mine. You could also have other fruits.

SunTea- is made by taking a big gallon jar filling it with water and adding the tea bags, then letting it sit in the hot sun for the day. It tastes really good. You just add the sugar to each glass as you you drink it. Gregg doesn’t like it sweet so I don’t add the sugar into the jar.

You can also make it in your coffee maker. Put the tea bags in the the strainer basket, not in the pot. Run the water through. Then add it to the pitcher with sugar. Let it cool. Pour some in a glass and add ice.

I had to use up some bananas today. I decided that I would make some low calorie muffins. Its a simple recipe. Anyone can make these and they taste pretty good.

Mix together the first 4 ingreidents.

1 3/4 cup flour
1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda

Then mix the rest, and blend it all together.

1/2 cup no calorie splenda
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1/2 cup apple sauce
1/2 cup low calorie vanilla yogurt (can try other flavors)
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup bananas

Pour into muffin pan or loaf pan, I used silicone muffin pans. This makes 12 muffins. Bake at 350 for about 12 minutes or until brown on top.

The calories for one muffin is 110 cals . 1 gram of fat. 22 grams of carbs. 1 gram of fiber. 6 grams of sugar.

You can add nuts or top with frosting. Or maybe add a few dark chocolate chips. There are so many things you can do with this simple recipe. Now we will see if Gregg like them

When we were in Mexico, we noticed a steak that was served almost at every restaurant. Its called “Arrachera” which means flank or skirt steak. Its actually a simple meal. I think its all about the spices and how long it marinates. Anyways, we really enjoyed it. So now I am going to make it for us. We drove into Vancouver on Saturday and stopped by a Mexican grocery store and found the spice we need.

The recipe is very easy, all you do is marinate the meat in the spices for 1 day. Then grill and serve.

Season both sides of meat with GOYA seasoning and lime juice. Cover entire meat with lime and season lightly.
Once the meat is limed up and seasoned you roll it up, like a sushi roll, nice and tight and place all of the meat all rolled up in rolls in a deep dish and pour beer on top making sure it gets all over. If you marinate your meat with beer and you don’t roll it up, you wash off all of your seasonings.
Cover the meat with plastic wrap and leave it in the fridge over night, but 2-3 hours works just as well.
Then just grill each side for like 5-6 min less if you like it medium. The meat will be tender, juicy and full of flavor. Enjoy

I’m really curious if this will taste the same. I hope so! I have been wanting it for a while now. Here is a picture of what we had in Mexico at H&C restaurant/butcher. You get the steak, a baked potato, half an avocado and lime and a hot green pepper. Gregg and Glen both gave me their avocados.

And with steak you must have a tasty beer to wash it all down.

The only problem with this, is that I can’t get Leon Beer here. It doesn’t get exported out of the Yucatan. So Gregg will have to have something else. A cold glass of diet coke with a twist of lime on ice sounds good.

So far Gregg has enjoyed them…a lot. Me too…hehehe If you want to see the rest of the cookies just follow the link to our Flickr site. Or you can go to my new Photo page.

So I went on a internet search for some new recipes to try. I was hoping to use Gregg’s Mom’s recipes but I still havent found them. I did find 8 recipes just not the ones I wanted. So I found some online and tried them out. I have been reading a certain blog for a while now and really enjoy all the recipes they have. A lot of the food reminds me of the food I grew up on. If you know anything about German Mennonite cooking you will love this blog.

Here I found the recipes for snow drops. I made these but changed a few things plus renamed mine to Reindeer Poop.. lol. Instead of Crispex (I couldnt find any) I bought a box of Rice Krispies and a box of Corn Squares. Mixed and crushed them together. Then melted the chocolate chips and peanut butter. Poured that over the cereal and stirred. I didn’t have a paper bag so I used a large zip lock bag. I added the mixture to the bag of icing (which, by the way was made out of splenda and cornstarch) And shock the bag till it was all coated. Then scooped it our with a large strainer to get some of the sugar off.

Once it was all coated I put it in a pan and then into the freezer. An hour later it was hard and easy to package into containers.

This stuff is so yummy! So I made a second batch For Gregg’s dad. He is Diabetic so it was made with 8 unsweetened baker’s chocolate squares and a cup on Splenda. I actually forgot the peanut butter and poured the chocolate on the cereal mix and then covered it the same way with the Splenda and cornstarch icing sugar. It tastes good too!