As you’ve probably learned by now, I really enjoy baking. It’s a huge stress relief for me. I took off the week of Christmas, not really sure what I was going to do. And then on Black Friday, we decided to buy a new oven. The one we had was as old as the house (20 years, for the record). It was scheduled to arrive a few weeks later, which meant I needed to try it out of course. That’s when I got the idea to make 12 different types of Christmas cookies, inspired by the fact that I wasn’t participating in a cookie exchange this year. I didn’t just make them for us, I made enough for over 20 people! It took my four full days to make them all, which a few hiccups along the way. In the end, everything was successful and received rave reviews.
12. Eggnog biscotti: I love biscotti, and apparently so did everyone else. This treat seemed to be very popular. I thought I got a picture with the plate full, but apparently not so you’ll have to refer to the first picture.
The travel to Canyonlands was absolutely beautiful. We drove through Capitol Reef and gorgeous mountains, as we made out way to Canyonlands.
About 25 miles off the main road, we found Canyonlands, or at least one part of it- Island in the Sky. This is the most popular part because it’s easily accessed from Moab.
Our first stop was at Mesa Arch, which really set the tone for what was to come. Mesa Arch isn’t a difficult hike; it’s relatively flat, 1/2 mile hike from the parking lot. You must visit the arch while visiting Canyonlands. This iconic view gives a gorgeous view of the park. We have the above picture framed in our living room.
Unfortunately, I ended up with really bad blisters from the previous hike so I wore my teva sandals for the first two hikes of this park. I seriously can’t recommend these sandals enough. They are so comfy and easy to hike in. I wear them all the time now!
Next we went to Upheaval Dome, which they believe was formed by a crater. This trail was relatively easy in my sandals, even though it had a little bit more incline/decline closer to the dome.
If you haven’t figured it out already, Canyonlands is super unique and like nothing I’ve ever seen before. This park ranks easily at the top of our favorites- so many gorgeous things to see.
After driving on a backroad for hours, we finally made it to Bryce Canyon City (city is a loosely defined term). We didn’t even see the “city” until we were just under 5 minutes away. There weren’t a lot of dinner options, but we settled on Bryce Canyon Pines, enticed by their homemade soups and pies. I have my favorite foods, but I do like to try and be adventurous. And for this meal I was. I settled on an elk burger; the meat was sourced from Ephraim, Utah (just 2 1/2 hours away). I wasn’t sure what to expect, but I found this burger to be delicious! It was leaner than ground beef, which I liked and had tons of flavor. I thought it would be game-y, but it wasn’t. It was served with beer-battered fries. It was so filling so we didn’t have any room for dessert, but knew we would have to come back for some.
We made a stop at Ruby’s Inn General Store (literally the only store around). We had not appropriately packed for the weather. When we looked, the weather was supposed to be in the 50s; when we were there, it got down into the teens. I didn’t even pack a long-sleeve shirt! I got a hoodie which I was grateful for because I was able to protect my face from the wind. It was literally below freezing when we started our hike the following morning. We missed the sunrise, but started at sunrise point.
We headed to Queen’s Garden Trail, which was right next to the point. We hiked down some switched backs, got onto Navajo loop trail, which led us to Peek-a-Boo loop.
It was 3-mile difficult trail, with lots of up and down, but gorgeous hike. We saw several groups riding horseback.
The hoodoos (the tall, thin rocks that stand up from the larger rock base) were unique. We immediately fell in love with this park; it was close (if not) our new favorite). The views, canyon, colors- everything! It was breathtakingly beautiful.
The loop led us back to Navajo loop, which took us to sunset point (see our selfie’s).
After our hike, we explored some more of the park, including Bryce Point. We drove further into the park, stopping at various overlooks before heading back to the hotel.
We headed back to Bryce Canyon Pines for dinner. I got a salad with homemade ranch dressing and mozzarella sticks. You could tell they were frozen, but nevertheless I enjoyed them. Jason got Chicken Fried Steak- not my cup of tea, but it looked really good. We chose the homemade apple pie a la mode to share for dessert. It was definitely worth coming back for.
We stopped back at the general store to get some souvenirs before heading back into the park to watch the sunset at sunset point. Sadly the sun had already gone behind the trees when we arrived, even though the sun wouldn’t fully set for another 45 minutes. As you can see, we still saw some gorgeous views on the canyon.
The next morning we woke up early to watch the sunrise. It was definitely worth standing in the cold to watch the sun rise over the canyon. It was stunning. Absolutely stunning.
In case you missed my post on Bryce Canyon, I had to share this sunrise again.
If you’ve every at Bryce Canyon, go watch the sun rise.
We drove into Capitol Reef around 9:30 AM. It was really cool to see the formations of the park as you drove in. The picture doesn’t do the colors justice.
We packed our backpacks with snacks and started our hike on the Grant Wash Trail. This trail takes you though a canyon. It was neat to see how the water formed this area.
We hiked about two miles before headed up to Cassidy Arch. This was a fun trail, but we got off a couple times because we weren’t sure where the trail markers were. We finally figured it out, thankfully. We had the map downloaded on All Trails to help get us back on track, which is also how we knew we had gotten off track.
We saw a lot of canyons on this trip!
You can see Cassidy Arch off in the distance. A lot of hikers take the day to repel down from it.
We finally made it to the arch, where you can look down into it and view the grand wash trail from above. While eating lunch (aka- snacks), we soaked in the views around us and even made some new friends (aka- two chipmunks). They desperately wanted our food. We named them Kam & Khloe after our cats because they also try to eat our food!
We hiked back down and headed to the car, realizing we hadn’t put on any sunscreen. It was in the high 50s, low 60s so it hadn’t even crossed out minds. We later regretted not putting any on.
Before checking in at the hotel, we stopped to see the petroglpyhs. These were cool to see and learn the history behind them.
We also stopped at panorama point, which gave a great view of the park.
After checking into the hotel, we showered and took a breather before heading out to find a souvenir shop and get dinner.
We ate at the Rim Rock restaurant. This was our dinner view. Yes, that’s the park off to the left.
They had so many great looking options on their menu. I chose the honey and garlic chicken with mashed potatoes and salad. The salad came with a homemade blackberry vinaigrette, which was excellent. The chicken was the best chicken I’ve ever had; it’s a must try. Jason opted for a salad with chicken, which looked amazing! We were so full, otherwise we would have tried their homemade ice-cream sandwich.
We headed back to the park (panorama point) to catch the sun-setting. The views didn’t disappoint.
The next morning, we drove through the park on our way to Moab.
This is one of my favorite posts to write each year. I love looking back on all the things I made and the progress I’ve made as a cook/baker. As always, I make a lot more than 50 new recipes each year, especially this year. So here are just a few. Hope you enjoy!
Supreme Pizza Chicken: I was pleasantly surprised by this dish. It’s not a “go-to”, but certainly worth making again.
8. Homemade Pasta: I watched a lot of cooking shows this year and they always made homemade pasta so I decided I needed to give it a go. It wasn’t super easy, but not super hard either. I had fun doing it, but buying ready-to-boil pasta is much easier!
9. Chick-fil-a Copycat Grilled Chicken Sandwich: Do you love their grilled chicken sandwich as much as I do? Then this recipe is for you! It was simple and tasted very similar!
10. Chuy’s Jalepeno Dip: I love this dip from Chuy’s so when I found the recipe to make I home I knew I had to try it. I’m glad I did, because it was very good!
11. Zucchini & Pumpkin Bread: This was before the quarantine. Love zucchini and pumpkin so this was a great mesh of the two.
12. One Pot Chili Mac-n-Cheese: I tried lots of new chili recipes this year. This one did not disappoint!
13. Roasted Butternut Squash Bisque: I love butternut squash, but have never tried it in soup form. I thought this was good, although the texture was a bit off for me.
15. Spicy Shrimp Pasta: This was supposed to use orzo instead of other pasta noodles, but a pandemic happened and everyone bought all the pasta they could. In the end, this was a good dish that we would eat again.
14. Fish Tacos: I’ve made fish tacos before, but this was a new recipe with different toppings.
17. Pasta Primavera: One of my favorite pasta dishes. I don’t know why I waited so long to make it!
18. Taco Truck Lettuce Cups: Fun & catchy name. This recipe came from a magazine. It including mixing ground pork with chorizo and pickling vegetables. We were skeptical, but it was very tasty!
19. Bangin’ Mac n Cheese: Nothing like adding a bit of spice to your mac & cheese. We both loved this dish and will definitely make again.
22. Balsamic Glazed Pork Chops: Pork chops tend to be very plain on their own, but this glaze was rather tasty!
23. Slow Cooker Lamb Chili: I love lamb and I love chili. This dish was excellent and I can’t wait to make it again!
24. Roasted Red Pepper Deviled Eggs: I do not like deviled eggs, but I found this recipe that I made for Thanksgiving because you could make the eggs look like pumpkins. Well, I tried one and fell in love. These are so yummy, I ended up making them for lunch one week.
25. Homemade Chicken Noodle Soup: Trying new soup recipes is another fall tradition I enjoy. I have some carrots and celery I wanted to use up so I made homemade chicken noodle soup. It was very good!
26. Chicken Patties with salsa: This recipe came from a Cooking Light cookbook. You mixed ground chicken with zucchini, which sounds weird but was good. However, the homemade salsa made the dish go from okay to very good!
27. Chicken Pot Pie: I’ve made chicken pot pie before, but not with this recipe. I have to say, this recipe was so much easier and just as delicious.
28. Homemade Potato Soup: Again, I’ve made potato soup before, but this was a new version. I put everything in the crockpot and then blended most of the soup once it was done cooking in my ninja blender. I topped with cheddar cheese and bacon bits. It almost had a mashed potato consistency, which I really enjoyed!
29. Salmon Cakes: I love salmon cakes, but hadn’t made this particular version. They were one of the better ones I’ve tried.
30. French Onion Pork Chops: If you try one recipe from this list, it has to be this one. It was amazing.
32. Chicken and mushroom crepes: This dish was so yummy, like something you would get at a restaurant. I used the leftover crepes for breakfast!
35. Spicy Shrimp and mushroom pasta with spinach: This recipe came from Instagram. I made shrimp and pasta as normal. Cooked some mushrooms and onions with spinach, mixed together with some spices, adding the shrimp and pasta, and done!
37. Air Fried Onion Rings & Black Bean Burger: I’m not sure I’ve perfected the art of onion rings (though still good), but this black beam burger recipe is fantastic and has become a favorite.
38. Bao Buns: This just sounded fun to make. I added in veggies that we liked. Of course, my pan wasn’t quite right, but they still tasted great.
39. Meatless Casserole: Jason loves rice and beans, as do I. I found this recipe and thought it would be good to try. This dish lasted several days, which is always a plus!
41. Shrimp Burgers: I was a littler nervous how these would turn out, but I was happy. They weren’t dry like I expected.
42. Cod Au Gratin: I’m honestly not sure where I got this recipe? I ‘m thinking mom sent it to me. But as I’m looking back, I really need to find it because this dish was really tasty and I would love to make it again.
44. Crockpot White Chicken Chili: I told you I love chili. I have never made chicken chili before. This was a good one to start with.
45. Sweet & Sour Cauliflower: Sometimes you just don’t want to eat mean. This cauliflower version of sweet and sour chicken hit the spot!
46. Slow Cooker Chicken and Dumplings: I loved the fact that I could cook the dumplings with the chicken in my foodi. And it turned out to be very tasty.
48. Mexican Cheese Dip: I love Mexican cheese dip so I thought I would make it to go with some nachos. Unfortunately, the consistency wasn’t quite right, but it tasted good!
49. Big Mac Bites: I love a Big Mac, but of course, it’s loaded in calories. I opted to make this healthier version at home. The sauce was perfection and could be served with other items.
50. Mediterranean Quesadilla: Jason loves Mediterranean food, so I thought this would be a fun spin.
2020, oh where do we begin? We all thought what a great year this would be. I mean, it’s 2020, it seemed like this was going to be everyone’s “year”. Maybe we needed a wakeup call? I don’t know…but 2020 knocked us all off our feet, some more so than others. I’m a people person so not being around people was not good for me. I did as much as I could while staying safe. But I won’t go into the spiel of what 2020 taught.
At the end of last year I set 20 goals for myself (I normally set 10). I thought I was doing pretty good for the first few weeks of 2020. COVID-19 slowed me wayyyyy down, but I still managed to hit most of my goals (some I went above and beyond) so it wasn’t all bad, right?
Here’s a review of my goals and how they were or weren’t accomplished.
Road Trip! Knock off at least 10 National Parks. We had a trip planned to visit some big names like Yellowstone, The Grand Tetons, Glacier (were were going to hit 10 in total). When COVID hit, that changed our plans. We “settled” for 8 National Parks instead. Though it was still a road trip.✅ We finished off the Utah Mighty Five and 3 out of the 4 in Colorado. Hop over here to read about them.
Write 10 blog posts. ✅13 in total (this one counts for 2021).
Practice more self-care. This one was easy. COVID forced me to tackle this one head on so I didn’t lose my sanity. Between coloring, reading, bubble baths, pedicures, naps, and more, I stayed sane…most days.✅
Try 50 new recipes. Y’all know I love to cook! My 2020 recipes blog will be coming soon. Definitely well over 50 new recipes were made. ✅I tried 50 new baking recipes alone. Read about 20 bakes I did during the first few months of quarantine here. Read about my 50 new recipes in 2020 here.
Replace carpet downstairs. I’ve said this for the past few years now and we keep putting it off. Well, turns out, this was the year! (see finished product below)✅
This past year I wanted to improve my baking skills. This is a continuing goal for me. I really wanted to work on my decorating skills. I’m excited to share with you the Christmas Cookie challenge I took on.✅
Pay off about 1/3 of my student loan. Thanks to my dad for this one. With his generosity/help, these will be paid off early 2021. ✅
Keep running. I was really exciting to get back into running after giving my foot sometime to heal. Unfortunately, I lost my motivation and still have some trouble with pain in my foot (running or not). I only made it a few miles in total, but sometimes to have to listen to your body.❌
Keep doing Strength/Flexibility training. Even though I didn’t run as planned, I was able to add this back into my lifestyle. I was even able to find some weights so I don’t have to go to the gym.✅
Track monthly. I bought this awesome Happy Planner in September of 2019. I started off really well with keeping track of things like my water into, workouts, etc., but I fell off my wagon in June and never got back on. ❌
Another nice thing about this planner is that I can also list daily goals. I am terrible about making to-do list and following them. Turns out I’m still bad at this. I’m open to suggestions if anyone has tips!❌
Waste less food. I feel like I did much better with this. I made things that lasted multiple nights or Jason could eat for lunch, which helped a lot. I also did inventory each month to figure out what needed to be used.✅
Give back to the community. I’m not really sure I accomplished this one. I was super busy with work the first two months of the year and then I didn’t do anything once COVID hit. ❌
Meet my move goal 200 times. I succeeded by hitting this goal over 250 times. I was a bit nervous once COVID hit since I wasn’t as active on a day-to-day basis. ✅
Eat a balanced lunch. I was pretty good about this for the most part. Of course, being at home helped greatly!✅
Continue saving for our emergency fund. We hit this goal pretty early on and have been able to save for other things.✅
Read at least one book. I read 17 (woot woot!) ✅and am on track to finish one in the next week or so.
Improve my French. I have an official streak of over 350 days. I actually didn’t miss a day this year (but somehow the app got mixed up and think I did). This is has been a fun challenge!✅
Decrease food costs. We didn’t eat out a lot before, but we really didn’t eat out when COVID first hit so that helped our food cost go down in addition to eating the same dish multiple times or using low-cost ingredient (Aldi for the win!).✅
Be mindful of my time. I started off really successful of limiting my time on social media. I got off track when COVID first hit and the month before the election as I was keeping up with the politics of it all. However, I have it set to notify me when I spend over 30 minutes a day on FB or IG.✅
Some books read! My mom got me hooked at these series by Harry Truman’s daughter so I’ve been trying to finish her series. Just a handful more to go.
Self- Care: Coloring (and other things too, not pictures)
Friend time and trying new things! Axe throwing was so much fun. Hitting our garage was not. 😦
My bestie got engaged (and married)! And our bestie got married!
Learning French! My goal is small, but a little bit every day helps.
A few highlights from our road trip!
My bestie (who lives in TN) came to visit (twice)! Plus I spent time with friends that I don’t get to see enough. We celebrated upcoming marriages. My (faux) niece turned 10.
Sold the mustang. Bought a Tesla.
New floors😍
Worked on my baking (and cooking) skills.
Was 2020 what we wanted? No. Was 2020 hard? 100%. Was 2020 a good year? Yes, it really was. I think we all learned a lot of lessons this year. I know I did.
What does 2021 have in store? I have no idea. We all seem to think 2021 is magical and all that was 2020 will be gone. However, I promise you COVID will still be around. Bad things will still happen. But so will good things. In 2021, I’m choosing to stay positive and find happiness.
So here goes nothing, my 2021 goals.
Try 50 new recipes.
Visit new places. Hopefully we’ll have the opportunity to knock off some more parks, but new states and local places are cool too.
Pay off my student loan.
Write 10 blog posts.
Continue practicing my French. Now that I’m getting really comfortable to reading French, I want to improve my written and spoken French as well as listening to French.
Stay moving. I hit my move goal over 250 times last year and I think I can do that again this year. So that will be my goal. In addition, I need a consistent workout schedule. I still haven’t managed that.
Practice self-care and find happiness in the little every-day joys.
Read 20 books. I came pretty close this year and I have some books on stand by to read. Reading is very relaxing to me so it won’t hurt me to read more.
I’ve sort of already accomplished this goal. In 2020 I learned about Google Sites through work. I decided to create one for my blog, but I haven’t publicly shared it with friends and family. This will help things be more organized and easier to find. You can view it here.
I have one more really special goal, but it’s not something I can really control so I’m not even sure I should include it. However, there are things I can do to help. I’m not going to share it here just yet. I promise I’ll share more about this when the time is right. 🙂
It’s the beginning of day 4 now. We slept until 7 AM and got breakfast at the hotel. We’re morning people if you haven’t figured that out. Sleeping until 7 was “late”. All checked out, we headed to Black Canyon of the Gunnison. I got overly excited when I saw deer. Now I know you’re thinking deer…really? Well, these deer didn’t look like any deer I had seen before; these were Mule Deer. At first I thought they were sheep until I got a closer look.
We stopped at some overlooks on our drive to the visitors center. The timing was perfect as the sun started to peek out for the day. Though the smoke from the fires caused the canyon to look hazy.
We got some great shots of the canyon, especially with the sun showing overtop. Lots of great views.
We hiked a short 2 miles on Oak Flat Loop. This is one of the few trails you can hike due to the nature of the canyon. However, it’s a great hike to do so you can see the canyon.
We drove around the south rim and saw some neat views before driving to the bottom of the canyon.
Before stopping back in town for lunch, we stopped at the gift shop found on the corner where the main road and the road to the park meet. This little shop has traditional souvenirs, but also has lots of homemade items including jewelry, knives, and more.
We stopped local bakery for lunch called the Daily Bread Bakery. We had seen this place the night before when we got dinner, as it’s just a few doors down from the brewery. For lunch we both got the turkey and rice soup which was fantastic, plus sandwiches. We finished off our meal with a warmed cinnamon raisin bun that was absolutely perfect (and huge)!
With lunch finished, we started off on our six hour drive to Bryce!
The pandemic has affected everyone in some way or another. For many people, including us, their vacation plans were changed or cancelled. What was originally supposed to be a 17 day road trip, covering 10 National Parks including some big names such as the Tetons, Yellowstone, Glacier, and Badlands was cancelled. It was planned for late June but many of the National Parks were not open and we had already changed our dates once due to a rescheduled wedding I was in. We decided it was best to wait. We started making other plans for September in hopes that they would be open by then. And thankfully they were! We thought about doing our original trip, but with the unknown of the pandemic, that wasn’t going to happen. We loved Utah when we visited in 2017 and Jason really wanted to visit Colorado so we thought a road trip to the four NPs in Colorado plus a visit to the two in Moab, Utah would make for a great vacation. All was planned and then the west coast caught fire, including Colorado and Utah. Our Utah parks weren’t going to be affected but Rocky Mountains would be so we had to change our plans yet again. We’re on plan D now if you’re keeping track. We took Rocky Mountains off our list and added Bryce & Capitol Reef to the agenda, which we were not mad about.
Here was our final plan:
Day 1: Drop Hank off, drive to Frankfort KY
Day 2: Gateway Arch, drive to Salina, KS
Day 3: drive to Montrose, CO
Day 4: Black Canyon of the Gunnison, drive to Bryce Canyon City
Day 5: Bryce Canyon
Day 6: Bryce Canyon, drive to Capitol Reef (Torrey, Utah)
Day 7: drive to Moab, Utah; Canyonlands
Day 8: Arches
Day 9: Arches, Dead Horse Point State Park
Day 10: Mesa Verde, The Great Sand Dunes
Day 11: Drive as far as possible (which ended up being about an hour into Indiana)
Day 12: Pick up Hank, drive home
And so our long-awaited vacation finally began. We dropped Hank (our dog) off with Jason’s mom since she’s working from home and could watch him full-time. He has separation anxiety so we avoid boarding him at all costs. We made it to Frankfort in decent time. We probably could have made it a big further, but that’s okay. We found a local Mexican restaurant for dinner who’s social distancing practices were a bit sketchy. We headed straight for bed so we could get up early and head to Gateway Arch, which was over a 4 hour drive. We got to St. Louis shortly before 11 AM. We found a nearby parking deck, ordered our free entry tickets for the arch online, and then walked around the park outside of the arch before heading inside at our entry time.
When our time came, we went inside and explored the museum. There were several areas broken down by timeframe that explored the history of the arch and St. Louis. Unfortunately we were not able to take the tram to the top, which I would still love to do one day.
Since it was lunchtime, we found a café inside the arch. It served 10-inch pretzels- their example size was very misleading.
After barely eating a 1/2 of our pretzels, we hopped back in the car and made it to our stop in Kansas for the night.
We both had been craving ice-cream and had seen signs for Freddy’s- Frozen Custard & Steakburgers. Our burgers and fries were delicious. Of course, we had to split a Peanut Butter & Banana custard afterwards. It was so good!
Once again, we were extremely tired so we went straight to bed for another long day ahead. Up bright and early, we drove 10 plus hours to our stop in Montrose, CO. On the bright side, we got a beautiful view of a Kansas sunrise.
We were both starving when we arrived in Montrose so we found a local brewery called Colorado Boy. I ordered an American Wheat beer with a Margherita pizza (my favorite) and Jason had a Pale Ale with classic pepperoni. The food and beer were great. I highly recommend you try this place out if you’re in the area.
You’d be surprised how exhausting driving can be. We headed straight to bed again so we could get up early an explore Black Canyon before heading to Bryce
Like many people, I baked a lot of yummy treats (many of them new) during the quarantine. It started with a dessert on the weekend, but quickly escalated into a stress reliever. I had planned to share some new recipes I baked in my “50 new recipes” post, but I was baking so much, I figured it deserved it own post. So…what did I bake during the quarantine? Everything from cookies, cupcakes, breads, biscotti, puddings, and more. And sadly, not everything is pictured.
1. Orange Breakfast Buns: This was one of the first things I made in quarantine. These turned out so well and were really yummy! As you can see, we ate 3 buns before I took a picture in daylight.
2. . Beignets: A local bakery had posted that beignets were their special for the month. Obviously I have to try to make them for myself. Though they were good, I can improve my frying techniques!
3. Mint Chocolate Chip Ice-Cream: If you know me, you know that mint chocolate chip is my favorite ice-cream. I get it pretty much anywhere I go that involved ice-cream. But ice-cream is not exactly cheap and it’s not healthy for you. I decided to make some at home during the quarantine.
4. Brownies: Around the same time, Jason requested brownies. I made a version of these brownies and paired it with the ice-cream for one of my favorite dessert combinations.
5. Cranberry Almond Scones: I love cranberries. I found some frozen cranberries left in my freezer and decided to use them up in these yummy scones.
6. Amaretto Pound Cake: This cake was the perfect texture! Love the kick of Amaretto!
7. Sweet Crepes: Made these savory mushroom and chicken crepes. The batter made a lot of crepes, so we ate the extras for dessert. I attempted to make some whipped cream with half and half, but as you can see, it didn’t hold. lol
8. Oatmeal cookies: My mom told me she made oatmeal cookies and then Jason requested them so I gave them a shot. I’ve never made just oatmeal cookies before but they were delicious in milk.
9. Orange Biscotti: I’ve been dying to make biscotti on my own, so this was the perfect time to try it out. It was delicious! It got eaten very quickly.
11. Pecan & Raisin Cookies: These were made as part of a work project. I love raisins in baking so I really enjoyed these. Unfortunately, I deleted the picture of the final product so you will have to watch the video.
12. Apple Crisp: I love apple crisp and have made this many times, but it’s so good I had to share!
13. Lemon Ginger Scones:I loved this flavor combination! I’ve never used it in baking before, but I can’t wait to try it again.
14. Banana Pudding: We love banana pudding. I always request my mom to make it for family occasions like reunions or church events. However, I can’t seem to make it like she does…mine doesn’t ever set fully. Maybe I’ll perfect this dish one day, but this was not that day. I didn’t take a picture because it didn’t look good, though it tasted fine. The recipe is my mom’s; it’s no bake and better than the recipe on the box of wafers.
15. Cupcakes: This was the first thing I made over quarantine, followed by the previously mentioned orange rolls. I had bought box mix for our bible study dessert party, but it wasn’t going to happen. So instead I made them, practiced using my new Russian tips, and gave them to some of my embryology teachers. I went to check their eggs for viability. One teacher joked that I brought them funeral food for the eggs that didn’t survive!
16. Berry Poptart: I had this phyllo dough leftover from a dinner dish so I found this recipe to use it up!
17. Banana Bread Waffles:I highly recommend making these. I’ve had this recipe pinned for a while and finally got around to making them.
18. Peanut Butter, Oatmeal, & Chocolate Chip Cookies: I’ve been making these for several years. They’re one of my favorite cookies. I forgot to take a picture this time, but they’re amazing- I promise!
19. Beet Brownies: Okay, I know this sounds weird. Jason was not thrilled about these until he tried them… the beet flavor did not overwhelm. They were very good!
20. Apple Tarte Tatin: I captioned this “Just call me Julia Child”. After trying this dessert for the first time in Paris, I knew I wanted to make my own sometime. What better time than in the middle of a quarantine? This dessert takes patience and time, but it was so well worth it in the end. I was surprised at how well it turned out. It was served with homemade vanilla ice cream. Now I want to experiment with other fruits!
Learning Love with Food 