A few weeks ago, Chris and I splurged and bought ourselves a one-touch espresso machine. We’ve had our Starbucks Barista machine for over 10 years and thought it was time to retire it. It was a great machine but it was manual and cumbersome. Technology has come a long way. Now you can make a great espresso drink with a touch of a button! What used to be a 20-minute process to make a latte now only takes a couple minutes!
I think I have found a new love. And that’s these blondies. They may look ordinary but they taste extraordinary! You’ll know what I’m talking about once you sink your teeth into these. And you can’t just stop at one.
I came across Laurie’s recipe for a Banana Snack Cake over at A Taste of Morning. I knew I wanted to make this cake the second I had overly brown bananas. I’m always looking for new ways to bake with bananas and I have to say, I think this maybe a new favorite!
I hope everyone is having a lovely long weekend! We spent it barbecuing with family, some cooking/baking and fighting off the ants and spiders! Ugh… one of the things I hate about home ownership is battling pests! Flies, spiders, ants, racoons, skunks —you name it! I’m relieved that I’m having my home fumigated on Tuesday. Hopefully most of them will be gone by then. Chris and I used to live in a condo so we didn’t encounter pest problems but we did have some noisy neighbors. Either way, they’re both pests. At least with these pest, they’re not loud and obnoxious, just creepy.
I brought home a box of raspberries from the store the other day. They were the prettiest out of the bunch. Big, plump and organic. I washed them when I got home and when I fed it to Chris, he said… “it’s kind of sour” then he made a face. More of a reason why we don’t eat fruit around here. Sigh… I hate it when that happens. How the heck do you pick out a good box of raspberries? So when that happens, I usually bake with them. It’s the only way I know to salvage them without throwing it out, or make a liqueur out of them.
Happy Friday everyone! I hope everyone had a lovely week. E and M will be visiting next weekend. I’m super excited, as I’ll get to see my two cute little nieces. Which means this weekend, I’ll have to start cleaning. Yuck! It’ll be the first time they’ll be seeing our new place since Chris and I bought it last fall. I gave a quick tour via FaceTime but that doesn’t really count. I’m dreading having to scrub and clean, but at least I’ll have these yummy blondie bites to look forward to after my cleaning.
Baking, for the most part, takes up a good few hours of my day. I don’t mind it but on the days when I do bake, dinner sometimes can get neglected. We either eat leftovers or something super quick.
Well, today’s recipe will have you in and out of the kitchen in less than an hour! And yes, this includes clean-up. Yay! I just love those kinds of recipes, don’t you? And you’ll still have plenty of time to make dinner.
I finally finished up the last couple of black bananas —yay! They were really ripe but that’s OK. The recipe calls for ripe bananas! This cake has all my favorite ingredients —bananas, cinnamon, ricotta, and chocolate chips. I added the pecans in here to give it texture but you can totally leave it out if you are not a nut person.
Had it for dessert after dinner and it was the perfect ending to the meal. Of course, you can have it before dinner or for dinner if you choose to. I won’t judge. 🙂
I’ve been missing our breakfast muffins lately so I decided to bake a batch of these. I had a sack of blood oranges I need to use up so expect to see a few more recipes with blood oranges in it. Aren’t they pretty? I just LOVE the color!
These muffins turned out really well. I love the texture and the flavor. Orange and chocolate pair so well together. And when you have some tea or coffee with this, it’s fabulous! Chris and I couldn’t wait ’til morning. We each had one before dinner with our tea. It made our bellies happy. Who says you can’t have dessert before dinner? 🙂
My local market had some really beautiful, ripe and juicy Meyer lemons so I purchased a few without having anything in mind that I wanted to use it for. I think it was more of an impulse buy. It was just too pretty! I baked a batch of these muffins; I figured chocolate goes with everything right? I’m more used to muffins with a crumbly texture, as I think that’s how you differentiate between muffins and cupcakes. Cupcakes have a more cake-like texture. These muffins were not as crumbly but airy, which was a pleasant surprise. You can taste the chocolate and the lemon is just in the background. I baked them in a mini muffin pan and they turned out so darn cute! I normally prefer baked goods with coffee but these would be wonderful with tea. Enjoy!
uni homemaker 