The Pantry Dish

These delicious cookies have been a hit in my home. Normally I would make one batch but a few weekends ago my brother and sister came over to spend the weekend with us while my mom celebrated her birthday in Vegas, so we made an extra batch. At the end of the weekend they took a little over a dozen back home with them. This was the first time my mom actually tried them and she loved them. To you this may mean nothing but let me tell you a little secret about my mom. She doesn't like anything sweet! Not even chocolate!! What's my point in bringing up my mother's opposition to desserts? Well, she loved these cookies! Not so much the chocolate part, but she was pretty impressed and delightfully satisfied when she had one of these oatmeal cookies with her coffee. Yay! 1 point for team Stephanie! Next time I'll have to make some without chocolate for her :)

Dinner Rolls

05/07/2010

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Another successful recipe provided by my Tia Sandra: Dinner Rolls.

The first time I tried these dinner rolls was about a year ago. My Tia Sandra lives in Nevada so we don't have the pleasure of having these delicious dinner rolls whenever she makes them (which is quite often). When I did get to taste these dinner rolls for the first time however, I was at another one of my Tia's house who had just come back from visiting Tia Sandra and she offered me one. After the first bite I practically inhaled the whole roll in a matter of seconds. I finally got the courage to try and make them. How'd they turn out? Well......after the fourth attempt to duplicate the wonderful fluffiness and taste of these delicious rolls, we finished about 1/2 the batch in one day :)

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One of my favorite websites

04/13/2010

About a month ago I ran across a website called What's Cooking Blog, created by Michelle Stern, and have been hooked since. In it you'll find all sorts of useful information such as recipes, ideas for kids' lunches, useful products, and blog posts that anyone who hangs out with kids will enjoy. Recently she started a segment called What's Cooking With Your Kids which features posts from other readers who are also passionate about cooking with kids. This week I have been given the honor to share one of my own personal favorite posts on What's Cooking With Your Kids. Thank You Michelle! Click here to skip on over to her site and check it out!

Homemade Pasta

04/02/2010

If you've never tried to make homemade pasta you're missing out! Wait...let me rephrase that....you have to try homemade pasta! It is so much better than store bought. Yes it's a lot of work and you probably could just go out and buy buitoni, but it still isn't the same as homemade. Especially when you have a kiddo like mine at home who jumps at the opportunity to make something that is edible. Pressing the pasta kept her busy for a long time! Now if only I could just get her to sit and eat dinner! Argh. It's a laborious challenge we face every night for dinner. That's a whole other post I won't get into right now.

Freshly Squeezed Orange Juice

03/26/2010

Recently we inherited a LARGE bag of oranges that were hand-picked from a family members' tree. Though we made every attempt to finish them before they started to go bad, we just about had our fill halfway through the bunch when they started getting a bit too soft. So one morning we were having breakfast and my little minime over here, out of the blue, said "ont oyang pea" (translation: I want orange please). I sliced up an orange and gave her about three wedges since she was already finished with her breakfast. Before I knew it she was attempting to squeeze the juice out of them and into her cup. What a clever little chef I thought. So guess what we did......

Chocolate Pudding & A Toddlers' Perspective

03/20/2010

The other day I was scrambling through our pantry to find something that would satisfy my craving for a dessert, but couldn't find that "just right" fix.
A candy bar?
Nope.
A handful of chocolate morsels?
Nope.
A cookie?
Na.

And then I found it.

The classic of classics in an old-school dessert.

Instant Chocolate Pudding.

Homemade Pizza

03/13/2010

I don't know very many people who enjoy cooking with kids as much as I do. I come from a pretty strong background in Early Childhood Education so being able to bring these two elements into my kitchen with my daughter has been a priceless experience. This time around I got the chance to bring my niece and nephew into our little cooking rendezvous and we had a blast! It was their meal from start to finish. We went to the store and I let them pick out their own ingredients. We even used the child sized shopping carts that Mi Pueblo Supermarket has. I have to admit I was pretty surprised at what they put into their shopping cart. We got home, made the dough from scratch, let it rise, rolled it out, and they made their own pizzas as they pleased. They were in complete control of their pizzas which I must say turned out to be delicious.

Homemade Corn Tortillas

03/02/2010

One of Grace's favorite activities is to play with playdough, so naturally she loved helping me make these homemade corn tortillas. You can find the recipe on the Maseca Corn Flour bag if you decide to try this. I used the parchment paper because it was hard for her to handle the dough without breaking it, and I really wanted her to have an end result that she could actually eat.

Sweet Banana Bread Mini Cupcakes

02/23/2010

One of our favorite cakes in our family is banana bread. It's especially one of my favorites because of how easy it is and it's almost fool proof. Maybe Iv'e just made it so many times that it seems that way, but if my two-year-old can get her hands in it and still come out this good, it has to be easy. Lately she has been wanting to help out in the kitchen and is always ready with her stool. Makes it a little tough to do my job but she is so eager to help, how can I resist these teachable moments? It's just not in my nature. Of course I helped with the mixing, but in the end I had a pretty nice mess to clean after we were done :)
The hardest part was keeping her from eating the marshmallows and white chocolate morsels by the handfull.