Cheese Blintzes & Brown Sugar Bacon!

Growing up my family didn't do breakfast much and if we did it was good old scrambled eggs, toast, and sausage/bacon.  Nothing too fancy.  However, Matt's family loves breakfast!  Since I've known Matt and his family I've been introduced to lots of delicious breakfast meals.  This brown sugar bacon and cheese blintzes take one of the top places of breakfast foods!

I tried looking up where Cheese Blintzes originated, but I found that there are many different places where they claim to have started these super tasty morsels!!  I also found the way I was taught how to make these little guys is much different from various recipe websites.  The difference?  I put my sour cream and cottage cheese in the batter not as a filling.  Matt wouldn't eat them if those two things were a filling!  :)

This recipe is super easy and just takes one bowl to make it in.  I would highly suggest making these on a griddle.  You can make a lot at the same time and its also a bit more consistent in the heat department.

 Takes about 20 min to make
Feeds about 4 people

Cheese Blintz Ingredients:

1 Cup of sifted flour
1 Tablespoon sugar
1 Teaspoon salt
1 Cup cottage cheese
1 Cup of sour cream
4 Eggs
2 Teaspoons vanilla extract

Directions:

Sift one cup of flour into the bowl you want to mix it in.  I usually mix it in my 4 cup pyrex measuring cup.  However, if you want to make more you would probably want to make it in a big bowl.

Put 1 tablespoon sugar in along with 1 teaspoon of salt in with flour. 

Measure 1 cup of cottage cheese put in along with 1 cup of sour cream in to flour mixture.  Begin stirring together.  It will be very thick, so begin adding 1 egg at a time until you have all 4 in.  Mix well with wooden spoon.  Sometimes I add 2 teaspoons of vanilla extract to give it more flavor! :)

Once all mixed together pour onto griddle.  Let cook until the edges look cooked. You also can check underneath to see how they look. Flip and let cook until nice golden brown.

Matt's family has always rolled their blintzes up with their choice of filling in the middle.  I usually just put the filling on and eat it like a pancake.  Either way would work. Rolling it up makes it look pretty though. :)

Filling:

The filling is the best part of these bad boys!  Here is a list of yummy fillings you can put on yours
Strawberries
Rasberries
Blueberries
Nutella
Bananas
Whipped Cream



Brown Sugar Bacon!!!

If you like bacon and brown sugar, you will definitely love these bad boys! I usually get my bacon from the meat department.  I have found that it is good quality bacon and it costs less or about the same as the stuff you get pre-packaged.  I take the bacon put it on a cookie cooling pan on top of a cookie pan.  This is so the bacon grease can drip off, so you don't have to eat it!

Once when you have your bacon on your cookie cooling sheet and pan begin putting brown sugar on top.  Its easy to use a spoon to spread the brown sugar around.  Turn your oven on to Broil and put your bacon on the top rack.  *** Make sure you watch it closely!!***  or it will burn!  Matt likes bacon on the chewier side... so its up to you how long you want to keep it baking. 

When you find the baked level you want for your bacon take it out and flip them over, cover this side with brown sugar and put it back in the oven.  Bake them until you feel that they are done.  Just make sure you don't forget about them... I am notorious for doing this... and having burnt food!

Chili Fit for a King!

Chili is always a great food for when you want something hearty, full of flavor, yet simple to make.  Chili is one of Matt's favorite meals I make.  I must put a disclaimer out there... none of my batches of chili that I have made have been the same.  I am one of those cooks that measures things by taste and how I want it to taste that day.  There are times where my chili is sweet, spicy or both!  We enjoy eating our chili in sourdough bread bowls or with the traditional cornbread.

Here is my best recipe for my Chili!  Lets just say this recipe feeds an army!  So if you want less chili cut the meat, veggies, and beans in half. :)

Time: About 40 minutes

Ingredients:

1 1/2 Tablespoons of Olive Oil (any oil will do)
1 Pound of your choice of meat (I usually use ground Turkey)

3 Cloves of garlic
2 Tablespoons of Worcestershire Sauce
About 1 Tablespoon of Taco Seasoning (you may want more or less depending of taste)
3 Teaspoons of Chili Powder (more of less depending of taste)
1 Medium Onion
1/4 Red Pepper
1/4 Yellow Pepper
1/4 Green Pepper
1/4 Can of Olives
1 Can of Diced Tomatoes
1 Can of Tomato Paste
1 Can of Kidney Beans
1 Can of Chili Beans
1 Can of Black or White beans
If you want it on the sweeter side add about 2 teaspoons of brown sugar add more if needed to taste.
If you want it really spicy add Red Pepper flakes or Sriracha Sauce

Directions:

Put Oil in big pot.  Let heat up.  Add choice of meat let it brown for about 7-9 minutes stirring frequently. 

Add onion, peppers and olives.  Let them carmalize with meat for about 5-8 minutes stirring frequently.

Add tomato chunks and tomato paste.

Drain and add the beans.

Let is simmer on low for about 10-20 minutes.  Test it to see if you need salt, more taco seasoning, brown sugar or more spice.  If you find it too salty, add some brown sugar.  It helps fend off the salty taste.

Some great toppings are:
Sour Cream, Avacado, Raw onion, Peppers, Tortilla chips, cilantro  and Cheese!


Hope you like it as much as Matt and I!!

Frisbee Golf to the Max!

For those of you who haven't played Frisbee Golf you should seriously consider trying it!  It is fun, you get a work out and best of all you get to go outside and play. :)  There are a few Frisbee Golf courses around our area... but this time we chose the one that was closest to our house. 

This course is located at an old campground site.  It still has all of its picnic tables, BBQs, and electric & water hook-ups.  It seems a little eerie at first but its actually kind of nice to take a rest at a table while waiting for your turn.  This course is in the middle of the woods, so naturally there are trees everywhere!  We discovered that these flying disks we use are quite the evil weapon to trees!  They chip the crap out of bark and at times get stuck in trees! Haha!

London Fog!

Last weekend Matt Oram came up while his wife, Lindsey, thew a baby shower for a friend down in Bothell. We had a campfire in our back yard and we played some frisbee golf (I will post this later).  After frisbee golf we headed into town to get some coffee.  We went to a tiny place in Fairhaven called The Rustic Coffee bar.  They have pretty good coffee. However, that day I wanted something different.  Matt helped me choose and he told me to try the drink called London Fog.  It was seriously one of the greatest drinks I've had in a long time! 

Essentially the drink is made from Earl Grey Tea, Steamed milk and vanilla syrup.  Man-o-man is it good though.  Its like coffee minus the coffee aftertaste and bad breath!  Matt really liked it too!  The two of us liked it so much that last night we got all of the makings for it and drank some with dinner!

However, users must be warned the following information!!  If you are at all sensitive to caffiene like I am, please do not drink this during or after dinner!  I couldn't fall asleep and my mind was racing a hundred miles per hour!  That is always super annoying!  I plan to make it a breakfast or midday treat!  You should try it some time! 

Happy St. Patrick's Day!!!

I wore green today so I wouldn't get pinched by any 1st and 2nd graders!! Tonight, I am making some Traditional Irish foodies!  One of Matt's favorites!  Corned Beef, cabbage, carrots and potatoes! :)

Camano Island Adventure

Sunday Matt and I decided to check out a new park around us.  We went to Camano Island State Park.  This park was about 45 minutes south of us and we liked the drive.  Sunday was cloudy and kinda chilly, but we made the best out of it and we had fun out on the beach with Callie! 

The drive there you could see the Cascades and Mt. Baker and when you got to the park you could see the Olympics and in the far distance you could get a glimpse of Mt. Rainier!  I could imagine how beautiful it would be on a clear sunny day!  It was nice even with it being as overcast as it was. 

A few weeks ago we went to my friend Sarah's farewell party and Matt saw that they had some hand carved wooden spoons made from burl wood.  Matt really liked that and decided that he would like to try that some time.  Well, when we went out we saw tons of really awesome pieces of wood, so Matt found one that he is going to try to carve a serving spoon out for me! 

As were exploring around the State Park we found the craziest gate ever!  It was part spaceship/dragon/solar system!!! Haha!  We had to turn around to take a few pictures of it!

This late spring or summer I want to have a BBQ here and spend a day playing at the beach, anyone else interested??  I felt artsy when we went on this adventure, so I took quite a few pictures, but here are my favorites!

Matt Squared

Over the weekend Matt went hiking with Matt Oram.  They decided to go climb Mt. Saint Helens.  They couldn't have picked a better weekend to go play in the snow!  Saturday, as you all know was absolutely warm and beautiful out!  You can definately tell spring is quickly approaching.  (Minus the fact it snowed at my house this morning!)

We got to the Oram's house around 8:00 Friday night and the boys went to bed around 10:30 to turn around and wake up at 2:00 AM to start their journey down to St. Helens.  They wanted an early start so they had more time to play around and have fun.  I thought they were crazy! haha.

Their hike couldn't have been more beautiful!  I know that pictures don't do justice but, OOh-da-lollie those were some pretty pictures.

There are a few pictures of Mt. Rainier and some of Mt. Adams.  Both Lindsey and I asked them to not fall in to the crater!  They were good boys and stayed far away from the Cornices...  I am glad he did!  It looked steep.

 

Destination Packwood!

Last weekend we went to Packwood where Matt's family have their cabin. I don't know if it's like this for you, but when we go anywhere for the weekend we pack like we are leaving for a month! We seriously need to work on that! I really am scared to see what it would be like when we have kids and Callie!

Matt promised the boys that he would bring the Cougar aka Matt's snowmobile! HAHA this thing is so hilarious...it's straight up 80's and one of my goals is to get Matt an awesome neon colored onesie snowsuit! HAHA Wouldn't that be a sight!

To get to Packwood is about a 4 or so hour drive. We always leave from Matt's work and so we always get down there around 10:00 at night and are exhausted! We got there and we ate some pizza and went to bed.

The next morning we got ourselves all packed up and we went out toward Walupt Lake. All of us were a little nervous that we would not find snow, however at around 4,000 feet we finally founds some of that snow stuff we have seen so little of this winter. Because we only had 1 snowmobile and 6 people we had to take turns getting rides up. We had our sled that we towed behind the snowmobile too!







It was a really fun day. I hung out in the sun snapping pictures while Christian, Blake and Matt took the sled off of some sweet slopes!

On Sunday we went up to White Pass and checked out the Winter Festival they had going on! It was really sunny and there was an awesome castle that you could slide down! I convinced Matt to bring Callie down with him! :)