White Bean Hummus Dip

We've been fully immersed in the party season.  Christmas parties at work, church, with friends and College Football Bowl season is fast approaching.

I've always enjoyed these festive gatherings, the chance to mingle, swap ridiculous white elephant gifts and force my little girls to wear matchy sparkling red outfits.  

But as I've mentioned in earnest, appetizers are the butter to my bread.

How To :: Classic Gingerbread House + Free Printable Pattern

I have an early Christmas gift for y'all today. 

I am thrilled to be able to share this How-To and as a bonus I've created free printable patterns, just for you.  Ho Ho Ho.

Making these Gingerbread Houses was a highly anticipated tradition as I was growing up, and now I enjoy making them with my own little girls.  It is so magical and fun and totally worth the mess.

Jambalaya Wraps

Hello easy.

I needed you today.

And this family favorite from my kid sister Shawny couldn't be simpler.  I'll admit I was at first a little skeptical--I don't often cook with sausage--but this dish wowed everyone.   

Would you like to know the very best part?  You only use one pan for this one-dish-dinner, making clean up a cinch.  Amen. 

Pani Popo, Samoan Coconut Rolls

Dinner rolls are indeed a sacred Thanksgiving staple.  Each year I mostly serve up the same traditional dishes, but I try to mix it up and add a few new ones too.        

These hover somewhere between the status of roll and dessert, and to be frank, they're da bomb. 

   

Chopped Broccoli Salad

Need a new salad recipe to whip out for the forthcoming Thanksgiving festivities?  

Then lucky you.  I have just the thing.

Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls with Spiced Cream Cheese Frosting

It snowed today.  First snow of the season, and a frigid cold day.

So the girls and I huddled inside and baked.

Caprese Salad with Honey Balsamic Dressing

At long last we've been able to enjoy our garden tomatoes.  With a cooler climate and shorter growing season its a race against the impending frosts to have them ripen in time.  Back off frost, my babies are still green out there.  

Lately I've found happiness in the form of this beautiful salad. 

I think I could eat this every stinking day of my life. 

Rainbow Sour Cream Cupcakes

My youngest baby girl Gigi recently turned one.  

She's my angel baby.  Sweet, quiet, cuddly and the calm observer amongst her two spunky, boisterous elder sisters.  And like all babies of the family, my unabashed favorite child.  

Revolutionary Mac N' Cheese

I have unfortunately allowed myself to watch a handful of those terrifying food documentaries.  Everybody has seen a few right?  Each one has left me in a state of paranoid anxiety, fearing that everything I'm feeding my family is unsafe and practically poisonous.  I seriously don't sleep well for days. 

The positive effect is that they reaffirm my desire to serve my family as much of a healthy, balanced and unprocessed diet as I can.    

And that is why my girls have been deprived of the infamous neon orange Mac N' Cheese in a box.

12 Hour Salad

Although school has just started for most of us, we're still bound to have a few more weeks of warm summer weather.  I'm determined to keep pulling out the grill and drag out the BBQ season for as long as I can. 

Maybe even host one last farewell summer BBQ with friends?    

When preparing food for a crowd I've learned the hard way that simple should always be the rule.  And by that I don't mean sacrificing flavor, but choosing the smart easy options that allow me to trade fussing for relaxation and good conversation.

No TiAnn, you really shouldn't make homemade rolls, or be cooking at the stove when the guests arrive, or be a stressed out crazy person... Duh. 

Berry Crumble Bars

These bars were bonkers good.  

They remind me of my sweet Grandma Hill and all of the happy childhood memories of the lovely home baked goods that she spoiled us with as kids.  Mmmmmm.  

My choc-aholic P-Man loved 'em too.  He's always proving me wrong that way.  I'll make something that I'm sure he'll reject on principle alone, and he's like "Hey these are super good".  

Blackened Shrimp and Guacamole Tostadas

These totally just happened at my house.

I have romantic notions about shrimp.  We belong together.  Ping to my pong.  

When dining out I'll almost always order something with shrimp, and I never seem to tire of it.  Because what pray tell, is better than shrimp?  Few things in this world, and if you don't think so then I'm not sure we can be friends anymore!         

The Green Smoothie

First let me say how very disgusted that I originally was at the thought of these smoothies.

Secondly let me say how very addicted that I now am to them.

The thought of trying to choke down a swig of the leafy green embued smoothie-imposter, was for me, gag-worthy. 

But my kid sister Shawny helped me to see reason.  Or taste it rather.  It's so nice to have people like that in your life.  Those who will patiently take your hand and help you overcome your childish fears of the unknown.  Baby steps though, I still think wheat grass shots sound putrid.

So let me tell you what I assumed before trying my first green smoothie.  I assumed that it would taste like a liquified salad.  Bleck.  Of course I love salad, in it's proper way, eaten on a plate with a fork.

The truth is that you don't taste the leafy greens.  No really!  It just tastes like a regular fruity sweet wonderful smoothie, but dare I say fresher?  I absolutely love them.  They're my go-to breakfast of choice and I love how good and energized that I feel after having one.  They're also my detox meal after an episode with say perfect chocolate buttercream...  Brings balance to the force.

My little girls have caught on to their goodness too, and they've become known as "the Hulk drink" in our house.  I mix it up using different fruits and vegetables all the time.  Basically whatever is in my crisper goes into the blender and they're always tasty.  

Healthy awesome goodness.   

Fruit Salad with Vanilla Honey Citrus Dressing

Summertime means salads to me. 

I'm enamored with the fresh seasonal ingredients at the height of their nutrients and flavor.  I especially enjoy sampling new salads at summertime get-togethers and BBQs, and oft times simple wins big. 

So here's my version of simple.  A medley of fresh vibrant fruits tossed in lightly sweetened juices with the perfect hint of vanilla. 

Lovely!      

Perfect Chocolate Buttercream

I made this and spread it upon a reeeaaallly good chocolate cake- recipe to follow soon, it was snarfed up by family members before I could document it's greatness- as a belated Father's day dessert for my beloved P-Man.

He's an exceptional Dad to his girls.

We're all darn lucky to have him.  

I'm sorry to have to say this, but I was raised in a family that could take or leave chocolate. 

Yes people like that really exist. 

We prefer fruity desserts over double-chocolate-chunk-ganache-fudge-cocoa-smothered whatevers...  It's a genetic thing I'm sure.  But my choc-aholic husband has gradually eroded my ways and today I find myself sitting somewhere in the middle. 

I do like and even crave chocolate occasionally now.  Quite the evolution.

This frosting really was divine.  My P-Man's say on the matter was that he normally scrapes off the cloyingly sweet frosting and just eats the cake, but this frosting was in his words perfect.   

Roasted Sweet Italian Sausage and Vegetables (a one-pan dinner!)

I really like Pam Anderson. 

No, not that Pam Anderson, but Pam of Three Many Cooks.  She's the inspiration behind this recipe and my new preoccupation with one-dish dinners.  Her new cook book Perfect One-Dish Dinners: All You Need for Easy Get-Togethers  is an absolute revelation.      

A work of utter genius.         

Easy Cream Cheese Wontons

I'm an appetizer girl. 

When dining out, if given my druthers, I'd almost always pass on the sweets and opt for the savory. 

I'm odd and I know this. 

But there's just something about the miniaturization of ordinary eatables that has me utterly smitten.  And I can't seem to outgrow it.  Parties boasting of heavy hors d'oeuvres are the shindigs worth showin' up for. 

Guuuuyyys... they make me happy.  Yin to my yang.  

From Scratch Baby Food

My third baby girl Gigi was just starting on baby food a few months back, when my kid sister Caley came to visit with her own baby girl.  She watched me pulling out the over-priced little jars of baby food and kindly told me that I needed to wise up and make my own. 

What?  Make my own? 

I vaguely recalled attempting it once before, yearrrrs ago.  I had saved a couple thousand of the little glass jars and for some reason thought that I needed to find a way to refill them. 

Disastrous results ensued.  It was tedious, slow, and extremely messy trying to spoon food back into the little jars.  Not fun.  Also all those jars took up way too much freezer space and were annoying to defrost.  

I never tried it again.  The convenience of the store-bought baby food prevailed.  Big time.  

Well my wise sister shared with me a much smarter approach to homemade baby food, and I love it so much that I now deeply regret not doing so with my two elder daughters.    

Balsamic Strawberry Shortcake Sugar Cookies



Perhaps using the word "shortcake" is being a bit liberal with the term, but it just felt right.

Aren't they lovely? 

Almost too darling to eat?  Maybe that's what I said before two or three disappeared. 

I'm still perplexed as to how that happened.  Ahem.

To be honest, the first time I laid eyes upon the marriage of balsamic vinegar and strawberries, I can't say that it seemed too appealing.

An initial eewww may have crossed my mind. 

But for some reason the idea lingered and kept nagging at me for a few weeks.  Weeks! 

So finally I grabbed a carton of berries and mustered up the gumption to give them a try.  I cringed a little as I poured the vinegar over the freshly sliced berries and with my P-Man casting more than a few unsubtle doubtful glances my way... The mood was tense.

And then I dusted on the black pepper.  And that's when P-Man had to just leave the room.

But there's a happy ending to this story.  When I spooned a dollop of lightly sweetened cream onto a perfectly soft melt-in-your-mouth sugar cookie and topped it all off with those marinated berries, the result was glorious. 

bite. moan. bite.

Continued in that order.

Instead of overpowering the natural flavor of the strawberries it only enhanced and brightened their flavor, and color too.  Oh the possibilities.  I'm already diabolically plotting for future mind-blowing balsamic/strawberry concoctions.  And I'm a dork.
      

Memorial Day is a comin' my friends, and these eye and mouth candy treats will impress your BBQ crowd.  Try them.  Love them.  And you're welcome.  



Balsamic Strawberry Shortcake Sugar Cookies

Recipe by Bliss From Scratch  | Printable Version

• 2 dozen sugar cookies, recipe here.  (You may not need this many, it just depends upon how much topping that you pile on 'em.)
• 4 cups whipped cream, lightly sweetened

For the berries:

• 16 oz. fresh strawberries, hulled and sliced
• 1/4 cup white sugar
• 2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
• 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

Combine all of the ingredients in a large bowl and gently stir.  Cover, and allow to marinate for about an hour. 

Spoon the fresh whipped cream onto the sugar cookies and top with the marinated strawberries.  Serve immediately.  Enjoy.

Soft melt-in-your-mouth Sugar Cookies

Everyone needs a killer sugar cookie recipe in their dessert arsenal.   

Here's mine. 

The oooper doooper secret for fabulous sugar cookies?  Sour cream.  That's right.  They're soft, moist and perfect for use with cookie cutters.  You'll never need another recipe, trrrust me.

Creamy Spinach, Feta and Bacon Quiche Cups

What happened and where have I been for the last month?  Or two. 

You may have noticed that I've been doing some dramatic remodeling.  New blog name being a major change, new logo, layout... and I'm far from being done. 

Big changes to come and I'm rawwwther excited about it. 

I'm taking myself pretty seriously these days.  

Shamrock Cheesecake Brownies

Being that we've got a good amount of Irish heritage in our clan, there's a special place in our hearts for St. Patty's day. 

And I'll tell you a secret; I've never really been a lover of traditional brownies.  But cheesecake brownies... Oh that's another story for this Lass.

Zesty BBQ Slow Cooker Pulled Pork + Slaw Sandwiches

It is written in the stars that zesty pulled pork and creamy slaw were destined to unite upon my sandwich roll and make all of my wildest saucy sandwich dreams come true. 

This is a super easy, messy, finger lickin' masterpiece of a sandwich that will please the masses. 

So let it be written.  So let it be done.

Caramelized Onion, Chicken, Bacon, Blue Cheese and spicy Honey Mustard Pizza- aka "The Incident".

No.  This recipe title could not possibly be longer.  I had no other choice, this pizza needed an introduction that could give you a proper glimpse into its glorious flavor complexity.  It has been my phantom pizza.  Many times attempted, and now at long last perfected. 

"The Incident" background: Once upon a time, I tried an exotic brick oven pizza that I have since felt was my mission in life to recreate.  Here it is, and you're welcome.  The end. 

Fresh Strawberry Buttercream

There were a few extra strawberries in the fridge that I had somehow managed to hide from my girls.  This small miracle resulted the epiphany that I needed to fold fresh strawberry puree into the vanilla buttercream. 

The verdict: lovely, fragrant, pastel pink perfection. 

Vanilla Buttercream & Doctored Cake Mix

Oh Buttercream.  Thank you for being so flawlessly easy to whip up and so sinfully perfect.  I shan't ever open a can of store-bought frosting again.  

You surpassed my every expectation.  

But there's more!  My lovely Mom-in-law Charlyn--who has loads of cupcake wisdom--shared with me the secret to achieving wonderfully moist, flavorful cake from a box.  

Mayonnaise!  Who knew?!

Bacon-wrapped BBQ Sliders

I especially love that these neat little sliders are baked in the oven.  It's wicked cold outside and that can snuff all fun out of grilling.  Despite my aversion to cooking grill-worthy foods indoors, these BBQ basted mini-burgers are juicy and extremely flavorful.  My family loved 'em.  And I will also confess that this last time I made them with ground turkey and they were just as fantastic.  But don't tell the beef I said so.

Onion Strings

I cannot express how gratifying that it was to have these crispy beautiful onions turn out as ace-in-the-hole perfectly as they did.  Holy bananas.  They brought me pure unadulterated joy. 

I am not ashamed of this. 

You must try them.

Creamy Veggie Pinwheels

These creamy wonders are colorful, fresh and sure to please any crowd.  Even if its just you and your husband... using the Superbowl as an excuse to make delightful appetizers... which you have no intention of sharing with the kids. 

Or that's what I've heard anyway.