Making Me Smile...

Here are a couple of things that have currently been making me smile...

Cute popsicle dish towels that I picked up from Crate&Barrel at the end of this spring.

So, I made this take on chocolate covered pretzels a few weeks ago and Matt and I loved them - they're the perfect amount of salty + sweet and they're so easy to make. I call them Chocolate Pretzel Twists, but you can call them whatever you would like...

The ingredient round-up

Place a chocolate kiss in the center of each pretzel and then bake for a few minutes.

After baking for 2-3 minutes at 275 degrees, they'll come out with the chocolate all shiny and melted like this.

Next, place an M&M in the center of the chocolate on each one

And once they're cooled, they will look like this. Ready to taste!

These are soooo simple to put together! I made my own variation of these cute little things, but here is the "recipe" I very casually followed.

This is a super easy treat to make and there are so many varieties to make. I used tiny twist pretzels, but just use whatever you like or have around. You don't have to make any certain amount, just make however many you would like to! I just filled up my baking sheet. I did not grease my baking sheet (that did not sound like the best idea to me), I just lined mine with parchment paper and they turned out perfect.

I chose to use dark chocolate Hershey Kisses, but you can use any variety. I also, used a combination of regular milk chocolate M&M's as well as peanut butter M&M's. The peanut butter were our favorite. The combination of the pretzel, dark chocolate and peanut butter was perfection! After assembling them, I let mine cool for at least a couple of hours in the refrigerator before trying them. We really liked them straight out of the refrigerator, so we continued to store them in there in a sealed container and they were delicious! Mmmm!

oxox,
lauren

New Year, New State

Hello! I hope everyone enjoyed the holidays!

We went down to Florida to spend Christmas with my mom and two sisters and we had a great time! We all had a wonderful Christmas and I hope you did too! We came back to Atlanta to celebrate the New Year and Matt and I had a wonderful dinner out at Pricci (one of our favorite restaurants in Atlanta) to celebrate and it was delicious.

With the New Year brings some big changes for us. First of all, we're moving to Nashville, TN! My hubby got a great job opportunity there and now we're relocating. Matt and I have been a whole three times in our entire lives, two of which were for his interviews and one to house hunt last weekend. It's been a whirlwind. The whole process began back in the beginning of October! They brought us over twice for him to interview, and then made him an offer right before Christmas and he accepted a few days later! Whew! So far I know where the two best malls are (sounds a bit lame, but one of the days he interviewed for nine and a half hours and I was by myself all day wandering around Nashville, so, yes that is how I spent my time alone!), some great restaurants, cute shops, Vanderbilt and that is about it. Last weekend we had a tour of downtown Nashville and the surrounding areas so we learned some more about the city. It is going to take a little while. We are very excited for this change in our lives! It is always a bit intimidating to move to an unfamiliar city and also in our case, an unfamiliar state, but 99% of the people we have spoken to about Nashville really love it and we think we will too!

So, back to December when this became official, I surprised Matt with a very nice dinner. I cooked him a porterhouse steak, and that was the first time I have ever cooked steak in my life! I went to a butcher in Buckhead and bought a 1 1/2" thick porterhouse and used an epicurious recipe that you can find here, if you would like. I cooked these mashed potatoes as a side dish along with asparagus. I bought some rolls that he did not even touch because the steak was the size of a basketball and he had two side dishes to go along with that...it was a lot of food, but I had planned out the whole menu and bought the ingredients before I got to the butcher and saw how enormous the steak was! I was so nervous about messing up the steak, but Matt promises it was the best steak he ever had! I feel like I set the bar a bit high though, I mean let's be honest, I am not going to be cooking him porterhouses on a regular basis here! My husband is definitely a meat and potatoes kind of guy and he had a permanent smile on his face that whole meal. It was so fun to see how excited he was...I mean, he was giddy...I am not kidding!

I told you it was a lot of food! The steak was huge! He ate the entire thing though, just not all of the mashed potatoes and he could not eat any of the bread (understandably)!

Mixed cherry tomatoes are not really in season, so I just used all red, but I don't think Matt had a problem with that!

This is now my husband's favorite meal and he talks about this darn steak a lot!

I don't eat steak, so I had chicken instead. I have to say that the mashed potatoes were really good, if you're looking for a new recipe you should try these.

Well, we have a lot going on! It looks like we are headed back up to Nashville tomorrow to continue our house hunt (we did not find a place last weekend) and we're keeping our fingers crossed that we find a place because Matt starts his new job in the middle of next week!

oxox,
lauren

Sprinkling in Some Glam: Pie time

I am starting a series called Sprinkling in Some Glam. I have found that there are many tasks that can be a bit ordinary but have the opportunity to be a little glammed up. This is not a necessary thing, by any stretch of the imagination, but can make simple tasks a lot more fun and glamorous, like for instance...baking a pie!

Well, it's that time of the year...Holiday cooking has officially begun! I realize that everyone may not be so excited about this, but I happen to really enjoy it...this may or may not be because the time has not come for us to host Thanksgiving or Christmas, we are currently still the travelers who come to visit! With that being said, I always contribute something, even if it is as simple as chocolate covered pretzels! :)

Gotta start with a cute little apron

And a pretty pie dish

As well as this adorable little pie bird to match!

This pie cookbook would make a great gift

Really fun mini pie molds

Even the pie crust shield can be cute!

Another great pie dish

Loving these sparkling gold buck measuring cups

This rolling pin may not be the cutest, but i have it and it works like a charm!

Happy glam baking!

oxox,
lauren

*Cute apron, pie dish, adorable pie bird, pie cookbook, mini pie molds, pie crust shield, ruffled pie dish, gold-tipped buck measuring cups, rolling pin

Sprinkling in Some Glam: Measuring up

I love to bake. Some days I feel like I could spend endless hours in our kitchen baking all sorts of things. I made some peanut butter oatmeal chocolate chip cookies from scratch last weekend and they were delicious! I think cooking and baking is a lot of fun, especially when having great utensils, and I really enjoy both. My measuring cups work wonderfully and I love them...

These are ours, they're really great...we received them as a wedding gift and use them all the time!

But look at these, they are all so happy and fun...

I really love these!

So pretty

Really cute and whimsical

These remind me of home

How adorable!

Snails!...i think these are great for when little ones are helping in the kitchen!

These look like Mrs. Deen's...i have always thought hers are so pretty when I see them while watching her show.

Fun play on measuring CUPS!

So darn precious...i love these as well!

On another note, this recent article written by David Jones from the Patriot-News that I read earlier this week makes me smile. I am proud to be a Bama fan, so I thought I would share this really nice write-up about Alabama's southern hospitality.

oxox,
lauren

*Classic silver cups, silver heart & arrow spoons, delicate bloom cups, silver fleur de lis spoons, little shell spoons, pewter fish spoons, red & pink heart cups, silver dining spoons, fun snail cups, pretty hanging silver cups, stacked colorful cups, silver bird spoons

Yumm...cheesecake!

About two and a half months ago I baked my first cheesecake. I baked the marvelous Barefoot Contessa's (I just love her!) Raspberry Cheesecake and I used her Raspberry Sauce recipe to top off each slice. I was intimidated by this at first, but it actually turned out really well! I made the cheesecake the day before Katie came up to visit back in June so that Matt and I could share with someone! Kidding, I really made it for Katie! The cheesecake itself is plain, but the recipe calls for one tablespoon of freshly grated lemon zest which makes it a little lemony and different! I used Mrs. Ina's raspberry sauce recipe (if you watch her show she makes this sauce all the time) which the cheesecake recipe did not include, it included another kind of raspberry sauce. Katie, Matt and I really enjoyed the cheesecake...it was a big hit!

Here is the finished crust

2 1/2 pounds of softened cream cheese and 1 1/2 cups of sugar

The creamed, light and fluffy cream cheese and sugar

After all the other ingredients have been mixed in

The finished cheesecake

The beginning of the raspberry sauce

The sauce, after being cooked down

Smoothing the sauce out in the food processor

This sauce is soooo good!

The finished product

I garnished the cheesecake with fresh raspberries and grated dark chocolate...mmmmm!

If you would like to make one here is the link to the cheesecake recipe and here's the link for the raspberry sauce. Try it...it's delicious! And surprisingly easy to make!

P.S. Well, as you may know, I am a southern girl and in the south we love our college football! Needless to say, Matt and I are soooo excited for the kickoff of college football this weekend (actually it kicks off on Thursday, but our teams (Alabama- me and Georgia Tech- him) don't play until Saturday!)) Yay! We are so ready for this long and fun-filled weekend!

oxox,
lauren