Santa Left Us Some Coal

I wanted to make these coal looking rice krispies since when i first saw them. also because i had some black food dye i wanted to use again. I did this one as a mix of two pins i wanted to do.
Coal idea: http://www.bigredkitchen.com/2010/12/advent-day-1-christmas-coal/
Recipe i followed: http://www.cookingwithbooks.net/2014/10/coconut-oil-rice-krispies-treats.html

I didn't do the recipe exactly, mostly used it for the use of coconut oil. My brother isn't sure exactly to if he's lactose intolerant or not but i've been looking into dairy free stuff to try. Thought this would be easy to make since all it switched out was the butter for coconut oil. Still had some trouble with it though, but that was user error, nothing to do with the recipes.

I ended up burning the first batch of melting marshmallows, was turned away a few seconds too long. Once that was good, making a new batch, i added the black dye. I just happened to have the actual dye they said to use. I first planned to use the black food coloring dye i have, but went with the one they said because needed to use it at some point anyways. Only had it because of when we did my daughter's birthday cake before. I think i ended up using alittle too much dye but i wanted it actual black and not looking purple.

Downfall of this....It colors your teeth and for the tmi, colors your stool lol.

I didn't get around to eating much of it, partly from the coloring and partly from that i am getting more tired of sweets as i'm getting older. Little bit of sweets keeps me good for a while. But depends on the sweets i guess, i don't get tired of cotton candy. What i did try, it was good. The coconut oil didn't make it drift away from the usual in taste.

Wouldn't go as far as to claim it's healthy just because it's using coconut oil, Though nothing is claiming that. It does seem to maybe make it a little less greasy feeling like butter makes it. I don't make or have rice krispies very often, less than once a year, maybe some every other year and then that's mostly having the store bought kind.

I am tempted to make these again, without the black coloring, but also add coconut flavoring. that sounds like it would taste pretty good.

Walmart Deli Sammich

Completely serious with this one, well done Walmart. Keep doing these.

Don't shop at walmart all too often, mostly just from that we have shopped mostly safeway so it's our go to instead of walmart though there's one across the street from it now. So was completely by chance that i came across this. I fell in love with this whole thing when i saw it. It was $2.50 and so much more food than lunchables.

This more of a lunch than any of the lunchables. Don't get me wrong, i still like lunchables and just loved them growing up. Just when thinking something 'healthy' or more filling, this looks like it.

As much as i love this...it's slightly disappointing :(

The sandwich is a little depressing. And would of been nice if the boxes include little packets of mayo and mustard. Being home when i ate it, i was able to add those and made it really nice to eat. I couldn't finish the cookies because i got tired of the taste, but they aren't horrible, guess i'm just use to overly sweet treats. The apple was good, just i prefer a different type of apple. The juice was alright, but i'm not big on fruit punch.

Over all it's good, just wasn't perfect for me. There wasn't a choice in types of sandwiches or anything like that, which maybe these are fairly new or if they only do the one types then they can get more out. Hopefully they do more and give more choices.

Snow Cocoa

White chocolate cocoa made in a crock pot?! I say bring it on!
Followed this recipe: Snow Cocoa

I completely forgot to take a picture of the after, but i was distracted that i had only made half a batch instead. Was still amazing though. Super simple to make and half batch is perfect if making it for yourself and plan on having more than one cup.

I decided to try making it because i wanted to make something out of my list of what to do and this was the easiest at the time. But as i went to start it, i realized that we didn't have much milk left...I about wanted to cry because i didn't want to wait. I still ended up measuring out what milk we had and thought it was crazy that we had exactly 3 cups left...Should of pictured it. With 3 cups left, i made half a batch so that i could still make it. Because of it being half a batch, i cooked it for an hour on low instead of the 2. If anything just so i could stir it and check.

It was on warm for alittle while before me and my mom got to it to actually try, it left it at a perfect temperature to drink. Hot but not scolding. Didn't even need to try and cool it down. I ended up drinking most of it because no one else was really there to drink it lol. Was great to drink but is a little annoying when it starts cooling down since it's made with the chocolate chips, it separates and gets a cooled layer of chocolate on top. That's worth it for how tasty this is. Part of that could of been the type of white chocolate you use since that is the main flavor to it.

Not sure to whether it will be this cocoa or another cocoa, but because of how simple it is with the crock pot, we will probably be doing crock pot cocoa on christmas morning.

Beyond Meat Chicken-Free Strips

I've talked before about how i like to try vegetarian and vegan foods to see how close they come to what they claim to be like, or just to see if they taste good, kind of a way to see if i'd miss meat if i went meatless. I had been seeing this and a "beef" crumble in my Ibotta app for a long time but too forever to find them, had never thought to look in the frozen section until i just happened upon them. Haven't tried the crumble yet but i tried this one. I wasn't impressed with it.

To me, this was a bit of a lie. It didn't taste much like chicken and didn't really shred like it either. But For those who are use to these type of it's not that bad, i'd say worth trying if you haven't.

Here's the nutrition facts in case people were curious.

So being frozen, here's how it looked straight from the bag. Not really yummy looking. It also didn't help that the directions was so vague to that if someone doesn't know how to cook, they would be so clueless. I went with the directions, which basically just says heat until cooked. No temp to cook at, no offer of some sort of oil to keep it from sticking and burning, not even a simple 'spray the pan'. Having no idea on what temp and such, i actually ended up burning some of the smaller pieces and took it off the heat and turned out that some of them was still cold. There was microwave directions, should of just done that instead. I did pan because i usually prefer food cooked stovetop or oven.

I decided to put teriyaki sauce over it and have it over some noodles.....i was able to eat some of the 'chicken' but couldn't finish it. Wasn't that good to me, the rice was good though lol.

doesn't look very good, but that is this salad dressing we get from Joy Teriyaki that is on the sweet side. I was able to eat this just fine, but that dressing is just AMAZING! Even if it looks like something children shouldn't look at.

Over all, i won't be buying this again. I'll stick with my chicken.

Mann's Snap Pea Sensations Asian Sesame

I like snap peas so i thought i'd try this...But i'm also a sucker for things that say "new".

Seemed simple enough to cook and make. I love kits because it should mostly have everything you need.

First thing i did was take out the ones that just didn't look good. Cut off a few ends that i wouldn't want to eat. Next step was mix the peas with the sauce then cook it. i seemed to of had a bit of trouble with it since my heat might of been too high. I use one of those nuwave stove top things(too lazy to find what it is right now lol) and so when things say "medium heat" it might actually be more or less than what the programmed medium heat is. Anyways, The sauce got pretty reduced fairly fast to where i was worried to lose all sauce and start burning it. I thought it was cooked enough but once i went to eat it, the peas weren't as cooked as much as i'd like.

I liked the idea of this, cooking the peas in some sort of sauce and have it over some rice or quinoa....just this kit didn't turn out well for me. I like these peas when cooked, when more on the raw side, i don't care for the taste, these ended up under cooked. And with so little sauce, just over all was sad for me.

I think i'll try the idea again, get some peas and cook them in some teriyaki sauce then put over some stuff to have that has a meal.

9 things I believe

1. I believe one day i'll have my 'click'. That click that people have that just seems to change people's lives.
2. I believe no matter what the future holds, me and my daughter will be just fine.
3. I believe i will find my motivation
4. I believe i will find my routine
5. I believe i'm good at photography and photo editing
6. I believe that my daughter will do something great with her life
7. I believe one day i'll move out
8. I believe some day i'll have the friends i want to have
9. I believe i'm not good at figuring out what i really believe in

My favorite present I’ve ever received…

Small intro: I want to try and get back to writing something every day but i don't always do something new every day so i found a really large idea list (here) that i'll just be writing from those when i have nothing else to write about. There's a lot on the list so i might double up on days if i end up with something else to write.


Best present i've gotten? Tough decision, though that is partly from bad memory. One of my electronics could be one of them, most have, if not all, have been gifts. A nice tv, a laptop(though not exactly mine, just my mom's old one), a desktop computer, a 3ds, kindle fire hd, my cell phone, other things too. Currently the laptop and phone are the most used. My bed is a good contender in this. My mom paid for my mattress since i could only afford the frame at the time, has been amazing sleeping on a bed again.

Though actually thinking, the best one i've gotten is my graduation gift. Originally it was a datsun truck that my dad was going to fix up for me. Well, years kept going by and nothing was done with it. I got to the point of that i just don't care anymore, do whatever with it. Also with me having my daughter, the truck wouldn't be the safest thing to drive. So my parents ended up talking and so that i wasn't out a present by not keeping the truck, they decided instead to help me pay off my credit card bill that i had been struggling with. That probably was the best/favorite because it took away a lot of stress....though helped feed my want to shop lol.