living life to the creativest
Category Archives: Cooking

{Recipe} Roasted Cauliflower

by Crystalyn

I wanted to share this super easy, yummy recipe with you all. I’ve been slightly obsessed with this snack ever since I saw it in Whole Living magazine. (January I believe) You just take some cauliflower and drizzle it with olive oil and a dash of spices. (I used jalapeno seasoning, because for some reason I am also obsessed with jalapenos lately.) Then you roast it in the oven at 350 degrees until they are soft and slightly browned. I personally prefer mine a little charred. (I am a huge supporter of burnt marshmallows) I think these would be good cooked on the grill in the summer. My husband is not a fan of cauliflower, so I get these all to myself! (I think I’ll go make some now.)

(I’ve noticed that I use parenthesis a lot…)


Cupcakes

by Crystalyn

Every time I make cupcakes, my brother’s girlfriend tells me she wants one. The only thing is, she lives 1000 miles away! So I decided to make a special batch just for her and I include them in the Christmas package I sent home. (Last week… yes I am a huge slacker! At least it’s not June!)


I think they turned out super cute. Juniper helped with the sprinkles, of course. She’s my official sprinkle sprinkler. Kim was kind enough to send me this BEAUTIFUL photo of what the cupcakes looked like when she got them. Pretty much exactly what I was expecting!! Oh man, this photo makes me laugh so hard.. Sorry Kim, it’s the thought that counts right?


{Recipe} Smores Bark

by Crystalyn

We have had an unusually high amount of chocolate around here lately, with the holidays and all. After we made peppermint bark last week I was in a chocolate melting mood, and we had some mini marshmallows leftover from Juniper’s birthday party so I thought I’d make some smores bark! Seemed like a good idea. (Turns out it was.)

For some reason my photos all turned out to be a weird color… so ignore the cruddy photography and focus on the yummy, chocolatey, marshmallow goodness.

1. Poor a handful of marshmallows into a pan. Stick them in the oven at 350 for a few minutes until they are nice and soft.
2. Use a spoon to spread the melted chocolate around.
3. Sprinkle mini marshmallows on top of the bottom layer of chocolate and pour on MORE chocolate. (Never a bad thing, right?) Stick it back in the oven.
4. While that is getting nice and melty, crush up some graham crackers. Be sure to break a hole in the bag and make a crumbly mess.
4. You’ll also want to make sure to mislabel your graphics. Once it’s all melty, smoosh it around with a spoon and make a goopy mess. It will look TERRIBLE at this point. Just trust me, it will be yummy. Sprinkle your grahams cracker crumbs and push them down into the chocolate with a spoon.
6. Put it in the refrigerator for a couple of hours. When it is hardened completely, pry it off the pan (Mine popped off easily with help from a butter knife.) Break into pieces and enjoy!

So good. This batch will be coming with us tomorrow when we visit family for Christmas. Is Christmas really already tomorrow?? I have been a gift-making-maniac lately. Hence the silence on this here blog. I didn’t want to share anything or I’d ruin the surprise! But boy have I got lots of projects to share with you once this holiday weekend is over. (And I promise not ALL of them involve chocolate.)


Colorful Cookies

by Crystalyn

I’ve been a little preoccupied lately putting together a little birthday celebration for my Juniper. (I still can’t believe she is going to be 3 tomorrow, and I’m sure I will express similar feelings every year until I die.) Today we baked some super colorful cookies. (I got the idea from this post on Tablespoon.) They sure are pretty cookies! (Can you tell which color Juniper helped roll into balls?)


Juniper helped make a couple of the cookies, and she did a pretty good job! She was pretty excited, as you can see from that hilarious look on her face. She’s a funny kid.

fffffffffghjklzxcvvbnmasdgfghjklqwerytyuiop zxcvbnmasdfghjklqwertuyuiop
(Juniper wanted to type…)


Mini Cake Challenge – November

by Crystalyn

I’ve been wanting to try this technique forever. I’m glad I finally decided to go for it, because it sure makes for a super cute little cake! Now, usually I am a strong believer that every single thing on a cake should be edible, but I just couldn’t resist adding a little cake bunting. (Darn you Pinterest, you wore be down!) Now I’m trying to think up a way to make a cute cake topper that is edible.. Candy sticks and sugar paper? Maybe next time.



See some of my other cakes here.


Mini Cake Challenge – October

by Crystalyn

It has been a LONG week. Shaun is training for his new job, so he has been gone pretty much all day every day this week, and there are still two more days of fun. Today was an especially hard day for some reason. So I thought, you know what? I need to bake a cake. So I did. And I felt a little better.

I went with a super simple, quick pumpkin patch cake. I think it turned out cute! (Especially since it took maybe ten minutes to decorate.) I didn’t bother busting out the nice camera for this one since it’s not like the most amazing cake ever, so enjoy some cheesy camera phone shots. (Juniper for one LOVED the pumpkins!)



And I found an amazing pair of Halloween socks at the thrift store today. I guess if you were to go trick or treating as Santa these would work great :)

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got to get back to Dancing with the Stars. I’m pretty hopelessly hooked at this point… Go Ricki!

Past Months: January, February, April, May, June, July


Mini Cake Challenge – July

by Crystalyn

Those of you who are familiar with the video game Portal will probably recognize this month’s mini cake! I had purchased some rhubarb last week, so of course I had to make a cake. (And not just any cake, THIS cake.) The inside is classic yellow butter cake with strawberries and rhubarb and it is the absolute yummiest cake I’ve ever made.

I made a few Portal cupcakes with the leftover batter, and they didn’t last very long between me and Juniper… Oh so yummy. It’s a good thing there was a church event last night so I had people to help me eat the cake or I would have been in trouble!

Past Months: January, February, (I missed March, I had a baby!), April, May June


Banana, Peanut Butter & Chocolate Vegan Ice Cream

by Crystalyn

Kaylah from The Dainty Squid just posted a super yummy recipe for Banana, Peanut Butter & Chocolate Vegan Ice Cream! With a name like that, who could resist trying it out? And I had all of the ingredients already, so that was a plus. This ice cream is super easy to make, and oh so good. You can get the full recipe here on the ♥elycia blog. (Can I just say, I absolutely love those two blogs. I have a serious style crush on both of those lovely ladies!)

It was a good thing I decided to make this last night, because our friends Thane and Esther came over today to play games and Esther can’t eat dairy. She was so excited to have a non-dairy ice cream alternative while we all ate our desserts! I’ll definitely be making this again. Next time I’m going to play with add-ins after it’s all blended. Like diced banana chunks or peanuts!


Orange Juice and Honey Roasted Peanuts

by Crystalyn

Once upon a time there was a young couple who was very much in love. One day, after getting out of work early because it was the 4th of July, they went to the boy’s house to decide what they wanted to do for the evening. Upon arrival, the young man noticed a package sitting on the kitchen table. He turned and yelled to the girl “Go in the other room!” Confused and slightly suspicious, the girl did as she was told.

A few moments later, the boy returned, looking nervous. He asked the girl if she wanted to go outside to see if they could see any fireworks. Once outside, he suggested they walk around behind the house to see if there were any fireworks out back. Once out back, he asked the girl if she was thirsty. She said sure, so they went back into the kitchen. When the she turned around, the boy had poured orange juice into two champagne glasses and he was holding a bowl of honey roasted peanuts. They ate in silence. Once their meal was through, the young man asked the girl if she wanted to go outside again and wait for his roommate to get home. The girl couldn’t help but laugh, and outside they went.

As the two sat silently on the tailgate of the boy’s truck, he reached into his pocket and pulled out a small black box. He tried as hard as he could to be romantic and eloquent as he opened the box, but all he could think to say was “Will you be my wife?” The girl just smiled and shook her head enthusiastically as he put the ring on her finger. And 5 years later, they are still living happily ever after.

The end.  

We were trying to be all romantic-like and link arms while we drank our orange juice, can you even tell? Ha! Oh well. We’re just a couple of goofballs. I guess the moral of this story is, I love my husband. We like to celebrate our own holiday on the 4th of July, we call it “Dependace Day”, because that was the day we decided to depend on each other for the rest of our cheesy lives ♥

I love you honey.


Mini Cake Challenge – June

by Crystalyn

So it was Thursday night, I was trying to decide what to make for dinner, and all of a sudden I realized it was the last day of the month and I hadn’t baked any cakes! Now of course I couldn’t have that, so I postponed dinner for a bit and got to it. I didn’t have much time (or desire honestly) to decorate the OUTSIDE of the cake, so I decided to decorate the INSIDE!

A little bit of color makes everything better. The cake didn’t last very long… Good thing it was just a mini cake! I’ve got big, top-secret plans for July’s cake, because a certain husband of mine has a birthday coming up. And the planned theme for August’s cake is Star Wars! That’ll be a fun one!

Mini Cake Challenge Past Months: January, February, (I missed March, I had a baby!), April, May.


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