Category: In the Kitchen

How to have an epic Christmas party!

Published on by BniconannLeave a comment

I have ALWAYS wanted to be apart of all types of parties, such as costume parties, Christmas parties, New Years parties and everything in between. Well this year I decided that my family will  host their first annual Christmas party and I am so excited! Our party of course was centered around having a lot of food. I created a list of things that you have to have to make your party epic! It’s not that hard, it’s definitely fun but it does take a little effort. 

  • Invitations
    • We ordered our invites from zazzle.com, Zazzle is always doing some kind of discount on their invitations and they come out so nice! I did some research with other invitation websites but for me this was the best one. I was really happy with how they turned out. 
  • Food
    • On our invites we wrote “bring your favorite dish”. This, for us, was a MUST! Of course we love cooking and we would do it happily but it relieved a lot of stress on us to have our guests bring dishes also. We definitely made some cookies which I have posted the recipes on here and a few appetizers. We actually ended up cooking A LOT of food, way too much for a traditional potluck but I’m not complaining, I ate all of it. 
    • Chocolate covered oreos (my favorite!)
    • Dulce de leche bars
    • Coconut and white chocolate cookies 
  • Shrimp Ceviche
    • Decorations
      • Our house is always decked out for Christmas so this aspect wasn’t too hard. We did go to Home Goods, Michael’s and Hobby Lobby  to get anything new. 
      • We bought decorated Christmas plates (paper) and napkins from Marshalls. 
      • We created our hot chocolate bar from items from Hobby Lobby. 
    • Drinks 
      •  Hot chocolate bar
      • Wine (multiple bottles)
      • Sparkling cider

    • Entertainment 
      • As for entertainment, we decided to have the ultimate Christmas album playing the background, Mariah Carey! Along with classics such as Frank Sinatra and Justin Bieber (haha!)
      • We also decided to play some Christmas games such as:
        • Christmas Trivia
        • Name that Christmas song 
        • Christmas Charades 
      • We provided gifts for the winners. We had chocolates, a pasta kit, and candles from Home Goods, Pier 1 Imports and TJ Maxx. (Thank God for those stores)
    • Chocolates, a pasta kit and candles!

    Overall, our party was awesome and I’m glad we finally ended up having it. 

    If you have any tips of how to make a party great please do not hesitate to share!

    Have a great day! 

    Love, 

    Harvest Salad

    Published on by BniconannLeave a comment

    Let me tell you a little secret about myself….. I hate salad. I think this hatred stems from people thinking that I should love them. I was a vegetarian for about 2 and 1/2 years and I refused to base my food intake around this dish. My mother always talked so much crap! “How can you be a vegetarian if you don’t eat salad?”, so annoying. 

    Well for this past Thanksgiving I decided to do a salad anyway because truth be told, they can be delicious and fun. 

    Ingredients:

    • 1 cup of chopped toasted pecans
    • 1 cup of dried cranberries 
    • 1 and 1/2 cup of feta cheese 
    • 2 sliced apples 
    • 1 container of spring salad mix
    • Salad dressing (we used a mixture of Rice wine vinegar, dijon mustard olive oil, salt and pepper)

    Salads are pretty easy to make, just put all the ingredients together! We waited to put the dressing on until we were ready to eat it and it was delicious. 

    Let me know if you try this recipe out! 

    Or if you have any other salad recipes that I should try. 

    Have a great day! 

    Love, 

    Dulce de Leche Bars

    Published on by Bniconann2 Comments

    Another dessert?? Yes! We are getting so prepared for this Christmas party and eating all the sweets and this dessert is just that, sweet! 

    If you’re looking for a unique sweet that’ll make everyone fall in love then you have definitely come to the right place!

    Ingredients:

    • 2 & 1/2 cup of unbleached flour
    • 1 4-ounce can of dulce de leche
    • 1 cup of softened unsalted butter
    • 12 ounces of semi sweet chocolate 
    • 3/4 cup of light brown sugar
    • 1 teaspoon of salt 
    • 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract

    Steps:

    Preheat your oven to 350 degrees and have a rectangular deep baking sheet lined with parchment paper ready. (You will be layering your bars in this pan.)

    1. Mix together your flour and salt.

         2. On medium speed mix together your butter, sugar and vanilla until combined. 

         3. Once your butter, sugar and vanilla is creamed, slowly fold in your flour and salt mixture. ( I recommend adding in 1/2 cup at a time.)

         4. Once everything is mixed together add this to your prepared pan. Flatten the dough down in an even layer.

          5. Bake this dough for 25 minutes or until lightly brown. 

          6. Once done, let it cool down for about 30 minutes or until cool. (I know, I know, a lot of waiting but it is needed!)

         7. After your base is cool you are going to spread the dulce de leche in an even layer. 

         8. Now the bars have to be refrigerated for about 25 minutes, I just placed them in the freezer to speed up the process. (Yes! We are almost done)

         9. While the bars are cooling, in a bowl, melt your chocolate chips. The best way to do this is to melt them in increments of 30 seconds and stir it to prevent it from burning.

       10. Once your chocolate is melted and your bars are done cooling you can add on that final layer of chocolate! (About time!) Make sure this layer is thin and even. 

       11. Now place your bars back in the freezer, this time for only 10 minutes! 

        12. And you are done! Finally! Take a knife and cut it however you’d like.

    I hope you guys try this recipe and you enjoy it! It’s the perfect dessert for anytime of the year. 

    Let me know of any other recipes that I should try!

    Have a great day!

    Love, 

    Coconut and white chocolate cookies

    Published on by BniconannLeave a comment

    In preparation for our upcoming Christmas party, my sister and I have been practicing making cookies. Yes, we need to practice. I am in no way a strong baker, honestly I’m more likely to burn the cookies than to make anything edible.

    But lo and behold! A super simple recipe that is fail proof! The ingredients included are basically all normal household staples besides probably the shredded coconut and white chocolate chips.

    This recipe is definitely worth it!

    Ingredients:

    • 1 cup of unsweetened shredded coconut
    • 1 egg
    • 2 cups of unbleached flour
    • 1 teaspoon of baking powder
    • 1 cup of softened butter
    • 1/2 teaspoon of salt
    • 3/4 cup of granulated sugar
    • 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
    • 4 ounces of white chocolate chips (or however much you like)

    Steps:

    Preheat your oven to 350 degrees and have your baking sheet lined with parchment paper.

    1. Mix together your flour, baking powder and salt. IMG_2754
    2. On medium speed mix together your butter and sugar until combined. IMG_2755
    3. Once your butter and sugar is creamed, on low speed slowly add in your flour, baking powder and salt mixture. (To do this we added in about 1/2 a cup at a time)
    4. Fold in your white chocolate chips.                                                                                            IMG_2757
    5. Refrigerate your dough for about 20-25 minutes.
    6. Once refrigerated, take tablespoon sized portions and roll them into a ball.IMG_2759
    7. Roll the balls in the shredded coconut.                                                                            IMG_2756
    8. Place the balls on your baking sheet.                                                                                          IMG_2763
    9. Bake for 25 minutes or until lightly brown.
    10. AND YOU’RE DONE! (let them cool down before you try!)IMG_2764

    This recipe is super simple and the cookies came out better than I expected. I hope you guys try this recipe and if you do let me know! I’d love to hear about it. Or if you have other cookies that we could make for the holidays I would love to hear about that as well!

    Have a great day!

    Love,

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    Making Healthy Fun

    Published on by BniconannLeave a comment

    Happy Tuesday!

    As I described in my last post, I had an amazing weekend. Typically my fiance and I like to cook new foods together and this weekend was no different. We wanted something simple but tasty.

    I bought butternut squash last week because I wanted to start incorporating that in my diet more especially because it is fall.

    So we knew we wanted to make the butternut squash in some form and I found the most perfect recipe!

    Sauteed butternut squash with bacon! 

    All you need for this is:

    • Minced garlic
    • Butternut squash, diced (we used two)
    • Bacon (we used 5 slices)
    • Salt and pepper to taste

    In a skillet, on medium heat without any oil, cook your bacon until it is almost done. This is really dependent on how you like your bacon cooked, but remember you’re going to add your bacon to your squash a little later so make sure it isn’t completely done.

    Move your bacon to a plate and with the bacon drippings still in the skillet add your diced squash.

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    Cooking the squash took a little bit longer, probably around 15 minutes.

    While it is cooking add in salt and pepper and break up your bacon in little pieces.

    Once the squash is done turn off the heat and add in your bacon pieces.

    Now it’s done and it’s amazing and it’s the most delicious dish ever. Honestly though, this was such a simple recipe.

    IMG_2174

    Even though bacon was added (along with the grease) it is a healthier option and a fun way to incorporate butternut squash.

    Next broccoli!

    Broccoli is simple for me, I love it with just salt, pepper, red pepper flakes and roasted.

    IMG_2172

    How you like it depends on how long it’ll be in the oven for, I love broccoli in any way, whether it’s extremely roasted and crispy or still soft and tender.

    Next up…. the chicken!

    The chicken we marinated it with:

    • Olive oil
    • Garlic (roughly two tablespoons)
    • Salt and pepper
    • Dried thyme (1 tablespoon)
    • Dried oregano (1 tablespoon)

    After about 30 minutes in the marinate we grilled it for about 10 minutes on each side. Once done we waited until after the table was set to cut the chicken into smaller pieces because that helps to not dry it out.

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    Overall the whole meal was amazing. It was fun to make with my family and it was good and simple. It’s nice to know that you don’t need all these crazy ingredients or be super talented to cook good meals.

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    (Also, my fiance made some amazing guacamole but we’ll save that for another post!)

     

    Have a great Tuesday!

    Love,

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    Peanut Butter Covered Pretzels

    Published on by Bniconann2 Comments

    Yes! Yes! Yes! This is so easy, so messy and just super fun to make.

    All you need is:

    • Mini pretzels
    • Peanut butter
    • White chocolate chips
    • Semi-sweet chocolate chips
    • Coconut oil

    IMG_2181

    I’ve looked up recipes for this and several said to microwave the chocolate but let me tell you DO NOT DO THIS. It’s just so easy to burn the chocolate that I’m not trying to risk it.

    To start off we double boiled the white chocolate with creamy peanut butter and a spoonful of coconut oil. The amount of chocolate and peanut butter all depends on how much you’re making.

    We made such a mess dipping the pretzels in the sauce and then placing them on parchment paper, but the sauce is amazing.

    Once you’re done with all the pretzels place them in the freezer (depending on how much peanut butter you added in, it might be hard to get hard).

    In the meantime, melt the semi-sweet chocolate the same way you did the white chocolate.

    Once the pretzels are done in the freezer take them out and splash as much semi-sweet chocolate as you want!

    IMG_2183

    IMG_2186

    This is so easy to make and it’s great to make it when you want to just have fun.

    I ate so many of these I got a stomach ache! I never knew I loved the mixture of white chocolate and peanut butter so much!

    This is a must try!

    If you have any recommendations or any other fun recipes please share!

    Love,

    1236232158172503250116

    Parmesan and Rosemary Homemade Popcorn 

    Published on by BniconannLeave a comment

    I’ve never been that big a fan of popcorn but when I started to eat healthy I was looking into healthy snacks and guess what…. homemade popcorn is awesome. It provides fiber, whole grains and antioxidants. I will make a little ziploc bag full of popcorn without any salt or anything on it and it tastes delicious. 

    But I did look around to find some recipes and to see what other people were making and I’m about to share the best popcorn recipe: Parmesan and Rosemary  homemade popcorn! 

    All you need is:

    • Popcorn (it can be white or yellow)

    • Dry Rosemary (as much as your heart desires)
    • Shredded Parmesan (load it up) 
    • About a 1/2 a teaspoon to a teaspoon of salt, depending on how much you’re making 
    • A tablespoon of melted coconut oil. 


    All you have to do is: 

    • heat up coconut oil in a pot
    • pour about 1/2 a cup of kernels in the pot
    • Cover the pot and wait until all the kernels are popped, about 5-10 minutes. 
    • While the popcorn is popping get your seasoning ready. 
    • Get a bowl and combine your Parmesan, rosemary and salt together. 
    • Once the popcorn is cooked, transfer it to a bowl and immediately pour your coconut oil on the popcorn and add your seasoning. 


    And bam! You’re done and ready to eat the best popcorn of your life! 
    Making your own popcorn beats store bought ANY DAY! 

    Try it out and share any other popcorn recipes you have, I’d love to hear about them. 

    Have a beautiful Sunday❤️