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Wednesday, December 5, 2007

Welcome to Milton, FL

Finally!!!!! Finals are over! Now all I have to do is get through 2 weeks of long weeks of work then we are back to Oregon for the holidays! YIPPEEEE!! My mom and stepdad are in town. They got in last Saturday and I had the weekend off to study for finals, so Saturday night we decided to try 'Global Grill,' a tapas restaurant in downtown Pensacola, FL. I had never heard much of it and quite frankly, historic downtown ain't much unless you really look around, so I never even realised that it was on Palafox street. It's a good thing we ventured there, cause it was DELICIOUS! Yummy for my tummy!



My mom and stepdad at Global Grill
Brandon and I at Global Grill
Mom and I
So sunday morning I got up early before church to fix some muffins for my mom and stepdad and Brandon of course. I made two versions of the batter. I halved the batter and put chocolate chips in half and fresh cranberries in the other. The chocolate chip is above and the cranberries are below.
CHOCOLATE CHIP/CRANBERRY SOUR CREAM STREUSEL MUFFINS
2 Cups flour
3/4 C sugar
1 ts baking powder
1 ts baking soda
1/2 ts salt
1 C sour cream (non-fat)
1/4 C eggbeaters
1 ts vanillia extract
1 1/2 C cranberries (fresh), rolled in flour and sugar (sweetens and suspends fruit in batter)
or chocolate chips
1/4 C vegetable oil
Mix dry ingredients together and mix wet ingredients together. Fold wet ingredients into dry and once incorporated add the cranberries or chocolate chips. Scoop into muffin tin and sprinkle cinnamon streusel on top (mix cinnamon and brown sugar together) and bake at 400 degrees F for 20 minutes.
Mom cooked us a wonderfully yummy chinese meal Sunday night. Above is a jalopeno, onion and dried fish stirfry in oyster sauce, sweetened by a bit of brown sugar.
Another dish is a pork and vidalia onion dish. I picked out the onions and ate them since I don't eat meat.
And lastly, sweet and sour shrimp. Yummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. That's all I can say. :-D
Last night, I was sick of studying so I made some magic cookie bars but changed it from the usual recipe.
MAGIC COOKIE BARS
BASE:
1 1/2 C ground graham crackers
1/2 C olive oil spread, melted
Mix together and press firmly into an ungreased 13 x 9 in glass pyrex pan
TOPPING:
1 - 14 oz can of condensed milk
1 C chocolate chips
1 C peanut butter chips
1/2 - 3/4 C shredded coconut
pour condensed milk evenly over cracker crumbs then sprinkle chocolate chips, peanut butter chips and shredded coconut over condensed milk. Then press down firmly with a fork and bake at 350 degrees F for 25 minutes.

11 comments:

Emily said...

You all look so cute in the pictures! I hope the tapas were good.
Your muffins look really good; the tops look nice and crumbly.

I would love to try all of your mom's dishes. They look to die for.

Unknown said...

Thanks emilie, you're too sweet.
Yeah, the tapas were SO good. It's good cause it's small portions so I don't overeat, which happens like daily. lol.

I know for some reason, I'm really uncreative with cooking chinese food. Go figure huh, so I was really excited to eat moms cooking and it's always nice to have mom take care of you.

Cynthia said...

Seems you've been having a good time with the company of your parents!

Whew! finals are over Yayyyyyy!!!

Rosa's Yummy Yums said...

All that food looks mighty gorgeous! Congratulations!

Cheers,

Rosa

Rosa's Yummy Yums said...

P.S. Those pictures of you are lovely!

Unknown said...

Cynthia - yes I definitely had fun with the parents :-) and can't believe that the first semester of school is over! It went by fast!

Rosa - thanks rosa. The food was SO good. Yummy! It's nice to not be the one thinking up of things to cook! lol

Christine said...

Beautiful pictures, Valerie!

The magic cookie bars look really good. I haven't made any in a long time but I should, seeing how easy it is to make.

Unknown said...

hahahahahha val your profile icon is SO spastic!
shes like oo coffee, gulp gulp, yam yam yam yam
hahaha

Christine said...

Hey Valerie, Happy Belated Birthday!!! ^.^

I hope you and your family have a Happy Christmas!

Emily said...

Happy holidays to you Val!

Unknown said...

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