Max

As soon as I finish editing these, there will be more of this:

resolution #2: exercise more

Could I have chosen a more cliche resolution? I never promised originality in my resolve to do better this year. I am simply stating a necessity, I need to work out. And the lovely (and a bit mannish, but who cares cause look at those abs) Jillian Michaels is going to fill that need. Thanks to Emily, Amazon.com and $8 I will be better looking in a matter of days. Wish me luck!

resolution #1: cook more

This year I am resolving to cook as much as possible. It is better for you, cheaper, and frankly I am pretty good at it . So I hope to hone my skills as the year goes by and I will continue to share my recipes. These two are some of my favorite, bon apetit!


Double-Coconut Cake
Recipe courtesy Cooking Light 2001
3 images courtesy Google Images

I usually insist on making my cakes from scratch, but I almost think this one is better if you use a box mix. There is something about the lightness that comes from a white cake box mix. Just add 1 tbsp coconut extract to your cake mix and split into two nine-inch rounds. I also prefer less coconut on the finished cake and then I serve with a bowl of shredded coconut on the side. I also really like unsweetened shredded coconut. Enjoy!

1 tablespoon cake flour
2 1/4 cups sifted cake flour
2 1/4 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 2/3 cups sugar
1/3 cup butter -- softened
2 large eggs
1 can light coconut milk -- (14-ounce)
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
Fluffy Coconut Frosting
2/3 cup sweetened coconut flakes -- divided

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

2. Coat 2 (9-inch) round cake pans with cooking spray; dust with 1 tablespoon flour.

3. Combine 2-1/4 cups flour, baking powder, and salt, stirring with a whisk. Place sugar and butter in a large bowl; beat with a mixer at medium speed until well blended (for about 5 minutes). Add eggs, 1 at a time, beating well after each addition. Add flour mixture and milk alternately to sugar mixture, beginning and ending with flour mixture. Stir in vanilla.

4. Pour batter into prepared pans. Sharply tap the pans once on countertop to remove air bubbles. Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes or until a wooden pick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool in pans 10 minutes on wire racks, and remove from pans. Cool completely on wire racks.

5. Place 1 cake layer on a plate; spread with 1 cup Fluffy Coconut Frosting. Sprinkle with 1/3 cup coconut. Top with remaining cake layer; spread remaining frosting over top and sides of cake. Sprinkle 1/3 cup coconut over top of cake. Store cake loosely covered in refrigerator. Yield: 14 servings.



Sweet Potato Oven Fries
Recipe courtesy Meikel Reece
3 images courtesy Google Images

4 Yams or Sweet Potatoes (there is a difference, see here.)
I generally do a potato for each person I want to serve.
Sea Salt
Fresh Ground pepper
Ceyanne Pepper (optional)
Olive oil

For the Fry Sauce:
Sweet Baby Rays BBQ Sauce
Ketchup
Mayonnaise (I use Veganaise.)

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Peel yams and cut into 1/2 inch fries or wedges which ever you prefer. Put on cookie sheet and drizzle with olive oil until well coated (not dripping just gleaming really) and sprinkle with pepper (not salt, it will pull out the water and make the fries soggy). Place in oven for 20-35 minutes depending on the oven.

In a separate bowl combine equal parts Sweet Baby Rays BBQ Sauce, ketchup & mayonnaise combine and set aside.

Test your fries, they should be fork tender. Turn your oven to broil and watch until golden brown. Immediately salt and serve with your fry sauce.

For more recipes, visit NOSH

christmas past

Another lovely Christmas gone by filled with family, friends and a grotesque amount of food. My aunt and uncle had us all over for Christmas Eve, a tradition that I look forward to every year. The food and company is always amazing and this year was no exception.
Afterward we had such a great time with Luke's parents and sister, they spoiled us rotten with so much good stuff! Luke and I both had to work Christmas day, which is never ideal, but ended up being a great day that we spent with my mom, aunt and grandma.

We capped it off the holiday week with a ruckus New Years Eve, that involved more food and movies. At midnight we banged pots and pans with wooden spoons to ring in the new year! It is our family tradition that we have to break the wooden spoon to bring luck, but I think it may have started because one year someone accidentally broke one and now we break several every year. I suppose that is how most traditions get started, by happy accident.

Hoping all of you had a delightful holiday season, and now all we have to look forward to is snow and cold with no holidays. Good times 2009!

2008

“Have you heard of chaos theory? It’s a science that tries to determine underlying patterns in chaotic systems in weather, ocean currents, blood flow that sort of thing. But it turns out that there are few things more chaotic than the beat of the human heart.

Speeding up, slowing down, pretty face, flight of stairs, it’s always changing depending on what is happening to us out there. It’s an erratic thing, but the truth is under all that bump-pi-di-bump mess, there is in fact a pattern, and it's love.

The most important thing about love is that we choose to give it and we choose to receive it. Making it the least random act in the entire universe. It transcends blood, transcends betrayal and all of the dirt that makes us human.
If you can figure that out, all of the trials, disappointments and tragedies of the world have nothing on you.” -chaos theory

Happy New Year!

the drive

I had an interesting drive to work today, and by interesting I mean life threatening. I love my job, but days like today often leave me wondering why on earth I work at the top of a mountain. Then I get to work and a stray goat (who apparently made his way down from bear lake) is tied to our Safety department, they have named him (his name is Steffan) and Steffan is really cute and warmed up to me. That almost made it worth having to drive up today. He looks about as stressed out as I do, bless him. I know I should be grateful for that moisture that everyone is praying for, but I was cursing it today. At least we will have a white Christmas.

Evening with the Stewarts

We got to spend a marvelous evening going to Body World's (thanks so much to David for the tickets) & Temple Square with the Stewarts. Body World's was amazing, if you have the opportunity to go I highly recommend it. Traci was especially pleased to see that they had a three headed camel at Body World's, after all they are very, very rare.

As always the lights were beautiful as is Temple Square, but we did notice they cut back on the lights a bit this year. Nothing like an evening of Christmas lights and plasticized corpses to get you in the Christmas spirit! Merry Christmas everybody!
photos of Body World's v. Google imaging.

Afternoon with the Tiek's

Thanksgiving

A little sneak peek of one of the four Thanksgivings we had!

best november ever

I went for a walk the other day since it felt more like April than November. I could really get used to all this sunshine . . .

Eisley again

My favorite black and white from Eisley's shoot.

St. George Weekend

We joined the Stewart's & Tiek's for a weekend trip to St. George for some sun before the really bad weather sets in. We were all pretty bummed that the Hoffiens' & Davis's could'nt join us! Thanks to Justin & Traci we get to go to all these great weekend vacations!

A very quick trip to Vegas . . .



. . .ended with us getting a piece of metal stuck in our tire, so we had to get a new tire. We were lucky the tire store was right across the street.



No one on the corner has swagga like us . . .

Allison, Steve and C joined us and we did a little rock climbing . . .



Cohen was a champ while we all climbed and just continued to be cute all day long.

Jedi Luke and his padawan . . .

Sunday we went to the St. George LDS Temple . . .




. . . and out to Snow Canyon for some light hiking.







A great trip, thanks again Justin and Traci!