Cauliflower Leek Soup

This is a great soup to make for St. Patrick's Day dinner -- and it is so much more tasty than corned beef and cabbage. Trust me... I know (my husband 100% agrees). This is the first time I've cooked with leeks, and they are so delicious! This soup is light, but filling. It tastes like there is potato in the soup, and my husband thinks it tastes like there is cheese! It's healthy and easy, so give it a try!

CAULIFLOWER LEEK SOUP

2 bunches of leeks

1 head of cauliflower

2 T. butter

3 c. chicken broth

1 c. or 8 oz. Greek plain yogurt

Salt and pepper to taste

Chop up the white and light green parts of the leeks (I chopped just a bit of the dark green too to make the soup a beautiful light green color). Turn soup pan on medium-high heat and add the butter. Sautee the chopped leeks in the butter for several minutes until they soften. Chop the cauliflower and add to the leeks and immediately add the chicken broth. Bring to boil and simmer for 5 to 10 minutes to soften the cauliflower.

Take the soup off the heat and let cool for a few minutes. At this point you can use an immersion blender or a regular blender to puree the soup. I used my immersion blender to puree the soup. If you do it in a regular blender, just do the soup in batches. (You may have to let the soup cool a bit longer before adding to the blender.) Once the soup is fully pureed, add the Greek yogurt (or you could try just plain yogurt). If the soup is too cool at this point reheat for a few minutes and then salt and pepper to taste. Serve.

Honey Balsamic Chicken

My husband loves balsamic vinegar, so I thought I'd try it on chicken. Last time we went out to eat he ordered a dish called "Honey Balsamic Chicken." I thought I'd give it a try cooking it myself. It can't be that hard, right? Thank goodness I was right - this is so easy and oh, so yummy!



Honey Balsamic Chicken

1 Tbsp. olive oil
2 thawed chicken breasts (I buy mine in the 6-pack at Costco, 2 breasts sealed in each pack)
1/2 cup balsamic vinegar
1/2 cup honey

Pound the chicken once thawed (I put mine in a sturdy Ziploc bag and pound it with an ice-cream scoop since I don't actually have a mallet. Resourceful, right!) Pour oil into frying pan and heat to medium. Cut chicken into serving sizes and add to pan. Drizzle balsamic vinegar evenly over the top of each piece of chicken then pour the honey over the top. Let it simmer for a couple minutes. Turn over each piece of chicken and add additional vinegar and honey to taste. Cook until completely cooked through, about 10-15 minutes.

St. Patrick's Day Garland

I liked my Valentine's Day garland so much, I decided to make one for St. Patrick's Day, as well. I purchased these foam shamrocks from Hobby Lobby. They came in a set of 12 for only $2.99!


I simply punched two little holes in the top of each shamrock with a tiny hole punch (it punches smaller holes than a normal hole punch) and strung narrow white ribbon through each shamrock. I put a little dot of glue behind the ribbon on the front of each shamrock to hold them in place. I also added a little bow and a white button to the plain green shamrocks to embellish them a little.


I used the extra shamrocks to hang from the hutch doors to add a little bit more green to the kitchen. Let's be honest, garland is so simple to make and looks so cute hanging from the fireplace. I'll probably make one for every holiday!

Whole Wheat Carrot Pineaple Cake

This is a sugar-free recipe that uses Agave as a sweetener and tastes delicious!


CAKE:
1 ½ cups canola oil (or olive oil)
1 ½ cups Agave
3 eggs
2 tsp. vanilla
2 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt
1 cup unsweetened coconut
2 cups grated carrots
2 cups crushed pineapple, with juice (1-20 oz. can)
2 tsp. cinnamon
1 cup chopped nuts, walnuts or pecans
3 cups whole wheat flour

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Mix all ingredients in a bowl and stir until smooth. Pour into greased 9x13 inch pan. Bake at 325 degrees for 50-60 minutes. Let cool and frost with Cream Cheese frosting.

FROSTING:
½ cup unsalted butter, room temperature
1 8 oz. cream cheese, room temperature
1 Tbsp. lemon juice
⅔ cup Agave

Put all ingredients into a large mixing bowl and blend until smooth with an electric mixer.


I like to make this cake in a bundt pan. Once the cake is baked and cooled, cut off any extra cake across the top of the bundt pan with a long bread knife so that the cake is flat and ready to be turned over onto a serving plate. Because the frosting is not very thick, I like to spoon the frosting into a frosting bag (or Ziploc bag with a clipped corner) to drizzle each individual piece of cake with frosting before serving rather than covering an entire cake. I think this cake tastes better on day two, which makes this a great dessert to make a day ahead!

For this recipe and other delicious Agave Recipes check out the cookbook Where Delicious Meets Nutritious.

Jewelry

I was so excited to receive this canvas 80-pocket hanging jewelry organizer in the mail this past week. I ordered it online from The Storage Store. Now I can see all of my jewelry in one place rather than having all of my ear rings and bracelets strung across my room and bathroom.


For my necklaces and longer jewelry I covered a cork board to hang just inside my closet.

To make your own cork board jewelry organizer you will need:

a simple cork board
material to cover the board
glue
butter knife
ribbon
decorative pins (upholstery pins work well for a larger board)
tacks or pins to hang jewelry from

For this project, I used these pearl tip pins and clipped them shorter with wire cutters.

Cut the material just larger than the size needed to cover the cork board. Start along one side and tuck the material under the frame of the cork board with a butter knife until the material is completely tucked in around the entire cork board.

Measure along the sides of the board and make a small mark with a pencil where the ribbon should touch the edge of the board. Cut the ribbon to be the right lengths and put them over the board in place so it is crisscrossed like this:

Use the butter knife to tuck the edges of the ribbon under the frame and place a pin through the ribbon where it crosses. Place a bead of glue around the entire frame once finished to hold the material and ribbon in place (Tacky glue or Elmer's glue works fine).

Insert pins along the top of the board and hang your jewelry!

Bed Pillows

Last fall we had a really nice bed spread and pillows on our bed that we got for our wedding. I decided we needed a more "baby-friendly" bed spread and pillows that could easily be thrown in the washer. I didn't want to spend a lot of money, so I purchased these DKNY pillowcases on clearance at Bed Bath and Beyond.

I really liked the ties on the side of the pillows. Unfortunately, the front pillow above did not come with these cute ties on BOTH sides...
It came like this (below). Since the pillowcases were such a bargain, I bought 3 extras (a total of 8). I used one of the extra pillows to cut off the solid colored side of the pillow with the ties and sew it to the end of another pillowcase to make a more symmetrical look for the front pillow.
And this is how it turned out:
I used the remainder of the cut pillowcase and the 2 extra pillowcases to place over pillows I already had to put by the window in our bedroom. The pillow covers came together nicely for just under $40.
Check out the clearance section of your favorite bedding store, you'll be surprised what you can find!!

New Shoes

Now that my baby is nearly one I've decided it's time to get back to running! So this last week I went to my favorite running store and purchased the updated model of my all-time favorite running shoes (Nike New Balance 759 trail-running shoes to be exact). I love them! Thank-you Nike New Balance for spoiling my feet with extreme comfort. Time to re-vamp the running mix on my iPod and make a running schedule - Half Marathon here I come!