Workshop!

So I hosted my very first workshop last week with Shalae!

I know kinda crazy, I have never hosted a workshop before. It was so much fun, not the best turnout, but other than that I had a blast! We had good company, great crafts and decent treats...could there be any better ingredients for a party?! I think not!

Here are a few pictures from that night!

 {Shalae demonstrating the make and take}

 {My lovely friends}

 {More demo-ing}

 {The snacks}

 {Visiting, stamping, eating}

 {My cute make and takes :) I had so much fun, and what cute Christmas tag ideas!}

Recipes..

I found this great recipe from Ina Garten on the Food Network, but of course I had to make it my own, so this is her recipe a little modified.
Ingredients:

• 1 rotisserie chicken, pulled apart
• 5 cups chicken stock
• 2 chicken bouillon cubes
• 12 tablespoons (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter
•  1/2 onion, chopped 
• 1 1/2 cups frozen small whole onions
• 2 tsp garlic minced
• 3/4 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/4 cup heavy cream
• 2 cups medium-diced carrots, blanched for 2 minutes
• 1 (10-ounce) package frozen peas (2 cups)
• 2 stalks of celery chopped
• 1 cup frozen corn
• 1/4-1/2 lemon, zested
• 1/2 cup minced fresh parsley leaves
• salt, pepper, cayenne

For the pastry:

• 3 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 cup vegetable shortening
• 1/4 pound cold unsalted butter, diced
• 1/2 to 2/3 cup ice water
• 1 egg beaten with 1 tablespoon water, for egg wash
• Flaked sea salt and cracked black pepper

Directions

PLEASE NOTE: if you are doing individual bowls and you want more crust and less filling, you will need to double the pastry.

For the pastry, mix the flour, salt, and baking powder in the bowl of a food processor fitted with a metal blade. Add the shortening and butter and mix quickly with your fingers until each piece is coated with flour. Pulse 10 times, or until the fat is the size of peas. With the motor running, add the ice water; process only enough to moisten the dough and have it just come together. Dump the dough out onto a floured board and knead quickly into a ball. Wrap the dough in plastic and allow it to rest in the refrigerator for 30 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.

In a small saucepan, heat the chicken stock and dissolve the bouillon cubes in the stock. In a large pot or Dutch oven, melt the butter and saute the onions over medium-low heat for 10 to 15 minutes, until translucent. Add the garlic and cook for a few minutes longer. Add the flour and cook over low heat, stirring constantly, for 2 minutes. Add the hot chicken stock to the sauce. Simmer over low heat for 1 more minute, stirring, until thick. Add 2 teaspoons salt, 1/2 teaspoon pepper, and heavy cream. Add the pulled chicken, carrots, peas, celery, corn, lemon zest and parsley. Mix well.

Divide the filling equally among (depending on size of dishes) 4-10 ovenproof bowls. Divide the dough into quarters and roll each piece into an 8-inch circle. Brush the outside edges of each bowl with the egg wash, then place the dough on top. Trim the circle to 1/2-inch larger than the top of the bowl. Crimp the dough to fold over the side, pressing it to make it stick. Brush the dough with egg wash and make 3 slits in the top. Sprinkle with sea salt and cracked pepper. Place on a baking sheet and bake for 1 hour, or until the top is golden brown and the filling is bubbling hot.

The Cheesy Artichoke dip:

I must give credit, where credit is due. My dear friend Mindy shared this recipe with me, it is super simple and super yummy! I actually like it better cold than hot, but thats just me :) FYI I used light everything, it tastes just as good and I don't feel as bad about eating the whole dish lol.

1c Mayo
1c sour cream
1c parmesan
1 8oz box cream cheese
2 cans artichoke hearts, quartered
2 cloves/tsp garlic minced 

cracked black pepper

onion powder

salt

cayenne pepper

bell pepper seasoning

Mix all ingredients together, add seasonings to taste. Pour into dish, sprinkle some Parmesan on top and bake at 350 for 45 minutes. 

Note: this is a basic recipe, have some fun and add some fun ingredients to it. Green chilis would be yummy, or jalapenos (jarred), roasted bell peppers, a tad of lemon, frozen spinach. Have fun with this :)

Questions anyone?

Advisory Board

What a fun dinner to cook. I spent a good amount of time doing the cakes, but it paid off, they were gorgeous and I even have a fun little video for you. The pictures say it all, so dive in!

 {Making the pot pies}

 {The finished cakes}

 {The cakes individually, first vanilla peach cream, chocolate chocolate, white chocolate raspberry}

 {The pot pies coming out of the oven}

 {The cheesy artichoke dip}

 {The finished pot pies}

 {The set table}

 {The inside of cakes}

{The cool video}

PS recipes soon to follow...

Weekend.

I know that I keep taking these long breaks from posting. But I promise I am coming up with fun and cute stuff to post! I just had a very fun weekend, we celebrated a good friends baby-on-the-way :) I gave her a "certificate" for her birthday for anything she is craving. She decided to cash in for soups for her shower, but she wanted to learn how to make them. We had such a fun time cutting vegetables together and sharing what I love to do. I then spent the rest of the weekend getting ready for an event for my mom. Get excited for that post :) It should be something fun, new and creative to show you what I did over the weekend.

I also have several holiday items I have done and thought of, now I just need time to finish or create them. I just wanted to pop in and say, "hello and Im still alive!" and that I will be back soon.

Garden Recipes!

OK, I think enough of you responded that it is worth it to post the recipes. It helps that after heating up the leftovers for my mom today she and my dad went nuts! They LOVED it. So here goes...

Watermelon Sorbet
1/4 c. Sugar
1/4 c. Water
6 c. watermelon, blended and strained (I used 1 1/2 mini watermelons, it gave me a half to do wedges with)
3 limes, juiced

Make a simple syrup with the water and sugar by dissolving the sugar in a saucepan with the water. Add to the watermelon juice and lime juice and follow your ice cream maker instructions. When it starts to set up, scoop into a bowl and enjoy with a little wedge of watermelon.


NOTE: I tried this recipe (plus an extra 1/4 cup of water) with 4-5 peaches today. It was good...but I think I should have strained the peach juice, it was a little, uhhh, pulpish?! We ended up pouring some almond milk over it and it tasted much better!

Stuffed Zucchini
2 large zucchinis
1 1/2-2 lbs hamburger
3 small tomatoes, diced
1/2 onion, diced
1/4-1/2 c. sweet vermouth, a fortified wine (I LOVE the Lejon brand, I use it for french onion soup...YuMmY!)

•       Definition: fortified wine These are wines that have been fortified with brandy and sometimes flavored with herbs, roots, peels, and spices.  The most popular examples are sherry, Madeira, Marsala, port, and vermouth.  Fortified wines are often used in cooking, or they're served as apéritifs or dessert wines. 

your favorite Italian herb combo, to taste
1/2-1 tsp garlic powder
1/2-1 tsp onion powder
salt, to taste
pepper, to taste
1/4 c. parmesan cheese
1/2 c mozzarella cheese (enough to top the zucchinis)


Slice the zucchinis long wise, scoop/scrape out the inside and reserve. In 2 separate pans cook the hamburger meat with the italian herbs, garlic powder, onion powder, salt and pepper. Let that cook down until browned and tastes good. In the other saute pan, (or in the same one, just set the meat in a bowl) add a little olive oil, the onions, tomatoes, and chopped zucchini centers. Saute down until soft, add salt and pepper to taste. Turn the heat to HIGH and add the wine and let it cook down and reduce till the liquid is almost gone, but before the mixture burns. Put the mixture in the bowl with the meat and mix. Add the parmesan cheese and mix till combined. Once combined, stuff the zucchinis (pack the filling in). Top with the mozzarella cheese and bake at 400 till the zucchini is heated through, about 20 minutes. Broil the cheese to get the browned look. ENJOY :)


NOTE: I know that was a lot of instructions, but it is actually really simple. I just didn't want you to get lost. You can substitute the ground beef with turkey, sausage, even tofurkey. Be creative and have fun. You can even use a grain for the stuffing, some quinoa would be great.


Questions??

Summer Fun...or Fall Fun?!

So last night I wanted to use our garden veggies in our dinner. I decided I would try something TOTALLY new :)

Presenting....stuffed zucchini and roasted potatoes!

 {My plate}

{After pulling them out of the oven. I was shocked that Jared actually ate the WHOLE zucchini, and LIKED it. Definite plus to sneak the veggies in there}

After dinner I had the Mia Maids (a group of young women ages 14 and 15 from our church) over at my house to carve watermelons. I went to costco and got their mini watermelons (2 for $5), I presented them this video and these pictures and then let them loose to create! It was so much fun to see what they created and to listen to their conversation. I would have posted pictures, but I figured I shouldn't since I didn't get their permission.

 {my first carved watermelon}

{The other leader, and friend, brought watermelon sorbet, so fitting right? I loved it so much I made it again today :) It was just as yummy}

I wish I would have thought of this activity earlier in the summer. This would have been the PERFECT summer activity, carve mini watermelons outside and then make sorbet!

So....if you want me to post the recipes, let me know. I will try to remember/write down what I did for the zucchini and I can easily copy the sorbet recipe. Let me know :)

Newest Additions to the Bridegan Home

For about a year now anytime anyone would come to my home (for those of you who have come to visit can probably confirm this) I have talked about how "someday" I want to have book shelves on either side of our TV lift. I feel like it is such a HUGE wall space that even with bookshelves its gonna look more wall than living room...boy was I wrong!!! You can probably guess what projects Jared had this weekend...BOOKSHELVES!!!

We have been looking at these bookshelves since Christmas time. We wanted something plain, but still enough character that it didn't look out of place next to the lift. These were a little smaller than what I envisioned at first, but compared to a set I liked from Ashley Furniture (over 600 when all was said and done) we decided that we weren't going to find a better deal or better shelves. I am so happy we finally bit the bullet :) Sooo...here goes the long awaited!

Here is the before...

Here is the after...

 And here is after we accessorized...(you may be asking your self...why is the second shelf empty on both sides? That is our next big purchase for the future, we want to get some speakers. Apparently our speakers are aiming down so the sound can travel somewhere...(I dont understand all the technicalities) and because our TV is in a lift all the sound goes down into the lift...so not very good sound traveling for us lol)

The accents are mainly from tai pan trading, it was so fun to go and get all this! The lady at the check stand was a little confuse at why we would need so much stuff. She asked if we had just moved into a new home...I laughed, because this has been a long year coming :)

All and all, with the super Saturday clean-a-thon, the new additions, and the Halloween stuff starting to come out (we didn't decorate for the 4th/Labor Day because we were out of town most of the summer) our house is feeling like a new home, and I have fallen in love with it all over again.