Peanut butter oatmeal breakfast bars

I got home from work last Friday without any plans, and when I saw this recipe by Emily from Sweet to the Soul, baking sounded like the perfect thing to do with my Friday evening.

I've now made these breakfast bars twice, and both times they were great!  I didn't have any dark chocolate chunks either time, so I used semi-sweet chocolate chips instead.

The second time I made this recipe, I decided to try a mashed banana instead of the applesauce to add some banana-y flavor to the already great combination of peanut butter and chocolate.  The blending of the three flavors is awesome.  And if you haven't had a peanut butter and Nutella sandwich with slices of banana in between, you should go try that right now.  It's great, as are these cookies, I mean, breakfast bars!

Yogurt or Cream Cheese Frosting Filled Strawberries

The other day ChocolateCoveredKatie posted a very simple recipe for Yogurt Filled Strawberries that would be great for a dorm room!  This recipe only requires a few ingredients and tools and is very quick to make.


Tools:
knife
plastic bag
scissors

First, I set out all of my ingredients.  I decided to try both yogurt and some leftover cream cheese frosting as fillings and cocoa powder and cinnamon as toppings.

Then I washed the strawberries.  I like doing this by soaking them in a bowl of water, but you can just as easily rinse them under running water.

A new pasta recipe!

I have now finished my junior year!  This past semester was difficult for me (for non-school related reasons), and I have to say I'm glad it's over.  School-wise I'm doing well and am so happy that I find myself in a major that is great for me!  One of my personal goals for this past semester was to make more of my own food / try new recipes.  That didn't happen as much as I had hoped.  (Nor did posting on this blog.)  Now that summer is here once again, I am going to try to post and make new recipes more often!


Here is one recipe that I made up this past semester that turned out great!  I love pasta, so I searched online for some new recipes, and then combined some of the ideas I found.  I was still living in a dorm, so my requirements for a recipe reflect that.  It must only contain spices I have or would use often enough that I will buy them, only require simply ingredients and preparation, and only require ingredients that I can buy in quantities small enough that I can use all of what I buy in the dish or in something else easy before it goes bad.  For example, when I bought spinach for this recipe, I used the leftovers on sandwiches or in salads along with the tomatoes and feta cheese.

LDOC and Explosions

Happy LDOC!  LDOC = Last Day Of Classes (for the semester), in case you were curious.  Actually, LDOC was a few days ago, but with college schedules differing so much, perhaps it is someone's LDOC.

And now it's time for a story.  Let's set the stage.  My roommate and I have bunked our beds together and the ladder that I use is next to our mini-fridge.  We use the space (about 2.5 ft high) under my roommate's bed for storage.  The floor is cleared in the space in front of the mini-fridge except for my roommate's bag containing holiday gift bags, etc. and some expired orange juice and an expired individual serving of chocolate milk that had been removed to make more space in the fridge.

I was studying for finals and reclining on the couch, facing the fridge.  I could not see the floor due to the armrest.  So there I was, minding my own business, and something explodes.  My first thought was that it was a party popper or something that my roommate had that just went off randomly.  It even threw things, maybe confetti, in the air!  And that's kind of cool and exciting.  

But the truth was neither cool nor exciting.  I stood up to find the once full chocolate milk bottle leaning on its side above a puddle of soured milk.  The souring milk had released enough gas to build up enough pressure in the plastic bottle for the bottom to pop outwards and the cap to fly off.  The "confetti" had been drops and chunks of milk.  Yuck!

So instead of continuing to study, I rushed to move things out from under the bed, where a significant amount of the milk was.  Then I was faced with cleaning up the rest of the mess.  While spilled milk might not be something to cry over, exploded soured milk might be.  Phew, the smell of it!  Even after soaking it all up and taking everything to the dumpster outside, the whole room smelled awful.  So I wiped the area down with some lemon scented wipes, which masked the smell some, but left our floor very sticky.  After about a day I wiped down the area again with just water to remove the stickiness and any remaining weird combination of smells.  Overall, wouldn't it have been much better to just take the expired milk to the dumpster in the first place?  Oh yes, a thousand times yes.

Updates and Pumpkin Baked Oatmeal (Boatmeal)

Sometimes when reading a post on a blog that I haven't read much or at all before, I'll check out the author's "About" section.  And sometimes even after reading only a few posts, I can tell that it hasn't been updated for a while.  The poor, neglected "About" section.  And what about us new readers?  But don't worry, if I can tell that the section might be a bit off, it's probably because the content of the posts is really rich.  So I just move on and read more posts. :)

And even though I've noticed things like this, somehow I let my "About" section become outdated.  However, there is not really much there.  But hey, I'm a junior now, not a sophomore, so I guess that's exciting. :)  Okay, and now for something much more interesting: Boatmeal!

This is another great (and easy!) recipe from Chocolate Covered Katie.  Baked Oatmeal = Boatmeal.  Since it is now definitely fall, I decided I wanted to make something with pumpkin in it, and this was a really easy way to do so.  I increased the size of the recipe (and the ingredients proportionally) and made my boatmeal in a 2-cup class container.  When I got back to my dorm room, I shared it with two of my friends.  I had bought a pack of about 10 small single-serving vanilla ice creams, so we each had the perfect amount of ice cream to go along with the pumpkin boatmeal.  Delicious!

Food plans for the week of 9/9/13

Once again, here are my lunch plans for the coming week.  I did not eat very many frozen meals last week due to attending many welcome events for different clubs offering free pizza and/or other food.  Thus, I still would like to have some more containers and freezer space before I make anything too serious.  Last week I did make some squash (with basil and garlic, yum!), so I will eat the remaining portions of it sometime this week.  Once again, breakfasts will be fairly simple.



Every day: Options of dried apricots, cranberries, veggie chips, applesauce, peaches, etc.


M:
lunch: salad using leftover tomato, cucumber, and greens from last week

Food plans for the week of 8/26/13

Once again, here are my lunch plans for the coming week.  I did not eat very many frozen meals last week due to attending many welcome events for different clubs offering free pizza and/or other food.  Thus, I still would like to have some more containers and freezer space before I make anything to serious.  Last week I did make some squash (with basil and garlic, yum!), so I will eat the remaining portions of it sometime this week.  Once again, breakfasts will be fairly simple.



Every day: Options of dried apricots, cranberries, veggie chips, applesauce, peaches, etc.


M:
lunch: salad using leftover tomato, cucumber, and greens from last week

FDOC, getting into classes, and how to make an awkward salad

Happy FDOC (First Day of Classes)!

Here's a quick note/reminder that if you really want to get in to a class, but it is full, attend the first class and then go talk to the professor/TA teaching it afterward.  One of my friends asked today about a class that he had been hoping to get in, starting, "Hi, I'm currently on the wait list...", to which the instructor responded, "Not anymore you aren't!  Let me get your name and student number, and I'll make sure that you are added."  Awesome-sauce!  It's not always this easy, but sometimes it is.  And it never hurts to try.  :)

And here is how to make an awkward salad.  I was super excited about my cucumber, tomato, and feta cheese salad.

First cut the cucumber and add it to your salad bowl.  I used half of a cucumber. 

Food plans for the week of 8/19/13

I moved back to college!  And now that I am living in a dorm again, I'm dealing with the challenges of cooking and eating in a dorm.  I thought it could be helpful to see how I prepare for making food for the coming week.  (And it is helpful for me to consolidate my plans in one place.)  This week I will just show what I'm doing for lunch, as it will require more work than breakfast or dinner this week.  (I brought a lot of frozen meals from home, so I will be eating those for dinner some this week.  I need the container and freezer space before I can make more food.  Other than that I will eat out with friends for dinner. For breakfast I will probably have fruit of some kind (applesauce or peaches, probably) and a bagel or some toast.  Oh, or I could have some oatmeal or dry cereal.)  Also, I'm more flexible about when I eat what than the schedule might imply, but by scheduling my meals, I can make sure I get enough food (but not too much) from the grocery store this weekend.



Every day: Options of dried apricots, cranberries, veggie chips, etc.

Monday:
-Tasks: Slice tomato and keep 2-3 slices.  Dice the rest.  Store in container(s).
-Eat: Sandwich - lunch meat and cheese, sliced tomato, and mustard

Restaurant to dorm?

Today I went out to lunch with a good friend, and we went to a crêpe place.  Yum!  It was so good.  We both ended up creating our own crêpes, though their listed options looked really good, too.  I ordered mine with chicken, feta cheese, avocado, spinach, tomato, and olive oil and balsamic vinegar.  It was really good!  And it felt kind of healthy.  So as we were finishing our food, I thought that this would be really nice to have in college.

Now that I'm home from work, I'm thinking about how this would work out.  I obviously can't make crêpes in my dorm.  (Okay, I guess I've made crêpes at home before.  But still, it would require too much time.)  I could try to make a sandwich with these ingredients.  And I could substitute sliced chicken or turkey for the cubes of chicken that I had today.  Or, I could make a kind of salad in proportions similar to those in the crêpe today.  Oh, and I could add cucumber and/or onion.   Mmm.  That sounds good.

Doing the math...on meal plans

Figuring out what meal plan to get or whether to have a meal plan at all can be a little tricky, especially if you have never had a meal plan before.  As I mentioned in a previous post, when I looked at my meal plan and other food expenses after the fall of my sophomore year, I decided to drop the meal plan altogether.

To evaluate everything, I wanted to figure out exactly how much I was spending on different things.  I double-checked the cost of the meal plan online and then looked through credit card bills to see how much I was eating out and buying groceries.

(Note that food costs will be different for different people.  Costs can be affected by the region in which you live.  Costs will also depend on what types of food you buy.  For example, buying organic foods will cost a lot more than Ramen.)

For the fall of 2012, I spent approximately $1240 on food.  The actual amount was slightly higher, as I took some groceries from home.  The $1240 was divided up approximately as:
Groceries: ~$280
Eating out on or off campus: ~$260
Dining Hall: ~$700 (I got the "Block 120" meal plan, which cost $1128, but then swiped in a friend for meals for which he repaid me.  We agreed upon this at the beginning of the semester, as I knew I wouldn't eat 120 meals in the dining hall.)

Homemade Hotpockets

I found these sometime during last semester and had been looking forward to trying them.  Within the past two weeks, I've made these twice.  They are easy to make and turn out wonderfully!  They aren't quite dorm friendly.  If I did decide to make them during the school year, I could go ahead and measure (and maybe mix) the dry ingredients.  All I would have to add would be yeast and water.  Another option would be to make and then roll out the dough and freeze it.  Then all I would have to do is thaw them and add ingredients for the filling.

Below is the recipe for the dough, which I found at ABeautifulRuckus.com.  The fillings that I suggest are combinations that I've already tried.  Feel free to suggest new ideas!


Dough:
Ingredients:
3 cups flour
1/4 cup dry milk
1/4 cup sugar
1 tsp salt
2 1/2 Tbsp yeast
1 cup warm water (not hot)
extra flour for helping the dough not stick when you roll it out

Homemade Peanut Butter Bars

I found this recipe for peanut butter protein bars on Chocolate Covered Katie's blog and it sounded wonderful.  It has only a few ingredients and very simple directions.  I was looking for something like a granola bar, not a protein bar.  Also, I don't have any special protein powder.  So instead I replaced the protein powder with chocolate-flavored Carnation Instant Breakfast.  I haven't put the full recipe on this page per Chocolate Covered Katie's request, but here is the recipe and below are pictures and notes about my experience making these yummy peanut butter bars.  Next time I make them, I will try covering them or mixing in them mini chocolate chips and/or crushed pretzels.


Tools:
-two bowl
-spoon(s)
-knife
-gallon-sized plastic bag
-rolling pin (optional, as you could flatten it with your hands...or a textbook)
-1/4 and 1/2 cups
-1/4 teaspoon
-1 tablespoon

I first gathered the necessary ingredients and tools.

Tomato Basil Chicken

This is a recipe that I really enjoyed at home and decided to try to make in my dorm.  It requires relatively few ingredients and is very simple to assemble.  I changed the recipe a bit to make it simpler for fewer servings; initially, it would have yielded about 6 servings.


When I made this, I used 3 2-cup glass containers so that I could have maximum flexibility about when I ate each portion and whether I froze any portions.  I bought two chicken breasts and cut them both into two pieces: one 2/3 of the chicken breast and the other the remaining 1/3.  Then two of the bowls contained one piece of chicken and the last bowl contained two smaller pieces.  This worked out great for me; each was just the size I needed for a good portion.

The ingredients required of this dish also work well for life in the dorm because they are either used up or easily used in other dishes.  Basil and garlic are probably my most used spices.  The leftover tomato can provide extra slices for sandwiches or something else.  And finally, the remaining mozzarella sticks make for a great snack; this is what they were sold for in the first place.

Candy Graduation Caps

My brother just graduated, and my mom and I had been working together to make some food and decorations for his joint graduation party.  As you can tell from the title, this recipe is for candy graduation caps, which turned out very nicely.  My mom had the recipe, which we then adapted to be peanut free, as one of the graduates has a peanut allergy.


Below is my picture guide of the process and at the end of this post is the full recipe.  My brother's school's colors were royal blue and white, so we found the closest thing we could to royal blue for the buttons and tassels.  And since I am at home and was working with other people, we used more tools than absolutely necessary.  That said, these could still be somewhat difficult to make in a dorm due to the lack of counter space and lack of fridge/freezer space.

Strawberry Cream Cheese Rolls

One weekend I thought it would be nice to make a special brunch-like meal.  I googled different things that I thought I would be in the mood for, and ended up with a recipe found on this site.  It looked great!  It only required a few ingredients, and those were items that I could use for other meals.  It was a very simple recipe.  And so I made them.  And they did not lead to a nice brunch.  This was due to a couple of important problems.

Problem 1:  Brunch did not happen until after lunch time.  I had gotten up early to make these, but was waiting on a friend to come over and eat them with me before I put them in the oven.  Suddenly, it was afternoon and I had eaten nothing all day and I was not happy for it.

Problem 2:  The pasteries did not get done in the middle.  The oven was too warm, so the outside crust got a nice golden brown look to it while the middle remained gooey and uncooked.

Final result:  I was too hungry for this very sweet and thus overwhelming pastry, and the gooey middle had to remain uneaten (or maybe I ate some of it and that contributed to not feeling well).

Fixes:  Make sure this isn't the only thing you are eating on an empty stomach unless you tolerate very sweet things in large quantity well.  The oven needs to be cooler than mine was.  I don't know if this means that the recipe needs to be changed or that my oven just runs hot.  But next time I will reduce the temperature just in case and cook them for longer.

Fancy Sandwiches, part 2

Another way that I dress up an otherwise boring meat and cheese sandwich is by adding other healthy things, such as eggs or sliced tomato or avocado.  By adding these things I feel like an otherwise small sandwich can turn into a healthy, filling meal.

At the start of the week, I can slice a tomato and store it in a plastic container in the fridge to use a slice or two every day throughout the week.  Avocados are harder to keep, as they turn brown soon after being sliced.  Therefore using an avocado is better when you are making sandwiches for you and a friend or two.  Another option would be to make some guacamole from the leftover avocado.  The lime or lemon juice in the guacamole helps the avocado stay fresh for longer.

Eggs are one of the easiest things to make in a dorm room.  All you need is a microwave safe bowl or mug and a fork (for scrambled eggs).  Crack the egg into your bowl or mug.  Whisk it with the fork.  Microwave until done.  Microwave times vary a lot based on the microwave (wimpy dorm one vs. high powered one) and how many eggs you use.  The egg will expand a lot as it is microwaved.  Just make sure that it is no longer runny, especially in the middle.

My sandwich: pepper-crusted turkey, tomato, egg, onion, green pepper
My meat of the week this week was pepper-crusted turkey.  I had also purchased a tomato for the week.  The onion and green pepper I had bough for another recipe, so I used some to make this sandwich seem even more delicious.

Microwave egg with green pepper and onion.  Add egg, turkey, and tomato to your bread.

And enjoy!

What are your favorite additions to a sandwich?

Fancy Sandwiches, part 1

Having a sandwich for lunch is wonderful.  It is simple and quick and can even be healthy.  But with only one person eating meat and cheese, I have the same meat and cheese all week.  So if I got roast beef and cheddar at the store the previous weekend, I eat that for lunch most days of the week.  But that can get boring very quickly.  So how can you change a boring sandwich into an exciting one?  Go fancy!

Find a different meat or cheese:
In addition to switching up the normal meats and cheese, you can find less normal toppings.  For example, at the grocery store I found small strips of chicken already cooked.  (They were called "short cuts" or something like that.)  They came in different seasoning, but I just got the plain ones.

Add seasonings:
Also, you can add your own seasonings to a sandwich.  Who said you could only add spices to elaborate dishes?  Not me!

My sandwich: toasted Oatnut bread, chicken strips, shredded cheddar cheese, basil, and garlic
Even though I'm home for the summer, I decided to make something simple that I could eat in my dorm room.  And since I couldn't find some of the spices at home, I dug through my college things and found my box of spices.


Assemble cheese and chicken, then sprinkle with spices.

Microwave until cheese is melted.

Enjoy!

Chicken Tetrazzini...a work in progress

When I want to make a meal at college, one of the post important things for me is that the recipe not contain very many ingredients and only those ingredients whose leftovers I will use in another recipe.  My mom is awesome and sent me to back to school with some frozen meals and some frozen chicken that she had previously cooked and shredded into bite-size pieces.  So when I realized that I had chicken and some spaghetti, I wanted to make chicken tetrazzini.  And as any good college student who doesn't remember something does, I googled it!  I compared 5-10 recipes and reduced them to as few ingredients and trouble as possible.  Also, I have yet to perfect the proportions of each ingredient.  That means that this isn't the most wonderful dish and certainly isn't your grandmother's well-known recipe, but it does still make a decent meal.  Give it a try and let me know what you think!

To have or not to have...a meal plan

During Christmas break of my sophomore year, I decided to reevaluate my meal plan.  Actually, I reevaluate my meal plan after each semester.  But during this evaluation, I decided to get rid of my meal plan all together.  My decision was based on what made the most sense financially and on my desire to make my own meals in my dorm more often.

So my advice is to take a good look at the different meal plan options.  One benefit of a meal plan is that your food costs are already covered at the beginning of the semester.  You are also guaranteed a variety of options of meat, veggies, fruit, etc. that would be hard to generate on your own.  Additionally, eating at a dining hall is great for meeting with friends or making new friends.  When I was a freshman, all of my friends had meal plans, and a group of us would go to dinner together almost every night.

On the downside, meals at the dining hall are generally more expensive than if one were to cook for themselves or eat out at somewhere like Noodles and Company or Qdoba.  Many people feel a certain security in having a meal plan with a guaranteed number of meals, but then fail to eat at the dining hall enough.  And when I decided to drop the meal plan, there was no problem for me with using a payment method other than my dining hall card.

For me it came down to a few factors.  I did not have as many friends with meal plans this year.  Also, I enjoyed cooking on my own when I had the chance.  Even when I was on the meal plan, I wasn't eating at the dining hall often enough to make it worth it.

What's your dining hall story?