Hot Chocolate Peppermint

I can't decorate without two things, Christmas music, and hot chocolate. 

I love hot chocolate super chocolatey with a hint of mint. 

 

Hot Chocolate Peppermint  

1 cup milk

2 tablespoons of semisweet chocolate chips (or more to taste)

1 tablespoon of sugar

1 candy cane

Can of whip cream

Combine milk, chocolate, and sugar in a small sauce pan and heat until chocolate melts smooth into the milk (I don't recommend bringing to a boil)

Poor into your favorite Christmas mug and spray on some whip cream. Stick in candy cane. 

Turn on your favorite Christmas tunes and enjoy!

And the Season Begins

So sorry for being absent. Life got a lil crazy there for a while...it still is, but I'm finally getting back to the blog world to wish you all a great start to the Christmas season! Mine has so far included Thanksgiving gluteny, Black Friday shopping (which went surprisingly well), and Christmas tree cutting. All being with my closest friend and family and topped off with some fabulous spiked eggnog.

FC Dallas Game with the Long Lost Cousin

My dad is one of four siblings each of whom have between three and five kids a piece.  This makes for a lot of cousins and babies to keep up with, and I have not done so well as I wish I could have.

Growing up we always came together at my grandparents' house for Thanksgiving and Christmas.  I've got great memories with all of us together, but it has been years now since I have seen most of them.

But a few weeks ago, one of my long lost cousins, Judy, decided she had had enough of not seeing anyone anymore!  So she invited me to a fund raiser she was throwing (it was a coffee tasting! Fabulous!) and together we discovered that we both had an interest in soccer, but no one to see the games with...until now!

This makes the third professional game I've been too in my life: Mavericks, Red Sox, and now FC Dallas! We had fantastic seats here, thanks to my cousin making a wise purchase, and the food wasn't half bad.

Embarrassingly, neither of us really knew the rules, so we would just cheer and boo with the more knowledgeable fans.

There were only about three dramatic knee injuries that cured themselves instantly once the medic came out...Perhaps he was a magician.

I've got another cousin adventure coming up and I'm way excited!  Not sure, but it may involve handlebar mustaches and a drum circle.

This Song Has Been Beaten to Death..But..

I know I know....If you here Radioactive one more time you might shoot someone in the face...But OMG!  I LOVE Lindsey Sterling, and she teamed up with a Pentatonix and made a freaking awesome cover!  The re-imagined sound that they give this song really brings back it's freshness, for me at least.  Check it out:

  I am a sucker for Sterling's work. Her talent blows my mind.

Feeling like Autumn

 For many places, the cool touch of Autumn has long begun.  Bu t in my space of the world, this is the first full week of temperatures below 75, and yes that is cold to us southerners.
This particular day had a nice cold high of a wet 68.  So, after slipping into some soft cotton pants, I made hot tea and sat to update my journal with my recent trip to Galveston and a few other tid bits that have been going on.

 And then, I just couldn't take it anymore!  I had to bake something!  My first thought was banana nut bread, but I was out of bananas...and nuts.  Looking around I found an over-ripe pear that was almost beyond eating, and I had an idea: I would modify my banana bread recipe for pear muffins.  Oh my!  they turned out beyond fabulous! The butter I used for the crumble top was a bit too melted, so it looks a bit odd in the picture, but the taste is still the same.

Pear Muffins, Small Batch:
1 very ripe pear, peeled and diced
1 egg
1/4 cup of butter
1/2 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 cup rice flour

Crumble Topping:
TB butter
TB brown sugar
TB rice flour

Preheat oven to 350
Mix together all the wet ingredients and smash up the pear a little bit.  Add sugar and mix well.  Add rice flour and mix well.  Pour into paper muffin cups in a tin muffin pan (should make about 5-6).
For topping: crumple butter, sugar, and flour together and sprinkle on top of muffins.
Bake about 40 minutes.

Stay cozy!

A Quick Journey Through Galveston

Where I work as staff for a community college, we get tons of vacation time, but no money...at least at my lowly position where I have nothing to do but play on the internet all day.

Thus, I don't get a chance to travel much.

But this occasion, I was offered a free night stay down in Houston to celebrate a friends birthday.  I was so there!!  I packed my car up and drove the four hours in the rain there, happy as a lark.  

Excluding the drive time, I had a little over 24 hours to spend with my fabulous friend, Daniela, and we spent the majority of that time down at the Seawall in Galveston, TX.  Thankful, though heavily overcast, it did not rained on us even once while we where out on the beach.

The beach down there really isn't bad at all.  The sand is not nearly as gorgeous as Destin Florida, but it is still fairly clean.  Both times I have been to visit have been in October, and the ocean has always been delightfully warm.

I have been to a few beaches, but this experience was a little special for me because this was the first time I had seen waves high enough for surfers.  It was so cool to watch people out on surf boards catching waves, but twice as fun to get chin deep in ocean water and have a big o'l wave hit you.  It probably wasn't the safest thing to do, and I probably shouldn't recommend it, but it was a blast.

Also down at the Seawall, there are a ton of fantastic local shops and eateries.  We didn't have much time to look around on this occasion, but we did check out the menu at Big Amos where they advertised burgers, shrimp, and ice cream.  It was $10 or less and smelled fantastic, but Daniela wanted something less greasy, so we went across the street to Jimmy's on the Pier.  The cost was a bit higher, but we split some delicious fish tacos and had a fabulous view of the ocean.

It was a fantastic quick getaway, and I am definitely going back the next excuse I get.

Rainy Days and Head Colds

It had been a while since it rained, so I was pretty happy for the chance to finally wear my rain boots again after months of drought. Sadly, months is not much of an exaggeration.
I got to work like a responsible adult only 10 minutes late with a fresh Starbucks beverage in hand...can you really blame me?  But rain or no, I had every intention of a productive day.
But then, out of no where, a sore throat happened swiftly accompanied by an unnaturally rapid draining of energy.  I was fading so quickly that my boss sent me home before I could infect anybody.
After a quick stop at the grocer for broth, I was home.  I've got to say, while a sore throat and miserably sluggish body are not much fun, there are few things better than laying on a stack of pillows, sip'n a hot toddy, and listening to the sound of a good rain.

It wasn't easy to move around, but I love homemade chicken noodle especially when I am sick. So as the weather was cooling and the rain continued outside, I made myself a big steaming pot of the stuff.

In case you get a case of the sniffles, here are the recipes to make the best of it.

Hot Toddy:
TB Honey
Shot of whisky (Southern Comfort is the BEST)
tsp lemon
cup of hot water
Mix everything together and don't feel guilty adding more honey or lemon to taste (easy there on the extra whisky)

Chicken Noodle:
1 cup of water
2/3 carton of chicken broth
3 to 4 carrots peeled and diced
1/2 cup of broccoli chopped
2 minced garlic cloves
2 large boneless skinless chick tenders cubed
1 cup of spiral noodles (I use rice noodles from Trader Joe's)
1/2 tsp of pepper
2 tsp salt (or to taste)
1 TB parsley
Put it all together in a big pot and bring to a bowl.  Once boiling, cook about 20 minutes, and serve hot.