A Little Chocolate Drizzle Goes a Long Way

Today I want to share my “most famous” cookie recipe with you.  It’s a simple oatmeal cookie, but the trick is a white chocolate drizzle on top. It really makes the cookies look nice, and adds that extra sweetness many people look for in an oatmeal cookie.

This recipe is the result  of  baking in an almost bare college apartment kitchen. Throughout college, eggs, vanilla, cinnamon, flour, sugar, and oats were all staples in my kitchen. All were ingredients that I used for quick meals or to whip up an easy batch of cookies or something else sweet. In addition to these ingredients, I happened to have leftover white chocolate bars and Craisins from a different recipe I had recently tried.

Some of you may notice that this recipe is a version of Quaker’s Vanishing Oatmeal Raisin Cookies, but the cookies are so delicious that they deserved their own name: Oatmeal Cranizzles.

Thank you Quaker for inspiration and delicious, wholesome oat products.

Quick, Easy, Delicious Spinach and Artichoke Dip

Do you love to indulge in a delicious, cheesy dip from time to time?  If so, you’ve come to the right place. This spinach and artichoke dip is the most amazing, possibly addicting, thing you’ll ever eat.

So delicious. This batch was cooked perfectly; see how the cheese is slightly brown on top?

Things I Owe You, Beloved Reader

‘Ello there. My weekly postings have not been forgotten. I have a bunch up my sleeve. Some even partially written… I know I failed to post last week, but I will double up, maybe triple up… WHO KNOWS?!?!

Start looking forward to posts about the following:
-Quick, easy, DELICIOUS spinach and artichoke dip
-Experimenting with a banana bread recipe
-Long hair–the good times and the bad
-Beatles cover bands
-The wonders of puppyhood

And many more… my brain certainly wanders to interesting places. Stay tuned!

You may say I’m a dreamer, but did you know I dream of muffins?

Dreams are one of the many wonders of life, and I dream often. Sometimes my dreams feel very meaningful, other times they are ridiculous. About a week ago, I dreamt of muffins.

The dream muffins weren’t your average muffins; they were large blueberry muffins with mini lemon muffins in the middle. The idea was to bake mini lemon muffins and then place them in a larger muffin pan surrounded by blueberry muffin batter.

Changes

Life… scratches head thinking of a non-cliché description—is a good cut of beef. You throw it on the grill, anticipating a supper of deliciously tender, juicy steak, a baked potato and corn on the cob, but when the steak is finally done cooking, you reach in the fridge for butter and discover the fixings for a salad. At this time, a steak salad sounds much better than your planned dinner. So, you wrap up the potato,  slice your steak and put together an absolutely mouth-watering salad. Salad and corn on the cob—not what you were expecting, yet tasty, tasty, TASTY. Yes… that’s exactly life.

Changes come and throw you for a loop, and now that my terribly forced metaphor has served its purpose, I have some important news. This site will undergo some major changes starting immediately. Prepare yourself for a better, bolder, more magnificent, mega-impressive site.

Woo!

Skip retail; work in a restaurant!

“Sun is shining… weather is sweet… makes me wanna move and find a summer job?” No, no, no. That’s not how that song goes, but for those of you without a full or part-time job, you probably aren’t thinking of summer vacation at this moment. As the weather gets warmer, the job market tightens. Now is the time to apply for a part-time job, and I’d like to take a moment to scream “GET IN THE RESTAURANT BUSINESS!”

If you’re looking for your first job, or simply something new, apply to restaurants. As a 16-year old looking for a job, I remember applying to anywhere that would give me an application. I walked through the mall filling out applications in every retail store I could find, drove to offices in town, and grabbed applications from every restaurant my family ever dined at. I was eventually hired at a local restaurant as a host. I didn’t know it then, but this was one of the best first jobs anyone could take.

Perplexed about Spandex

Hello folks.  I’m still here, alive and writing. I’m embarrassed that it’s been so long since I’ve posted. During my disappearance, I was interning with a company called BunchBite. As a marketing intern, I often contributed to the company blog. You can read my posts at BunchBite Blog. I was not the only person posting on the blog; everything I posted has my name on it. My internship with BunchBite is over and I am now hoping to move on to bigger and better things.

In the meantime I am working a part-time job and spending spare time picking up a variety of habits. One of which is going to the gym.

A gym membership provides much more than the incentive to regularly exercise. I feel that I have an entirely new outlook on the world thanks to my membership. A fitness center breeds its own customs and traditions. As a casual sociologist (more commonly referred to as “people watcher”) I find it fascinating to study life in this culture. One thing that intrigues me is the use of spandex.