Chocolate Bourbon Pecan Pie
Happy Pi Day! For those of you unfamiliar with Pi day, it is the celebration of Pi (3.14) that takes place every year on March 14th (3/14). I absolutely love to make different types of pie every year for Pi day, and this year is no exception. Check out last year’s savory pie: White Cheddar Macaroni Pie!This year’s pie is a chocolate bourbon pecan pie. Even though bourbon is an American spirit, I wanted to start paying tribute to St Patrick’s Day a little early. There isn’t very much bourbon in this recipe so it mostly just provides a slight flavor to contrast the pecans and chocolate.I don’t typically make homemade pie crusts for any of my pies. This recipe is no different. It calls for a premade pie crust as the base. However, you can make your own if that is something you prefer to do. I just don’t really feel like I get enough of a taste payoff for the amount of effort a handmade pie crust takes.[amd-yrecipe-recipe:179]Source: Food and Wine
Soup is a staple in our house during the cold winter months. I’ve been stuck in a proverbial soup rut though, making the exact same rotation of soups for the last month or two. I decided to break out of this rut by making a hearty chicken noodle soup.This soup is wonderful. It is chock full of veggies, chicken and spices. Alex even complimented the combination of spices in this dish. This soup is also very easy to make and will take you no time at all if you’ve already cooked the chicken. I like to make a little extra chicken in my crockpot whenever I have a dish like this coming up, then have the chicken on hand to just throw in the recipe.[amd-yrecipe-recipe:178]Source: Adapted from 
Every once in a while Alex and I start talking about making a certain dish and it takes us forever to get around to actually make it. This is one of those dishes. We’ve been talking about making it work several months, I even had the cashews hidden away in the pantry (we both LOVE cashews and would have eaten them quickly) but I still just never found the time to actually sit down and make this recipe. Well I finally had time and this recipe is better than we even expected!While this is easy to make you’ll need some interesting ingredients that you might not typically have on hand. This is also a gluten free recipe! You just need to make sure that the oyster sauce you have is gluten free. You can easily search online and find out which brands offer gluten free options.[amd-yrecipe-recipe:177]Source: Adapted from 
So I was looking to do something slightly different for a pizza night and this is what I came up with! I don’t have any specific recipe suggestions for pizza dough, simply use whatever you prefer. If you wanted to include some sort of meat on this pizza both chicken and Italian sausage would complement it very well.The 
Oven roasted garlic is one of the easiest things you can possibly make. You can use it in so many different recipes. I’ve used this recipe for roasted garlic to add flavor to hummus, dips and to use on a white sauce pizza! Come back tomorrow for a recipe using this garlic!Alex and I love the flavor of the finished product. It also smells amazing while you’re cooking it. I guarantee you’ll be salivating while it finishes cooking.[amd-yrecipe-recipe:175]
A couple of years ago I tried making Sloppy Joes for Alex and he absolutely hated them. I decided to try and come up with a Sloppy Joe recipe that Alex would actually like. When I served this to Alex he said “These aren’t sloppy joes. I don’t know what they are, it’s more like chili. Yeah! Chili you can put on a sandwich. Sandwich chili! That’s what you have to call it.”This dish received high marks from Alex. It is really on the spicy side so if you’re not a spicy person you’ll want to make a couple of substitutions. I would suggest using whatever salsa you have on hand that is your favorite. We have several flavors on hand so I’ve combined two different heat levels in order to get the best flavor combination for our tastes.You can serve this dish on either bread or tortillas. You could also spread it over tortilla chips for a different type of dish. I would suggest pairing it with some cheddar cheese if you’d really like a treat.[amd-yrecipe-recipe:174]
I wanted to make a special treat for my Mother in Law so knowing how much she loves a caramel and chocolate combination I decided a chocolate caramel cookie was in order. I had found some Kraft Caramel bits at Aldi around Christmas and I thought this would be the ideal recipe to use them in.I created this 
Tell me if this has ever happened to you: your husband has made a wonderful breakfast, he’s made cinnamon rolls, scrambled eggs and bacon. He even goes so far as to ask you before he uses all the eggs if you’ll need any of them since it’s a giant snow storm outside and everything is closed. You tell him you don’t need any eggs and its fine if he uses all of them.However, later that night you just need a nice pan of brownies to finish off the amazing snow day you’ve had. You put everything in the bowl and go to add an egg…there’s nothing there. All the eggs were used that morning! Yeah, that happened to us the other day. So I went online and tried to figure out a solution to my problem.This worked incredibly well. I personally couldn’t notice a difference in texture, Alex said he could, but I think he was just imagining things. As a disclaimer, I did use this substitute in a gluten free box mix of brownies. From the outcome I had though, I assume it will work in just about any recipe. If you’re baking gluten free though, you’re going to need to add a few additional tablespoons of liquid to the recipe in order to get the right consistency.[amd-yrecipe-recipe:172]
I made a giant ham back over Christmas and Alex decided to use the leftover ham bone to make a soup. He told me that his parents would make this all the time when he was younger and he really enjoyed their recipe. So he decided to look up a recipe and make a few changes of his own, and this is the result.You do need to prep this soup ahead of time since it sits in the crock pot for a while. I would suggest prepping the ingredients the night before so you can easily assemble everything the next day. This soup is best when served with a nice loaf of crusty bread with butter.[amd-yrecipe-recipe:171]Source: Adapted from 
I’ve been trying to clean out the freezer and get rid of or eat anything we’ve had in there for a while. I still had two salmon fillets from the last time I made salmon so I decided to try another recipe. As I’m sure you’ve gathered by now if you follow the blog, Alex really loves spicy foods, so I decided a spicy salmon was in order.The blend of spices I tried in this recipe is definitely pretty spicy. If you’re not a huge fan of spicy dishes you’ll want to adapt it to what your taste buds enjoy. This recipe also cooks very easily with very little clean up since the foil you just toss away. If you’re looking for a quick dinner this is definitely one.[amd-yrecipe-recipe:170]Source: Adapted from 
I love making new soups for Alex to try. He really enjoys a good hearty soup in the winter so I try and make one every week. I’ve been looking for new recipes and came across this one. I thought Alex would absolutely love it since it contains ground beef, beans and spices.This is a VERY easy recipe to make. You simply put everything in a crockpot and let it stew for several hours. I suggest cooking this soup on low so the flavors have more time to blend together. However, if you’re pressed for time you can cut the cook time in half by cooking it on high.Alex absolutely loved this soup. He said it was like a taco in a bowl. He chose to have it with crushed tortilla chips and shredded cheddar on top. You could also include a little sour cream on top if you’d like to add a little bit of creaminess. Overall, if you like tacos and soup you should totally try this recipe. You won’t regret it![amd-yrecipe-recipe:169]Source: Adapted from 
I had an open jar of ricotta cheese in my fridge from the 
Yesterday I posted some School Spirit cupcakes I had made. I thought I would give you my thoughts on working with the Wilton Sugar Sheets. I wanted to be able to create fully edible cupcake decorations and I thought these sugar sheets would be the perfect way to this.However, I found these sheets incredibly difficult to work with. Alex had to get me his X-Acto knife to cut them. After doing additional research, it seems you need to have a specific Wilton cutter in order to slice them nicely.
I also found that they had gone slightly soft a few hours after I had put them on the cupcakes. I didn’t really feel like they should have done that so quickly after I had put them on. Overall I probably won’t use these again in the future unless I have a lot of time to spare to create the toppers and I can put them on right before they are served.Overall I probably won't use these again since I can probably make better decorations from hand. I also prefer to use fruit, candied and fresh or other natural cupcake toppers instead. I would probably try to make something out of fondant before I used these sheets again.
Sometimes you just need an easy dinner you can put in the crockpot and let sit and cook all day long. This is a great recipe you can do that with. Depending on how many people you need to feed you can change amounts you include. I personally make about 1lb of roast with two or three potatoes and lots of carrots. This can easily be changed depending on the amount you are feeding.The combination of herbs is what we prefer on a roast, however, you can change or substitute things depending on your personal preference. Alex loves it when I include some ground cayenne pepper and chili pepper. This makes for a spicier version rather than the savory version below.[amd-yrecipe-recipe:167]
This soup was a surprise hit at my house! I had been searching for some new soups to broaden our horizons and came across this one. Baked potatoes are one of my favorite things to eat so I thought a soup version of it would be worth trying. I thoroughly enjoyed this soup. It tastes like the middle of a baked potato.Alex liked the base of this recipe too but he had a few suggestions for making this better. He thought adding ham chunks would make the soup a little more hearty. He also thought adding more pepper, both black and white would give the soup a bigger flavor. These suggestions are completely optional. I really loved the basic recipe below and don’t think it needs many changes.[amd-yrecipe-recipe:166]Source: Adapted from 
This recipe has been a favorite of mine for many years. It is one that my Mom would make while I was growing up and that I still continue to make. Funny story, I haven’t ruined many recipes in my time cooking, but this is the one I have the most trouble with. When adding the garlic salt you need to have a light hand, and there has been a couple of times when I’ve accidently added too much! So be careful, doing this will absolutely ruin the recipe.If you eat gluten free you can simply substitute gluten free spaghetti or penne noodles into the recipe. Either will work and the recipe is then gluten free! The chicken is also optional. I personally like to serve it on the side so people can add as much chicken as they like on their individual plates.[amd-yrecipe-recipe:165]
I love experimenting with kale, quinoa and sweet potatoes. There are just so many different ways you can prepare them! And almost all of them are super tasty. This recipe is no exception. I’ve used a lot of fresh herbs which lends the recipe a brighter quality. While you certainly don’t need to use fresh herbs, I highly suggest it if you happen to have them on hand.This dish is very much on the savory side. I personally love the combination of thyme and nutmeg in a dish together. However, Alex doesn’t like nutmeg at all so this wasn’t his favorite dish in the world. Since this dish has both quinoa and sweet potato it is very hearty. If you would like a lighter dish you can leave one of them out.[amd-yrecipe-recipe:164]
Alex specially requested that I make a ham for his birthday dinner. I’ve never made a ham before so I decided to try an Old Fashioned style ham. He was very happy with the end result. This is a great recipe for a large gathering or any time you really want to impress guests.This recipe is for a very sweet ham. If you don’t prefer your meat on the sweeter side this probably isn’t the right recipe for you. I personally love sweet ham so I found this to be a great recipe. Alex prefers slightly saltier ham but he still liked this recipe when finished.
Personally, I’ve used a roaster and a cooking bag for this particular recipe. I find using these things get the ham cooked nicely and it doesn’t take up additional space in my oven. If you decide not to use a roaster or don’t happen to have one on hand simply follow the directions on your ham in order to cook and then follow the last few directions here to glaze.[amd-yrecipe-recipe:163]
This is a recipe I absolutely love! It is from my Mother in Law and every time she makes it I just can’t get enough. Not only is this recipe easy to make it is also super variable depending on what flavors you use. I’ve included my personal favorites in the recipe below but you can use whatever you like.My mother in law likes to use the cranberry sierra mist and strawberry concentrate. I haven’t been able to find that exact juice concentrate around here so I typically just purchase the fruit punch. If you prefer a citrus punch you could use orange juice concentrate and regular Sierra Mist or 7 Up. It really just depends on what your local grocery stocks and what your flavor preferences are.[amd-yrecipe-recipe:162]