Camp Out Trail Mix

April 13, 2019 Amanda Plott

This past week, my girl turned 9 years old! As part of her ‘birthday week’ of celebration she got to miss out on a couple days of school so that we could go with a few of her friends to a local kids resort. The theme of the resort is a lodge style camp setting. And since I’m always looking to take snacks to keep on hand during our trips, I decided to mix us up a batch of camping themed trial mix!

This trail mix is full of fun little bits that I tried to keep somewhat ‘healthified’. One of the first things I think about with camping is tents and firewood. So I used some bugle chips and pretzel sticks! After that I aded some fish and bears. I mean, hopefully you won’t see a bear while out camping, but bears are out in the woods so…

Spring Vegetable Crudités Plate

April 10, 2019 Amanda Plott

To go along with my Skinny Whipped Feta Dip from yesterday, I decided to make a beautiful plate of Spring veggies! The plate is half Spring inspired and half Mediterranean inspired to go along with the feta dip. Along with the other disable bits, there’s some olives and capers on the plate too.

The plate of Crudités starts off with the Skinny Whipped Feta Dip. Then there’s plenty of slices zucchini, salami, tomatoes, fresh mozzarella, berries, and of course… olives and capers! I’ve made my fair share of plates, trays, and other sorts of sharable appetizers before. But, I have to say that this Spring Vegetable Crudités Plate is well balanced and one of my new faves!…

Skinny Whipped Feta Dip

April 8, 2019 Amanda Plott

The weather here in Texas right now is all over the place. We’ve gone from near freezing, to sunny and 90 degrees, and on further to torrential downpours of rain all in the matter of a couple of days. I almost feel like I should be doing the reverse of a rain dance at this point. But, besides bringing in a plethora of allergens, the weather has left us with an immense amount of Spring flowers this season.

So, I’m pushing on with the Spring inspired recipes. And this Skinny Whipped Feta Dip is topping the charts. To go along with the Spring season, I picked up some Spring inspired essentials. Namely, fresh produce including zucchini, tomatoes, lemon, and dill!…

Lightened-Up Cookie Monster Brookie Cake

April 6, 2019 Amanda Plott

As it turns out… I have a cookie monster living in my house and she’s turning 9 years old tomorrow. Though maybe she’s more of a cake monster since she’s somehow managing to get three birthday cakes this year due to a series of fortunate events. Yes, FORTUNATE events.

Every ear for my daughter’s birthday, I make her something special that I can take up to her school at lunch and let her share with her friends. This time around she requested a cookie cake. Which… is what I made last year. And we can’t do the same thing over again. So! I decided to take that cookie cake a step further and make it into a BROOKIE cake. What’s a brookie, you ask? A brownie and a cookie combined together!…

Lightened Up Carrot Cake

March 27, 2019 Amanda Plott

I’ve made a good lot of carrot cakes in my time. Anywhere from traditional to gluten-free, and a few others along the way. There’s a few things I’ve learned in my carrot cake making journey. One is that you always ALWAYS need a good simple cream cheese frosting with it. And two is that it needs to be chunky.

I like my carrot cake loaded up with plenty of the good stuff. Carrots, raisins, pineapple, coconut, and yes… even nuts!

I based this ultimate carrot cake off of the one that I made for my daughter’s 2nd birthday. It’s an ingredient heavy cake, just like most carrots cakes are, but I promise you that the cake itself is rather easy to make. No overly complicated instructions…

Italian Lunch Box

March 21, 2019 Amanda Plott

I was sort of slightly tasked with coming up with some fun and easy lunch(able) ideas recently. It seems like breakfast is pretty easy, dinner is almost always planned, it’s lunch that most people seem to have the greatest trouble with. I know that if I make up a few little lunch boxes ahead of time, that I’m a lot more likely to eat those, rather than going without or eating something I really shouldn’t.

For me, I like light lunches. Snackable lunches. Something finger-friendly that I can nom on while working at my desk. Right? Well, this Italian Lunch Box is just that! I made four of these boxes up in the matter for just a few minutes and they’re full of fun little bits that are as versatile as they are delicious!…