Minestrone Soup Recipe

Hey everyone!

With the fall season approaching quickly, it's been getting pretty cold and dark outside lately. All the ladies in my family have been getting sick so I decided to whip out one of my favorite recipes to warm us up and hopefully make us feel better. This minestrone soup recipe comes from Evelyn Raab's "Clueless in the Kitchen - A Cookbook for Teens".

You're going to need: 

1/4 cup olive or vegetable oil

2 medium onions, chopped (I just throw them in a food processor for about 15 seconds)

2 cloves garlic, squished

1 carrot, sliced (baby carrots are fine too)

2 stalks celery, sliced

1 28oz can tomatoes, broken up (I used diced tomatoes)

4 cups water

1/2 cup of any small pasta 

1 cup sliced green beans

2 small zucchini, sliced

3 cups raw spinach, shredded

1 19oz can kidney, or other, beans (I used white beans since I had them)

I would suggest you cut up all the veggies before you even start because it will make the process a lot easier and faster. If you aren't experienced with cutting vegetables, there are tons of tutorials out there for just about every vegetable known to man, so don't sweat it. 

To start off, heat up your oil in a large pot and sauté your onions and garlic until it's nice and soft. This should take about 5 minutes. 

Make sure to stir them around a little bit just to make sure you get them all. Next, add your carrots, celery, tomatoes with all of their juices, and all of the water. 

Add in your celery and carrots

Add in your tomatoes and water

Bring this all to a boil over a medium heat. Reduce the heat, cover it up, and let it simmer for about 40 minutes. I used this time to clean up my disaster of a kitchen and watch youtube videos. Just set a timer on your phone and do whatever you want. 

When your time is up, add your pasta and green beans. I used the rotini noodles since they were the smallest I had and ended up using frozen green beans. Let this cook for ten minutes.

Finally, add the zucchini, spinach and canned beans. The recipe doesn't say anything about draining the beans so I just threw it all in. It says to have this cook for another 10-20 minutes. I was hungry, so I just did the 10 minute option and everything was cooked perfectly. 

Now, I personally think the recipe alone is lacking a little spice. If you want to kick it up a notch, I suggest adding garlic powder, onion powder, worcestershire sauce, lots of pepper, and a little bit of liquid smoke. This is completely optional, of course. 

Another optional, but recommended, step is to serve with parmesan cheese! It melts over the top and gives a nice extra flavor and texture. 

Enjoy and stay warm!

Natalie 

Jam Sweethearts Cookie Recipe

Good evening! 

Tonight I decided to make some more cookies for the Seahawks game day tomorrow. These ones do take quite a bit of time and are hands on, so if you do make them, make sure you have a good chunk of time! This recipe comes from the "Mom and Me" cookbook by Annabel Karmel. 

For the actual dough, you will need: 

2 1/2 cups of flour

3/4 cup of superfine sugar (I used normal granulated sugar, I don't think it makes a difference)

2 sticks/8 oz soft butter, diced

1 large egg yolk (if you don't know how to do this, there are youtube videos)

2 tsp vanilla extract 

1/2 tsp salt 

First, beat the butter and the sugar in a bowl until it's creamy. Add your egg yolk and vanilla extract until you have a smooth consistency. Add the flour and salt and beat until the dough is smooth again. 

Your dough should look something like this.

Next, scoop your dough out onto a square of saran wrap and form it into a ball. The recipe says to refrigerate it for 30 minutes, but I would suggest maybe 45 because it warms back fairly quickly and makes using a rolling pin difficult. 

Refrigerated dough 😎

Once you've taken your dough out of the fridge, preheat your oven to 350F and get your rolling pin out. On a lightly floured cutting board, roll the dough out until it's about 1/4" thick. My dough did NOT work with the rolling pin so I used my hands, which works just fine if you don't have one! 

To cut your cookies out, you're going to need one 2 1/2" cookie cutter and one teeny little heart cookie cutter (the tiny heart is optional).  Once you've got them all cut out, place them on a greased cookie sheet. 

Circle cookies

Heart cookies

You're only going to put hearts on HALF of your dough circles and these will go on the top of the cookie sandwich. I was able to make 3 dozen total circles, which gave me 18 cookie sandwiches. The recipe says to bake them for 12 minutes, but check them after 10 minutes just in case. 

Baked!

While they're baking, you're going to want to make the frosting that goes on the bottom cookie in the sandwich. For this, you'll need:

4 tbsp softened butter

1 cup powdered sugar

A few drops of vanilla extract

1 tsp water 

Make the frosting by beating your butter in a mixer and gradually adding the powdered sugar. Then add your vanilla extract. Check the consistency at this point before you add the water because I added too much and had to go back and fix it. 

Wait until your cookies are completely cooled before you put the frosting on or else it will melt! Then add a small spoonful of whatever jam/jelly you want (I used strawberry) and make your cookie sandwich. In the end, you'll be left with something like this: 

For a little something extra you can dust powdered sugar across the top. Enjoy!

Natalie

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies

Hello, everyone!

Yesterday, I made a batch of snicker doodles that tasted pretty good, but I messed up on softening the butter so they weren't too pretty. They're already gone, so I decided to make another batch of cookies today. I was inspired by a YouTube video to do a peanut butter and chocolate cookie, so I pulled out a cookbook and found the perfect recipe.

This recipe is called "Official Peanut Butter Cookies" and comes from Evelyn Raab's "Clueless in the Kitchen - A Cookbook for Teens". 

For this recipe, you'll need 

1/2 cup butter/margarine 

1/2 cup peanut butter (I used Adam's chunky peanut butter, it's my favorite)

1/2 cup white sugar

1/2 cup brown sugar

1 egg

1 1/4 cup flour (white or whole wheat)

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 cup chocolate chips (optional, but recommended)
This recipe makes about 3 1/2 dozen cookies.

First, you want to preheat your oven to 375F. The recipe says to line some cookie sheets with aluminum foil, but I just greased mine and it worked out fine. 

In a mixing bowl, use an electric mixer to beat the butter, peanut butter, white and brown sugars, and egg until it's smooth and creamy. 

Add in the flour, baking soda, and baking powder until you have a smooth consistency.

Next, the recipe says to roll the dough by hand into 1-inch balls. I used a 1-inch cookie scoop  and it worked just fine. You're going to want to place your balls of dough about two inches apart. 

Like any classic peanut butter cookie, you're going to use a fork to make the criss-cross pattern on top and flatten your cookies out. The dough is sticky and will stick to your fork, so I suggest greasing it with a cooking spray. 

If you decide to go the chocolate chip route, press 3-4 chocolate chips into the tops of your cookie dough. I love chocolate, so I used 5 chocolate chips. Rules are meant for breaking. 

Once your done, pop those cookies in the oven for 10-12 minutes. Mine went in the oven for 10 minutes and turned out perfectly! 

After they're done cooling and you remove them from the baking sheet, you'll be left with something like this:

They're a great mix between crispy and chewy. The peanut butter flavor isn't overwhelming and the chocolate adds a nice touch of extra sweetness. I think the crunchy peanut butter works really well because you get little peanut chunks mixed in there too! 

If you do make these, enjoy! And make sure to check out the "Clueless in the Kitchen" cookbook. Especially if you don't have a lot of kitchen experience. There's some really good mix of recipes! 

Natalie 

Welcome to my blog!

Hello!

My name is Natalie. I'm 18 and live with my family near Seattle, WA. I recently graduated high school as a running start student and will be spending this year finishing my AA degree. I have a German shepherd named Zaida, a cat named Hot Dog, two beta fish, and a leopard gecko named Sully who lives on my dresser. 

In my spare time I enjoy reading, watching movies/TV, cooking/baking, and working out! I've been practicing Tae Kwon Do since fourth grade and I'm currently a red belt working toward a high red belt. 

On this blog, you will find posts such as food I make, OOTD's (outfits of the day), possibly make up looks, and just things I do during the week. I look forward to making more posts and I hope you enjoy reading them!

Natalie