Summer Meal Plan

Head on over to amotherworld.com for an easy 2 week meal {dinner} plan that you can print off and follow. Meals range from burgers to pastas to fancy grilled tenderloins, all of them easy and quick!

Sour Cream Chocolate Chip Muffins

I crave chocolate chip muffins almost daily. I can't go to Tim Horton's without getting one. They're so good. Soft and fluffy with just the right amount of chocolate chips. I have been searching for a good chocolate chip muffin recipe for years. They usually end up being too heavy, dry, oily, sweet or tasteless. Then along came Pinterest (which really should be renamed TimeSuckage.com) and my search was over.

The picture drew me in, and the recipe just seemed to make sense, so I gave them a try. These muffins are light and fluffy, buttery and not too sweet. In a word, perfect. I've already made them twice this week (they go fast!) and I'm sure they'll be a regular in our school morning breakfast routine.

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Sour Cream Chocolate Chip Muffins from Taste of Home

1-1/2 cups all-purpose flour
2/3 cup sugar
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 egg
1 cup sour cream
5 tablespoons butter, melted
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3/4 cup semisweet chocolate chips (I used mini chips)

Instructions:

1. In a large bowl, combine the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
2. In a separate bowl, ombine the egg, sour cream, butter and vanilla.
3. Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients just until moistened.
4. Fold in chocolate chips.
5. Fill greased or paper-lined muffin cups three-fourths full.
6. Bake at 350° for 18-20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted near the center comes out clean.

Cool for 5 minutes before removing from pan to a wire rack. Yield: 1 dozen.

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BlogHer'11!

The wonderful people over at Mom Central Canada are sending me to BlogHer'11 in San Diego next week. For those of you who are wondering what BlogHer is, it's a conference for bloggers (mainly for women but a few men attend too). There are sessions on writing, photography, how to use various social media platforms, etc... and at night, a whole lot of networking and socializing. Okay, I can't lie, there's a whole lot of partying too!

Personally, I'm really looking forward to attending some of the writing sessions and learning how to use some of the social media and statistics platforms (I can't read my Google Analytics!). I'm also looking forward to meeting some of the people I talk to every day, and have become friends with on Twitter and Facebook.

I hope to come back armed with tons of new knowledge and use it to make TBMOTB even better! In the meantime I'm trying to figure out what to pack (gotta look purdy) and make some easy meals for the husband to pull out of the freezer and make for him and the kids.

When you travel, how do you prepare for your spouse/significant other/babysitter to make things easier for them?

Chex Mex Munch

Celiac disease, which is an intolerance to Gluten, affects more than 330,000 Canadians. More than 73,000 of those that suffer are children. While I'm very fortunate that no one in my house struggles with this, I have friends that do. From talking to them I understand how frustrating it has been in the past to find gluten-free foods that taste great, are easily attainable to the general public, and don't cost a small fortune.

When I learned that General Mills Canada (GMC) was going to start offering Gluten Free Rice Chex and Gluten Free Honey Nut Chex I was so excited! You can get them in any grocery store (I live in the middle of nowhere and our little grocery store has them!) and they cost the same as any other cereal. GMC sent me a box to try and I have to say, they taste exactly like regular Chex. For families that have to deal with the daily reality of cutting out gluten (it's in everything! I can't even imagine how vigilant a parent has to be) having a product like Gluten Free Chex that they don't have to worry about, and that kids love to eat, must be such a relief.

I'm the only real "bowl of cereal" eater at my house so I wanted to try using my GF Chex in a recipe or two so my family would try them. First I made Muddy Buddies, GF Chex mixed with chocolate, peanut butter, butter and icing sugar... hello! They were so good they disappeared before I could take pictures! But my husband is more of a savoury than sweet guy so I knew I'd have to come up with something for him. I took GF Rice Chex, butter, Old El Paso Taco seasoning, seasoned salt and mixed nuts and baked them until everything was toasty. What a yummy muchy snack! And on a hot, sunny patio, nothing goes better with a Corona.

Check out lifemadedelicious.ca for more great Gluten Free recipes using Gluten Free Chex!

Chex Mex Munch

4 c Gluten Free Rice Chex

1/4 c butter or margarine, melted

3 tbsp Old el Paso Taco Seasoning

2 tsp seasoned salt

1 c mixed nuts (I used a premium blend that had cashews, Brazil nuts, pecans, hazelnuts and almonds)

Instructions:

1. Mix the cereal and nuts together in a bowl.

2. Pour the melted butter over top and mix to coat.

3. Sprinkle on the taco seasoning and salt and mix again until evenly coated.

4. Spread out on a cookie sheet and bake at 350˚F for 15 minutes until toasted.

5. Allow to cool and serve.

please see my disclosure page for information on my Life Made Delicious Partnership.

And the winner of the Summer Prize Pack is...

Comment #8

Congratulations Laurie! You win the Summer Prize Pack featuring products from General Mills!

Summer Prize Pack includes:

Barbecue Utensil Set
Paper Plates
Colourful Napkins
General Mills goodies from:
    Old El Paso
    Cheerios (including NEW Chocolate Cheerios!)
    Fibre 1
    Betty Crocker
    Nature Valley

Your prize pack is on it's way!

Amanda

please see my disclosure page for information on my Life Made Delicious Partnership.