Pasta Arrabiata

After a long day at the office, didn't feel much like cooking - but as there were no leftovers, had to make something... went for the easiest recipe - made some arrabiata sauce!! So easy and so tasty! Found this recipe at food.com - arrabiata-penne.

Tomatoes, onions, garlic...

Shared this with my dbf who enjoyed it... even though I put too many chili flakes!

This is a perfect dish when you have no food in the fridge!

Penne Arrabiata (my changes in red)

200-250 g penne pasta, dried (I used different pasta and didn't really measure!)

400 g cans chopped tomatoes (14 oz) (I used a 28oz can of diced tomatoes)
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 onions, chopped
1-2 garlic cloves, chopped
1/4 teaspoon chili flakes (added about a tablespoon... which was way too much!)
2-3 pinches basil, dried
salt and black pepper
1 pinch sugar (didn't add)
1/4 cup parmesan cheese, Grated (added low-fat mozzarella)
 
1 In a small saucepan, gently cook the onion and garlic in the olive oil until the onion has softened.
2 Add the chopped tomatoes with the juice, chilli flakes, basil and sugar.
3 Season with salt and pepper and simmer, stirring frequently for 25-30 minutes until its rendered to a nice thick sauce.
4 Cook the pasta in plenty of salted water until cooked 'al dente', and then drain the pasta.
5 Add the pasta to the sauce and mix in well. Serve with grated parmesan.
6 Add slightly more Chilli if a hotter flavour is required.

Blue and Yellow

I love these little blue flowers - wish I knew their names... so bad with names!! ;)

Love the petals of these!

and a sea of yellow... just because I love yellow!!  I also love that I caught a ladybird in the flowers!! :)

Cap St-Jacques

One of my favorite parks - Nature Park of Cap St-Jacques.  You can walk many miles, you can go swimming and you can also see some gardens and animals.

The path leading to the farm - love this path! 

Weeds everywhere - Love weeds!!

Some wild berries

A close-us of a weed

Pretty flowers

Cute little guy

Beautiful horse that didn't want to come to close - too bad!

The cat in the shoe...

My dear cat loves to lie down on our shoes... don't know why (doesn't look comfy at all!)...

Life's A Peach

Noticed yesterday that I had way too much fruit in the house.  Couldn't let them go to waste, so had to bake something!!  I had a choice of baking something with blueberries or with peaches.  As I had already baked some blueberry muffins the day before, decided to try my luck with some kind of peach dessert!

Wanted something easy and fast to prepare - found the perfect recipe - easiest-cake-ever!! But decided to make it with peaches like this!  It is soooo easy - perfect for a last minute dessert and you can make it with any fruit!! Can't wait to make it again with blueberries or strawberries!










Easiest Cake Ever (my changes in red)

1 cup flour
1 tsp baking powder
3/4 cup sugar (used a little less)
2 eggs
1/2 cup canola oil
1 tsp vanilla
1 peach, thinly sliced (used three ripe peaches)
1 tablespoon raw sugar

Preheat oven to 350F. In a large bowl, combine the flour, baking powder. Add in the sugar, eggs, vanilla and oil and mix to combine. Butter and flour an 8 or 9 inch cake pan and add in batter. Batter will be quite thick, so use a spoon to smooth out the top. Place peach slices on top of the batter, pressing them into the batter. Sprinkle with raw sugar. Bake for 50 minutes until a cake tester inserted comes out clean.

Chinatown Shopping at Lunch

Went for a quick walk in Chinatown at lunch time to get some stuff to make sushi soon - will be my first time trying and if you have any tips - would love to hear them!! ;)

It's interesting to see all the fruits and veggies on display - a lot of them I have no idea what they are!!! Any clue?

Doll Instant Noodle... ??

Not sure what this is - but it has a tingle flavor!

and some rice noodles (these I bought!)

Blueberry Lemon Love!

Yesterday had a family BBQ - it was great fun!! Lots of laughs, lots of food and lots of talking!! :)  My kind of day!! Nothing better than spending some time with people you LOVE!!

Of course, had to bring some baking gifts!! So went on a search for a light tasty muffin.  Was in the mood for something lemony and when I found these lanas' blueberry-lemon-muffins - I knew this would be yummy!!



Lemon and Blueberries are a match made in heaven!



You bake the muffins, brush some melted butter and dunk in a mix of sugar and lemon zest... mmmm!






Blueberry Lemon Muffins (my changes in red)

2 2/3 cups all-purpose flour
1 tblsp. baking soda
1 ½ tsp. salt
½ cup sugar (used a little less)
2 eggs
1 cup whole milk (used low fat)
2/3 cup cooking oil (used Canola)
1 ½ cups blueberries (used 1 cup fresh and 1 cup frozen)
2 tsp. lemon zest, divided (think I used way more than that!! Zested 2 lemons)
4 tblsp. butter, melted
½ cup sugar (used about 1/4 cup)
 
Preheat your oven to 400 degrees (used 350F) and grease the cups of a 12-cup muffin tin with butter (was lazy - used Pam).

In a mixing bowl, sift the flour and then add the remaining dry ingredients. Stir to combine and set aside. In a small bowl, whisk the eggs lightly. Add the milk and cooking oil and stir together. (didn't sift)

Make a well in the flour mixture and pour all of the milk and egg mixture into the well.
 
Stir as little as possible to moisten the flour. Set the batter aside to rest for a minute. 
 
In another small bowl, combine the blueberries and 1 ½ teaspoons of the lemon zest. A microplane zester makes really quick and easy work of the zesting.
 
Fold the blueberries and lemon zest into the batter with a large spatula. Stir very gently and only enough to fully mix in the berries.

Spoon the batter into the prepared muffin tin. Bake the muffins on a rack in the middle position of the oven for 20 minutes or until they are golden brown on top. Removemuffins from the oven and let them sit while you prepare the topping.

Melt the butter in a small pan. Put the sugar and remaining ½ tsp. lemon zest in a small bowl. Mix the sugar and lemon zest together well.

Run a knife around the edges of each muffin. Remove muffins from the tin one at a time.

Brush the top of each muffin with melted butter and then dip it in the sugar and lemon zest mixture.
 
Place muffins on a rack to cool completely.  

 

The Taste of Doughnut in a Muffin!!

Haven't had a doughnut in years... do enjoy a doughnut but would rather have a piece of cake or a muffin than a doughnut!!   Had made a recipe of doughnut muffin a long time ago and decided to make it again and see if I would enjoy it as much!! Decided to use up some of my homemade microwave blueberry jam and make these cinnamon-doughnut-muffins again.  Glad I did!!  They are healthy doughnuts!!







The sweetness of the blueberry jam was wonderful in these!!



Cinnamon Doughnut Muffins (from Taste of Home)

1 3/4 cups flour

1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
3/4 cup sugar (used a little less)
1/2 cup vegetable oil (used Canola oil)
1 egg, lightly beaten
3/4 cup low-fat milk
jam (used blueberry jam)

Toppping (used half of the recipe)

1/4 cup butter, melted
1/2 cup sugar
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
 
In a large bowl, combine flour, baking powder, salt, nutmeg and cinnamon.
In a small bowl, combine sugar, oil, egg and milk; stir into dry ingredients just until moistened.
Fill greased or paper-lined muffin cups half full; place 1 teaspoon jam on top. Cover jam with enough batter to fill muffin cups three-fourths full.
Bake at 350F for 20-25 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.
Place melted butter in a small bowl; combine sugar and cinnamon in another bowl.
Immediately after removing muffins from the oven, dip tops in butter, then in cinnamon sugar.
 
Makes 10 big muffins or 12 smaller ones!

Would totally sit under this tree!!

This field would be perfect for a cozy picnic!!

Confession...

Yes, I bake a lot. I love baking. But as my dbf does not eat much sweets, I give a lot of the stuff I bake at the office or to my family.  I also have a bite... or two... which adds up :(

I decided to start Weight Watchers again - it's a very slow process.  Started almost 20 weeks ago and only lost 10 pounds.  But that's OK.  I am hoping to lose another 5-10 but we will see.  Decided to start baking some low-fat or WW desserts and see if they are any good!!  But I will continue to bake the regular stuff too!! :)

Made Ww 2 Points - Frosted Banana Bread Muffins - they are delicious little muffins - only mistake I made is to make them on Sunday and when I brought them to the office on Monday... the frosting had melted and was all over the muffins!! :)

They are so cute!!

Here's the recipe:

Ww 2 Points - Frosted Banana Bread Muffins (think I got the recipe from WW last year...)

3 tablespoons vegetable oil (used canola)
3/4 cup unpacked brown sugar
4 medium bananas or bananas, mashed (used 3 large)
2 teaspoons lemon peel, grated (added a bit more than that - love lemon!)
1 large egg
1 large egg white
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon table salt
1/2 cup buttermilk (used low-fat milk and lemon)
1/2 cup golden seedless raisins
1/2 cup powdered sugar
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
 
Preheat oven to 350ºF.
Coat 24 mini muffin tins with cooking spray.
Blend together oil and brown sugar.
Beat in bananas, lemon zest, egg and egg white.
In a separate bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, cinnamon and salt.
Gently stir half the flour mixture into banana mixture; stir in buttermilk, remaining flour mixture and raisins.
Divide batter among muffin pans.
Bake until a toothpick inserted into center comes out clean, about 10 to 12 minutes.
Let cool in pans for 10 minutes before inverting onto a rack to cool completely.
To make frosting, blend powdered sugar and lemon juice together.
Drizzle over cooled muffins.

My new friends...

Went for a little drive a couple of weekends ago - had to stop for car troubles near a farm and made some new friends!!

We "almost" witnessed a birth!! We missed it by a couple of seconds!! It was so sweet to see this little calf being cleaned by its mother!! 

We were being checked out too by the family!

We stayed and talked to the farmer and saw this little one try to stand up a couple of times.  So cool!

Awwww - love!