Archives for October 2010

Here’s a quick little number that you can totally pull out of your pantry {especially if you’ve already bought your Halloween candy} and your friends will marvel about your superstar treats. Whenever we go to a gathering, I am generally asked to bring a dessert — I guess that’s all I’m good for, huh?  I never get asked to bring a main dish — I like treats, ok?  Don’t judge me.  And because of my own craziness, I try to avoid repeats — so last week I found myself with 2 hours till departure time and still no treat.  I dug around my cupboards and came up with Butterfinger Fudge. 

You will need:

One pound of chocolate chips {equal to about 3 cups}

One 14 oz. can of sweetened condensed milk

4 tbsp of real butter {1/2 a stick}

One bag of fun size Butterfinger {or any other candy bar you like/have on hand}

To make Butterfinger Fudge:

{1}melt butter, chocolate chips and stir in condensed milk

{2} crush candy bars — I used about 15; you can do more or less

{3} remove from heat, stir in candy

{4} pour into 8 x8 glass dish.  Quick tip: criss cross two pieces of parchment paper, leaving ends to overlap sides of dish.  This makes it easy to pop the entire square of fudge out and cut into perfect little squares.

{5} chill.  One hour is probably a minimum, 2-3 is better.

Enjoy!  For some reason people think fudge is tricky — it’s not.  Razzle dazzle your friends and family.

{I took this picture with my phone — sorry.  But in real life, it looks gooooood.}

I like to have dinner for my family on the table at dinner time.  So I make dinner for them every night –  a whole meal, with a main course, with a salad and vegetables on the side and even dessert.  NOT (somewhere my husband is laughing).  Truth be told, I’m the queen of “it’s 5:30 so what can I wrassle out of the fridge that could pass off as dinner?”  Sometimes it’s eggs.  Sometimes it’s pancakes.  But I do have a few meals in my pocket that I can usually come up with from whatever I have at home, or would require only one or two items a the store.  A family favorite is fajitas.  And even better — these are the  laziest quickest fajitas you’ll find around.   You’ll see why I call them the “5-10 Fajitas”:

You will need:

•  Tortillas
• Green peppers, red peppers, yellow peppers — pick one or any combination, whatever you’ve got on hand
• Onions — purple or yellow, whatever you’ve got
• mushrooms — if your family likes ’em, if you have ’em
• A bag of pre-cooked and seasoned fajita meat – I buy this at Kroger in the area by the hot dogs and lunch meat

Your first 5 minutes:

• turn on your BBQ
• prep by tearing 2 large rectangles of tin foil and lay flat on your counter, spray with cooking spray
• slice up your veggies lengthwise
• toss all your veggies into one tin foil and close it up, envelope-style
• bust open that bag of pre-cooked fajita meat and put it  in your other tin foil, fold it up envelope-style

And then your 10 minutes:

• place both tin foil envelopes onto your BBQ
• call a friend, push your kids on the swing, look for ladybugs outside — however you want to kill the next 4 and 1/2 minutes
• if you want, turn the envelopes over once or twice in that time
• remove from BBQ — somewhere between 7 and 10 minutes is generally all it takes to heat the veggies and meat through (remember you are using pre-cooked meat, so it’s not a safety issue; you are simply re-heating now) 
• get out your tortillas, sour cream, salsa, cheese — whatever you like, whatever you’ve got!
• fill up your tortillas
• feed your family a delicious, healthy and homemade dinner!

Hope you like ’em — what can you come up with in 15 minutes or less? Seriously, leave a comment and tell me — I’m always on the hunt for great quick dinners.