Comments (23)

March 11, 2010 9:17 am

Sorry for being MIA yesterday.

It was an incredibly busy day!

Not only have I been super busy training my replacement at work (yes… you read that correctly), but it’s National Nutrition Month AND yesterday was National Registered Dietitian Day!!!

There were lots of festivities that I organized at work and these high fiber treats were part of it.

For our Nutrition table I contacted numerous vendors for donations.

I’m pretty sure we got close to a thousand sample of fiber one

Along with this sample, I created and printed out this recipe for people to make.

These bars include Fiber One cereal, marshmallows, dried fruit, and semi-sweet chocolate chips.

The best thing about these bars is they contain 12 grams of fiber each!

Ingredients:

• 1 bag marshmallows
• 3 tablespoons butter
• 5 cups Fiber One Cereal
• 1/2 cup dried fruit. I like to use either dates or dried cherries.
• 1/2 cup chopped almonds
• 2/3 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips.

Directions:

Spray 13×9 pan with non-stick cooking spray.

Melt butter in a large saucepan at medium low heat.

Add marshmallows to melted butter.

Keep heat at medium low. Continuously stir marshmallows until completely melted. Be careful not to burn marshmallows.

Take marshmallows off heat. Add in cereal, dried fruit, and almonds. Gently fold in chocolate. Be careful not to over mix.

Spread in pan, allow to cool completely, then cut into 12 squares.

Enjoy!

As far as my job goes… today is my last day. I’m so excited about my new endeavor. I’m working on a post for tomorrow to explain it all.
Have a wonderful Thursday

Comments (27)

March 9, 2010 9:53 am

I was talking to my brother on the phone the other night.

I told him I was making Irish Soda Bread for the first time.

The first thing out of his mouth was “Does this mean Tim’s gonna make you tamales for Cinco de Mayo?” LOL!!

My brother lives in Minneapolis, I live in DC, but both of us were born and raised in Texas.

Born in a Mexican American family… neither of us had heard of Irish Soda Bread until we got older.

I had never heard of it until I met my husband.

I always thought St. Patty’s day was just a day you wore something green so nobody would pinch you…

Tim and I started dating in January of 1999 (I know… I’m old). I was a senior in college then.

I remember that year St. Patrick’s Day fell on a Tuesday.

He ask me if I wanted to go the local pub and grab a beer with him.

All I was thinking to myself was “Why do we have to grab a beer just because it’s St. Patrick’s Day?”

I was so naive! I knew nothing!!

Tim is from New York… I’m from Texas… he’s Irish… I’m Mexican…

I felt like we grew up in different worlds.

For his family… St. Patty’s Day is one of the biggest holidays of the year!

For my family… we wore green so we wouldn’t get pinched at school

This recipe came from my Irish mother-in-law.

She grew up on this bread… her mom grew up on this bread… and Tim grew up on this bread.

So when Tim asked me to make him some Irish Soda Bread… I knew exactly who to go to for the recipe!

Ingredients:

• 1 cup raisins
• 3 cups flour
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp salt
• 1/4 cup sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 1/2 cups buttermilk
• 3 teaspoons melted butter

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Soak raisins in about 1 cup of water for 10 minutes to moisten.

Sift flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, and sugar together… set aside.

In a separate bowl, whisk together eggs, buttermilk, and melted butter. (Make sure melted butter has cooled a little… if its too hot, you’ll scramble the eggs.)

Combine the wet ingredients with the dry ingredients. Stir together with a wooden spoon. Drain the raisins and gently fold into dough.

You can use either a loaf pan of a round 9 inch cake pan. Spray with non-stick cooking spray. Spread dough evenly into pan.

Bake for about 1 hour 10 minutes, or until toothpick comes out clean.

Enjoy!

Comments (20)

March 8, 2010 8:08 am

Ok…. Don’t Judge.

I belong to this group of fantastic women. This group is a combo of stay at home and working mommies.

Each one of us lives within blocks of each other.

Here are the rules:

• We meet every Friday (except Holiday weekends) at 4pm.
• All mommies live in the same neighborhood so we can all walk.
• We rotate houses.
• The hosting mommy provides snacks and drinks for both the adults and the kiddos.
• The best part – The mommies attending do not have to bring a single thing. We work hard all week long and this is time to relax… kind of… we all know a mom is never off duty

Friday was my turn to host… I don’t know why, but my camera was really enjoying taking blurry pictures… so bear with me

.

Normally I would make my dips from scratch… but in typical Estela fashion… I didn’t plan… so I did the next best thing…

I went to Whole Foods and bought some tasty dips and the ingredients to make baked brie.

To go with the veggies I got some roasted veggie ranch dip. It was pretty tasty and surprisingly spicy!

If you haven’t gotten this dip… go buy some! This organic creamy spinach dip is a staple in my house!

Oh… and I got flowers… flowers make everything look pretty.

And a very blurry picture of smoked gouda. :~

What missing is the picture of my baked brie. I have a little story about that…

So I bought this great brie, cut it in half, and filled the middle with berry jam and toasted almonds.

I wrapped the entire brie with puffed pastry.

I put it in the oven at 4pm so it would be nice and hot when most of the mommies arrived.

Before I knew it… smoke was coming out of the oven… this is not a good thing when you have two toddlers and three 10 month olds in your house.

The cheese was oozing off the pan to the bottom of the oven causing the entire house to smoke up

Luckily my husband stepped in to help clean the oven and air out the house… Phew!

The baked brie was salvageable… but did not look pretty

Whole grain goldfish and Annie’s fruit snacks for the kids…

Booze for the mom’s…

Hydration for the kiddos….

Seven mom’s, three dads, and twelve children later… it looked like a tornado had hit my house….

It’s so worth it though to visit with all the mom’s, share stories, and most of all… see how happy the kids are to play with each other!

My baby girl slept for twelve hours that night!

Happy baby = happy mommy