Coconut Date Balls

I have been wanting to make these for a long time because I like Lara Bars (really expensive) and the recipe I found is kind of similar.  Cliff bought me a food processor for my B-day and we have really put it to good use.  This is a great healthy snack and maybe it can substitute for my dessert sometimes!  I am sure you could add your variations to the recipe, next time I am going to add chocolate chips (I was pretty bummed when I realized I forgot to do that this time around-how could I do that?).  Anyways, you have got to try these.  I even did a breakdown of some of the nutritional stats to see if it was the kind of snack that keeps you full!  If you are having them as a snack you would probably want to have 2 or 3 and put a little peanut butter on them for extra staying power.  Hope you enjoy them as much as I do.

 My favorite way to eat these is with a smear of peanut butter (homemade peanut butter)

 

 Before I made the coconut date balls, I made homemade peanut butter, so I left about this much in my food processor before I made the date balls because I wanted to peanut butter flavor (plus it saved me from washing my food processor twice)

 These are the dates I used.  I used 14 and cut them like so

 This looks really weird but I wanted to show you what it looked like when I stopped my food processor.  If you wanted a little more texture you could process them less

I did toasted coconut for some and left the others plain, I like both.

 Enjoy!

Coconut Date Balls
1 cup rolled oats
2/3 cup dried coconut, plus a little extra for rolling
1/2 cup sunflower seeds
12-14 pitted dates, chopped
2 Tbsp. peanut butter
1 tsp vanilla
2 Tbsp. orange juice or zest of one orange (I used orange juice because we had it on hand)
1/4 cup water (may or may not use all of it)

Place oats, coconut, sunflower seeds, dates, and peanut butter in your food processor.  Turn on and as the ingredients start to break down and come together add your vanilla and orange juice.  Gradually add water until it all starts to stick together.  Mine started for form a ball and it probably only took 2 minutes.  The pictures should help.  Roll into balls and then roll in toasted coconut (you could also roll in oats, crushed pretzels, cocoa powder, you name it).  You might try it with more peanut butter or mini chocolate chips too!  Have fun with it!
Makes 17 balls and here are the stats for 1 ball:  
Approx Calories:  93  Fiber: 1.6   Protein: 2.5  Sugar: 5 (this is mostly natural found in dates, but a little came from the sweetened coconut, you could use unsweetened if you want)
*Adapted slightly from Daily Garnish

Family

Here is a little bit of our time with Cliff's parents!  They came to visit us for Labor Day weekend and we have a fun, relaxing time.  By the way, I started reading The Hunger Games and got totally hooked, so I read a lot while they were here!!  Cliff and me watched the movie this weekend, it was weird because so much is different.  I like the books more, but also appreciate the movie.  Back to the family!

 Brent found an awesome hiking stick before we hit the trail

 What a fun family:)

 I really like these bushes

 Okay we ordered nachos and asked them to sub waffle fries for chips...I know GENIOUS!

 I have been craving a lot of pancakes lately

 So good

 Big Monday morning breakfast, this is what you do when you have the day off from work.

 I made taco salad one night.

 Chicken, black beans, pico de gallo, guacamole, cheese, sour cream, salsa, lettuce!

 Have also been eating a lot of watermelon

 Mom this is how I cut it

 Great for lunches

Guess that about wraps it up.  Hope everyone is having a good day.

Steak Steak Steak

I don't know about you but when we cook steak we usually have leftovers.  Don't get me wrong, we enjoy the steak but usually it comes in a pack of 3 or 4.  I am always thinking up new ways to eat the leftovers.  Today was one of my favorites.  Steak, egg, potato and cheese scramble with skillet biscuits.

 I wanted it again for dinner honestly

 The key is to chop your leftover steak really small, I used my food processor and pulsed it until it looked like this.  I warmed it a little, then added my eggs (6 so we could have leftovers).  When the eggs were set I added my cooked potatoes and cheese.

 With my leftover homemade biscuits.  I skilleted them and topped with apricot jelly!  YUM

Okay you are going to think we eat steak a lot...but actually I just have not posted at all lately.  We have had steak a couple times in the past few weeks (because family has been in town).  Another way I used the leftovers was for Philly Cheesesteak Sandwiches.

 Saute bell peppers and onion in a skillet over medium high heat.  As they get tender add thinly sliced leftover steak.

 Serve on a bun with provolone cheese.  I also made my oven zucchini fries.

 So yummy!

This is what it looks like when we have steak right off the grill.  I love these oven fries.  I just sliced my potatoes lengthwise, tossed in oil, and baked at 425 for about 30 minutes, flipping halfway through.

Hope you like the ideas, sorry I haven't posted much lately.  I have been so busy.  I plan to post at least once a week, maybe more!

Homemade Biscuits

For our wedding one of my Mom's good friends, Judy made me a cookbook with her favorite recipes in it.  It was one of my favorite gifts because I love to cook.  She is a country girl, so I trust her recipes to be tasty and hearty!  Today I tried her biscuit recipe and believe it is the recipe I will use from now on.  Hope you like them as much as we did.

 Yummy!  I used a little wheat flour and I really liked the texture.

 This is what it should look like after you cut in the shortening

 After you add buttermilk and stir it should look like this.  At this point you can knead it 5-10 times until it comes together in a soft ball of dough

 Lightly flour a surface and roll out the dough

 Looks like this and you are ready to cut!

 

 I used a cup and dipped the rim in flour before hand

 We had eggs and bacon with ours

Butter and apricot jelly and you are all set.

Judy's Biscuits (I followed her recipe, but this is the recipe cut in half and it makes 8 biscuits)
2 1/2 cups flour (I used 1/2 cup wheat flour but know they won't rise as high if you do that)
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
3/4 tsp. baking soda
1/4 cup sugar
1 tsp. quick rising yeast plus 1/4 cup warm water to dissolve the yeast in)
1 cup buttermilk (or 1 cup milk mixed with 1 Tbsp vinegar)
1/2 cup shortening

Dissolve yeast in warm water.  Mix dry ingredients.  Cut in shortening (I like to use a pastry cutter).  It should look like little pea sized clumps of shortening mixed with the dry stuff.  Stir in buttermilk and yeast mixture.  Stir until just combined, nou may need to add more flour at this point.  You just want it to come together in a soft dough.  Knead 5-10 times and form a ball.  Flatten it out until it is about 1/2 inch thick and cut your biscuits.  Bake at 350 for 20 minutes (on parchment for easy removal).

Enjoy.  I know there are not a lot of tips/details, but you can find easy tips and how-to's online.  I watched a video a while back to learn how to handle biscuit dough, you do not want to over-work it! 

P.S. These are really good reheated on a skillet with a little butter.  If you want a sweet treat add biscoff to them:)