Beautiful dinner! This is grilled chicken with pasta in a tomato cream sauce along with some (burnt) asparagus. Mike loves this stuff and it's a recipe I consider a dish for "company" since it tastes sooo good and looks pretty impressive. Also, it's really cheap and easy to make. Don't believe me? Try it yourself! Amanda over at kevinandamanda.com has done a terrific job explaining step by step how to bust this out. Go here to see the recipe:

http://www.kevinandamanda.com/recipes/dinner/grilled-chicken-pasta-in-a-tomato-cream-sauce.html

I have made a few lazy girl and helpful modifications:

1. Any time I make chicken, I always let it sit in milk and lemon juice for at least a half hour. Ideally, I would do this before I go to work (or for 2-4 hours) but I never remember so I usually stick the chicken in a ziploc, pour milk and lemon juice over it and stick it in the fridge while I prepare other stuff for the recipe. The reason for this is that the milk and lemon juice (a quick and dirty sub for buttermilk) breaks down the proteins in the chicken and makes it more tender and also, for scientific reasons unknown to me, makes it sooo much more juicy.

2. I have made this recipe both with fresh basil and parsley and with dried basil. Both turned out great. If you don't have fresh basil on hand, dried works fine, you just feel less fancy.

3. If I am not using fresh herbs, I use "italian style" tomato sauce instead of plain.

4. Today, I didn't have tomato SAUCE but tomato PASTE. I just mixed it with 1 cup of water and it was fine but you DO need to add a little sugar otherwise it tastes a little bit bitter. Just pour it in a little at a time and taste it until you think it tastes good. Probably just a teaspoon or two.

Try this recipe, you will love it!!!

St. Patrick's Day Mini Cupcakes! Yummm!

A little baby cuppy cake!!!
HAPPY ST. PATRICK'S DAY, EVERYBODY!!! I made these little beauties last night to bring to work today and EVERYONE loved them. The recipe is super easy - it's just a box of white cake mix with a few additives.

Prepare the cake mix as it says on the box (I swap the oil for applesauce) and then ADD the following:

1 small box instant vanilla pudding

1/2 cup sour cream

(Oh yeah, LOTS of green food coloring)

These cupcakes will turn out to be the fluffiest most delicious things you have ever tasted! Tell everyone you made it from scratch.

Clinique Haul!!! Hooray!!!

Boo, bad lighting. Hooray Clinique Haul! For you fellow penny pinchers out there, Clinique is giving away this nifty sampler bag with any purchase of $21.50 or more. Decidedly, I am SICK of my skin giving me problems. For the last little while I have had wretched acne problems. The area around my chin and forehead are pimple fields and my pores are the size of dinner plates. Ack! I have combination skin meaning my T-zone is oily while my cheeks are relatively dry. After researching, I decided I was going to try out the Clinique 3 step skin regimen because of the nearly all-positive reviews online. I went to the Clinique counter, and after my consultation, the girl suggested I try the acne regimen instead of the Clinique level 3 set. I have yet to try it tonight but I will get back with you about how it's working for me. They were out of the acne moisturizer so for the 4.2 ounce bottle of cleansing foam and the 6.7 ounce bottle of clarifying lotion (which is more like a toner) I paid a little over $33.00. Yes, this is the MOST I have ever spent on skin care products at once. Wish me luck.

NOW, onto the sampler bag. I'm SUPER excited about this. The bag comes with the sample sizes of the Dramatically Different Moisturizing Lotion, Moisture Surge Extended Thirst Relief, Up-Lighting Liquid Illuminator, Lash Doubling Mascara, Different Lipstick in "Think Bronze", and Self Sun Daily Moisturizer. Because my skin is really self-hydrated (that's what I'm saying instead of oily these days) I think I'm going to see if the Moisture Surge will work for my ratty cuticles. I can wait to try the self tanner and the mascara. Reviews on all to follow!

Vintage Sister Lip Balms

Here are my NEEEEWWWW lip balms. I'm a lip balm/gloss/stick junkie. When I first moved out of my parents' house, I distinctly remember agonizing over buying chicken broth, but definitely HAD to have a new tube of lip balm (blistex raspberry lemonade to be exact) and didn't think twice. It's a disease of irrationality, I admit it. So, of course, when I got wind of vintagesister.com, I had to investigate immediately. Vintage sister specializes in homemade lip balm that is made with all natural ingredients and very interesting flavors. The balms sell for $3.95 a piece and shipping is $5.00 no matter how many you buy so I recommend buying at least three. The ones I bought were Gummi Bear, Divatini, and Cosmopolitan. Here are my thoughts: They come in cute little tins. Generally, I prefer tubes for sanitation reasons, but I'm willing to forgive. If anything, I just wash my hands more often and Lord knows that's not a bad thing. The flavors are to die for. My favorite is Cosmopolitan. All this said, it's not the most moisturizing balm I've ever used. I do find myself reapplying it quite often but I can't complain because the ingredients are all things I've actually heard of and can pronounce and the company makes the batches fresh every week. All in all, I recommend these fine folks. Go pick out a few flavors and enjoy!

Tarte MultiplEYE: It begins

I had a Sephora gift card and let me say right now that is the ONLY reason I splurged on this. I bought the Tarte MultiplEYE eyelash enhancer which sells for $65.00 per tube (ahhh!!!!). As you can see from the pictures (and please excuse the un-groomed brows) I am not lacking in the eyelash department. Now, before you slap me, let me just say I know I've got great lashes but hey, I guess I'm never satisfied. I took these pictures before I started using the product. It says to wait 6 weeks to see full results. So...I guess we have to wait until then. Here are my first impressions: some people say it stings. I haven't felt that and I have reeeaaaallly sensitive eyes. So maybe these people are poking themselves in the eye with it. It's clear and has no smell at all. It says to just put it on like eyeliner every day. I've used it for a week so far and haven't noticed a difference...but patience is a virtue. Stay tuned for more in a month.

Greatest Date Night!!!

Yesterday, I went up to Ester's for my monthly scrapbook-palooza. While there, Michael called and asked what my plans were later on. Well...I planned on hanging out with HIM. Turns out he planned a totally wonderful date for us. He asked if I'd rather go see a Jazz game or Daniel Tosh perform his standup at Kingsbury Hall. Well, I was good with either but Tosh was $40.00 per ticket and we decided, eh, we can watch Tosh.0 on tv for free. Then we found that the cheapest Jazz tickets were $17.00. Come on, $40.00 for a second rate NBA team? So we decided we would go to dinner with our friends Luka and Mandy and then go to see Alice in Wonderland.

Of course, I left Ester's house late so I was racing home to have some sort of time to change from the homeless-chic look I was rocking to a date look (rare for me since we don't really go on DATES very often anymore.) While I'm driving like I-15 is NASCAR, Michael calls me and says, "You won't believe it. My mom's patient at the hospital has two tickets to Tosh and can't go (since he's...in the hospital) and wants to give them to my mom for free." Really? Are whatever Gods may be smiling down on us or what? (Author's Note: My God apparently appreciates inappropriate humor and using other's medical misfortune to my advantage). So I get home with zero time left to get ready and yes, I looked awful. So I changed my clothes and carried my makeup out to the car.

Anyway, we made it to Marketstreet Broiler about 6 minutes late...not too shabby. We had an AWESOME dinner with our friends. If you've never been there, I suggest saving your pennies (if you are low-middle class...like me) and taking a trip. We happened to be there during crab festival. I got the crab ravioli in a tomato cream sauce (which tastes suspiciously like the cream sauce I made last month...recipe to follow.) and Mike got some sort of cajun pasta. I ate too much and by the time we had paid it was 8:00 which was the time the show was starting. So we jogged up to Kingsbury (I had a crazy side ache from the ravioli overload) and sat down, literally as the lights came down.

The show was amazing. So funny and I would say better than Tosh.0...if that's possible. Sometimes I wish I could be standup comedian instead of pretending to be one so that I don't kill anyone at my current job.

Afterward, we weren't really ready to go home so Mike suggested getting ice cream. After trying to decide where to go, he remembered his friend telling him about the secret menu at Jamba Juice. If you've never heard of this, it's a menu of smoothies not on the regular menu and there are some crazy flavors. Gummi Bear, Pink Starburst, Butterfinger to name a few. We'd never done this before and, at the risk of being laughed at, Mike said, "Can I have a Reese's Pieces smoothie." The girl blinked at us a couple times and finally reached into the drawer and pulled out a menu labeled "Secret" (no kidding.). That particular location didn't have Reese's Pieces so Mike settled for Banana Cream Pie and I got Sour Patch Kids. Since I harbor severe disdain for bananas, I didn't try Mike's so I can't tell you if it was good but he said it was. My Sour Patch Kids smoothie was delicious, although I'm not convinced it tasted like the candy but I highly recommend it.

If YOU want to try the secret menu at Jamba, I suggest either asking to see it or bringing the recipe from this link: http://jambaunderground.wordpress.com/the-smoothies/

Each location has a different variety so if you bring them the recipe, you can be sure to get the one you want.

I had so much fun last night. It's really great to splurge a little on the cash and go do something really great.