Chocolate Cake

UPDATE: Please note this is not "top 8" allergen-free-friendly!! 

Who doesn't love a good chocolate cake? Surprisingly me... I typically don't opt for cake, I'm more a freshly baked pie kinda girl. But my husband loves chocolate cake, so what more says "I love you!" than coming home to a surprise in the middle of the work week? And oh my goodness, I think I finally found a chocolate cake I love too!! Yum!!!

Here's my new twist on Devil's food cake:

Ingredients:

1 box of Devil's Food Cake

1 package of chocolate instant pudding (I like the sugar-free/fat-free box)

1 12 oz package chocolate chips

1 cup low-fat sour cream

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350*F

2. Prepare cake mix according to directions on box.

3. Stir in chocolate pudding mix, sour cream , and chocolate chips

4. Grease two 9 inch round baking pans; divide mix into each pan

5. Bake for 45 minutes.

I insert a toothpick into the center of cake; it should come out clean when cake is ready. I'm not good at making chocolate frosting so I cheated today and used a very thin layer of store-bought frosting. It's also a great time saver too! I suggest serving it up with a nice glass of cold milk

Shopping Savings

We all love saving money, but how many of us are extreme coupon shoppers? Kudos to those of you who are, but I am certainly not good at it (maybe I can learn from you one day!) But I like to think of myself as a gal that likes to find good deals. For me, that means using coupons when I can, pre-planning my trips to the store if possible, stocking up the basement for my family's future needs or even just scouting out which store carries the product I like for less.

Plus who doesn't love coming out of a store feeling like "Wow! I just saved how much?!" So here are my personal rules for what I consider a good deal:

1. Don't purchase things just because it's on sale or have a coupon for. If I don't typically use it or I don't actually want it, I don't buy it.

2. A "good deal" means I can save at least 25% or more in a shopping trip. Anything higher than 25% is simply a bigger happy dance when I come home and more $$ in my pocket.

3. The savings needs to outweigh the price of gas it costs to get to the store. If it costs less to have it shipped free from the store to my home, it's worth the wait.

4. Time is valuable too. I don't want to spend too much time coupon hunting. If it takes me an hour to find coupons that total $3, then it really isn't worth it to me.

5. Have fun and don't have too many rules or it gets too confusing!

So I've been running low on a few things in my home and I had a $10 off $100 at BJ's coupon in the mail. I like BJ's for buying things in bulk since the unit price tends to be a good deal, especially when using coupons. I looked at my house inventory and decided I needed more paper towels, tissues, dish detergent, cleaning products, and sponges in the house. So I took maybe 15 minutes to look through the in-club coupons I had available to use and also checked coupons.com to see what I should purchase. And off I went...

But ladies, let me tell you what was the best part of this trip: My husband came shopping with me! How lucky am I that he was willing to endure a coupon shopping trip? I honestly needed him because I needed help lifting up items because my wrists have been bothering me lately, and he was a great help! So if you are lucky to have a helper too, be sure you pay attention to their needs as well. My poor husband was busy doing yard work all day so the least I could do was take a pit-stop to Starbucks for a nice cup of coffee for him prior to shopping. (Oh yeah, and we used a gift card, so "free" coffee is always a great treat!)

Here's the break-down of our trip to BJ's:

I had a coupon for all but 2 items on my list: Tilex Mold&Mildew and Snuggles Fabric Sofetner sheets, but I had a coupon for all the other items. Plus, since my order came to a total of $107.71, I could use my $10 off $100 total order. So my shopping total came to $78.71 ...that's a savings of 27% Yippie!!

Cranberry Scones

It's breakfast once again and you open the fridge uninspired. Then you head to the pantry to pull out that same old box of cereal or oatmeal that you start every day off with. Do you ever feel like you wish you had other options? Of course we all do, but who has the time to make a fresh batch of waffles before running out the door in the mornings?!

That's where your freezer comes in handy! I tend to over-make everything and "left-overs" is the norm in our household. Whatever is made for dinner could always be your co-worker's envy at the lunch table the next day. But what about breakfast? I haven't quite figured out the trick to making pancakes freeze and then thaw tasting good, but it always seems to work out well for waffles. So what other breakfast treats can be frozen well?

Today I was inspired to make scones. We've been having some crisp mornings lately with autumn blowing in and what's better than a cup of hot tea, some fresh fruit and scones - yum! But no one has an extra 30 minutes lying around to whip up a batch on busy mornings... and if you are like me, that 30 minutes can easily turn into an hour! So I wanted to share the tip on how to prepare scones ahead of time in the freezer. All you need is 12 minutes baking time and presto! Fresh baked goods on a busy morning.

Yes, you figured it out: The trick to freezing scones is to NOT bake them ahead of time. Prepare them ahead of time, place in a freezer bag and then take one out whenever you'd like a fresh baked-good. Scones are ideal to freeze because of their low moisture content. The dough is similar to cookie dough and will freeze without too many funck changes.Oh, and how many times do you find recipes where it asks you to use a mixer or break your wrists/arms with cutting cold butter into a recipe? I have a tip on how to get around that too! Here's how I made mine:

INGREDIENTS

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

8 Tbsp (1 stick) unsalted butter

1 Tbsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 cup granulated sugar

2/3 cup milk

1/2 cup cranberries (or your addition of choice: raisins, nuts, chocolate chips)

DIRECTIONS

1. Put flour, baking powder and salt into a large bowl; stir mix well

2. Place stick of butter in a microwave safe glass bowl and melt for 1 minute. Stir to melt the rest of clumped butter (you don't want the butter too hot)

3. Add flour mixture, 1/2 cup at a time stirring until the mixture looks like fine granuls

4. Mix in sugar

5. Add milk and stir with a fork until dough forms

6. Fold in cranberries

7. Realistically, this dough will make about 10 scones. Roll a small handful of dough into a ball, pat flat (about 1/2 inch thick) and shape into a triangle.

8. Place on parchment paper on a flat surface (like a pan) and put into freezer for 1 hour.

9. Dough will be frozen enough then toss off the scones into a freezer bag for use at a later time.

That's it! Now you have scones ready-made for when you want them! I like to pat mine into triangles, but you can make whatever shape you'd like, triangles, biscuit shaped, whatever you like, as long as they are frozen individualized. If you freeze the whole dough together, it'll take a long while to thaw and individualize.

TO BAKE

1. When you are ready to make, take out one scone per serving. I know they look small, but they will puff up and will be very filling

2. Place on baking sheet. have sides touching if you want soft sides, but I recommend placing about 1-2 inches apart for crisper sides

3. Heat oven to 425°F (allowing scones to thaw slightly as oven heats up )

4. Bake about 12 minutes (this is a good time to make your coffee, cut up some fruit, or even just get dressed for the day!)

5. Serve with your favorite jam, side of fruit, juice/coffee or tea