School Lunch Peanut Butter Bars

Found this baby on Pintrest, and dieting just got that much harder

School Lunch Peanut Butter Bars

This recipe makes an entire cookie sheet full, and I can only make them if I have a place to take them and share. I could pretty easily down the whole pan by myself without really trying. They're kinda dangerous...at least in my chocolate/peanut butter loving world.

School Lunch Peanut Butter Bars

1 1/2 C Flour

1¼ tsp. Salt

½ tsp. Baking Soda

¾ C Butter

¾ C Sugar

¾ C Brown Sugar

1 ½ tsp. Vanilla

1 1/2 C Creamy Peanut Butter (split)

2 Eggs

1 ½ C Quick Oats

Frosting:

½ C Butter (1 stick)

3 ½ C Powdered Sugar

2 T Cocoa

¼ C Milk (I use whatever I have in the fridge)

1 tsp. Vanilla

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a small mixing bowl, mix together flour, baking soda and salt. In a large mixing bowl, cream together butter, sugars, 3/4 C peanut butter, eggs and vanilla until light and fluffy. Gradually add dry ingredients, just until incorporated. Then, stir in the oats. Spread onto a greased 11 x 15 Jelly Roll Pan (cookie sheet). Bake for 12-15 minutes, or until golden brown. Cool for 10 minutes.

The frosting is a two step process. First, whip the remaning ¾ C Creamy Peanut Butter until it becomes lighter colored and fluffy. Carefully spread the whipped peanut butter over the pan cookie.

Then, add butter to a small sauce pan and melt the butter. Add the milk and cocoa. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly. Heat just until boiling. Remove from heat and add vanilla. Then, gradually add the powdered sugar. Stir until thickened. Pour over the peanut butter and gently spread over the cookie. Cool completely, and slice into bar cookies.

Italian Marinated Veggies

Today is Jake's b-day and we had a BBQ (sadly without him because he was still in Boise...lol)  Anyway the following recipe is soooo simple, but it is one of my families favorites during the summer.  You can also make it earlier in the day and then the dressing gets even more into the veggies.

Marinated Veggies
4-6 cukes - sliced into wedges
6-8 Roma Tomatoes - seeded and sliced into wedges
1 large red onion - sliced small
1 large green pepper - seeded and sliced into wedges
1 bottle Kraft Caesar Vinagerette with Parmesan

Combine all ingredients into a bowl, stir and chill.  Enjoy!

Legendary Sweet Pork Burritos (a la Costa Vida)

My family is CRAZY for the sweet pork burritos!  Frequently Smiths will have a huge pork loin on sale for half price and it is about $25,  When I see these I pick up a couple and throw them in the freezer to use for parties and special occasions. This recipe will feed over 25 people and leave you enough of the pork to freeze for yummy burritos later.  Whatever you freeze just double line in 2 ziplock freezer bags, and it will stay good for about 3 months. 

Sweet Pork
One large pork loin
3 cans Coke (Regular)
1 1/4 c. brown sugar
Dash of garlic salt
1/4 c. water
1 small can diced green chilis (blended)
1 can red enchilada sauce

Put the pork loin (frozen or unfrozen) inside a large roaster with the about half the coke, the garlic salt, and the water.  Cook overnight or until it shreads easily.  About 4 hours before you want to eat add the rest of the coke, brown sugar, the enchilada sauce and the green chilis and let it simmer until ready to use.  The longer it simmers the better.

Black Beans
3 cans black beans
1 tsp. cumin
1 1/3 c. tomatoe juice
1 1/2 tsp salt
3 cloves of garlic (minced)
1/2 bunch of cilantro (chopped)

Simmer until ready to use.

Cilantro Lime Rice
5 c. raw rice
10 C. water
3 chicken bullion cubes
2 cloves of garlic (minced)
Juice from 1-2 limes
1/2 bunch cilantro (chopped)

Place all ingredients into a rice maker and hit start.  Mine usually takes about an hour to cook.  You could also do this with Minute Rice and just adjust the rice and water accordingly.

Jalepano Lime Ranch
3-4 c. prepared Ranch (We like the Gregg's Ranch from Costco)
2 Jalepanos with tops removed
Juice of 1-2 limes
1/2 bunch of cilantro
1/2 c. green chili sauce
1 clove garlic (minced)

Place all ingredients in the blender and process until smooth.

***To assemble burritos - take a tortilla, place a scoop of beans and rice on the bottom, top with some pork and then a little shreeded cheese.  Roll it up and place it seam side down.  Top with Jalepano Ranch, shreeded cheese.  We serve it with lettuce and homemade salsa on the side.  Enjoy!

Chicken Tacos (Freezer Meal)

This is one of my families favorites - plus it is the quickest and easiest freezer meal I make!  Whenever I go to Costco I get the biggest bag of chicken breasts they have and then cook them on a cookie sheet in the oven with just a little bit of Johnny's Season Salt and pepper.  I cook them until all the fat is rendered off and they even have some crispy ends.  After they are cooled you can assemble your taco pack. 

Chicken Tacos
5 large cooked chicken breasts - shreaded by hand
2 -3 cups Kirkland salsa (This is the BEST brand I have found for this recipe)

Put the shreaded chicken and salsa in a ziplock bag and fold down to get the air out.
In another ziplock freezer bag put enough cheese for your tacos - probably about 3 cups.  Then in one more ziplock freezer bag put about a dozen tortillas. 

It is a bit of a squeeze but I can fit the chicken, cheese and tortillas all in one ziplock gallon freezer bag.  This will freeze well for 3 months or so.  On the day you want to eat your yummy tacos just get your taco pack out of the freezer and place the chicken in a crockpot for the day to warm and marinate and then place the tortillas and cheese in the fridge until ready to use.  Enjoy!

Chocolate Chip Banana Muffins

These chocolate chip banana muffins are so good.  My kids love them and if they don't all get eaten for breakfast, they make great after school snacks.

Chocolate Chip Banana Muffins

Ingredients

1 3/4 cups all purpose flour
3/4 cup sugar
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 egg
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1/2 cup plain yogurt
1tsp vanilla extract
1 cup mashed ripe bananas
3/4 cup semisweet chocolate chips (I use the mini ones)

Directions:
In a large bowl, combine the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt.  In another bowl, combine the egg, oil, yogurt and vanilla.  Stir into dry ingredients just until moistened.  Fold in bananas and chocolate chips.  Fill greased or paper-lined muffin cups two-thirds full.  Bake at 350 degrees for about 16-20 min. When golden brown on top take out and cool for 5 min. before removing from pans to wire racks.

*I have also made these without the bananas and they make great regular chocolate chip muffins.  Also if you don't have any plain yogurt, you can substitute with sour cream and it comes out fine, in fact if you don't have bananas and are just making regular chocolate chip muffins I would suggest using sour cream in place of the yogurt.  Hope you like these as much as we do!

Breakfast Smoothies

Fruit and Veggie Smoothie
I am crazy about freezer meals and anything that makes my life easier. I have been trying to figure out how to take this easy approach to breakfast too. What I love about this recipe is that it gives you all of your fruit and one vegetable serving right there in your breakfast cup and it tastes great. I made up 18 of these little beauties an had a cost of $2.26/serving. I think that you are also looking at about 300 calories per serving - but they are HUGE. I think that as more fruits come into season I will be able to get the cost down a little - but still a great value and great for you. Jacob and I both had one this morning and it was awesome! I am still full

Freezer Pack
1 1/2 cups of mixed fruit cut in pieces(we used pineapple, strawberries, blueberries, kiwi and bananas)
1/2 cup vanilla yogurt (I got the cheapest I could at Winco and it was fine, but next time I might use greek yogurt for the added protien)
Put all the ingredients in a ziplock freezer bag and throw it in the freezer till you are ready to use it.

To Make Smoothie:
Take one freezer pack and thaw on the cupboard for a few minutes
Put it in the blender with 6-8 ice cubes, 1/2-1 cup of almond, coconut or regular milk. Blend until smooth. Then add a huge handful of spinach and blend until smooth. I promise you won't even taste the spinach!

Let me know how you like this!