Healthy Fake Out Apple Pie A La Mode- Review

I am always on the lookout for new things to try for breakfast. I prefer it to be quick and easy but still taste delicious. This recipe is one that I had pinned forever, but for some reason never took the time to try it. Once I did, I made it twice in one week. It is really fast to throw together and tastes amazing. I followed her recipe exactly except I didn’t add the Life cereal on top. (I actually purchased the Life cereal for this recipe but wound up eating it all be the time I got to making this recipe….shame on me. I have no control when it comes to cereal 🙂 )

Obviously I rate this recipe highly and will be visiting her site to try out a few more of her recipes.

Enjoy!!

Basic Granola Recipe

Good Morning and happy Tuesday 🙂 Today I want to share a basic granola recipe I found on pinterest. This Christmas I wanted to make a gift for loved ones that was a little bit healthier than cookies because we all know that by January 1st we have all hit sugar overload. I quickly came to the decision of granola. I love granola and find that most other people do as well.

I haven’t taken the time to test out alot of recipes to find out which I like best since I just started making it homemade in the last few months but I have had lots of success with this recipe and keep going back to it. It is pretty basic (as stated in the title..haha) and uses ingredients I already have on hand.

The most important thing is not to burn your granola. This is very easy for me to do because it seems to happen so quickly. Take it out right as it stars to golden and be sure to flip it as the recipe states. Also keep in mind that your granola will harden as it cools 🙂

CHANGES TO RECIPE :The only change I made with this recipe is using canola oil instead of vegetable oil and it turned out great. *I also just recently made it without any brown sugar to try to make it a bit healthier and still love it…although the other version was a bit closer to what you would buy at the store.

I simply put the granola in old peanut butter jars tied a bow around and voila a wonderful yummy gift was made.

What store favorites have you started making at home?

 

Dolce Tesoro – Simply Cupcakes

I am pretty happy to wrap up these Sanibel reviews it feels like they are all I seem to write about (which is kinda true after so little posts I have…haha) Anyways! I am pretty excited to write this post. It was by far the best place we ate while on our Sanibel vacation. I didn’t get the best pics but be assured that this place it AMAZING. I was totally blown away by the service. It is by far the best service I have EVER gotten at any restaurant…period.

Dolce Tesoro – Simply Cupcakes- Yep, a small cupcake shop in a small shopping center knocked the socks off all the other places we ate it 🙂

This was a must must do for me on our trip, because hello I love anything sweet (esp. cupcakes) and second it was rated #1 on tripadvisor.

Upon entering, Dave (he and his wife own the business) greeted us and made us feel welcomed answering all of our questions and telling us all everything they had to offer. I could write a 5 page paper telling you about how kind and just down right nice this guy was, but I’m sure you anxious to hear about all the yummy goodness.

The Sanibel Key Lime- *Their websites description- This paradise offering matches a sour cream cake with freshly prepared key lime curd, white Italian buttercream, and is topped with grated lime zest and graham cracker crumbs.  This is our “signature” cupcake.

This was light fresh and well amazing. I can totally see why this is one of their best sellers. The curd was amazing and the buttercream wasn’t too rich. Seriously YUM!

The Funky Monkey- *Their website description Moist banana cake, creamy peanut butter filling.Topped with chocolate ganache and peanut buttercream. Banana chip garnish

Now I’m not gonna lie. This one was just okay for me. I’m not a huge fan of chocolate ganache, which I knew was on it but decided to go for it anyway because I love me some peanut butter filling and peanut butter buttercream. Even with the ganache, I still really enjoyed it.

We also enjoyed a coffee (hubby not me) and a small serving of Queenies cinnamon icecream. Both of which were great.

As you can obviously tell I would totally recommend this place to all my friends and would have loved to go again if we would have found it before our last day on the island.

Before I close I have to share the story that shows just how wonderful the owner Dave was to us. I didnt mention earlier that we arrived RIGHT at closing time. He had literally just locked the door when we walked up. I was a bit dissapointed and looked at the hours for the next day. He saw us looking and came in and offered to let us come in anways. (Yes, I get that we are paying customers so it would be silly to turn us away, but I’m sure many other business owners would have done this anyway just to put an end to their day.) Not only did he let us in he also made us feel 100% welcomed despite it being closing time. Through all of his descriptions and just general conversation you could really get a feel for how passionate he was for his business. After placing our order we went outside to sit down and enjoy.

After about 10 minutes of enjoying our cupcakes, icecream and coffee,  Dave walked out with a bottle of water for us saying, “I’m not saying our cupcakes are dry but I thought you might enjoy some water with your treats.” I was in awe yet again. It’s the small things that makes a business successful and this place know that. Great treats and customer service…we will be back

Island Cow- Sanibel Florida

I really need to get a move on with these Sanibel restaurant reviews so I can start with our Orlando reviews from our September trip.

Next up : The Island Cow

Another restaurant that kept getting recommended on Sanibel was the Island Cow. It was on my must do list and I was very anxious to give it a try.

The location is right on Periwinkle along with most of the restaurants on the island. Upon driving up I could tell that it was a relaxing and fun place to have dinner. It wasn’t too busy when we arrived (around 5pm) and we were seated immediately.

There was one thing that we were really looking forward to eating here tonight, the deep alligator bites. Unfortunately, we were greeted by this sign when we walked in so we knew that wouldn’t be happening. Spoiler- (We finally got to try gator on our last Orlando trip)

After looking at the menu I decided on one of  the “Waterside Fun Sandwiches” that came with fries and slaw. I honestly can’t remember if it was the Flounder or Swordfish bronzed. My memory is telling me swordfish…but I could definitely be wrong. Either way it was amazing. I absolutely loved it.

 

Not one for seafood my husband ordered the BBQ Pulled Pork Sandwich. It was pretty much your basic pulled pork but he really enjoyed it and it was huge 🙂

I highly recommend this restaurant. The food was great and the menu is huge. So there is tons to try. We will be back on our future trips

Orange Cake Recipe Review

I needed a cake for my sisters birthday a few days ago so I began searching for the perfect one. I knew I didn’t want to make a typical cake because she isn’t a fan of icing or traditional birthday cake. Instead I wanted to make something light and fresh. Enter Orange Cake.  I looked at a few pinterest but ultimately decided on this one on allrecipes.

I did make a few substitutions:

Vanilla Pudding instead of lemon

Added pure orange extract instead of lemon

In the end I would say I was satisfied with the overall cake but not wowed. I would in no way compare it to the Orange Crunch Cake we had in Captiva at The Bubble Room….it doesn’t even come close. Mine seemed a bit dry because I got nervous about it not being done enough and left it in the oven a little longer. (bad idea. I also may have done something wrong with the glaze because it never really hardened like I had hoped it would.

Conclusions-It may have been better if I wouldn’t have over baked it, and maybe having some of the lemon flavor would have gave it a little bit of zip and freshness I was looking for.

Banana Protein Pancakes

Now that the new year is approaching I have decided to get my eating back on track and have fun with a few new recipes. I am going to be finding recipes on pinterest than coming on here to review them. 🙂

I absolutely love pancakes and would eat them every day if I could, but I’m guessing 20 pounds of flour a week isn’t a good idea. So when I found this recipe on PBFs blog I knew it would be worth a try. By the way her website is one of my favorites. She posts recipes and quick workouts.) It also didn’t hurt that it takes 10 minutes start to finish to make.

I followed all of her instructions and used my ninja and was very happy with the results. My husband said that they had a bit of an egg texture and he missed the fluffy flourness (yep that’s a word) but said he enjoyed them anyway.  I think this is a recipe I will keep around and try different variation in the future as well 🙂 Enjoy!!

Zebra Frozen Yogurt-Sanibel Island

Surprise, Surprise another more reviews of sweets we ate while on vacation in Sanibel. We really did eat healthy things….really we did 🙂

Our next stop was for frozen yogurt.

Zebra Frozen Yogurt

This is a place that I knew nothing about before visiting the island. I actually found out about it in some coupon book we got. When we pulled up we were happy to see this sign

I’m sure you can’t read it but it says. “Buy one FroYo, Recieve the second one 1/2 off” WOO HOO! Yep, I was a happy girl in froyo heaven.

I was a little dissapointed to find out that this wasn’t one of the pay by the ounce places. I have come to love getting to pick out my own flavors and mixing and matching them…all well sugar is sugar and I shouldn’t complain.

 I was very impressed when I saw the menu. They had multiple flavors to choose from including: Tahitian Vanilla,Strawberry Sensations,Strawberries n’ Cream, Dreamy Dark Chocolate, Sea Salt Caramel Pretzel, and Chocolate Covered Pretzel.

A bonus to these choices was the options to “add a stripe” which is basically like adding a flavor swirl to your yogurt. They also had quite a few options for this as well: Banana, Mango, Black Cherry, Blue Goo Candy, Butter Pecan, Peanut Butter,  Pina Colada, and Peach.

Along with all the flavors and stripes they also had your standard large amount of toppings available as well. The day we were there they were offering free bobas as a topping. I will get to explaining those in a little bit 🙂

It didn’t take me long to figure out what I wanted.  Vahitian Vanilla with a Peanut Butter Stripe and Cookie Dough.

Okay, here come the sad part. It looks a little better than it tastes. Not to say it was bad, it just wasnt great. I think the part that lost me was the stripe. It didnt have have the true peanut butter taste I was looking for. Now,  I should disclose that I am pretty much obsessed with peanut butter. I am picky when it comes to how peanut butter should taste. The cookie dough was a bit off too. It just seemed a bit dry and crumbly for my liking.

Next up was my hubby’s pick:

I believe he got the strawberries n’ cream. He also decide to get the free topping of the day which was the bobas. These were new to us. I have seen them at toppings bars before but hadn’t ever wanted to try them. He and my son actually ended up really liking them. Everytime my son would eat one he would get a big grin and say “Pop!”. Now when we visit yogurt shops we always try to get a few for him 🙂 I also took a bite of my husband and I would say it tasted alot like a Creme Saver hard candy. ( I’m not not if they still sell these, but I remember when they were everywhere.)

All in all it must not have been that bad because we planned to return later on our trip 🙂

More  Crafts will be Coming Soon!!

Thanksgiving Pumpkin Cupcakes

I know I have mentioned how much I love sweets about a million times already on this blog, but what I haven’t stated is that not only do I like to eat sweets, I like to bake them too. You never know when hostess will go bankrupt again..and one needs to be prepared in such emergencies. 🙂

This past weekend my church had a bake sale and I knew I wanted to make something. After looking online I found this recipe and I knew it would be a winner. I followed her instructions exactly and was very very pleased with the results. Everyone at the sale raved about how good they tasted.

When it came to presentation I knew I wanted to do something a little bit different. My idea started when I found this on pinterest. I absolutely loved it. I thought it was a brilliant idea and much easier for people to eat while walking around at the festival. I even went out and bought the cups and lids and was already to go. (You can find them at GFS by the way)

After sitting down and thinking about  it, I thought it may be a little too big.  After a little more searching on pinterest I found this and decided I would combine the two ideas to get something wonderful.

In the end I ended up with these:

Like I said I wanted to combine the two ideas and that is basically what I did. I loved the idea of the spoon but wanted to keep the wrappers off so they would be easily scoopable. I also wanted to add a little label so they would know what they were buying. In the end I was VERY happy with the finished product.  Enjoy!

Pinocchio’s Italian Ice Cream

My Sanibel restaurant reviews continue….

As I’ve stated probably 100+ times, I am a huge fan of all things sweet. This of course includes ice cream. Soft serve, custard, gelato, a regular scoop from a big ole tub of ice cream…I love them all. With this in mind finding some yummy ice cream on vacation was a must 🙂

After just a few searches, a clear winner came into view. Visiting Pinocchio’s Italian Ice Cream would become a must do.

Pinocchio’s Italian Ice Cream is located right on Periwinkle Way which is the main road where most restaurants are located. When we pulled up, there was already a line starting to go out the door. Considering it was super hot out, I wasn’t surprised.

It actually took us quite a while to decide on what to order. There were a few flavors we wanted to try so we decided to order a large (3 scoop) ice cream bowl. Hubby would have loved a waffle cone but, with that heat it just wasn’t happening, it would have been a melted mess all over our laps.

The three flavors we decided on were: Sanibel Krunch, Dirty Sand Dollar, and Butter Pecan…which I believe is seasonal?

YUM!

Once we got this bowl of yumminess we decided to head outside and find a bench on the porch to dig in.

World Famous Sanibel Krunch-  This was pretty good. The websites describes it as follows: Vanilla ice cream with toasted coconut enrobed in Chocolate and Gourmet Mixed Nuts. This is a fair description. We enjoyed it but it didn’t have any wow.  I will admit I’m not a huge coconut fan so this may play a part in my review.

Dirty Sand Dollar-Caramel based ice cream with malted milk balls “whoppers” & chocolate flakes. I was shocked I didn’t love this. Okay that was TOTAL sarcasm. Truth be told I do not like caramel or whoppers and I’m not really a huge fan of bits of plain chocolate.  With that said, why on earth did I order this? They told me it was a favorite and I knew my husband would like it. The good news is that he did indeed really like it, so if you are a fan of said ingredients you will love it. If you do not like the ingredients you wont… shocker I know. And you are welcome for reviewing this flavor.

Butter Pecan-Overall I would rate this ice cream pretty well. I think my husband would rate it super duper great becasue the flavors were more up his alley. Maybe I just need to kick my cookie dough and reese cup obsession to the side and get some grown up ice cream taste 🙂

Oh my goodness, I almost forgot how could anyone not love these awesome trash cans. Normally throwing away an empty ice cream bowl makes me sad, but throwing it away in these awesome trash cans left me with a smile.