Fun Food

30 minute Pizza Dough

September 14, 2010 By Stacy 4 Comments

I don’t remember where I got this recipe or I would give them the credit because it is so good and sooo easy!

1 cup warm water
1 packet of yeast ( or 2 1/4 teaspoons)
Add the yeast to the water and let it sit for 5 minutes
then add
3 tablespoons butter flavored Crisco
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon sugar
3-4 cups flour
mix together well and let rise for 15 minutes – then it is ready!
Bake at 400 degrees until the crust is golden brown. The amount of time will depend on the size and thickness.

For years and years I hand mixed this. I just got my Bosch mixer for Christmas last year and love it. Either way it works great! It also makes wonderful bread sticks.

We make home made pizza about once a week around here. My boys love pizza night because they get to make their own.

And watch it bake.

The Mr. and I don’t see eye to eye on the toppings.

Are you hungry yet???

Filed Under: Fun Food 4 Comments

Peanut Butter and Chocolate Spiders

September 7, 2010 By Stacy 31 Comments

If I were a spider I would live in my bedroom. I am going to let you in on one of my dirty little secrets. Because of the way I have arranged my room, on one side if my bed there is only about two feet from the bed to the wall. I reached down there a couple nights ago to get a book that fell and holy crap! Talk about DUST. And spider webs. My room is the messiest room in my house. I liken it to how as moms we spend so much time helping others we don’t take time for ourselves. I take care of the rest of the house and everyone else’s rooms, that I sometime neglect MY space. Well, I am going to try to change that because it is SPIDER season and I don’t want them taking up residence in there. And since it is spider season, it got me thinking about Halloween. I am going to admit that I am a total humbug when it comes to this holiday.But my kids LOVE it. So I started to think about something fun I could do that was spider-ish. This is what I came up with.

I made peanut butter no bake cookies. I made the mistake of waiting until they had set to put the pretzels in. It still worked but I had to be careful. It would be better to do it when they are warm and soft. I used peanut butter to “glue” the legs together because that is what I have but it would be better if you use peanut butter chocolate chips melted down. The eyes are a mini marshmallow cut in half and stuck on with more peanut butter. Since I was also making chocolate ones, I had some melted chocolate to do the dots on the eyes but you could also use raisins.

Here is my chocolate guy. Isn’t he cute too? I was going to make cake mix cookies for the body but realized that it was a brownie mix in the pantry and not a cake mix. Since it is Labor Day, I was not about to drag my behind to the store and wait in the long lines of people buying last minute BBQ stuff. I just made the brownie mix as it said on the box and baked them in muffin pans. I am glad it worked out this way. The legs are pretzels covered in chocolate. I just melted some chocolate chips in the microwave for about 30 seconds. The melted chocolate also worked as the glue.

I love taking treats to my neighbors and friends. I was thinking about this as I was making these spiders and realized they are too big to take. Only one or two would fit well on a plate. Then it hit me. My kids had fun with these, I bet my friend’s kids would like to make them too. You can make spider kits. Put one on the plate as an example and baggie with the things they need to make some of their own! This way they have a fun activity AND a treat to eat.
Now that my kitchen is cleaned up from this, I think I will go vacuum my room!!!

P.S. Don’t forget to enter the giveaway!

Filed Under: Fall/Autumn, Fun Food, Kids Activities 31 Comments

Painting Cookies

August 17, 2010 By Stacy 5 Comments

I am always trying to think of fun activities for my kids. I am a clean freak so I usually try to think of things that won’t make a big mess. This one wasn’t bad at all, but I guess it depends on the ages of your kids.
I used a bowl to cut out giant cookies. The size gives the kids more room to color. Plus, how often do they get to eat such a big cookie?

For the “paint” I mixed some corn syrup (Karo syrup) with water and then added food coloring. I did this so it would be a little thicker and easier to work with. It also doesn’t make the cookie soggy. Give them cups of water for rinsing their brushes in between colors too. Any time I do a potentially messy project I give the kids an old tee shirt to wear over their clothes.
This entertained my kids for about 30 minutes (which in kid time is an eternity) They loved it!

The best piece of artwork is one you can EAT!

Filed Under: Fun Food, Kids Activities 5 Comments

Dinner time!

August 17, 2010 By Stacy 1 Comment

I like to cook. I like to watch the food network to get ideas for new recipes. Most nights I cook a very good dinner from scratch. But if you ask my kids what their favorite dinner is, they say Mac and Cheese. So to make things fun for my kids I have come up with a few ideas.

We have dip it night. Everything we eat is something that you dip in some kind of sauce. Chicken strips, carrots, celery, fries, tator tots, etc. The kids love having different options for sauce. Although it grosses me out when my three year old dips veggies in ketchup!

Another thing we do is lunch tray night. The kids take sack lunches to school so they don’t get to eat on trays. I found some at Target and I have also seen them at Wal-mart. For some reason my boys think that it it so cool. I usually make a very kid friendly meal (like Mac and Cheese) and a lot of side dishes to fill all the compartments on the tray. Sometimes (when I remember) I buy little milks or juices.

Indoor picnics are also a big hit at our house. We spread a blanket out in the family room and sometimes even pack the dinner in a basket to make it seem more real.
I am always looking for more fun things, so let me know if you have any more ideas!

Filed Under: Fun Food 1 Comment

Were you raised in a barn???

August 7, 2010 By Stacy Leave a Comment

I have four little boys. Five if you count the big guy (my husband). So dinner time can be, shall we say, rambunctious. I watch them sometimes and the famous phrase “Were you raised in a barn?” comes to mind. Not only do they smack their food and grab, and kick, and spill, but the topics of conversation usually revolve around bodily functions. I was pondering this one day and came up with a plan. I made dinner as usual but made the boys stay down in the playroom while I was getting it ready. I set the table with our nice plates (anything that isn’t paper is “nice” at our house) and got some candles lit. I turned off the lights to set the mood. I got a note pad and pencil then went downstairs. I told them I was there to take their order. I had a few different shapes of pasta, a few different sauce options, a couple vegetable choices, and milk, juice, or water. They loved the idea of being able to choose just like a restaurant. I came back up to fill their orders and then called for them to come up. I didn’t say a word. I just stood in the kitchen across from the dining table and watched. When they came up and saw the way the dining room looked, they were so quiet. You could tell they were excited but the mood had effected them. While we ate we talked about what good table manners were and WHY we are suppose to have good manners. Every time it gets a little crazy at dinner I remind them of that dinner and we have a refresher course on manners. I might just do it again for fun!

Filed Under: Fun Food, Kids Activities Leave a Comment

Fruit pizza

August 7, 2010 By Stacy 2 Comments

We have family night one night a week and this time I decided to make a special treat.
I made sugar cookie dough and shaped it the way I would pizza dough. I even baked it on my pizza stone. Leave enough room around the dough so that it can expand when cooking so it doesn’t fall off the edge or get squished on your cookie sheet.
I used vanilla pudding colored with red food coloring for the sauce.

I grated a white chocolate bar with a cheese grater to look like mozzarella. The I added fruit that I thought looked like real pizza toppings. Strawberries for pepperoni, blueberries for olives, and kiwi cut lengthwise to look like green peppers.

ENJOY!!!

Filed Under: Fun Food 2 Comments

A Valentine Day tradition

August 6, 2010 By Stacy Leave a Comment

Every year we have a red & pink dinner. The kids help me decorate the dining room (I wish this picture showed the decorations better) in homemade hearts, confetti, streamers and anything we can find that is red and pink. Everything we eat is red and pink and we have to wear red and pink. The kids LOVE it. If the food isn’t naturally the right color, then we use food coloring. Pasta, Alfredo sauce, cauliflower, got dyed this year. Valentines day is a favorite at our house!