Super Gooey Oreo Brownies

After a long 6 months of dieting for our wedding, I have been more than ready gorge myself on some sweets. So, ever since we got back from the honeymoon, I have been baking up a storm! These amaaah-zing Oreo brownies were some of my favorites of the many creations. I discovered it on Pinterest of course, courtesy of Kevin and Amanda's Recipes

Here is what you are going to need:

1 box of brownie mix (I went with Ghirardelli, mmm)

eggs and oil (follow the directions on the brownie box)

1 scoop of cookies and cream ice cream

1/4 cup hot fudge topping

Here is what you do:

1. Preheat oven, following the brownie box directions and spray an 8x8 pan. 

2. In a mixing bowl (I used my KitchenAid) combine brownie mix, eggs, and oil (but not the water). 

3. Add the ice cream and hot fudge to the brownie mix and stir. *NOTE* I would like to try this recipe without the ice cream mixed into the batter, because it made it VERY gooey, so it all depends on your affinity for gooey-ness.

4. Pour half of the brownie batter into the dish and smooth down into a layer.

5. Layer with Oreos.

6. Pour the rest of the batter on top of the Oreos.

7. Bake for about 50-60 minutes (I baked it for longer than it said on the box, again, depending on your love of gooey-ness).

This is what it will look like:

Can I get a "MMMMMmm"?

Mmm Mmm Malaysia

Malaysia was the last stop on our trip and the most relaxing. Malaysia's cuisine is interesting because it is very diverse - we enjoyed amazing curries, dim sum, seafood, thai food, and great tropical fruit. 

I know this isn't particularly Malaysian... or Asian, but you know there is nothing I love more than a limey margarita, and you give me one by a gorgeous pool and I am a happy girl. 

A Malaysian seafood buffet. They gave us cards that said "steamed," "fried," and "grilled." You choose your seafood, and how you would like it to be cooked, then put that card with your table number and your cooking style in the bowl and they bring it to your table. So fun, interactive, and delicious - the grilled prawns were my favorite.

The next few pictures were from a fruit market we visited after hiking in the rainforest near Mount Kinabalu. I wish I knew what they all were!

Of course limes, my favorite!

My new favorite snack: dim sum  sweet pork buns. Mmm I wish I knew how to make these!

Savory Singapore

In Singapore, we had to go to the Raffles Hotel and have the obligatory Singapore Sling at the bar where it was invented (even though Anthony Bourdain said it was too touristy). I had this on my to-do list before we went to the Long Bar and discovered that they charge $35 AMERICAN dollars for one drink. In order to not have anything unchecked on my list, we decided to split one. Not really worth it... I think I agree with Bourdain. 

 More lychee at a market. Not my favorite, but they sure are photogenic.

I had been in search of a wet market to discover the weird, crazy chinese meat and fruit. In Chinatown, we were not disappointed! Crocodile, live frogs, live squirming eels, what more could a traveler ask for??

In the Chinatown market, there was also an amazing food court. These men are making the best dim sum I have ever tasted!! So cool!

He is making my sugar cane juice. A little too sweet for my taste, but definitely worth a try.

 This was the appetizer sampler at Jumbo's, an awesome seafood restaurant on the water. My favorite was the melt-in-your-mouth scallops.

I have to try to make this at home - sweet chili stew with crab. I could have drank this with a straw. Mmmm...

Tasty Thailand

After taking the last couple months off from blogging to get married and go on a spectacular honeymoon, I am back to regale everyone of my favorite meals from Southeast Asia. This trip made me want to learn how to cook a lot of this amazing food.


Our first night in Phuket, Erik and I had a romantic dinner at a restaurant overlooking the beach.

Mini spring rolls with peanut sauce. So crunchy, but light.

This is my favorite soup - not just Thai soup, but of all time. Tom yum soup is so flavorful with coconut, lime, lemongrass, and chicken. But, I have never enjoyed my favorite soup out of a COCONUT! How cool!

 I decided I wanted to try as much Pad Thai as I could and become and Pad Thai connoisseur. I had anticipated that this dish was just an American idea of Thai food and wasn't actually popular in Thailand, and if it was, I thought it would taste vastly different than our version. WRONG. At almost every restaurant we would ask the servers what they recommended and almost everyone recommended pad thai. They were delicious.

One of the greatest parts of our honeymoon, was getting to sample and learn about beautiful, new tropical fruit.  I had heard of lychee, but I definitely had never seen it before:

You have to peel this Dr. Seuss looking outside to get to the fruit on the inside, which kind of reminded me of a hard grape. 

I also was not a huge coconut fan before this trip. I obviously had never had fresh coconut water. On a kayaking trip, our guide found a new coconut that had fallen on the ground. The water inside was so sweet and delicious and the meat of the coconut was so buttery - I am a coconut convert!

That night we had dinner right on the beach and had hands-down the best pad thai I have ever tasted (and the least expensive, also! I believe it would have been 4 American dollars).

Raspberry Thumbprint cookies

Mmmm mmmm it was a baking weekend at the Navin/Andersen (soon to be just Andersen) house this weekend. I have always wanted to make thumbprint cookies because I love me some shortbread, but I disappointed Erik by making raspberry, rather than chocolate (however, it would be very easy to substitute the jam with Hershey's kisses).

I looked at a bunch of recipes, and what I ended up doing is most similar to the recipe at Two-Tarts.

It only took about 10 minutes of prep and about 10 minutes of baking time!

Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups of butter (softened in the microwave)
1 cup of sugar
3 egg yolks
3 cups flour
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
raspberry jam

They will yield from 3 dozen to probably 5 dozen, depending on how large you make them.

Steps:
1. Pre-heat oven to 400 degrees.

2. I will take any excuse to break out my KitchenAid, so I would use the mixer to cream together the butter and sugar.

3. Add the egg yolks, flour, and vanilla to the mixer and blend. Make sure you have enough flour to be able to roll the dough into balls easily.

4. Roll the dough into balls (this is where you will have to decide whether you want to the cookies to be little or big - I opted for medium sized).

5. As you roll the dough into balls, place them onto an ungreased baking sheet, and make a thumb print into each dough ball.

6. Spoon jam into the thumbprint of each dough ball.

7. Bake for about 10 minutes.  Watch them kind of carefully, I burnt some of mine the first time!

8. Serve to your friends and wait about 20 minutes... they will all be gone.

Avocado Chicken Lime Salad

I know most people dislike eating reheated meals, but not me. I love leftovers! It is my favorite thing to do to cook an enormous amount of food and then eat it for lunch (and dinner) all week. This avocado chicken lime salad is a super easy quick meal that could be made huge and then continue to eat for lunch (it would probably be a good idea to add the avocado later for leftovers so it doesn't brown). I got this from Oh She Glows but decided to add chicken to make it more of a meal. 

Ingredients: 

2 avocados

2 chicken breasts

1 can of black beans

1 tablespoon cilantro

Juice from 1 lime

Salt

Steps:

1. Grill the chicken.

2. Chop the cilantro.

3. Dice the chicken and avocados.

4.  Add the black beans, avocados, chicken, cilantro, lime juice,  and salt to a large bowl. 

5. Toss and serve cold. 

So easy, right??

Asian Turkey Meatballs (with lime, of course)

These are definitely going into my rotation of dinner go-to's! Dang, these are yummm. Of course, because they have some of my favorite ingredients: cilantro and lime

I found this recipe at The Girl Who Ate Everything (thank you!) Soooo flavorful!

Ingredients:
20 ounces (1 package) ground turkey
1 Tablespoon soy sauce
1 tablespoon minced ginger
1 egg
1 tablespoon lime juice
1 teaspoon minced garlic
Panko bread crumbs

Soy Sauce and lime dipping sauce: Mix together...
4 tablespoons soy sauce
2 tablespoons chopped cilantro
2 tablespoons lime juice
water

Peanut Dipping Sauce: Mix together...
2 tablespoons Thai kitchen peanut satay sauce (which comes in a little jar at the grocery store)
soy sauce
lime juice
garlic
olive oil (or sesame oil)

Steps:
1. Preheat oven to 500 degrees.

2. Put ground turkey, cilantro, egg, bread crumbs, soy sauce, ginger, and lime juice in a bowl.




3. Spray a baking pan before your hands get messy.

4. Mix together with your hands.

5. Form the meatballs and place on the baking pan.  It should make about a dozen.



6.  Bake for 15 minutes.

7. Dip in the different sauces and DIG IN!!!!