recipe: chocolate mint pudding delight

As you know if you haven't been living under a rock, the season finale of The Bachelorette was Sunday night. I think Emily Maynard's season was my favorite yet—the guys seemed normal (mostly), Emily clearly had her head on straight, and we got to meet Sean Lowe (the man that, at least judging by Twitter, approximately 87,000 women want to marry. Including this woman).

Anyway, we had Bachelorette viewing parties at my parents' house throughout the season, and we decided to make snacks for the finale. My chocolate chip cookie dough dip got rave reviews from Al and my mom, and Janae loved Blendy's peanut butter bars, but my favorite was the chocolate/cheesecake/mint concoction I came up with. I adapted a recipe I found on Pinterest (where else?) to make this delightful dessert, which turned out remarkably similar to a dessert a woman at the church I grew up in brought to every potluck. Yummy! 

Chocolate Mint Pudding Delight
adapted from Mint Chocolate No Bake Cheesecake on mybakingaddiction.com.

1 (8 oz) brick Neufchatel (⅓ less fat cream cheese), softened
½ c powdered sugar
1 (8 oz) carton light whipped topping, divided
1½ c skim milk
1 (3.4 oz) pkg instant chocolate pudding
½ tsp vanilla extract
⅛ tsp peppermint extract*
¼ c Andes Crème De Menthe Baking Chips

Using a stand mixer with the paddle attachment, cream together cream cheese and powdered sugar. Add extracts and mix until incorporated. **Beat in ⅔ of the whipped topping (this can be approximate). Set aside. In another bowl, combine milk and instant pudding and whisk until thick. ***Spread cream cheese mixture in a serving bowl or 8x8 glass baking dish. Spread pudding on top of cream cheese layer. Top with remaining whipped topping and Andes chips. Refrigerate at least two hours before serving.

*Even though it doesn't sound like much, ⅛ tsp will make this pretty minty. Not a problem if you like a lot of mint (like me!), but you may want to just use a couple drops or leave it out completely. You could also go with other flavor combinations, like almond extract and Heath toffee pieces. The sky's the limit here!

**The original recipe said to gently fold in the whipped topping. As mine was still mostly frozen and I lacked the patience to wait for it to thaw, I just dumped it in and beat the living daylights out of it. And it turned out fine!

***This would look great layered in parfait glasses or individual ramekins.

The finished product. Thanks, Beth, for the beautiful Spanish serving dish!

I was too busy eating to get a picture on the plate, so this is
the best view of the layers you're going to get!

The cookie dough dip—basically the only thing we dipped into it was a spoon!

Blendy totally dominates the graham crackers for the peanut butter bars!

what's in the mail? 4-26-12 edition

A few weeks ago, I saw a "What's in the mail?" post on another blog. (If I could remember where I saw it, I'd give the blogger credit ...) The idea behind this blogger's post is that she receives so many books to review that she can't possibly get to all of them, so each week she creates a post on everything that came in the mail that week. Now, I don't have her problem of being inundated by books, and I've never received unsolicited review copies, so I review everything I get. However, I don't post all my reviews on this blog—Amazon's Vine program doesn't require reviewers to post on their own blogs, just on Amazon, so there are some books/products you'll never see unless you go to my Amazon profile.

Thus, the debut of this feature. I'm going to try to do one of these posts every other Thursday because I sometimes go a few weeks without receiving any review products. I've also decided not to limit this to products I've received in exchange for a review; I also want to include any books I purchase. (Believe it or not, I actually do still buy books!)

So here we go: "What's in the Mail?" 4-26-12

Finally & Forever by Robin Jones Gunn
This is the fourth book in Gunn's Katie Weldon series. I didn't even know there was a fourth book (I thought the third wrapped things up nicely) until I saw something on Twitter about it. No question—I had to buy it. Not often do I cry from joy when I read, but that's exactly what happened as I finished up Coming Attractions. I even listed the Katie series on my "Books to Read" recommendation page. I have high hopes for this book, and I may have squealed in delight as I opened the package from Amazon!

(I just discovered the first three books in the series—Peculiar Treasures, On a Whim, and Coming Attractions—are each currently $1.99 for Kindle. You need to read these books!)

The Chase by DiAnn Mills
The Chase is one of my Vine books. On the last Vine newsletter, I was offered several Christian books, and The Chase is one of the few I hadn't already read and reviewed! I knew I'd heard of DiAnn Mills before, but I couldn't quite place her until I looked up her author page on Amazon. She wrote Nebraska Legacy, a collection of novellas that I bought a few years ago solely because the stories took place in my beloved home state. (I don't think I ever actually read the book. I wonder if I still have it somewhere?) Anyway, The Chase appears to be about as far removed from a historical romance on the Nebraska plains as you can get. I've lately really been enjoying reading suspense, so I'm looking forward to this book!

Crazy Dangerous by Andrew Klavan
When I got the review invite e-mail from Litfuse for this one, I practically fell over myself in my rush to sign up. Why? Because it's suspense and YA. In the last 18 months or so, I've gone crazy for young adult fiction. Kinda funny, since I never read YA as an actual teenager—I thought I was "too adult" for it. Ha! When I got the book, I found out that Crazy Dangerous's author Klavan also wrote Don't Say a Word. I haven't read that novel, but I'll never forget Brittany Murphy's line from the movie: "I'll never tell!" Now I'm even more anxious to read Crazy Dangerous ... and I think I need to watch Don't Say a Word again! (Success! I just remembered that my cousin/former roommate left her movies behind when she moved—and Don't Say a Word is one of them. I know what I'm doing this weekend!)

The Ishbane Conspiracy by Angela, Karina & Randy Alcorn
Recently, longtime blog reader Cari recommended the Alcorns' Ishbane Conspiracy. Cari and I have a similar enough taste in books that I knew if she recommended it, I'd probably like it. So I went to Amazon and found a dirt cheap used copy, which arrived today. It will probably sit on my shelf for a while—I seem to have a backlog of non-review books!

T-fal FZ700251 ActiFry Low-Fat Healthy Dishwasher Safe Multi-Cooker, Black This is my big Vine "get" of the year (so far). It arrived yesterday, so today I took it for a test spin. I used it to make potato wedges, and they turned out pretty well. The ActiFry's advantage is that it cooks with minimal oil. I followed one of the recipes in the booklet that came with the appliance, and I honestly wasn't too impressed—but I think that's more the recipe's fault than the ActiFry's. Supposedly you can cook plenty of things besides potatoes—meat, veggies, even fruit compote. I'll be trying out several things in the weeks to come, and I look forward to the delicious research!

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received some of these products free in exchange for my honest review. Other products I purchased myself. Regardless, I was not required to write a positive review and received no monetary compensation. The opinions expressed are my own.  I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission's 16 CFR, Part 255: "Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising."

two snow days. whatever will i do???

Pretty much everything in Central Nebraska came to a standstill Sunday night, thanks to a slow-moving snowstorm. We weren't going to have school on Monday anyway, thanks to our four-day school week, but we did have a staff in-service scheduled for Monday morning that got postponed. I decided to stay home for at least the morning (I normally work in the office on our day off), and it's a good thing I did--I couldn't have gone anywhere anyway, as I woke up to at least a foot of snow in my driveway! Monday night, I got winter's most anticipated call: the call letting me know we had a snow day on Tuesday! So how did I spend my time? Glad you asked :-)

Monday

• Woke up at 7 to cancel the coffee order I'd placed for in-service. Our local coffee shop doesn't have an answering machine, and they closed on Sunday before I knew in-service had been postponed, so I needed to call before they started on it. After placing the call, I rolled over and went back to sleep until 10!
• Read my book. I've had this book to review for Waterbrook Multnomah for far too long now. It's an interesting book, but it's not one of those "can't put it down" reads. Sadly, of the 150 pages left when I started reading, I only made it through 50.
• Worked on my puzzles. Ever heard of nonograms? How about O'Ekaki? I think they go by other names, too. I first saw them in a sudoku book I had, and I'm currently obsessed. I just bought a book (if you click on O'Ekaki above, you'll see which one), and I spent about an hour doing them Sunday night ... and then proceeded to dream about them! One of the reason's I only made it through 50 pages of Flight of Shadows is that I kept going back to O'Ekaki.
• Shoveled my driveway with Blendy ... well, we shoveled enough of the driveway to get my car out of the garage. The rest of the driveway we left, hoping that a nice man would come by and move the rest of the snow.
• Guess what? A nice man did come move the snow! About an hour after we finished shoveling, my dad showed up with a tractor and blade. He cleared the rest of the driveway and the circle drive!
• Played "Just Dance 2" with Blendy. Mom and Dad gave it to me for Christmas. I'm well aware that I look like a complete fool while playing, but I don't care--it's so much fun! (It's also making me sore--I think that's a good sign!)
• Went to the chiropractor. Around 11:00 Monday morning, I suddenly thought, "I wonder when my next chiro appointment is?" I dug out the appointment card I carry in my wallet and saw my next appointment was at 4:15 that afternoon! I always feel so much better after seeing my doctor!
• Decided to be responsible and work on speech. I started cutting a piece that my team could potentially start using this weekend. Then I received "the call" (the one letting me know school had been called off) and I ...
• Decided to be irresponsible! I spent the evening with Mom and Blendy watching The Bachelor and Castle. If you recall, I do love me some Nathan Fillion!
• Watched some What I Like About You while blogging. Season 4. Vic and Val. Why isn't this show on dvd? Someday my video tapes will wear out ...

Tuesday

• Woke up at 9:30 and decided to spend the morning pampering myself and the afternoon being responsible. It didn't go quite as planned ... I decided to take a bath in the master bath. I never use that bathroom because it wasn't available when I moved in, and I just use the bathroom that's across the hall from my bedroom. But this bathtub has jets, and it's actually deep, so I thought I'd try it out. Yeah, that was a bit of a mistake. I ran the water, got in, sighed in relaxation, and turned on the jets. Soon I was sharing the water with hundreds of rust flecks! I'm guessing the jets hadn't been used at least since the owner moved out, and that was over a year ago ... and who knows if she even used them for a while before that! I immediately jumped out and drained the water. Ewwww!!!
• Moved on to part two of the pampering process: facial and hand treatment! I dug out my paraffin bath (which I hadn't used since Christmas '09), put some goop on my face, and settled in for part two of Bleak House. (Thanks, Netflix streaming!)
• Started being responsible by reading my book instead of watching part three of Bleak House. Finally finished said book and wrote the review. You can see it here. (If you do read the review, would you let me know if you can see the ranking button at the bottom of the post? It's not showing up for me, but I wonder if it's just my browser.)
• Made flour tortillas for use in supper's quesadillas. Tortillas are surprisingly easy to make, and they taste so much better than the ones I usually buy at Walmart!
• Decided to give the bath another go ... complete with the next part of Bleak House. (Have you gathered yet that I'm a period drama nut?) This time I waited until the very end of the bath to turn the jets on ... and sure enough, the same thing happened!
• Watched Knight and Day with Blendy. Entertaining, but not a movie I'd want to see again and again.

All in all, I had a good two days off. Not sure I'm ready to hit the grind again, but I'm certainly a lot more rested than I was before ... and rest is a precious commodity during speech season!

lazy blogger

I've been an incredibly lazy blogger recently. The reasons for this are many, but basically I feel I don't have enough of interest to say to create an entire blog post. So, I offer you yet another bulleted list of randomness.

• I saw a commercial the other day illustrating how much food we throw out each year. I think the average was $500-worth. While I'm sure I don't throw that much out, I could certainly identify with the commercial. I can identify with it even more after cleaning out my refrigerator. Spoiled milk? Check. Old lunchmeat? Check. Moldy cheese? Check. Hard-as-a-rock bread? Check.
• In case you hadn't noticed, Lost is back! Tonight is the third installment of the final season. So many questions, so little time for answers!
• My dearly beloved desktop computer, which one of my brother's college friends built for me, exploded the other day. Maybe "exploded" isn't quite right ... I heard two loud pops, smoke shot out of the back, and it died. I'm so glad I decided to buy my laptop last summer! My brother thinks the data on the hard drive should be salvageable ... I sure hope so!
• I love the Olympics! The "inspirational" stories they run between/during competition always make me cry. And the actual competition is so fun to watch! Back in junior high/high school/college I was absolutely obsessed with figure skating. Funny, I'm not even sure I watched it at all during the Torino Olympics. I recognize the names of the American male skaters and one pair of ice dancers, but I don't know much about them. I think I've just found a new favorite skater, though: Takahiko Kozuka of Japan. He skated his short program to Jimi Hendrix, and he was so fun to watch!
• How is it that I went 28 years without realizing how wonderful cayenne pepper is? It's my new favorite spice. Just a little goes a long way, and it flavors without adding fat, which is excellent for my diet. Yum!
• Val and I are contemplating a trip to see Lifehouse and Daughtry in May. Really, Daughtry is the headliner, but Lifehouse is more important to me :-) We could see them in Wichita or Kansas City ... either would require a 4-5 hour car trip, but I've already proven I don't mind traveling to see my favorite artists!
• My next Blogging for Books review is due sometime next week. I have two books to read this time, and I'm about halfway through the first. The problem? It's a sequel, and I didn't read the first book. I was incredibly lost for at least the first 60 pages. I finally decided I didn't need to understand what was happening; I just needed to make it through. And now I think I've sort of figured out what's what ... and I really need to start speed reading!

what to do on a completely free day

These things I've done:

• sleep in
• watch Thursday's FlashForward. 
• rewatch the middle 20 minutes of FlashForward because I was distracted.
• watch Thursday's The Office.
• retake the Strong Life Test that goes along with my book review book. Get yet another result for my lead and supporting roles.
• finish my review of Find Your Strongest Life. Per Thomas Nelson guidelines, it will go up on my blog on Monday.
• write an expanded review to also post on this blog. Thomas Nelson requests that all reviews are approximately 200 words, but I had so much more to say about this book that I decided to write a regular review and an expanded review.
• work out while watching the first season of Fringe.
• make a better-than-Egg McMuffin out of a soft-boiled egg and an English muffin.

These things are yet to be done (and I can virtually guarantee not all of these will happen!):

• do the dishes
• go to the parents' for supper
• read Green
  
• take out the trash
• shower
• watch Ryan Reynolds on SNL
• search for speeches for the new speech season
  
• go to bed before midnight
  

what i did over christmas break

• attended family gatherings, of course: in Kansas and Nebraska. (Click on the states to see my facebook albums.)
• baked lots of bread, including rolls that take 70 minutes start-to-finish.
• decided to read the entire Bible in 2009. This is something I've never even attempted before--my new ESV Study Bible (thanks, Mom & Dad!) came with a one-year plan, and I'm excited to do this!
• found lots of great after Christmas specials at Hobby Lobby, Kohl's, and Bath and Body Works.
• bought lots of butter. Seriously. I had no idea how much until I was cleaning out my freezer and found seven pounds of frozen butter quarters. I had one pound left after my Thanksgiving baking. Speaking of cleaning out my freezer, I . . .
• threw away 2 1/2 year old frozen pork chops.
  
• finally finished up my cross-stitch project. I'll post a pic soon.
• stayed up until 4:30 a.m. on New Year's Eve/New Year's Day with Val watching What I Like About You.
  
• finished reading Field of Blood (Jerusalem's Undead Trilogy, Book 1),my book review blogger book. Look for my review in the next few days.
• visited Red Lobster for the first (and second) time.
• played Dominoes for the first time (or maybe I've played before and was just so bored that I blocked it from my memory).
  
  

crazy? you bet!

Steph wanted pizza last Friday, but I didn't want to take the time to make our normal homemade crust. Searching through Mom's recipes, I found one from my aunt called Crazy Crust Pizza. It looked fairly quick and simple, so I decided to go for it. I knew it would be different, as it called for 4 eggs and only 2 cups of flour . . . but I had no idea just how different! Fortunately, I had my camera:

1. Mix all ingredients until smooth; spread in pan. Add meat, and bake for 25 minutes. I chose to ignore the meat directions--why would I put the meat on before the sauce? Well, perhaps the meat would serve to hold down the crust; when I opened the oven to check on the crust 15 minutes into the baking time, this is what I saw:
2. When I took the crust out after the full 25 minutes, it looked like this:
3. After I beat on it with a spatula, it looked a little more normal:
4. Add the sauce . . .

5. And cheese. And in my case, meat:

6. And here's the final product. It looks like a normal pizza!
The crust was surprisingly good . . . until the next day. I usually love day-old pizza, but not this stuff. The crust took on a funky texture and flavor. So, beware of Crazy Crust Pizza . . . or at least follow the recipe :-)