Chocolate Strawberry Bars

Last and final dessert of my holiday baking. I saw this recipe first on Courtney’s blog and decided should bake for Holidays. We had it on Christmas pot luck and its lip – smacking good.

The recipe calls for raspberry jam and I replaced it with strawberry jam.

Recipe Courtesy : Sweet Tooth Sweet Life

Ingredients:

• 1 cup (2 sticks) butter, softened
• 2 cups all purpose flour
• 1/2 cup light brown sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 (14 ounce) can sweetened condensed milk (fat free or regular)
• 2 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips, divided
• 1/3 cup seedless strawberry jam

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Beat butter until creamy then add flour, brown sugar, and salt until well mixed. Press 1-1/4 cups crumb mixture unto the bottom of a greased 9×13 pan. Bake for about 10-12 minutes.
3. Heat a small sauce pan and combine 1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips with sweetened condensed milk, melt over low heat, stirring until smooth.
4. Spread chocolate over hot crust.
5. Spread the jam evenly over melted chocolate. Sprinkle with remaining crumb mixture and remaining chocolate chips.
6. Place back into oven and continue baking for 25-30 minutes, or until center is set. Cool completely and enjoy.

Dark Chocolate Turtle Graham Bars

Another delicious and incredibly decadent dessert from my holiday baking. I bet you cant stop with one and all my neighbors whom I shared these with were raving about how good these are.

Recipe Courtesy : Food Network

Ingredients

12-14 graham crackers

1 cup unsalted butter

1 cup packed brown sugar

1 cup chopped pecans

12 oz. dark chocolate chips

Procedure:

1. Preheat oven to 350 F
2. Line the baking sheet with parchment paper and arrange the graham crackers in a single layer.
3. Heat a saucepan and add butter, brown sugar, pecans. Boil this for about 2-3 minutes stirring continuously.
4. Pour the butter mixture over the graham crackers and spread it evenly. Bake it for about 15 minutes.
5. Meanwhile melt the dark chocolate in microwave. I did it in 90 seconds. Place the bowl in microwave for 30 seconds. Give it a good stir and again place it in microwave. Do this until the chocolate is melted.
6. Pour the chocolate over the caramel covered graham crackers and spread evenly.
7. Chill in the refrigerator completely for 30-45 minutes. Cut into bars and enjoy.

Pretzel Delights

These are the easiest and the quick dessert I have made over the Holidays. I am kind of late in posting the recipe, but here it is. Hope you enjoy it.

Ingredients

• Small pretzels

• Chewy Caramels in Milk Chocolate

• Pecan halves

Directions

1. Heat oven to 350°F. Line cookie sheet with parchment paper or foil.

2. Place one pretzel for each pretzel treat desired on prepared sheet. Top each pretzel with one unwrapped Chewy Caramel in Milk Chocolate.

3. Bake 3 to 5 minutes or until caramel piece begins to soften, but not melt. Remove from oven

4. Top with either pecan half. Cool completely and enjoy it.

MIMM : A Chilly Weekend

Happy Monday to you all. It feels as if I have blogged long time back. Good to be unplugged from the blog for a while and now I am back to my groove. The Colorado area has been dumped by loads of snow on this weekend.

Friday and Saturday we spent at home,  chatting with family over Skype and having loads of yummy food. Sunday we went to a birthday party and got to meet lots of friends after a very long time. By evening I was so exhausted but prepped for the week meals and planned too.

So time for the meal plan of this week.

Monday : Carrot Coconut Curry, Broken Wheat / Roti, Aloo Palak

Tuesday : Eggplant Coriander Curry / Veggie Bean Soup

Wednesday : Veggie Pasta / Quinoa, Tindora Curry

Thursday : Broken Wheat , Beans Curry / Dosa, Chutney

Friday : Tomato Dal, Quinoa / Methi Paratha

How was your weekend?? Did you meal plan for this week??

Happy New Year 2014 & 2013 Reflections

Welcome New Year…
We look forward to you
A year of wonderful happiness
A year of good health
A year of great success
A year of incredibly good luck
A year of continuous fun
Happy New Year 2014

I wish all of my readers  and their family a joyful, bright, healthy, prosperous and happiest new year ahead!

As far as I remember I started resolutions every year and failed to practice them. This time I would like to recap on my resolutions I made for 2013.

• Eat pretty less sugar, sweets  — Was partially successful as I cut down most of the sugar.
• Avoid chips, deep fried foods, soda totally. — Just had occasional munching on chips and deep fried foods during parties. Totally stopped drinking soda.
• 30-60 minutes of exercise daily in some or the other form — I would say its 70% accomplished.
• Run a 5k by the end of Summer. — Completed as I ran my first 5k this past summer.
• Eat more healthy and increase intake of veggies, fruits and water. — Still trying but would say doing good on water intake and eating more amount of veggies and fruits.

 2013 has been great  for me.

1.   Ran my first 5K this summer.
2. Bought my dream house and currently in the process of decorating and making it a home.
3. Completed Summer Shred and Extreme Summer  Shred successfully.
4. Visited India after 2 and 1/2 years and met all of my family members.

Instead of resolutions, I would like to say to adapt these changes in to my life for 2014 and hopefully continue them for the rest of the years.

• Try to eat clean and healthy as possible by staying away from processed foods.
• Try to be active as possible ( even walking for 30 mins )
• Stay positive and  enjoy simple pleasures of life.
• Try to take mini vacations every two – three months and embrace the beautiful life and nature.
• Be thankful for my life, family and work.
• Try to be good parent, wife .