Tag: oreos

It Expired When?!

Well…crap.

I had such awesome ideas for tonight’s meal! I was even going to do a before and after video to accompany it. The before video was naively uploaded before I had an after video. Total rookie mistake there… (the video is uploaded onto the JOABC FB and Insta pages)

Unfortunately, awesomeness was not meant to be. Here’s the story:

First off, I started off much later than usual. With piano practice, preschool orientation, and our first day of blended home school, we were running behind on time and energy once dinner rolled around. Luckily, on Saturday we had an amazing (albeit a little dry) roast and I saved a little to make BBQ Stuffed Potatoes.

However, I did not check the expiration date on the barbecue sauce until I was WELL into cooking. We are talking about completely and utterly ruined the potato stuffing. The sauce expired in September 2016!

I mean…COME ON! Really?! How in the world has this barbecue sauce been hiding in the back of my pantry for that long? I just noticed it a week ago and patted myself on the back for having a good, easy staple sitting on the pantry shelf. I’m just going to assume it magically appeared. There’s no other explanation…

Luckily, a little quick thinking with a half pack of bacon and a half block of sharp cheddar cheese saved our meal tonight.

Whew! I definitely deserved those few extra double stuffed Oreos I sneaked after my kids went to bed!

 

Print Recipe
 Oven Baked Potato
This delicious potato is crispy on the outside with fluffy goodness on the inside! Finish with your favorite toppings to make this a go-to and simple meal. Also, absolutely no foil is needed in this recipe! This serving size can easily be adjusted to feed as few or as many friends/family as needed.
Course Main Dish
Prep Time 5 minutes
Cook Time 60 minutes
Servings
people
Ingredients
Course Main Dish
Prep Time 5 minutes
Cook Time 60 minutes
Servings
people
Ingredients
Instructions
  1. Preheat oven to 450.
  2. Wash and dry potatoes thoroughly. Make a few holes in the potato with a fork to release steam during baking.
  3. Put the potatoes directly on the oven rack for 45 minutes.
  4. After 45 minutes, remove the potatoes (use an oven mitt or tongs!!!) and brush thoroughly with oil and put a small pinch of salt on each side of the potato.
  5. Return the potatoes to the oven for another 15 minutes.
  6. Once the potatoes are done cooking, they should be slightly crispy on the outside, but slightly "soft" to the touch when removed from the oven.
  7. Slice open, fill with toppings, and enjoy!
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Owl Take a Chance

My oldest child turned 10 this past May and was excited to have a birthday party with her friends. She is very much into the Harry Potter craze and has been reading the books for the past year. I don’t know much about Harry Potter (not my preferred genre), but I know it has an owl in it and she likes owls so I ran with it as the theme.

I found these ADORABLE owl cupcakes on Pinterest. I was under the impression they would be simple. I did not take the original picture that is featured on the site and I’m not sure if I can share it on here, so I’ll refrain. Let’s just say the owl cupcakes are supposed to resemble the picture attached to this post, but cuter. Much, much cuter.

First off, I’m not sure how big the cupcakes were in the original post’s picture, but the “eyes” and such fit much more comfortably than they did in my kitchen. I had the hardest time trying to keep all the items on top of these stupid cupcakes.

Secondly, how did this person separate the Oreo cookies so cleanly? I only wasted 15 sets of these things trying to get one set of eyes. I am just going to assume I got a faulty bag. It’s definitely not user error, right?!

Once I finally got the M&Ms and Oreos placed, I patted myself on the back for this cupcake creation that “SLIGHTLY” resembled an owl. Then, this happened:

What. The. Crap.

That little guy melted faster than a popsicle in an Alabama summer. I was so aggravated at this project. I used almost all of the frosting on only a few of the 24 cupcakes trying to keep everything in place. I ended up scrapping the poor, melting “owl” cupcake and took the successful cupcakes to the party. Unfortunately, only two made the cut.

 

My daughter had one of the owl cupcakes and gave her best friend the other one. The rest of her friends had the non-owl cupcakes and, wouldn’t you know, I didn’t hear a single complaint. My daughter would have been perfectly happy with the plain cupcakes had I decided to forego the owl idea entirely. I think that it is us, the parents, that usually put more pressure on ourselves than necessary for birthday parties. To be honest, children just expect sugar at birthday gatherings. I don’t think the form that it takes is that important to them.

The cupcake mix came from a box and the icing from a plastic tub (because her birthday was smack dab in a crazy time of the school year), but I’ll leave you the directions on how to “fashion” the owls. Good luck!!!

Owl Faces

  • Oreos
  • M&Ms (brown and orange)
  • patience (big heaping loads of it)
  1. Separate the Oreo cookies by gently twisting the two pieces in opposite direction. Separate them according to the ones that come off with frosting and the ones that come apart “clean”.
  2. Take two of the brown M&Ms and put a tiny amount of frosting on the back of each and attach one to one of the frosted Oreos
  3. Take two of the frosted Oreo cookies with M&Ms and place them on the cupcake next to each other.
  4. Cut or snap one of the “clean” Oreo cookie pieces in half and place above the “eyes” at a slight angle to act as the owl’s eyebrows.
  5. Press an orange M&M firmly into the cupcake vertically and centered underneath the two “eyes”.
  6. Use your patience to tweak them however they need to be tweaked to work properly.