I Have a Garden!

Plants and I have never really been friends. Sure, I appreciate their existence and all, and they're nice to look at most of the time, but we were pretty much mutually oblivious. That is, until I got my first place and decided I was going to have houseplants. I went out and picked out the perfect houseplant. It was adorable and I was going to name it. I have no idea what I was going to name it because the damn thing died two weeks after I brought it home. I watered it, I swear, but somehow I couldn't keep that freaking pot of ivy alive.

I bitched and sulked for a while after that and decided to never have another plant ever again.

Yaknow, until I went to the store and saw all the adorable mini cactuses and stuff. Then I wanted a houseplant again. But I'm not completely stupid. This time, instead of getting houseplants, I opted for traditional outdoor plants.

I got a little carried away.

My yard now looks like a veritable jungle, and not just because we haven't mowed.

At the beginning of May I filled three planters with petunias (I think) and sweet potato vines:

They don't actually grow sweet potatoes, but they're nice to look at.

I also planted jalapenos....

and some other kind of pepper....

and a pot of peppermint....

and I started cilantro and dill and spearmint from seed. Two weeks later they were definitely not dead. Score!

Well, kind of. It took another month before I finally figured out the stuff in the spearmint pot wasn't so much spearmint as a very impressive weed. I went out and bought a spearmint plant instead.

Now my deck looks like this:

The seeds have gone absolutely crazy....

the mint is all splayed out and probably pissed I didn't give it a bigger pot....

and I have peppers!

So many peppers!

Also, thanks to a little Miracle Grow, the flower boxes have filled in pretty well too.

As if that wasn't enough, my roommate has also started a vegetable garden with cucumbers and corn and tomatoes and more peppers and pumpkins and mini pumpkins and funny-looking gourds. Me, I would have been totally fine with just having a giant gourd patch, but apparently that's "boring."

Even with all that greenery, I think my favorite thing in the entire yard is this piece of onion grass growing out of a cinder block.

What's growing in your yard? Do you have any ideas for all those peppers? Let me know in the comments!

Peanut Butter M&M Cookies

Guys! Today is the day! Are you excited? Are you? Are you? Huh huh huh?

Today I am finally giving you my Peanut Butter M&M cookie recipe. *the crowd goes wild* But first, I need to tell you a short story.

For some time now I have been on a quest to discover the world's best peanut butter cookie recipe. I started out, as everyone does, with the classic Peanut Butter Blossom cookies, adorned oh-so-sweetly with a Hershey Kiss. I didn't like those. So I tried my own Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip cookies. They were alright, but I didn't love them. After that I invented my own recipe while laying in bed half-asleep and attempted to bake them the next morning from my scrawled notes. I kind of forgot all about the egg, because, evidently, sleepy me doesn't care much for eggs. I tried a couple more times and tweaked the recipe to become what you're getting today, and I'm pretty happy with it. However, throughout this journey to find the perfect peanut butter cookie recipe, I have come to realize something very important about myself.....I don't like peanut butter.

Yes, you read that right. So long, Peanut Butter M&M cookies. So long, Reeses Peanut Butter Cup Oreos. So long, horrible peanut butter sandwiches my mother used to make without jelly. (I feel like that last one may have started my psychological aversion to peanut butter, but who knows. Maybe I had a peanut allergy in a past life or something.)

Since I've hyped this recipe so much lately--and since I invested so much stinkin' time trying to perfect it--I'm going to share it today whether I like it or not. People around me who like peanut butter claim they're delicious. If you don't like them, blame my friends.

Here's what you'll need:
1 3/4 cup flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup butter, softened
3/4 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup sugar
1 tbs egg replacer
3 tbs warm water
1 1/2 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup peanut butter
1 cup mini M&Ms
Note: I don't use eggs and used the egg replacer and warm water as a sub. I'm pretty sure it's the equivalent to approximately two eggs....or maybe an egg and a yolk....but probably two eggs, so give that a whirl and let me know if I need to adjust the recipe for egg-eaters.

Here's what you do:

1. Sift the flour, baking soda, and salt together into a medium bowl.

2. Beat together the butter and sugars.

3. In a tiny bowl, mix together the egg replacer and water and then beat it into the butter mixture. If you're using real eggs you can skip the tiny bowl....unless you really want to pour your eggs into a tiny bowl, in which case, follow your dreams and stuff.

4. Beat in vanilla and peanut butter.

5. Add the floury mixture into the peanutbuttery mixture in two portions, beating after each addition. Dough should be squishy. Be sure to test for squishiness by squishing.

6. Stir in 1 cup of mini M&Ms. Or mini chocolate chips. Or candied ants. Whatever you happen to have on hand is fine. I happened to have a few M&Ms.

7. Roll dough into approximately tablespoon-sized lumps, place on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper and squish slightly because squishing is fun.

8. Bake at 350 for 10-12 minutes.

9. Cool on a wire rack.

Makes roughly 32 cookies depending on how big they are and how much dough you eat.

How do you feel about peanut butter? Did your mother put jelly on your sandwiches? Was it delicious? I bet it was....

I Fixed My Stove!

Guys! I did it! I fixed my stove!

Now, I know this isn't a cinematic wonder or anything, but I figured it would be easier to show you the process in video form rather than blog post. Thus, I present to you my YouTube debut:

For the last week, the only way to turn off my stove has been to flip the breaker, which has vastly limited my culinary endeavors. Luckily, the fantabulous dudes from Appliance Parts Pros provided me with the knowledge and appliance parts necessary to repair my stove all by myself.

(This is a very big deal for me. I called my roommate when the stove broke and not only would he not let me attempt the repair myself, but he told me not to order the part until he came home. I also told my mother I was going to fix my stove and she yelled at me and told me to hire an electrician. I showed them.)

It was actually a very simple repair; I just had to swap out the Infinite Switch. (I totally know what that is, by the way.) The whole process took me less than thirty minutes, even whilst trying to find camera angles. It saddens me that the people in my life have so little faith in my stove fixing abilities.

If any of your appliances are being bitchy, I highly recommend checking out AppliancePartsPros.com. Actually, if none of your appliances are being bitchy I recommend breaking one of them just so that you have a reason to check out AppliancePartsPros.com. The part I ordered was less than $25 with shipping, whereas ordering it directly from GE would have set me back $35 before shipping. And, speaking of shipping, I ordered the part on Sunday night and had it on my doorstep at 10am Tuesday morning. I was absolutely floored and cannot say enough about how awesome the Appliance Parts Pros are. (No, they're not paying me to say this, they're just that rad.)

Regularly scheduled blog programming will return on Monday with the long-awaited Peanut Butter M&M Cookie recipe. For real this time. I promise.

What's in My Fridge?

I was planning to do this post sometime next month, but my stove went wacko this week and now the only way to turn it off is by flipping the breaker. This means I can't use my oven without the stove running full speed for an hour and a half, which means I can't bake you cookies, which means I'm strapped for content, which is why today I'mma show you what's in my fridge. Yaaaaay!

I was planning to spend the next month unofficially cleaning out my fridge so there wouldn't be anything embarrassing in there when I showed it to the whole internet, but since desperate times call for desperate measures, today you are getting a completely uncensored look at the inside of my fridge. With the exception of the bag of chocolate chips that I took out and then started eating and never remembered to photograph. Whoops.

The first thing you'll notice once you find my fridge (it's that big thing buried under the pile of crap and the Zits cartoon) is its lack of organization. It was organized once. That was a long time ago.

The second thing you'll notice is the collection of salad dressing. I don't eat salad--nor does my carnivorous roommate--but somehow we ended up with five different kinds of dressing. I do not understand this phenomenon.

I also have Miracle Whip "dressing" and mayo.

Next up: pickles. Lots and lots and lots of pickles. And jalapenos. But mostly pickles. I'd love to tell you I bought the pickles for a recipe, but I didn't. I just love pickles. Mostly because they make for great dirty jokes. I did, however, buy the jalapenos for a recipe.

Then I have spaghetti fixin's and a jar of roasted red peppers.

After that, there are a ton of jelly-type substances. I don't actually eat jelly on anything, but somehow I have a fridge full of it.

And, of course, more condiments.

I also happen to have some ketchup left over from Brand Wars. If anyone has a recipe for ketchup ANYTHING, please let me know. (Just kidding. That would be gross.)

Moving on to the second shelf, we have a wide selection of fizzy beverages, including sparkling grape juice and peach Fresca. Peach Fresca isn't nearly as good as alcoholic peach lemonade, but it's okay.

Also, there is yogurt on the second shelf. The second shelf tends to be a catchall.....but then, my entire fridge is a catchall.

Then we have the big, tall shelf which houses the big, tall pitcher of iced tea. And water. And milk. But mostly the iced tea, because iced tea is amazing. (I've been having iced tea withdrawals since my stove has been on the fritz. It might be time for me to learn to make sun tea.)

Underneath the iced tea is the best part of the entire fridge: the cheese drawer. I love the cheese drawer. It holds the cheese. I love cheese. I love cheese more than I love iced tea. That's a big, big love. Right now my cheese drawer holds a package of Laughing Cow Creamy Swiss cheese, a package of American Cheese, a bag of cheese sticks, a box of cream cheese, some provolone, some sliced Swiss, two bags of mozzarella, a bag of mild cheddar, a bag of sharp cheddar, a little shredded Parmesan, and some stowaway fake meat and old pepperoni. (Someone please leave an old pepperoni joke in the comments.)

The next shelf is typically home to all the meat, but since I have the house to myself this week, that's where where my bagels are chilling (no pun intended). Bagels and lettuce.

Bagels and lettuce and apple sauce.

(All those eyeballs are from April Fools Day, by the way. They've been falling off things and appearing randomly all over my kitchen since April.)

All the way at the bottom we have two drawers: the candy drawer and the overflow condiments drawer. The candy drawer currently contains half a bag of Easter-themed mini Kit-Kats, two full-sized Kit-Kat bars, a strip of snack-sized Kit-Kats (I like Kit-Kats), some 3 Musketeers, a bag of old scummy Halloween candy, a bag of caramel filled Kisses, a bag of mint filled Kisses, two strips of snack-sized Hershey bars (for S'mores), chocolate chips, Andes Peppermint Chips, three Holiday Mint White Chocolate Hershey bars, a bag of mini Reeses, a bar of orange-flavored Moser Roth chocolate, a bar of chili-flavored Moser Roth chocolate, a bar of mint-flavored Moser Roth chocolate, and the remnants of our Costco-sized package of Kraft Singles.

The first shelf on the door holds the margarine and butter.

The second shelf usually holds water bottles, but lately it has become an all-around beverage holder to include my roommate's post-mowing Gatorade, lime juice, and whipped cream. Yes, whipped cream should be considered a beverage.

Finally, we have the booze. Since I don't have any super-girly alcohol right now, I've opted for tonic water (gin and tonics) and root beer (for root beer and rum).

And that, my friends, is my fridge! I'd love to snoop on yours, so if you do a similar post leave me a link in the comments!

Reese's Peanut Butter Cup Oreos

So you know that recipe I promised you for peanut butter M&M cookies? I'm breaking my promise. See, I made a batch and planned to photograph them for you but somebody  *cough*myroommate*cough*  ate all but three of them before I could take out the camera.

That's okay, though, because we have Oreos!

And not just any Oreos. These are the long-awaited Reese's Peanut Butter Oreos.



Ever since both the Lindsay Lohans bonded over Skippy and Oreos in their isolation cabin, we've been awaiting the day Oreos came prefilled with peanuty goodness.

M&M Infestation

Lately my roommate has gotten super gung-ho on this whole living-with-a-blogger thing. Last week he brought home a bag of Gimbal's Sour Lovers, two packages of Chips Ahoy cookies with Oreo Creme filling, and about four million packages of M&Ms. All of these gifts were completely selfless, intended only to grow my blog. None of them had anything to do with my roommate wanting to eat two packages of cookies about four million M&Ms. Nope. None of them.

In case you're curious, the Chips A-whore-eos taste like Chips Ahoys. With Oreo filling. This is not nearly as spectacular as it sounds, I promise.

The Gimbal's Sour Lovers candies are also not spectacular. They were squishy and came in odd flavors like Fuji Apple and Baja Margarita and Mango.

Seagram's Escapes Review

In case you haven't ventured into your local Walmart lately, I'm here to inform you that they have alcohol. Cheap alcohol. Cheap, embarrassing alcohol.

Yes, that's right, the Seagram's Escapes collection has taken store shelves by storm, offering a summery beverage option in a variety of girly colors sure to tickle the fancy of just about anyone without testicles. Since we've already established I like girly drinks, clearly, I had to give these a whirl, and what better excuse to get moderately buzzed on a weeknight than the internet? (I'm a food blogger; I have to review these. I can't let the internet down!)