Christmas Eve Invite

It's our first Christmas in our new house and I couldn't be more excited! We invited our families to celebrate Christmas Eve with us and I whipped up some little invitations and packed up some of the pumpkin chocolate chip biscotti I made the other day. I also made some almond biscotti and threw some of those in there too. It's not too fancy because each little package has to travel across the country but I wanted to mix Christmas with fall (to prove I wasn't nuts and actually knew what time of year it is!). They should be arriving any second now!

Here is a copy of the invitation:

Almond & Pumpkin Biscotti and Invite, pre-wrapping

Invite and wrapped biscotti

All my little ducks in a row!

AEM

Pumpkin Pasta

Let's continue with my pumpkin obsession (ok, truth be told, I needed to use the rest of the pumpkin from last night's biscotti.) We like to eat pretty healthy so when I make dinner, I try to keep things interesting but also healthy without sacrificing flavor. On the menu for tonight: Pumpkin Pasta...Lesson learned tonight: if you're not paying attention, you may bump the pan and burn your finger! Oops!

Pumpkin Pasta

1lb of chicken
1 cup of onions
1 tablespoon of garlic
1/2 can (about a cup or so) of pumpkin
1 teaspoon nutmeg
1 teaspoon salt
1 can reduced sodium chicken broth
3 tablespoons skim milk
1/2 box penne pasta (we like the Barilla Plus)

1. Cook chicken however you choose. I bought tenderloins, diced them, and cooked them on the stove over medium-high heat. Set off to the side.
2. Saute onions in olive oil until onions become translucent.

3. Add garlic, salt, pumpkin, nutmeg, chicken broth, and milk to onions. Simmer until sauce starts to thicken.

4. Add chicken to sauce and continue to simmer until sauce thickens to your liking.

5. Cook pasta according to directions.

6. Serve pasta with chicken and add a touch of Parmesan cheese if you wish.

Mike's rating: 5 out of 5 stars "Very good. We should have it again. I wouldn't want it every night but it's a good change of pace." Personally, I thought it was missing a layer of flavor, it needed a touch of something, maybe red peppers, not sure yet...

AEM

Pumpkin Biscotti

I am obsessed with pumpkin so when fall rolls around, I get pumpkin crazy. Imagine my delight when my cable/phones/internet crashed and I had to go work at Starbucks on the day Pumpkin Spice Latte’s (although I get the Frappuccino version) came back. It was a glorious work-from-Starbucks day! A few years ago I started making pumpkin chocolate chip cookies (recipe to come later in the pumpkin-season!) and I was hooked. 2011 will mark my 4^th year of delicious pumpkin cookies so I decided to kick it up a notch with pumpkin chocolate chip biscotti. I’ve never made biscotti before but it seemed easy enough so last night, while Mike was out of town, I decided it was the perfect time to give it a try. Here’s how it’s done with a few of the lessons I learned:

Pumpkin Biscotti

3-1/2 cups flour

1-1/2 cups brown sugar

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

3 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice

1/2 cup solid-pack canned pumpkin

2 eggs

1 tablespoon vanilla

¾ cups mini chocolate chips (I used 1 cup...that was too many! I always forget that those mini chips go a long way!)

1.      Preheat oven to 350-degrees F and grease 2 large baking sheets.

2.      In a large bowl, combine flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, and spice.

3.      In a small bowl, whisk together the pumpkin, eggs, and vanilla.

4.      Add the pumpkin mixture to the flour mixture, stirring until well combined. I used my stand mixer. The dough will look crumbly but will ball up nicely.

5.      Knead in the chocolate chips.

6.      Place dough on a lightly floured surface and divide into 3 equal portions. Shape each portion into a slightly flattened log about 3-inches by 12-inches.

7.      Place logs 3-inches apart on prepared baking sheets. They will not rise and spread like cookies.

8.      Bake for 25 minutes. Remove from oven and place baking sheet in a wire rack to cool 15 minutes.

9.      Reduce the oven temperature to 300 degrees.

10.  Transfer each log to a cutting board. Using a serrated knife, cut diagonally into 1/2-inch slices. Lesson I learned the hard way: don’t saw the logs like a loaf of French bread! Your little biscotti pieces will only break if you saw at them. It took me an entire log to figure this out…just put the serrated knife where you want it and press down, saw at the very end if need be.

11.  Place the biscotti on their side on the baking sheets and bake 10 minutes, flip and bake another 10 minutes. Cool on wire rack.

Mike Scale: 3.5 out of 5 stars "Excellent, pumpkin makes me want a coffee or some hot cider!"

AEM

Change of Direction

Hello faithful followers! All 16 of you!

It's been awhile since we've last chatted with each other. Ash, Kady, and I LOVE this blog and love YOU! Our lives have been so busy over the past few months with some great times (weddings, engagements, sun tans, comedy shows, trips) and some of the hardest times in our lives (Love you always Grandpa, Number 1 always!)- but the three of us have stuck together and made it almost 3/4th of the way through 2011!

Now, we've done alot of "soul searching" about this blog. We felt like it was at a stand still. I mean we've got plenty of funny stories to share, but is it really enriching our followers lives? Are we really doing something to help the blogsphere? We got to thinking about our passions and hobbies and we kept coming back to the same thing...FOOD!

But not just food, while we do love to eat it, our idea took on a new direction: fun new recipes, cute ways to present party appetizers, decorating for holidays and parties, fun invitations, party planning and hosting, the latest fashions, do it yourself projects, and the list went on. Our idea went out of control! But so are we and that's the new direction we've decided to take this blog. Don't worry, we'll still be our funny selves and we'll blog about all the mistakes and laughs we've made along the way to helping us all become the Ultimate Hostess whether it's for a night with the hubby/boyfriend, cocktails with friends, or a Holiday party!

We'll also be re-do'ing the look of the blog so be on the look for some exciting changes and make sure to give us your feedback! Who knows? This could be the start of the "Keeping up with KAK" book series and accessory line! Watch out Martha! Here we COME!

Ciao yall!

Kristin