Banana - Vanilla bean - Chocolate chip pancakes

Super bargain....a whole jar of pure vanilla bean seeds for $9.99....gasp!!!! I found these at HomeSense the other day and after doing the happy dance in the middle of the store I couldn't wait to get home and try them.
 I was a little suspicious as to whether they would have as much oomph as a fresh split bean so I tried out a new pancake recipe this morning....pleasantly surprised!!
On the jar it says 1/4 teaspoon of these babies is the equivalent of 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract.

Aren't they beautiful?

 I mixed them in with the mashed banana and let them sit for a few minutes.

Topped the pancakes off with a few dried bananas and some pure maple syrup.....mm mm I'm hungry again just looking at them. These would go fabulously with a toasted marshmallow milkshake from Joy the baker.

RECIPE: (adapted from The all new Good Housekeeping cookbook).

1 Cup all purpose flour

2 tablespoons sugar

2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 1/4 cups milk

3 tablespoons butter, malted

1 egg, lightly beaten

1 banana, mashed

1/4 tsp vanilla bean seeds

1/2 cup or so chocolate chips, 5ish per pancake

Combine dry ingredients in a bowl, add milk, butter, egg, banana and vanilla seeds,(mix seeds with banana mash).

Stir until just combined.

I'm sure you all know how to cook a pancake so I'm not going to explain the rest of the process, you're too smart for that!

When cooking pancakes, before the big flip, sprinkle with chocolate chips. You could always add the chocolate chips to the batter too if you like.

I had some dried banana chips on hand so I added them as garnish with maple syrup.

Now get in your cars and get to HomeSense!!!!

Yumminess...

I've been ogling the wonderful goodies over at Joy the Bakers blog, hoping to find some yummy recipes for Xmas gift goodies.  I found that... and then some.

If you haven't already seen her blog then you are truly missing out, you must stop what you are doing ( after you've finished reading this of course ) and go take a look. If you didn't feel like baking today then you will after looking at her fabulous recipes, and she's a great read to boot.

Great photography helps, not that she need it but it does get me motivated to get out of my rocking chair and into an apron.

I'm thinking about making the toasted marshmallow milkshake for breakfast...why not?

A series of unfortunate events....

Did you ever have one of those weeks where nothing goes quite as you had planned?

I tried a bunch of new recipes this week, cauliflower soup...sounded foolproof.......NOT!

It ranked up there with my biggest soup failure ever!!! Even the dog wouldn't eat it!

Salsa Verde....yummy right? NOT!

My friend Isabel gave me some super yummy tomatillos from her garden..so why not try a new recipe I say!

My gals pals and I had the yummiest Salsa Verde in a little hole in the wall restaurant in Vancouver in September. I've been dreaming of it ever since..so I made some....FAIL!!!

What's a girl to do? Just when I thought my chef mojo had abandoned me completely I was rescued by a pie... and not just any pie mind you. Just the cutest damn pie in the whole wide world.

 

I found this fantastic little pocket pie maker thingy a while back at the superstore for $4.99. Put in in my overflowing Tupperware cupboard and kinda forgot about it...until today...when I needed it the most.

Check it out!! I guess other stores sell similar products, like this heart shaped one from Williams Sanoma, but double the price.

Best 5 bucks I've ever spent lately!

I used store bought puff pastry and an apple and raisin pie recipe ( it comes with a recipe but I altered it slightly ) and Bob's your uncle!!!

Zoe has her bestie over for a sleepover tonight and I can hear them downstairs munching on their sweet treats as I type. I will be making more of these for school lunches, if anyone wants to join me for a baking session....let me know.

The death of Mr Jack 'O'

I don't know about everyone else out there but a real sign that Halloween is over and done with at our house is the traditional jack 'o' lantern slaughter in our goat field.

Please observe........

....everyone say bye bye Jack 'O'.....

          ....Jack 'O' say hello to my little friend Chopper!

mmmmmmmmm pumpkin.

So, if you are within driving distance of my house, please feel free to join in the annual pumpkin feeding frenzy by bringing over your Jack 'O's.

And on a completely different topic, I'm hoping my wonderful friend Sam, who happens to be the best crocheter ( is that a word?) in the world..will give me a hand to learn how to make me one of these.......

......super cute. I found it here.

Support kids literacy.

I recently became a volunteer at our local elementary school as a 'One to One' tutor to assist kids with literacy and to help struggling readers become confident readers.

As a volunteer I was required to go to the training session offered to all tutors and I'm so happy and honored that I am now armed with the know how to not only help other kids but to help my own children become rockin' readers.

Tonight I stumbled across this great website and wanted to share it with you all. It was created by this fascinating guy by the name of Dallas Clayton, who wrote a book for his own son about having big dreams and never giving up. The book is called An Awesome book, you can read it online here for free or you can purchase it here.

There is another book called An Awesome book of thanks....same deal.

The coolest part of this deal is the Awesome world foundation that he created where for every book sold he will donate another to a needy child, school, library etc...... ANYWHERE KIDS ARE DREAMING
I will be purchasing these books for my kids...what a great cause.

http://vimeo.com/15369986 ....check out this cute clip.

How much better would each day be if someone told you you had done a good job doing something you’d never tried before.....Dallas Clayton

The many faces of Miss Marley.

I'm almost positive that these pics are proof of why being a parent makes the heart melt.

Sure there are days when I want to tie my kids up and put them in a padded soundproof room, or maybe that would be a better place for me to be.

But then there are moments like this, and I'm sure Marley will hate me for this when she is an adult, but for now what she doesn't know won't hurt her!

These next few pics make me smile every time I look at them. Marley has loved fireworks since she was old enough to understand what they were. The local fire hall put on an amazing show this weekend but nothing could compete with the looks on Marley's face, I think I spent more time watching her reactions than I did watching the fire works.

Halloween fun

Aaaaaaa Halloween my friend!!! What a busy weekend we had, my poor kids will have to slap on a mud pack or two to suck 3 days worth of face paint from their pores.

Here's some fun pics from the recent festivities......my lady friends in their finest attire!

Me and my Barney Rubble!!!

The whole gang!!

Nancy channelling her inner 'Diva" much to her husbands joy.

Party number two at another friends house. Lots of great costumes there too!

Costume change for Miss Zoe, I liked this one on her the best. I got to spray her hair black...now she looks more like her momma.

I hope you all had a great Halloween....we did!