Coconut donuts!

Valentine’s Day Ideas When You Have NO Idea!

I hope today, right now in this moment, is not the first time you’re remembering that it’s Valentine’s day. I have mixed emotions about this holiday honestly – I’m a romantic at heart, but I also think every day should be special right?! I’ll save my love rant for another day, for now, if right now you’re scrambling to find a gas station teddy bear and some chocolates that will pass for the “I totally had this planned out” impression well here’s your guide to ‘fakin’ it ’til ya make it’….to the mall!

Valentine’s day gift ideas for when you have NO idea!

So it’s crunch time…. you forgot the thoughtful gift – you’ve been busy! You skipped out on making breakfast in bed to rush out to get a gift that’s you think will be more personal in gesture than making that breakfast in bed idea. Well there are a few things you can do to make it seem as though you totally had today in the bag! Also, this is for men and women, all of the ideas listed below will work whether it be for your boyfriend, girlfriend, fiance, husband, wife, child, pet goat…..all of them:

  1. Breakfast in bed – before you rush out the door to frantically find a teddy bear that’s larger than life, why don’t you just cook their favorite breakfast meal and serve it to them in bed? This will work every time, it’s so thoughtful! AND it’s budget friendly, just use what you have already in your fridge
  2. Hand picked flowers – great for men and for women, hand picked flowers are the cutest gesture, it’s sweet and Earth friendly and you can find them anywhere in your front yard… or a neighbor’s…PLUS they’re FREE! Unless your neighbor comes after you with the garden hose
  3. Love notes – love notes are great because they’re building blocks! Leave them around the house, in the bathroom (extra points for notes left in heart shapes and smiley faces), on your loved one’s car, all with personalized messages to show them that you care, that you listen, and best part…it buys you time. To either make a reservation or go out and get their favorite icecream
  4. Dinner cooked by a real life chef – yep that real life chef is YOU bud! Nothin’ says ‘”I love you”, more than a home cooked meal made with love. And bacon. Besides, all the restaurants will be over crowded and over priced. Save yourself the cold sweats of having to call around to make a last minute reservation and set the dining table for two
  5. A love basket – this is my all time favorite go-to gift! You get a basket, or a bucket, or a shoe box, whatever – you fill it with their favorite items, trinkets, snacks, and a couple of tickets to the movies and BAM, YOU are the most thoughtful gift giver evaarrrrr!

Now I’m not saying these gifts will blow them out of the water with surprise and romance, but it will make your gift more interesting, and personal to your relationship, AND it’s not super expensive or super over the top ‘buy a star and name it after them’ status. Those are for movies like “The Notebook”.

If all else fails, make them some ‘love donuts’. Picture below along with the recipe. It’s gluten free because… love. And remember, “if you’re a bird I’m a bird”.

coconut donuts
xoxo- Jess

Gluten free donut recipe for my love, Corrine.

What you’ll need: (yields 12 donuts)
For the Donuts:
1/2 cup GF flour or coconut flour
6 eggs
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
2/3 cup melted coconut oil
1/4 teaspoon baking soda

– Mix wet ingredients together and then stir in sifted dry ingredients, bake in a donut mold for 15 minutes at 350 degrees

For the Chocolate Glaze:
3 tablespoons cocoa powder
2 tablespoons melted butter
1 cup powdered sugar
3 tablespoons hot water

– Mix ingredients all together in a bowl and then glaze over the donuts once they’re cooled, top with sprinkles and kisses and you’re all done! Enjoy!
Coconut Donuts!

TOP 3 THINGS TO DO WITH AVOCADO!!!

I’m that girl! Any time anyone talks about avocado and its many uses, I go, “oh I put it on everything!” But I really do! My hair, my skin, my food, I just put it on anything I can.

I love that avocado is not only delicious but it also has beauty benefits when applied topically.  So today I’m going to share with you my top 3 favorite things to do with avocado!


Just like with most of my meals, we’ll just start with dessert first! So this is a healthy version of pudding, a cocoa avocado pudding! Now this doesn’t taste exactly like the pudding you get in the lil plastic cups at the grocery store! But it IS just as creamy and for me, when I’m craving something chocolatey and indulgent, this does the trick!

You’ll need:
– 2 large avocados
– 6-8 Tbsp agave or honey
– 1 tsp vanilla extract
– 1/2 cup cocoa powder
– coconut flakes for garnish
– 1/4 skim milk
– coarse salt to taste

Method:
Into your food processor, toss in the peeled and pitted avocados along with the rest of the ingredients. Blend until smooth, chill for an hour and ENJOY! Garnish each bowl with coconut flakes and some salt, you’re in for a treat! Joe says he’d rather not mix chocolate with a vegetable, but I say … don’t knock it ’til you try it!


Next up, a hydrating mask that will leave you feeling moisturized, refreshed, and smooth! The natural oils in avocado mixed with a few ingredients you can find in your pantry make a wonderfully whipped up cocktail for your hair and skin!


For this you can use any variation you fancy, but I like to keep it simple, just avocado and honey! I put all of it into a bowl and smash it up! Then I apply it to my face for ten minutes and my hair for 30 minutes. Rinse and relish in the softness!

You can add in coarse sugar for a nice face scrub! Then when you rinse it off your skin, massage gently, and you’ll exfoliate and hydrate all at the same time!


Oh the yummiest thing to do ever! Take a ripe avocado, plop it onto your favorite toast, spread it around, crack some black pepper and Himalayan pink salt on top. Eat. Repeat until all the foods are gone! This is the best thing to do before a work out for me, it’s super filled and fuels me for my weight training!

Give these a try and let me know what you think! What is your favorite thing to do with avocados? I’ll try them all!

Romantic Metallic Macaroons

The Romantic Metallic Macaron

Macarons can totally be romantic right?! You bet! These babies were a labor of LOVE!!! These sweet treats make a perfect dessert or gift idea for this Valentine’s day- for your loved ones and friends! These are salted caramel metallic gold and silver macarons and I get it now why these crunchy, chewy, sweet, and savory treats can be so expensive. This photo was taken this morning after:

  • two trips to Bed Bath & Beyond
  • two trips to my local grocery store (in sweats and tear streaked cheeks)
  • an impromptu trip to Target at 10PM
  • a trip to Michael’s
  • and dumping the entire first batch to start again from scratch at 11PM

macaron love

Let me tell ya, if you’ve mastered the art of making macarons than you’ve mastered an art. Below is a recipe I got from two different places EatLiveTravelWrite and HowToCookThat blogs.

I’ve linked you to the two original recipes if you want to follow their method, HowToCookThat’s blog, saved me from breakdown number two! I won’t list the step by step here since she so adequately displays the ‘how to’s’ over there. Instead I’ll show you what I learned along the way to get these fluffy, chewy, and delicious macarons…..errr take two!

sift it real good!
First sift your dry ingredients once twice….trust me on this. And set aside.

I took my egg whites out for about 2 hours before I whipped them into a fluffy mound. Just when you think it’s ready, it’s not…keep on whisking folks! It took me about 15 minutes by hand to achieve what 2 minutes of an electric mixer did.

goldennnn
I wanted a golden macaron to fit in with the theme of metallic salted caramel, so I mixed in 10 drops of yellow food coloring with 2 drops of red food coloring.

fold, press, turn, repeat
Then I added it into my dry ingredients and folded, press, turn….that’s the method. Fold, press, turn, repeat. Until your mixture flows like lava!

look at the 2 love birds
I piped my ‘rows’ of batter into an odd zig zag pattern for some reason, also they were huge like loving lil cookies, some even touching. They will spread so don’t over pipe them out like I did.

those pretty feet though!
Allow them to rest on the counter for about 30 minutes after racking them to release air pockets. This is the time to set your oven to 300 degrees and sprinkle a bit of coarse salt on top of each of them.

tadaaa!
Then pipe out some homemade Dulce de Leche in the centers and sandwhich with another macaron.

metallic gold and silver salted caramel macarons!

I also got inspired by my friend’s birthday macaroons that were bright gold, so I picked up some cake spray paint in metallic gold and silver and when the macaroons were set, I sprayed them down and above is what I got!

I took a ton of photos with them and then allowed my family to devour them, they were soooo delicious!!! They are chewy and fluffy, they’re delicious and delightful, try them out!

I love to bake but I’d give these a sold 7 in difficulty level haha. Try them out and tag me in your yummy posts! You can make them for events, holidays, and gifts! Happy love day to you and yours!!!
xoxo- Jess

 

yummy chewy cookie

The Cookie Butter Nutella – cookie sandwich

Please do not try to adjust your screen, you read that correctly. Behold! The cookie butter Nutella cookie…sandwich!

Imagine a Nutella cookie smeared with chunky, crunchy cookie butter, and then sandwiched with ANOTHER Nutella cookie! Oh it happened! Here’s how!

nutella nomsFirst let me preface this by saying that this is NOT exactly the healthiest of recipes, but it’s one of the YUMMIEST! I love cooking and baking in healthy ways, but sometimes you just need a ‘good ol’ chewy goodness’ kind of cookie!

Here’s what you’ll need:

    1. 1 cup of Nutella (you won’t regret it..just scoop it out of the tub with your eyes closed)
    2. 1 egg
    3. 1 cup of flour
    4. 2 tablespoons of sugar
    5. sea salt if you like sweet and savory!
    6. cookie butter if you wanna live a lil! (ps cookie butter changes everything!!!)


The method:

In a bowl combine all of the ingredients together except for the salt and cookie butter
Spoon rounded tablespoons of the cookie dough onto an un-greased cookie sheet 2 inches apart
Bake for 8-10 minutes until the cookies are set
Allow them to cool for a few minutes before transferring to a wire rack
Sprinkle with sea salt or smother cookie butter in between two of them and enjoy!!!!

Nutella Cookies!All the credit and love goes to @lina_fit who posted this yummy little number on Instagram sans the cookie butter. I fell instantly in love with the recipe…it had me at Nutella.

Try these out, tag Lina and I on Instagram when you’ve regained consciousness from all of the goodness, and have a rockin’ rest of your weekend!

xo-

Jess