Our Saturday in Pictures

Yesterday welcomed back our most favorite time of the year.  I actually dreamed about football and woke up way too early with excitement!  Pretty sad, huh?  While being in the swamp yesterday would have been about a bazillion times better, we managed to enjoy our day up in Nashville.  Let's just hope the gators figure out how to step it up a little in the upcoming weeks.  Not sure my heart can take anymore fumbles or dropped snaps (come on Pouncey!).  Here's how our day went (post-Panera bagels of course):

Putting up the gator flag!

I actually beat Mike a few times and was pretty stoked about it!

Let's go gators!

Making mini pizza pockets at the half out of Publix bakery multigrain pizza dough.

They were so good!

Changing colors to support our second favorite SEC team!

Commodore stadium

Sitting in the Vanderbilt student section was definitely an experience.  I've never seen so many brightly colored ties, bow ties and sundresses in my life.  Apparently wearing school colors to a sporting event is overrated here?  I surely hope Florida fans don't fall victim to this strange tradition and continue to rock their orange and blue!

Gator Cupcakes

In honor of the greatest thing about fall kicking off tomorrow (Gator football!!), I thought I'd share a little gator friend that I created last year for the SEC championship.  Yes, I'm aware that this was an awful day for Gators everywhere but at least I had cute cupcakes to eat my sorrows away!  The inspiration comes from the book Hello Cupcake via my sister-in-law.  I added a Florida shirt to him for a little extra spirit. 

This little guy was surprisingly easy to create!  I had never done any decorating like this before and I was so excited about the way it turned out.  To make the scales, I used a ziploc full of icing with the corner cut off.  I started at one side of the cupcake and created a row of scales.  Then I worked my way across adding one row at a time, overlapping a little each time.  For the shirt, I bought a pack of cheap icing tips at the grocery store and stuck the star tip in the end of a bag.  I just iced one glob at a time till I was done!  The tip made it incredibly easy.  My gator's finger nails are banana runts and his "F", nostrils and pupils are m&ms.  His eyeballs are big marshmallows covered in icing and his teeth were made by cutting up large marshmallows.  Refrigerating them prior to doing this made the task a little less sticky.

At the time, I used a box cake mix and can of icing.  This is totally unlike me but I recently tried the most incredible recipe for almond cupcakes which is seriously yum!  It's also from Hello Cupcake:

Almond Cupcakes

2 cups all purpose flour
2.5 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 stick unsalted butter, softened
3.5 ounces (1/2 tube) almond paste (I found this at Whole Foods)
1 cup sugar
3 large eggs
1 cup milk
1 tsp vanilla extract

1.  Preheat oven to 350F.  Line 18 muffin cups with paper liners.
2.  Whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt in a medium bowl.
3.  In another medium bowl, with an electric mixer on medium speed, beat the butter, almond paste, and sugar until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes.
4.  Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition.  Reduce the speed to low and add the flour mixture alternately with the milk in batches, begining and ending with the flour mixture and beating just until blended.  Stir in the vanilla. 
5.  Fill the liners two-thirds full.  Bake until golden and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, 15-20 minutes.  Remove the cupcakes from the baking pan and allow to cool completely. 

I regularly flip through this amazing book although I haven't yet attempted any of the other creations.  Many of them are a little intimidating!  Has anyone else ever made anything from this book?

Crispy Parmesan Ranch Chicken Fingers

We often make attempts at various seasoning/bread crumb combinations that result in dinners of mediocre chicken fingers.  However, tonight's were delicious!  When I saw this recipe, I was excited as it claimed it held the secret to crispy nuggets.  I also encountered two new things in making this meal: buttermilk and panko (yes, I know, these are probably not new to anyone else who's ever stepped foot in a kitchen).  When I first opened the buttermilk I was very disturbed by the consistency and the sour smell.  After doing some research on the web I discovered these were normal characteristics and I could continue with the recipe.  I was horrified to learn, however, that some people actually drink this stuff as the smell of it alone had me gagging! 

2 cups low fat buttermilk
1 packet dry Ranch seasoning
1.5 pounds boneless, skinless chicken breasts- cut into "fingers"
2 cups panko
1/4 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 cup parmesan cheese

Combine buttermilk and one half of the Ranch seasoning packet in a large bowl.  Place chicken pieces in mix and marinate a few hours or overnight.
Combine panko, flour, cheese, and remainder of ranch seasoning in a bowl.  Dip the marinated chicken breasts into the mix and place on a wire rack sitting on a baking sheet.  Spray lightly with cooking spray.  Bake at 400 degrees for 7 minutes, flip, spray other side, bake another 7-9 minutes until cooked through.  (I had very thin pieces so you might need a longer cooking time.)

I sadly forgot to take pictures as it smelled so good we dug right in.  The one below is of the leftovers in the refrigerator but you get the idea.  (plus taking the picture was a good excuse for me to snag the little bite for a snack!) Enjoy!

Recipe courtesy of howsweeteats.com

Dinner on the grill

Last night we enjoyed a fun evening of cooking out and relaxing on the patio to take advantage of our slightly cooler weather.  We grilled three new recipes and all were awesome. 

Marinated grilled shrimp

Bacon wrapped asparagus

BBQ Corn on the Cob

All the food was super easy to make and delicious.  Thanks to a great Publix sale, we'll be enjoying another night of cooking out- this time with T-bone steaks!  Yum!

We also took advantage of the grill to make one of the favorite desserts around our house.

Unfortunately, the coals were mostly ash so Mike resorted to a little unconventional marshmallow roasting.

Making our house a home

We've had some requests to show off some pictures of our rental house now that we're all moved in.  We are loving all of the space and having a place to our selves.  The kittens have completely adjusted to the change and Pouncey thinks our floor vents were made to provide him his own air conditioned bed.  You all should come visit and see everything for yourself!!

first time with a mantle... can't wait till christmas!

starry night- nashville skyline edition

new blue chair!

our room

dining area

Florida Recap

My 12 days in Florida seemed to fly by as did this last week of back-to-school adjustment.  I spent a week down on Manasota Key at the condo.  Mike was there for the first half of the week before he had to go back to Nashville to get some work done and my mom joined me the second half of the week.  The weather was sunny and hot every day and the water was warm.  It was a perfect, and much needed, vacation!  We spent our days and nights relaxing, swimming, sharks tooth hunting, eating and shopping.  I also got to spend a couple days in Gainesville catching up with some Florida friends and eating all my favorite foods from home.

back of the condo- my favorite morning spot

Boys fishing trip.  They caught lots of little sharks.

Sunset cruise on the boat.

Pelican tree!  We counted 23 pelicans in here at one time!!

We saw so many amazing sunsets.

Mike came back to Florida the next weekend for a friends bachelor party and we arrived back home Sunday afternoon in spite of the series of disasters that occurred Saturday.  (think: lost keys in Cedar Key, calling a locksmith and a tow truck, hoping to have time to make it back to get our Uhaul trailer, making it to get the trailer only to find out we don't have towing lights on our car, scrapping the whole plan and shoving everything we could in the back of the jeep!)
I had orientation Monday to meet the new first year students (yikes- I'm a second year!) and get my fall schedule.  Mike and I hosted a back to school get together at our place Tuesday night that was a lot of fun!  We grilled a ton of burgers, dogs, and sausages and fell even more in love with having a deck, patio furniture, and grill to enjoy.  I jumped back into classes on Wednesday and today am heading back to Florida for Erin's bridal shower and bachelorette party weekend!  I can't wait to have a girl filled weekend celebrating the beautiful bride-to-be!

Catchup: Chihuly at Cheekwood

My first exposure to Vegas was walking into the Bellagio lobby to check into our room for my 21st birthday celebration (thanks again R&M!) and being in awe of the blown glass flower display on the ceiling. 

I found out at some point that these works of art were created by Dale Chihuly and the name stuck around in my head.  When reading in the local magazines that Chihuly glass exhibits were coming to three locations in Nashville, I knew we had to see them.  We took advantage of a free day at the cities main downtown art museum, "The Frist," to check out one of the displays with some visitors from Florida.  They had a number of pieces in all different shapes, sizes, and colors.  I was obsessed with them all.  Unfortunately, they have a strict no-photography policy, complete with guards at every turn, so we didn't get to capture any of the awesomeness. 

Luckily, I got the chance to go to "Chihuly at Cheekwood."  Cheekwood is a huge botanical gardens in one of my favorite areas of Nashville where this next exhibit is being held.  I have actually been twice now as it's an ideal experience for entertaining out of town guests.  When you arrive, you are given a map of the gardens with a list of all the glass displays locations and descriptions to help you navigate through a self-tour.  We were able to take pictures of the majority of the exhibits with the exception of a few housed inside a museum on the property (one of them being my favorite, go figure). 

Some of the other neat features of the botanical gardens included floating picture frames and, of course, flowers. 

There's also an event at Cheekwood where you can go at night to see all of the pieces lit up.  I can only imagine how neat that would be!