Peanut Butter Blondies with Chocolate Chips

Take me out to the ballgame 
Take me out to the crowd
Buy me some peanuts & Cracker Jacks.....


oh, hiya there...I was just reminiscing about our fun day at the ballpark (thankfully this blog doesn't come with sound clips, so you weren't lucky enough to hear my screechy singing in real life)! We ate, we cheered, we boogied between innings in our seats and most importantly our home team won ~ woot woot!! We had a perfect Saturday afternoon.

As I mentioned on Friday, I thought it was most important that we have some yummy and delicious treats to take along on our roadtrip to Toronto. We went with our friends and their 3 kids and because I'm the world's best "aunt", I always love to load up my favourite kiddos with lots of sweets and sugary goodness. I don't know if Derek and I will ever be parents, but if we are, I fully expect some serious payback for the sugar highs and sugar crashes that we encourage :-)

Now I'm going to warn you that this recipe is not the type of recipe you will typically find on my blog. I didn't go with my usual healthy treats full of natural sweeteners, whole grain flours, fruit and nuts. This recipe is downright sinful! It's devilishly good and is filled with all ingredients I would normally tell you not to eat! I have no excuse for myself except to say that I saw a recipe a while ago that I've been thinking obsessing about and I thought that this was the perfect opportunity to try it and to have someone else take home all the leftovers. What can I say??!! Nobody's perfect and just because I try to eat healthy 95% of the time doesn't mean I don't still enjoy the "bad" stuff once every blue moon.

Peanut Butter Blondies with Chocolate Chips
Recipe slightly adapted from allrecipes

These blondies remind me of two-bite brownies. They are soft and chewy and just plain delicious! Thank goodness I was able to give them away to our friends because I would have picked away until the entire pan was gone.

1/2 c. peanut butter
1/3 c. butter
2/3 c. sugar
1/2 c. brown sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 c. all purpose flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 c. chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350. Grease a 9x9 pan.

Cream together the peanut butter and butter. Add sugars, eggs and vanilla and mix well.

In a separate bowl, combine flour, baking powder and salt. Gradually add to wet mixture and mix until well blended.

Fold in chocolate chips.

Pour batter into prepared pan.

Bake for 30 to 35 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the centre comes out clean.

Remove from oven and let cool.

These take a loooong time to cool, but they are totally worth the wait.

Cut into squares and serve.

Talk about ooeey, gooey awesomeness!! These are a-ma-zing!!

Muah! Lip-smackingly delicious!!

What is your favourite treat to take on a roadtrip?

I  hope you are having the most wonderful of weekends!!

Andrea

Honey Tofu Stirfry

Woohoo ~ we've made it through yet another long week and now the weekend is upon us :-)!  After work, I headed straight to the gym before going home. I did a 30 minute run, did some quick weight training, stopped by to say howdy to my hubby who's moonlighting as a bartender tonight and then headed home! No wonder I'm feeling so exhausted!

Once I got home, I baked up some treats to take with us on a roadtrip tomorrow. We're heading out of town for the day to a Toronto Blue Jays game. We're going with our friends and their 3 kids, so I wanted to bring some yummy treats for us to munch on while we were on the road. Unfortunately, there will be no treat recipes posted today, but I will definitely be doing some sharing over the weekend :-)

Tonight, I'm sharing a really awesome stirfry recipe that I cooked up for dinner in an effort to use all of the veggies that were in a "use it or lose it" state in our fridge.  I saw this recipe on Kelly's blog last week and it inspired me to put my own twist on her easy and delicious stirfry. At first I was planning to just do a veggie stirfry, but then some teriyaki marinated tofu caught my eye at the grocery store and I decided to give it a try.

I'm not a huge fan of the texture of tofu normally, but this tofu turned out great and I loved it with the stirfry!

Honey Tofu Stirfry
Inspired by Honey Chicken Stirfry recipe by Kelly

This stirfry recipe is so easy! In the past, I've tried to make a great stirfry, but I could never put together a really good sauce. This was much easier than any of my attempts and the flavour was fantastic.

2 tbsp oil (I used avocado & garlic oil, but your fave will be fine)
1 clove of garlic, minced
4 - 5 c of your favourite veggies, chopped
pinch sea salt
3 tbsp honey
2 tbsp soy sauce
2 tbsp cornstarch
2 tbsp water
2 slices of teriyaki marinated tofu

Heat 1 tbsp of oil in a large wok. Add garlic. Cook for a minute or two and then add all of your veggies. Stirfry the veggies for 5 minutes.

Add the honey and soy sauce.

Cook for an additional 2 -3 minutes.

Combine the water and cornstarch and add to stirfry. Cook for one more minute to allow the sauce to thicken. Once the sauce is to your desired thickness, remove from heat.

While the veggies are cooking, prepare your tofu. I cut the slices into small chunks. In a small frying pan, heat 1 tbsp of oil and add your tofu. Pan fry the tofu for approximately 5 minutes ~ until it's starting to brown on the outside. Be careful! This spattered all over the place!

Serve the stirfry over cooked brown rice and then top with the tofu.

Yum, yum, yum! What a delicious dinner!

I hope you enjoy your evening. I was planning to hit the hay early because we're going to be up and on the road super early tomorrow, however I hear David Letterman on the TV, so I think "early" has long since passed!

Do you like marinated tofu? Have you marinated your own before?

Andrea