Favorite Recipes - Caprese Grits

Last weekend, T was playing in a golf tournament on Sunday morning and I was at home for the day with little on my agenda and I really wanted some yummy brunch food. 

We had eggs, grits and basil/tomatoes from the farmer's market so I decided to head to the fancy grocery store up the street and got some bacon and mozzarella and made a more than delicious meal. 

I baked the bacon in the oven (the best way, in my opinion), fried my eggs over medium with salt and pepper and made the most delicious caprese grits...

Caprese Grits

Makes 4 servings

Ingredients:

1.5 cups water (or chicken broth)

.5 cup quality grits (such as Bob's Mill)

Pinch of salt

1 small tomato, chopped

10 basil leaves, chopped

.25 cup fresh mozzarella, chopped

Pepper/Salt/Garlic powder

Balsamic Glaze (from TJ's) 

Olive oil

Instructions:

Bring water/broth to a boil with a pinch of salt. Once boiling, add grits and reduce heat to low. Stir occasionally until thick, about 6 minutes. 

While the grits are cooking, mix tomato, basil, mozzarella in small bowl with balsamic and olive oil, sit aside.

Once the grits have the right "grit" consistency, add small amount of salt, pepper and garlic powder to taste and stir. 

Add tomatoes, basil and mozzarella (leave a small amount for garnish), stir and let sit for 3 minutes. 

Garnish with a drizzle of balsamic and basil and the caprese left from above. 

Serve immediately and enjoy!

Life Lately

Hi There!

I can't believe it's already June and been over six months since I've written anything in this little space!

Life lately has been a little hectic... Although I hate to describe things as "busy" but work really has been really taking a big chunk of our time lately. We are both excelling in our careers and feel like now is the time to focus on getting ahead in that aspects of our life before priorities shift.

Let's take a look at where we've been and what we've been up to in 2015.

In January, I took a half day off of work to head to Raleigh to celebrate my sorority's 10th year at our university. It was so fun to meet up with friends I rarely get to see and spend some quality time together!

In February, we headed to the beach to visit my sister and unfortunately, I got really sick on the way home... so let's move right along...

In March, we picked up our pace with working out and started going to the gym consistently in the mornings and spent a lot of time with our Muggsy man.

Spring also started to show itself in uptown Charlotte...

In April, we headed to one of my childhood favorite places... Litchfield Beach! The weather wasn't great but the company and time away from work was unbeatable. (Sidenote: this was also the first time we left Muggsy at home with a local kennel and thankfully, we all made it through with minimal tears!)

In May, we celebrated our moms birthdays and hosted T's family for a weekend in Charlotte and a golf tournament.

We also debuted Muggsy's new patriotic bow tie for Memorial day... I'd say, he looks pretty cool in it!

Thus far, June has been filled with weekends around Charlotte, preparing for our upcoming trip to Europe and T enjoying some rounds of golf with his friends. We've also been trying to keep the pup active and have found he loves going to the dog park and dog bar. 

I've also enjoyed a few girls nights, including a great night with these perfectly sized prosecco bottles for our gals! 

The first half of the year has been exhausting... T & I combined have taken two vacation days total... needless to say, we are super excited for our upcoming trip and the rest of the year (and many more vacations to come!) 

Favorite Recipes - Mini Chicken and Waffles

One of my favorite (and easy!) recipes to bring to a party is mini chicken and waffles. It's always a big hit with guests and super easy to make! I got the idea from this site, which I found through Pinterest. I like to keep things simple so I changed the steps a bit...

You'll need:

Frozen mini waffles (I use egos from HT)

Chicken nuggets (I pick up from Chick-fila)

Honey or Maple Syrup

Toothpicks

Herbs for garnish/savory flavor (I used thyme in the picture below)

Heat mini waffles, then place on a platter and top with chicken and secure with toothpick.

Next, drizzle with honey and sprinkle with herb to garnish. 

Done and done!

I usually cover with tin foil and keep in the oven at a low temperature until ready to take to a party or serve. Such an easy and fun idea - perfect for girls nights and parties throughout the year!

Summer Goal: Canning Heirloom Tomatoes

My paternal grandmother, Pearl, always canned tomatoes, peaches, pickles, and lots of other amazing goodies that she shared with her children, grandchildren and close family friends. I was handed down her canning pot and have been wanting to can some tomatoes for myself for years but never got around to it until a few months back in August. 

Dad picked up the heirloom tomatoes and peaches at the farmer's market in Charlotte while I got the mason jars, canning book and other canning items at Target, which had all sorts of canning goodies to help me in my canning goals!

I blanched the tomatoes then added lemon juice and salt to the jars before sealing in the canning jar. For comparison, this entire basket was filled with tomatoes and I only ended up with 7 jars of tomatoes! This was partially because it was late in the season and some of the tomatoes weren't usable. 

This is an activity that I thought would take a couple of hours and ended up taking the entire afternoon. While it did take a long time, I'm so glad I did this and will absolutely can more tomatoes next year! I've really enjoyed using these tomatoes to make homemade tomato basil soup and marinara sauce that tastes so fresh and just like summer. 

Muggsy is ready for Christmas!

Muggsy made his Christmas card debut this year in a cute red gingham bow tie and will continue to be the dapper dog he is throughout the holiday season with his new bow tie! 

 

I ordered his new bow tie from an Etsy shop called Barking in the Rain, which has the cutest collars for pups! 

 I happened to be working from home on the afternoon that his new collar was delivered and opened up the delivery box to find the beautifully wrapped new collar with a note from the Etsy shop owner. 

The collar is solid red and the bow tie is red and green with a little sparkly gold thread throughout. 

The bow tie comes off so I can easily order new bow ties from the site and switch them out each season while continuing to use the same collar. 

All and all, I am so excited for this new collar and can't wait for Muggsy to wear it over the next few weeks! 

Christmas Card - 2014

As I mentioned in the Christmas Cards - 2013 post, our 2014 card of course had to include Muggsy!

We were planning to have some first anniversary with Melissa after our anniversary trip to California so it was perfect timing to include Muggsy when he was only 12 weeks old and about 11 pounds in our family session. Our photos turned out perfectly and Muggsy was absolutely adorable. I hope to do a whole post on this shoot since there were so many cute photos I'd like to remember.

We decided to go with Tiny Print's Sugar Vine design in red this year. I loved this design and how the red balanced out the amount of navy and green in our photos. 

This year, we kept it simple on the back with no photos. We still upgraded to kraft envelopes and used a custom address stamp that I ordered earlier this year instead of purchasing matching return addresses. 

Overall, I'm so pleased with the way our cards turned out - I hope to continue the Christmas card trend into 2015! :)

Favorite Recipes - Fall Harvest Salad

I had to make dishes for two friendsgiving dinners in the same day a few weeks ago so I needed something that would be easy to prepare ahead of time and require little work once at the parties. I started thinking about my options and decided to make salads and homemade dressing. 

One of my absolute favorite salads was one I used to get from Panera and only available in the fall - the harvest salad was absolutely amazing with mixed greens, pears, dried cherries, gorgonzola cheese, chicken and cherry balsamic salad dressing.

I googled recipes looking for this amazing salad recipe and found a copycat version of my favorite salad, here. I followed the directions loosely, making a few tweaks to the dressing (cooking the garlic, shallots and balsamic to mix the flavors more) and didn't add chicken since there would be a huge thanksgiving spread at each event. 

Tip: layer the toppings in the salad so everyone will get a taste of everything throughout the salad! 

Final product

I would definitely make this salad again! It was so delicious and everyone loved it! I just wish Panera still had it so I could order it every fall. :)