Pasta with Broccoli Walnut Pesto

Pasta with Broccoli Walnut Pesto – delicious meatless dinner recipe. Homemade broccoli pesto is ready in minutes! The broccoli lover in your life is going to love this one!

My kids are obsessed with broccoli.

Have we talked about that?

All 3 of them would happily eat an entire pan of roasted broccoli for dinner every night if I let them.

I literally can’t keep broccoli in the house. I buy bags and bags of the pre-cut kind and it seems to just disappear.

There’s absolutely nothing about broccoli that appeals to me unless it’s covered with mayo and tossed with dried cranberries so I don’t get it.

Click for the full recipe

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Pumpkin Banana Muffins

Pumpkin Banana Muffins – the best fall breakfast! Delicious cinnamon-spiced muffins with pumpkin, banana, and walnuts. Make a batch and have breakfast all week!

Pumpkin Banana Muffins - the best fall breakfast! Delicious cinnamon-spiced muffins with pumpkin, banana, and walnuts. Make a batch and have breakfast all week!

Hey guys, how was the long weekend?

I did nothing all weekend. And by nothing I mean that I decided to rewatch Jane the Virgin and somehow made it through 2 1/2 season in 3 days.

Granted, I tend to just leave it on and walk away for hours at a time but still.

I always go back to that show when I’m super stressed because it’s funny and ridiculous and I just love it.

I did escape to my favorite trail with the husky (Good Water Loop in Georgetown) because I just really needed it to not see another human for a few hours.

I listened to a couple of my favorite podcasts, fell in the mud twice, and then stood under the waterfall before doing the 3 miles back to the car in wet shoes.

It was exactly what I needed.

Click for the full recipe

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Pumpkin Walnut Muffins

Happy international Food Bloggers Have to Post a Pumpkin Recipe Day!!

Yep, we made it to October! Get ready to be completely overwhelmed by pumpkin recipes. Pancakes, cupcakes, doughnuts, pasta, pizza, it’s going to be everywhere. And that makes me happy.

I actually wasn’t feeling the pumpkin love this year but this weekend I had to replace my vacuum and while we were at Target, I wandered over to the baking aisle and a can of pumpkin fell into my cart. What do you do?

These muffins might be my favorite pumpkin muffin ever. Figuring out that I need to add an extra egg to recipes like this (because of elevation) has seriously changed my life. I think every muffin I’ve made since then has been my omgfavoriteever. But yeah, they are incredibly delicious and let’s be real, anything with brown sugar sprinkled on top is amazing. The brown sugar gets crunchy in places and melts in other places. You can’t go wrong.

I caught my 2 year old licking batter off the counter when I turned my back. Apparently they’re that good.

One year ago: Bang Bang Shrimp
Two years ago: Chicken with Cider and Bacon Sauce
Three years ago: Black Bean Burgers

Print
Pumpkin Walnut Muffins
adapted from Heirloom Baking with the Brass Sisters
Servings: 18 muffins
Ingredients
  • 2 cups flour
  • 1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1 teaspoon cinnamon
  • 1/4 teaspoon ginger
  • 1 cup sugar
  • 1 egg
  • 2 teaspoons vanilla
  • 1 cup milk
  • 2/3 cup pumpkin puree
  • 1 1/2 cups chopped walnuts divided
  • 1/4 cup butter melted
  • 1/2 cup brown sugar
Instructions
  1. Preheat oven to 400F. Grease or line 18 muffin cups or be prepared to bake a second round.
  2. Sift together flour, baking powder, salt, cinnamon and ginger. Set aside.
  3. In the bowl of a mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, beat sugar, egg, vanilla, and milk together until combined. Ad fry ingredients and beat just until moistened. Fold in 1 cup of chopped walnuts and butter.
  4. Fill each muffin cup 3/4 of the way full. Sprinkle some of the remaining 1/2 cup walnuts on top of the muffins; sprinkle brown sugar on top.
  5. Bake 20 - 22 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center of a muffin comes out clean. Cool in pan for 5 minutes before turning onto a cooling rack.
Recipe Notes

(High elevation: add an extra egg.)

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Levain Bakery Chocolate Chip Cookies


I’m an only child – as if that wasn’t painfully obvious by the fact that I write (and I use that term loosely here) a completely me! me! me! blog. But I have a point here. Stay with me.

There are many great things about being an only child but there was always one thing that kept me up at night. The fact that I had to get married if I wanted to have nieces and nephews. Not only did I have to get married, but I needed to marry someone with lots of siblings so that my chance of getting a niece instead of a stinky nephew was better. I don’t lie when I say it kept me up at night. And then I would eventually get tired of obsessing over finding a man with 15 siblings so I would fling myself off the bed, being sure to bang a body part on the nightstand so that I had something to go whine to my parents about.

Well all my obsessing finally paid off and my husband’s brother and his girlfriend recently welcomed a baby girl into their family! A girl! A girl to buy clothes for! Granted, she lives in Virginia but still! A girl!!

I was throwing together a package for her last week when I realized it was time for Secret Recipe Club. I got one of my alltime favorite, favorite, FAVORITE bloggers this month: Amber from Bluebonnets and Brownies. Know why I worship her? Because she has an entire series of recipes using Fritos. Plus she’s just all-around awesome.

I had planned on making her Peach & Southern Comfort Jam because I’m dying to can something this summer but once I started putting together the package for my niece (!!) I decided to make some cookies for her parents. I used Amber’s Levain Bakery Chocolate Chip Cookies recipe and they turned out perfectly. I’ve never actually tried the Levain cookies so I can’t tell you how similar they are but I can tell you that they are fantastic and received a great review from my brother-in-law. I especially loved the walnuts – I always forget how much I love nuts in CC cookies. I need to remember to always include them!

Two years ago: Brown Sugar Bacon Waffles

5 from 4 votes
Print
Secret Recipe Club – Levain Bakery Chocolate Chip Cookies
from Bluebonnets and Brownies
Ingredients
  • 1 cup 2 sticks unsalted butter, chilled
  • ½ cup sugar
  • 1 cup brown sugar
  • 2 large eggs
  • 2 cup all-purpose flour
  • 1 cup cake flour
  • 1 teaspoon Kosher salt
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • ¼ teaspoon baking soda
  • 1 tablespoon corn starch
  • 1 cup 60% bittersweet chocolate chips
  • 1 cup milk chocolate chips
  • 1 cup toasted walnuts chopped
Instructions
  1. Sift together the flours, salt, baking powder, baking soda, and corn starch in a medium-sized mixing bowl.
  2. Cut the chilled butter into 1 inch pieces. Put the white and brown sugars in a stand mixer bowl or large mixing bowl and mix until well combined and no lumps remain. Add cold cubed butter and continue to mix at medium speed. Add eggs, one at a time; continue mixing until well combined.
  3. Add flour mixture to sugar mixture in increments until just incorporated. Stir in chocolate chips and walnuts by hand.
  4. Refridgerate cookie dough overnight.
  5. Preheat oven to 375F.
  6. Using a large spoon or ice cream scoop, place dough onto baking sheets lined with parchment paper. For trays with 6 dough balls, bake about 14-15 minutes, 12 minutes for trays with less dough balls. As is the Levain style, the cookies should be removed from the oven when they look slightly underdone,

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