Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Cupcake-in-a-Mug

This little treat came from my grandma. Her and a friend tried this the other day, and of course, she thought I might like to try it.

You just need to buy a box of angel food cake mix, and then any other flavor of cake mix you desire. She had red velvet, but I tried strawberry.

I don't know if all angel food mix is like this, but the one I bought had two different bags - one for the cake mix, and one for the egg white mix. I only used the cake mix.

Pour the two mixes in a bag or bowl, shake it up until it's all mixed together.



Scoop out three tablespoons of your "cake" mix, into a coffee mug. I used about two tablespoons of water, even though I think she told me one. It was about the consistency of when you first combine pudding mix and milk.

I microwaved for about two minutes, but just watch to make sure yours is fully cooked, but doesn't explode inside your microwave :)

Ta-da! Cupcake! I like this method much better than baking a whole batch of cupcakes, because once they're made, it's hard not to keep eating them. And, you don't have the extra calories from three eggs + oil that the mix usually requires.

Thursday, February 9, 2012

Salad in a Jar

Yes, you read that title correctly. Some of you may have seen me talking about this already, but in case you haven't seen it or tried it - I'm here to show you.

I love a good salad. (I'm known to go to Olive Garden and just eat salad.) But, it's hard to conveniently take a salad to work... unless you put it in a jar.

Buy a mason jar, and all your salad ingredients.

Put your dressing on the bottom (it's kind of a guessing game as to how much...), and then all your toppings in after that.

I've been doing quinoa, dried cranberries, bell pepper, mushrooms, tomatoes, cheese. For my meat, I either use canned chicken or torn up deli meat (you better believe it's turkey, no way is it ham!)

The MOST important part of this trick is that your dressing is on the very top, and your lettuce/spinach is at the very top, with your toppings in the middle. I would say my jar is about half toppings, half lettuce. Make sure to leave some room at the top, because if it's too full, it doesn't shake up very well.



Take your jar to work (luckily I have a huge supply of plastic forks I can use up!), and when you're ready to eat, just shake it up! It usually takes a few minutes to shake up - I shake it every which way possible to mix it good enough.

Presto! I usually get some weird looks if people walk into my little office and I'm eating out of a mason jar, but they realize how good of an idea it is once I explain. :) I usually eat some crackers of some sort to go along with my salad. Either saltines + turkey pepperoni, or Cheez-its. (Fun fact: Cheez-its and Teddy Grahams are healthier than Club Crackers; no high fructose corn syrup or partially hydrogenated oil!)

(No rating for this post - healthiness and cost differ on what you use!)