Baking Frenzy

Table full of stress baking

When I get stressed I start organizing, making to-do lists, and cleaning things out. Notice I did not say clean, I said clean OUT. I never, ever, EVER do actual cleaning when I am stressed unless someone is coming over. I'm sure Eric would prefer that I did. But, alas.....

So, this weekend I suddenly decided to dump out my 'baking ingredient' container and see what was lurking at the bottom. I had the following that I thought I could work with: A bag of cherry flavored M&Ms (left over from Valentine's day clearance), several random packages of pecans (must have hit a sale), and some pomegranate infused craisins (I bought those for another recipe but didn't use them all). I also found unfinished packages of Baker's chocolate in unsweetened and semi-sweet.

I turned over the packages to see what THEY recommended I make with their products. Here is what I ended up making!

No-bake white chocolate craisin haystacks

Pecan Pie bars

Chewy chocolate covered cherry cookies

Much to my children's disappointment, they didn't like ANY of it. Not that they would even try the haystacks or pecan pie bars. But they were both completely disgusted by the cherry flavored M&Ms (go figure!). I caught Evie trying to 'wipe the taste off her tongue' with a napkin. *sigh*

Adults, however, declared them a success. I thought they all turned out pretty well for brand new recipes. Not only that, there was alot of substitutions going on. No corn syrup....hmmmm I have honey. No more butter.....I have coconut oil. No more white sugar....I'll just use this brown sugar. 

It really helped me work through some of my stress and I finally got my ingredient bin emptied, cleaned out, and washed up. Now THAT feels better. 

I think Eric forgave my lack of cleaning since by channeling my energy into baking I didn't yell at anyone and he had yummy treats to eat. He even invited me to watch a movie with him so we had a mini date night (The Mummy Returns)! Evie heard what movie we were going to watch and said 'OH, that was the movie where I was made!' Hahahahahahaha, what she meant was that we got her name from the character in those movies. She said she wanted 'to see what she looked like when she was in the movie' Hahhahahaha. We laughed, then we put her to bed :D 

So, what do YOU do when you are stressed? Do you ever look on the back of an ingredient package for a recipe idea? Do you substitute ingredients or are you a strict recipe follower?  

Please note: that this post violates my Disneyland Project 2012 challenge in every way and that I totally ate ALOT of what I made Hahahahahahaha. So, don't be looking for anymore updates on THAT particular project until school starts. As seen in this post, I have just not been able to keep any kind of schedule (or progress) during the summer.