Making & Baking Mondays

Alrighty folks. This week was pretty uneventful in the kitchen.

I did a lot of dinner repeats and until today, the trickiest thing I baked were Green Rice Krispie treats for our St. Patrick's Day guests.

Here's a pretty good before pic. At this stage we've already torn up all the brick, dug down about 6" into the ground, dug trenches for the frames and are ready to lay crushed granite.

My husband and I spent most of our weekend outdoors working on our brick patio, so cooking in the kitchen definitely took a backseat. This has been quite a project and there's still a little ways to go but it's going to be SO worth it! At the end of this project we're going to reward all our hard work with a grill and some new patio furniture and I can't wait.

Here's a photo of the landscaping we're working on. We dug up the overgrown grass plants (you can see one to the left of the stool), broke them into smaller bunches, trimmed them and are replanting them along the planters. They will curve all the way around behind the chair on the left. Not sure what we're going to put in the middle yet. Any ideas? You can also see our firepit and the all the furniture spread out from our St. Patrick's day backyard party. Oh, and the stack of bricks on the right.

So until I can share some amazing recipes from the grill, here's what I do have to share:

A little over a week ago Amy shared a Bean Burger recipe on her blog and I was anxious to try it. Using what I already had on hand, I sauteed some yellow bell peppers, onions and garlic, then added a can of mashed pinto beans, bread crumbs and flour to the mix. I also added a bit of worsteschire sauce and salt & pepper for extra flavoring.

If you use the whole can of beans you'll get about 3 decent sized burgers, or 4 smaller burgers.

And although my burgers didn't quite sit pretty on the bun, they were still delicious and I will definitely make these again. Next time I'll drain the beans a little better since I'm pretty sure that's why they fell apart.

Who cares if they fall apart?! Just grab a fork and load up on the ketchup like my husband did. He didn't seam to mind!

Right now I'm working on some Cake Pops! I said I was dying to try them. And it just so happens that my girlfriends are getting together for dinner tomorrow night to celebrate a birthday. I guess we'll need cake (pops) won't we now?! Don't worry, I'm on it!

I'll let you know how they turn out! But if you want a great tutorial, check out Little Miss Momma's cake pop tutorial.

Here's to a Happy Monday! Right now I need my second cup of coffee before it's time to start tackling my TO DO list.