Golden Onion Soup
Growing up in Panama City, we used to eat at a restaurant called The Cheese Barn and they served one of my favorite dishes, their French Onion Soup.  I had a bit of nostalgia a few weekends ago, so I started hunting for a recipe to satisfy my craving.  If you have time one weekend, I recommend you try out Betty Crocker’s Golden Onion Soup.  It takes a little over 3 hours but the...
Bob Chinn’s Crab House
I work for a publishing company and one of our sister companies is located in the suburbs of Chicago, IL.  About once a year we visit our distant friends to discuss business face-to-face. The last few times we visited, our team took us to Bob Chinn's Crab House to enjoy some delicious seafood as well as an extraordinary dining experience. The atmosphere is energetic, loud, and sizzling with ...
French Tarragon Burgers
  One of my co-workers gave me a recipe last week for French Tarragon Burgers.  The recipe is from Taste of Home which has fantastic recipes in their magazines and online.  I tried it out Wednesday night and loved it. I only made four burgers but I made the full amount of mayonnaise mixture so I still had a bunch left after dinner.  I didn't want it to go to waste so I used ...
Carbonara alla Courgette
The new Cooking channel has started and I am feeling completely nostalgic watching Two Fat Ladies, Sara's Secrets and Jamie at Home. Last week I saw an episode on Jamie at Home called Carbonara alla Courgette that looks easy and delicious. I made the dinner for the family and it was so flavorful with the cream sauce, full of fresh zucchini and squash and don't forget the bacon. Who doesn't love ...
Chorizo-Potato Tacos
I made my first dish from the July / August issue of Food Network Magazine, Chorizo-Potato Tacos. Adam and I loved the dish. The dish reminds me of a meat and potato hash but with Mexican flavors. I also love that the dish includes yellow squash but cooked in a way I haven't tried, diced and cooked until crispy. I did eliminate the jalapeño pepper from the dish but I didn't tweak anything else. T...
Pepperoni Pizza Chicken
Last night I made a great dish that the kid in you will love called Pepperoni Pizza Chicken. This recipe comes from Pillsbury's July 2009 issue entitled Best Ever Chicken that instructs readers to stuff a skinless, boneless chicken breast with pepperoni and mozzarella cheese. After cooking the stuffed chicken on either side to a golden brown, you then cook elbow pasta adding your favorite pasta sa...
Chicken Tandoori and Roasted Vegetables
One thing I pride myself in is that I cook a variety of ethnic foods in our home and I typically don’t make recipes the same way every time. Sure I have those special recipes that I make every few months for my family because they are family favorites but I still try to make slightly different each time.  I would rather change things up and make new and different meals to treat my family to foo...
Meaty Quesadillas and Perfect Guacamole
On Monday, I chose to make the Meaty Quesadillas and Perfect Guacamole from the May 2010 issue of Food Network magazine.  I made the 30-minute Meaty Quesadillas recipe with lean ground beef and only used a few alternative ingredients.  I didn’t have ancho chili powder so I just used the generic chili powder.  I also used the Mexican blend shredded cheese instead of muenster or Mon...
Food Network Magazine Recipes
I received the May 2010 Food Network magazine last week and decided to use recipes from its contents to feed our family for the week.  I chose Meaty Quesadillas, Chicken Tandoori, Skillet White Fish With Feta, Green Onion and Basil Salad, Curried Salmon Cakes, Ham-Taleggio Grilled Cheese and Trail Mix with Honey-Oatmeal Clusters.  I also made Italian Sausage Lasagna from my Betty Crocker...
Freezer Food
The past few weeks my husband and I have been battling busy schedules, bad weather, common colds, an teething 18-month old not to mention pure laziness.  In the past I have made large meals such as lasagnas, pot pies, stir fry and other easy freeze meals so that we have them on hand for busy nights.  Unfortunately, we have munched through all of those meals and so I ventured through the ...

Bake Sale Encore!

Posted By: Brandy on December 24, 2009 in Bake Sale, Comfort Food, Desserts, Events, For Sale, Fundraisers, Hope for McKenna, Uncategorized - Comments: No Comments »

Wow! Thank you to those of you who participated in the bake sale. Not only did we sell all the goodies but some of my wonderful co-workers also made monetary donations to Hope for McKenna. The first day we made $151! To make the day even better, I had requests for more cookies.  I spent Wednesday evening making 8 dozen Christmas Cookies 002cookies to take to the office the following day.  I made Chocolate Chunk Pecan Cookies, Chocolate Chip Cookies and Reese’s Chewy Chocolate Cookies. Only downfall was that the plastic Christmas containers were smaller than the 1st round so I could  only fit 8 to 12 cookies in each depending on the size of the cookies. I did make some cute “thank you” labels for each container. We had the potential of making about $80.  I thought it would go well because while I was baking, my friend, Beth called and her husband insisted she buy the Chocolate Chunk Pecan Cookies right then and there.  I hoped the rest of the items would sell well but figured whatever didn’t sell could be gifted to family and friends.

Well guess what, between sales and monetary donations made by family and friends, we made a whopping $310 overall!

At the end of the day that is quite a significant amount of donations for only two days of work.  I look forward to finding other ways of raising money for Ms. McKenna. Both my sisters, McKenna’s mom, Tracy and our older sister Danielle are working hard to try to raise money over the next year.  We have hand crafted paper products, hand-made clothing accessories and raffles ongoing.  Look for future posts on these items.

***If you know of any great fundraising ideas, please send them our way.  It is so easy to just ask, ask, ask but it is more fulfilling to give something heartfelt in return for the donations.***

Thank you again to all that support Hope for McKenna.  Hopefully, in the near future, we can spread the kindness our family and friends have shown us to another family in need. 

Thanks,

Aunt Brandy

Bake Sale Fundraiser

December 22nd, we held a bake sale fundraiser at my office to help raise additional funds for Hope for McKenna.

HFM Fundraiser Bake Sale 024

We sold three tubs of Chocolate Chunk & Pecan Cookies (18 count)  as well as three take-out boxes  of the Chocolate Chip Pecan Cookies (6 count). I made them all with Nestle brand chocolate chips.  I also had a tree-shaped, glass candy canister filled with various Christmas candy such as Snickers, Whoppers, Chocolate Crisps, Hershey’s chocolates and cherry cordial Hershey’s kisses.  We also sold a coffee mug filled with Hershey’s candy and some chocolate angels.

 HFM Fundraiser Bake Sale 020HFM Fundraiser Bake Sale 021HFM Fundraiser Bake Sale 018

Thank you for all your support during our efforts to raise money for McKenna.  Our goal is to help alleviate the financial burden that her 6 surgeries in the past two years have created.  Any money  that we raise above and beyond her medical expenses will be donated to a cleft palate association chosen by the Conrad family. 

Thank you again for your support.

Brandy Pate

Charitable Donations

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