Mint Chocolate Chip Blondies

Have you watched the show, Work of Art, the next great artist? I watched it for the first time last night. Their assignement was to create a work of art for a book cover for a specific book. One of the options was Alice in Wonderland. I love love love Alice in Wonderland (book, movies, etc). Stephen suggested that I do my own version of this challenge and create a painting based on Alice. I must say, this was pretty fun. It gave me an excuse to watch the new Alice in Wonderland twice in a row, and it gave me "purpose" to my brush strokes. The quote says, "Who in the world am I? Ah, that's the great puzzle."

I need more ideas or themes for paintings. Any ideas?

A random mess I created before I dove into Alice. It's fun, and definitely got all of my jitters and craziness out.

A yummy egg sandwich with hot sauce and blue cheese. The other piece of bread had plenty of greek yogurt to add a "cooling effect" to the sandwich. Served with roasted corn and some zucchini.

I made blondies for dessert tonight, even though we went out for date night. You see, Stephen had a great idea and took me to a coffee shop for tea and a dessert. We ordered a toffee chocolate bar, with hopes that it would be delicious. It wasn't. I won't eat a dessert unless I love it, so I stopped after the first bite. So did Stephen. Yup, it was that bad.

I had to make up for the dessert, so I whipped up some blondies.

Mint Chocolate Chip Blondies

1 stick unsalted butter melted

1 cup packed brown sugar

1 egg

1 tsp mint extract

1 cup flour

1 tsp sea salt

3/4 cup chocolate chips (I used a mix of semi-sweet and dark)

Preheat oven to 350 F and butter and flour a 8x8 baking dish or a cake pan.

Cream together the melted butter and sugar. Mix in the egg, and then the mint extract. Stir in the flour and salt until well combined. Stir in the choclate chips.

Pour into the baking dish/cake pan and bake for 20 minutes. I put the blondies into the freezer for 20 minutes and then sliced it into 16 pieces.

Super satisfying! Blondies may be one of my favorite treats, because they are like a cookie but with a budgy texture like a brownie. Plus, they are so easy to make and easy to adapt to whatever flavors I am craving. Plus, only one bowl to clean is a huge benefit!!

Random good/exciting things (to me):

I got my books in for yoga teacher training and am in love with one of the books. It is so fun to read and learn about Kripalu Yog, and I am realizing how perfect it is for me. It embraces meditation, breath, and movement and teaches that you just need to be yourself, nothing more or less. I am also realzing that when I'm doing yoga, I am not paying as much attention to my breath as I should. I mean, I make it a point to breathe with my movements, but I don't incorporate breath work into my practice, which is something I will strive to do!

I also got in a set of weights and the Jillian Michael's No More Trouble Zones DVD, which I may try tomorrow. I am excited to have her kick my butt again.