To Oklahoma and the city of Moore, you're in my thoughts and prayers.  We're no strangers to tornadoes here in Kansas, but the devastation there is simply heartbreaking.  If you're wondering how you can help, there is a great list of resources here.

To the person whole stole our credit card number yesterday and tried to purchase a bunch of prepaid T-Mobile cards: I'm giving you a big thumbs-down.

And to those of you using Wordpress and the Comment Reply Notification plug-in: have any of you had difficulties getting it to send your replies?  When I first started using this plug-in before Christmas, it worked just fine.  But then it.just.stopped.  Even my tech consultant can't figure it out and I am at my wits end.  I've been giving it the stink-eye for nearly the last five months and still...just nothing.

Okay...let's get onto the features!

This week's top viewed post was Nieman Marcus Brownies from I Dig Pinterest and I Did It Too.  Don't they look fab?  And easy, too!

And um?  This Coffee Heath Bar Crunch Cake from Confessions of a Baking Queen pretty much combines everything I love in one cake!

Basically, adding Oreos to a recipe guarantees I want to eat.it.all. Like this Quick and Easy Chocolate Peanut Butter Oreo Pie from Living Well Spending Less.  YUM.

Now that the weather is finally starting to warm up here, I chomping at the bit to break out our ice cream maker.  First on my list to try this season?  These S'mores Sundaes with Homemade Marshmallow Ice Cream from Dress This Nest.

You know my love of Mexican-inspired dishes.  I'm kind of drooling over this Fiery South-of-the-Border Mac and Cheese from A Bright and Beautiful Life.

Thank you all so much for coming back each week to make this party a great success!  I love seeing all of your great creations, and it's such an awesome way for me to find new blogs to stalk read.

Are you ready to share what you’ve been up to this week?  After sharing, please take a moment to visit some other links–we all love comments!

If you were featured, make sure to grab a button from the left sidebar!

XO, Ashley

The post What’s In Your Kitchen Wednesday appeared first on Kitchen Meets Girl.

The thing about food blogging, I've realized, is that it may give people the wrong impression about how we live our lives in my house.

Our meals aren't plated up fancy when we sit down to eat dinners during weeknights.  Or on the weekends, if you want the real truth.

We're eating on mismatched plates, with the dinner table covered in kindergarten worksheets, newsletters, crayons, and board games.

And while I love making meals entirely from scratch, our lives just don't allow it most days.  Instead, our dinners look more like this chicken cheesy Doritos casserole more nights than not.  Quite frankly, this kind of easy meal is what I can entice my kiddo to eat - and I'm all for that.

I got this recipe from a coworker years ago, and while I've modified it some to suit the tastes of my family, I'm sure you've seen versions of it all over the internet.  That's because it's basically the bomb.

If I didn't live with a 5-year old, I'd totally add a small can of diced jalapeños in.  Or maybe some chipotle peppers in adobo, since the Tall Boy and I really like our foods spicy.  And, if you're opposed to canned cream of chicken soup, you can always make your own.

Just a side-note: if you've never tried substituting greek yogurt for sour cream, you should give it a go in this recipe!  I used Chobani 2% plain Greek yogurt, and my sour cream eating fiend of a husband couldn't tell the difference.

I know this isn't that pretty to look at, but it sure tasted good.

:-)

XO, Ashley

The post Cheesy Chicken Doritos Casserole appeared first on Kitchen Meets Girl.

These Chocolate Salted Caramel Muddy Buddies got me a "thumbs-up" around my house over the weekend.

I live with a pretty tough dessert crowd. The Tall Boy doesn't like desserts at all, and Doodle only likes to eat frosting off of brownies like these. Writing a food blog means I make lots of goodies - and I think its become so expected that I have some sort of dessert item sitting on the counter at any given time, that no one really gets that excited when I make some new sweet.

But really, who can resist muddy buddies?  You can see that Doodle had a very difficult time keeping his hand out of the bowl during my photo shoot.  If we're being honest, I did, too.

The thing I love most about muddy buddies is that you can change 'em up to make almost any flavor combination that you want.  Since I'm into salted caramel right now, that's the path I chose when I decided we needed a snackable treat around the house over the weekend.

Another thing I love about muddy buddies?  They take only about 10 minutes to make.

What I hate about muddy buddies?  I can't.stop.eating.them.

XO, Ashley

The post Chocolate Salted Caramel Muddy Buddies appeared first on Kitchen Meets Girl.

Cookies and Cream Fudge Brownies = chocolate cookie gooey heaven.

I've made these cookies and cream fudge brownies twice in the last week. And for good reason.

They are really that good.  Plus, Doodle asked me to.  I can't say no to that cute kid.

The first time, I made 'em just for fun...I was craving a rich, dense, fudgy brownie, and I had a bag of Hershey's Cookies and Cream Candy Drops that needed to be put to good use.

After Doodle ate one of these, he immediately asked if I would make a batch for him to take to school to share with his friends.  Because he has a summer birthday, his teacher allowed him to bring in treats this month for an honorary birthday celebration and I'd been brainstorming what homemade treat to send.

Problem solved.

The best part?  These brownies come together in one bowl, and don't even require a mixer!  This is the perfect recipe for lazy bakers like me.

Quite honestly, these brownies are decedent enough on their own - they are truly the best brownie I've ever eaten.  And many other bloggers and bakers agree.  This base recipe comes from Alice Medrich's book Bittersweet: Recipes and Tales from a Life in Chocolate.  Whatever else you do in life, I beg you:

make these.

After I baked the brownies, I made an Oreo buttercream to smear on top of them.  This buttercream is a slight variation to the one I learned while taking a Wilton cake decorating class years ago - the Wilton recipe uses Crisco, which I replaced here with butter.

Full disclaimer: these brownies are very rich and very sweet - but since I made them for a 5-year old who prefers to eat frosting with a spoon, he didn't mind.

[amd-zlrecipe-recipe:238]

XO, Ashley

The post Cookies and Cream Fudge Brownies appeared first on Kitchen Meets Girl.

So, we have eight school days left here, and then the madness of summer begins: basketball camp, karate camp(s), t-ball games, swimming lessons, and "Fun Factory" days...what ever happened to the "lazy days" of summer?  Also: can I sign up for some of this instead of work, laundry, and grocery shopping?

Do any of you have super awesome summer plans?  Or maybe just relaxing summer plans?  We're tossing around the idea of driving to Silver Dollar City for a short family-friendly vacation in either July or August, which (1) could be really fun; or (2) could be miserable in the heat of the summer.

Before we get to the party, I still have two giveaways going on right now: one for a Kitchen Aid Mixer and a basket of surprise goodies, and another for a Samsung NX1000 camera/$50 Amazon gift card.  So make sure you're all signed up to enter.  I'd LOVE for one of you to win!  Also, I'm posting over at Somewhat Simple tonight, so it would be kind of awesome if you stopped over and said hello.

This week's top view post were these Oatmeal Cookie Pancakes from A Kitchen Addiction.  Wowzers, pancakes and cookies all in one?  Sign me up, please.

Ooooh, this Firecracker Chicken from Life With the Crust Cut Off sounds amazing. I'm always looking for new ways to jazz up chicken around my house, and this? Needs to happen soon.

I'm also kind of in love with these Chocolate Peanut Butter Pretzel Cookies from The Brunette Baker.  Plus, they're gluten-free!

These Cheesy Bacon Bites from The Tasty Fork contain two of my favorite ingredients: cheese and bacon. You can't go wrong! Unless you don't like bacon; in which case, what?

Aaaaand, since I'm a total dip fanatic, I'm pretty much drooling over this Apricot Gorgonzola Cheese Spread from Crumbs and Chaos.  Must. Make. Today.

Thank you all so much for coming back each week to make this party a great success!  I love seeing all of your great creations, and it's such an awesome way for me to find new blogs to stalk read.

Are you ready to share what you’ve been up to this week?  After sharing, please take a moment to visit some other links–we all love comments!

If you were featured, make sure to grab a button from the left sidebar!

XO, Ashley

The post What’s In Your Kitchen Wednesday appeared first on Kitchen Meets Girl.

I am so excited to tell you all about this incredible giveaway brought to you by an even more incredible group of bloggers! But only because we love ya!

This giveaway is for not one, or two but

THREE WINNERS!

Two of you will win a $50 Amazon gift card and One of you will win this fantastic camera!

We are especially excited about THIS camera (the Samsung NX1000) because of how amazing it is AND it's pink...(which is a HUGE bonus)! This little goodie is the perfect marriage between convenience and quality. The biggest thing that will instantly improve anyone's photography is the lens, and this little beauty takes interchangeable lenses. Yet, it's still small enough to fit in the front pocket of your purse (or diaper bag!). We love it so much and are excited to give it to one of you lucky readers!

Here's how to enter:

Step 1: Come and "like" all of these awesome bloggers! (We really like you too!!)

{Mom 4 Real}~ {My Mommy Style}~ {A Little Tipsy}~ {Kitchen Meets Girl}~ {Bird ala Mode}

{Sweet Treats More} ~ {Smitten By} ~ {Love by Lynn} ~ {MOMentity}

{That's What {Che} Said}~ {Little Miss Fearless}~{Walking in Memphis in High Heels}~{Sweet Solstice}

{Lolly Jane} ~ {Rags to Stitches} ~ {Style with Shannon} ~ {Glitz & Gold}

Step 2: Enter using the Rafflecopter widget below. For additional entries, follow us on Pinterest too!

**Sometimes rafflecopter gets bogged down, so be patient if it takes a second to load.

If the Rafflecopter doesn't load for you, you may:

Click here to Make your Entries NOW!!

Good luck my friends!!

XO, Ashley

The post Get Creative. Get Stylish. Get THIS! appeared first on Kitchen Meets Girl.

Let's talk recipe sharing for a minute.

I mean, this is a food blog and all.  And if you want to know the truth, the entire reason I started a blog was to catalog the recipes I'd tried and that my family really liked.  No more recipe cards, random scraps of paper shoved down in the bottom of my purse (am I the only one who does this??) or wondering which of my dozens of cookbooks contained the recipe I was looking for.

Blogging is pretty slick.  Food blogging is definitely awesome.  And My Recipe Magic?  It's where any lover of  food needs to be.

Have you noticed this little guy sitting above the recipe card in some of my recent posts?

Click him. Go ahead. Then come back here and keep reading.

Did you see what happened?  Yep, you clicked right on over to the My Recipe Magic site, developed by the awesome gals behind Six Sisters' Stuff.  They started this site as a way for recipe lovers, food bloggers and foodies to share recipes, create custom cookbooks, menus, shopping lists, see nutrition values, earn extra income, and get more traffic to their site.

Is that awesome or what?  I'll be adding the Chef Giovanni icon above the recipe card in my posts, so if you're interested in looking at the recipe nutrition, all you have to do is click.

As a food blogger, My Recipe Magic has been an invaluable way for me to market my site and increase my traffic.  By linking my recipes there, it creates backlinks to my site, increasing my SEO. It drives traffic back to my site by having people click over to view the directions to my recipe. It helps people find me that may have never found me before - this blogging world is a big, big place!

Plus, I can actually make money by sharing my recipes there.  I'm not going to lie: that's pretty cool. The more your recipe is liked, shared, and viewed the more money you make. But even better than that, it's an awesome place for me to connect and network with some of the best bloggers in this recipe sharing community.

A brand-new feature on My Recipe Magic is Reward Points.  The more you use My Recipe Magic by sharing, liking, and submitting recipes, you earn points that can be redeemed for online gift cards and entries for giveaways.  You can earn up to 1,000 points a day, and each week the site has a new prizes and a giveaway to choose from.

Some of you are probably saying, "Ashley, I'm not a food blogger.  Why should I use My Recipe Magic?"

Well, here's why:

Clearly, I could go on and on about the benefits of using My Recipe Magic - for bloggers and food lovers alike.

To get started using My Recipe Magic you need to sign up as a chef. Once you create an account you're ready to start uploading your recipes!  Adding a recipe is really easy.  All you do is fill out the recipe form on the website, upload a picture  and click submit.  Easy-peasy!

Their recipe loving people verify each recipe so there are no duplicates on the site.  Once your recipe is published to the site, you will receive an e-mail letting you know it's there.  To view all of your recipes click on "My Recipes". Head over to your dashboard to view your recipes, your page views, how much money you earned, and your analytics!

Click here for a PDF on how to use My Recipe Magic in depth.

What are you waiting for?  Go get started today!

XO, Ashley

The post The Magic of My Recipe Magic appeared first on Kitchen Meets Girl.

Whoops - I inadvertently published this post early...so go ahead and start linking up!

Happy Wednesday, everyone!  Well, we're nearing the final stretch of the school year, and there are a still a million and one activities we're trying to squeeze in.  In the meantime, I'm daydreaming about the idea of "summer vacation" for parents - the closest I'm going to get this year is a few days in Austin in June for BlogHer.  Who's going?

Also, if you haven't already entered, I have two really awesome giveaways going on right now.  One is for a Kitchen Aid Mixer and a basket of goodies from some of your favorite bloggers, and the other is for a $250 Amazon gift card.  So please - go enter!  I would love, love, love one of my readers to win one (or both) of these!

Okay...on to the features!

This week's top view post was Berries and Creme Panini from Heather's French Press, and I can see why.  Drooooooooool.

I'm also kinda-sorta in love with these Blackberry Lemon Glazed Donuts from A Sweet Baker.  You know I love my breakfast sweets!

Aaaaaaand, I'm also in love with all things Mexican flavored, so these Tequila Lime Green Chili Chicken Roll Ups from The Plaid and Paisley Kitchen are right up my alley.

The Tall Boy's very favorite Chinese food ever is Lo Mein, so this recipe from Mandy's Recipe Box is on my list of things to try - SOON (Mandy, my husband says thank you)!

Yeah, Chica Chocolatina combined two of my favorite things in these Churros and Chocolate Donut Holes.  Hey Jasmine, I do accept deliveries, anytime you want to send some of these over.  :-)  Holy yum!

Thank you all so much for coming back each week to make this party a great success!  I love seeing all of your great creations, and it's such an awesome way for me to find new blogs to stalk read.

Are you ready to share what you’ve been up to this week?  After sharing, please take a moment to visit some other links–we all love comments!

If you were featured, make sure to grab a button from the left sidebar!

XO, Ashley

The post What’s In Your Kitchen Wednesday appeared first on Kitchen Meets Girl.

Want to make preparing a homemade pancakes a snap? Let me show you how, with this easy homemade instant pancake mix.

Actually first, let me tell you a story.  It's about my kid.  'Cause that's what moms do, right?  Talk to their invisible internet friends about their kids?

I've mentioned before that Doodle is totally into karate right now.  We're at the dojo three or four times a week, and he loves it.  We love it, too, especially since the coaches do a wonderful job of weaving life lessons into the classes.  Each month, the coaches focus on a word of the month, and the word for May is "teamwork."

The other evening at class, Coach Rachel was talking about how the family we live with is a team.  How everyone has their own responsibilities and duties, and if one person fails at completing their duties, they let the entire team/family down.  Then she asked for examples from the children of something one of their parents did that the other parent did not do.

Of course, my child doesn't have a shy bone is his body, so his hand shot straight up.  He's waving it in the air wildly, eager to share about all of the wonderful things his mom does that his dad doesn't do.  And this, folks, is what Doodle shares:

"My mom puts in earrings."

I also make homemade pancakes, but apparently that's long been forgotten.

My husband isn't a big pancake eater, but Doodle and I love 'em.  And instead of keeping one of those boxes of "instant" preservative-filled boxes in my pantry, I decided to learn how to make my own.  You know what?  It's so, so easy!  Now, I keep a container of my own homemade instant pancake mix in the pantry, and Doodle and I have been eating them up like...well, like hotcakes.

:-)

This recipe does use buttermilk, and if you're like me, buttermilk isn't a staple in your fridge. Not to worry - just put 1 tablespoon of lemon juice or vinegar in a measuring cup, and then add enough milk to make one cup. Let it sit at room temperature for about 5 minutes, and voila! Now you have buttermilk.

Easy-peasy.

Now excuse me, I need to go put in my earrings.

[amd-zlrecipe-recipe:237]

By the way, it's my friend Lisa's birthday this week (and my birthday month as well), so I'm celebrating and partnering with a bunch of other awesome bloggers by giving one of you a $250 Amazon gift card.  Sa-weet!

Make sure you enter via the Rafflecopter entry form below.  The giveaway runs until Friday, May 10 at midnight (Central time).  Good luck!

XO, Ashley

The post Homemade Instant Pancake Mix appeared first on Kitchen Meets Girl.

This is a sponsored post written by me on behalf of The Home Depot.

Well, I have some bad news. It was my intention to show you how full and lush my wave petunias were looking in my new Home Depot planters.

However, since I planted my new flowers, we've had snow here twice. Twice. Seriously, I've lived in Kansas my whole life, and I've never experienced weather like this in April and May.  Fortunately, The Home Depot still has plenty of pentunias and other pretty annuals left.

In fact, I was so excited after completing my original planter project, that I decided I wanted to fill up some other pots as well. And, since cooking is my true passion, I decided to plant some herbs.

Years ago when I moved into my very first little house, I thought it would be a great idea to plant a "little" herb garden.  I was in love with the idea of having fresh herbs on hand: chives, oregano, rosemary, and mint, just to name a few.  Now, if you've ever planted mint of your own, you'll know what I'm talking about here:

Do not ever plant it directly in your garden area.

Always, always use a pot.  Unless, of course, you're ready for the mint to take over your entire yard.

This time, I decided to plant just a few herbs (in pots!), and I chose some that I use most often in my kitchen in the spring and summer: basil, oregano and rosemary.  By using pots, I can ensure that my herbs don't totally invade the rest of my garden area, and I can easily bring them inside if I need to.

How cute would a row of fresh herbs in small pots look as a centerpiece for your entertaining table in the summer?

I decided to use some of my fresh basil to make a strawberry lemonade.  If you're making this later in the season, add significantly more basil to your pitcher than what you see in my photograph - 30 degree temperatures aren't conducive for rapidly growing plants.

:-)

If you're not sure what type of container to choose for your own planting, ask an associate!  They'll be glad to help answer all of your gardening questions.  And after you finish planting all of your garden items from The Home Depot, you can sit back, relax, and admire all of your hard work with one of these Strawberry Basil Lemonades in hand.

[amd-zlrecipe-recipe:236]

I had so much fun working on this project along with The Home Depot. I hope you enjoyed following along with me, and that seeing a few projects started by a brown-thumb gardener (that's me!) has encouraged you to dig in to spring in your own yard.

I'm leaving you with this short video of Doodle, who isn't nearly as camera shy as I am. He loved helping me with this project, and for me that was the best part - sharing some quality time together as a family!

XO, Ashley

The post #Digin with Home Depot and Strawberry Basil Lemonade appeared first on Kitchen Meets Girl.