My spice cabinet has been a mess since we moved into this house, last July. Every time I opened the cupboard I was annoyed, and spent forever digging for what I needed. We had been talking about how to fix it and make it functional, pretty much since the day we moved in. It was one of those things that just got pushed to the back burner though. I finally got fed up enough, and took matters into my own hands.
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I think you all know that I like to bake. Christmas time is like heaven to me. I can pretty much bake any time during the month of December, and not feel guilty. I do get the “what did you make this time” comment from my husband when he gets home, sometimes. But I have an excuse, it is December, Christmas is coming!
I realize not everyone likes to bake like I do, but cookies at Christmas time are a must. And I have found the best alternative to homemade cookies. The Cravory. When they asked if they could send me a box of their Holiday Menu, I was interested to see what they would be like. There had some very interesting sounding flavors like; Spiked Eggnog, Cookies & Milk, Gingerbread House and more.
To say I was impressed would be an understatement. These were so thick, chewy, and soft. The flavors were just right. The Spiked Eggnog, was a little spicy with lots of nutmeg. Gingerbread House was a perfect soft gingerbread with white chocolate swirled throughout. These would go wonderfully on your holiday cookie tray, and no one has to know that you didn’t slave over them.
Cravory also have you covered the rest of the year with Pancakes & Bacon, Red Velvet, Blueberry Muffin, Rosemary Balsamic and so many more, including the classic Chocolate Chip. Trust me, if you want to send a gift someone will love, or don’t have time to get in the kitchen, Cravory Cookies will surely impress.
a Rafflecopter giveaway
**This giveaway is sponsored by The Cravory. They sent me a box of their Holiday Menu cookies. I was not compensated in any way for this review. Opinions are 100% my own.**
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Did you know that November is Diabetes Awareness Month? I honestly had no idea. I am embarrassed to say that, but I just didn’t know. I have been very fortunate to not have diabetes touch my life, or anyone close to me. I recently met someone who has it, but he manages it very quietly, so you would never know. My friend Carolyn, from All Day I Dream About Food is my closest real connection to diabetes. She is constantly in the kitchen doing amazing things, making over the most decadent dish to make it diabetic friendly.
Today many of us are getting together to help spread the word about Diabetes. Did you know that 25.8 million people (adults and children) in the United States have diabetes. In 2010, 1.9 million new cases of diabetes were diagnosed in people 20 years of age and under. It is a wide spread disease that can affect anyone.
Today Carolyn challenged us to share a recipe that was gluten free, lower in carbs, and didn’t use any type of sugar. I came up with this Greek yogurt dip. It is a little spicy, and you can never go wrong with chili and lime together. Serve with veggies, or your favorite gluten free crackers for a super healthy snack. You can easily serve this at any party, and no one will ever know that you are serving something healthy!
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Tis’ the season for chocolate! And boy are you in for a treat today. We have lots of chocolate to talk about, and lots of chocolate for you to win!
But first, let’s get serious. West Africa is the source of 70% of the world’s chocolate, the Ivory Coast alone produces 40%. The beans that are harvested in West Africa are then mixed into almost every mass produced brand of chocolate. But here is where it gets serious. In West Africa, the Ivory Cost in particular, child trafficking is very common. Kids and families go to the Ivory Coast in search of jobs, but then the children are separated from their families, and trafficked to cocoa farmers. Some of the farmer’s pay the children a small sum to work on the farm, others pay them nothing. The children are forced to work long hours, perform dangerous tasks, and are given minimal food and shelter.
This is where Equal Exchange is stepping up and making a difference. All of their chocolate is sourced from small scale farmer co-ops in the Dominican Republic, Panama, Ecuador and Peru. The farmers all own their land, and control their business. All of the chocolate from Equal Exchange is organic. They partner with farmers using sustainable farming methods, without pesticides or fertilizers. The chocolate is made without corn syrup or other additives, so you can feel better about putting it in your body. You can learn more about the fair trade of chocolate and what Equal Exchange is doing on their website.
You can play a game on Equal Exchange’s Facebook page to win some of their new candy bars, as well as learn more about chocolate. They currently have 3 new candy bars. One filled with peanut butter (my personal favorite), a crispy one filled with crisped rice and quinoa, and a dark chocolate fruit and nut bar. All were delicious, and I love the idea of quinoa in candy! I was also given mini’s that were just milk chocolate – super silky and smooth. They are going to be great for trick or treaters!
Want to win some of your own chocolate, just in time for Halloween? Well Equal Exchange is giving one lucky winner a 24 pack of candy bars!
Open to residents of the US Only. I will notify the winner via email, and they will have 48 hours to respond, or I will pick a new winner.
**I was sent 6 Equal Exchange Candy Bars, and a box of mini chocolate candies. The giveaway is sponsored by Equal Exchange. All opinions are 100% my own.
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Posted in Admin
Tagged candy review, chocolate, chocolate giveaway, equal exchange chocolate, fair trade chocolate, giveaway
I got business cards! This is such a small thing, but it excites me very much. I can send them to work with my husband when I send out treats, I can hand them out to strangers when we get into a conversation about what I do, and I can give them to my Mom to make it look like I am the real deal! It’s all about the little things 
Moo.com contacted me about creating my own business cards, and I jumped at the chance. They have a very easy to use site. There are all kinds of different templates you can use, or you can create your own. Just upload the pictures you want, type in your text, and you are done. The order arrived about a week later, and I am very happy with the quality. They look like professional business cards!
Moo.com doesn’t only do business cards either. They have Greeting Cards, Postcards, Stickers, Labels, and more. You can upload your own pictures and customize all of them. This would be great for address labels or Christmas Cards. You could always have a stash of thank you cards on hand, whatever you want to do.
Here is what I made! What would you make if you could make your own?
Well, you can make your own!
Moo.com is offering 3 winners the chance to design their own business cards! Plus the first winner drawn will also win a set of Postcards!
Details:
3 winners will be given their own set of 50 business cards
1 winner will also be given a set of Postcards
This is open to everyone World Wide!
To Enter:
Mandatory:
1. Leave a comment (any comment will do)
Extra Entries: (leave a comment for EACH item you do)
2. Follow Dinners, Dishes, and Desserts on Twitter
3. Follow Moo.com on Twitter
4. Tweet this giveaway mentioning @Dinnersdishes
5. Follow Dinners, Dishes, and Desserts on Pinterest
6. Subscribe to my RSS/E-mail feed
That is 7 chances for you to win!
I will draw a winner using random.org. The giveaway will be open until Wednesday August 22nd. This is open to everyone world wide.
**I was given 150 business cards free from moo.com. The opinions are 100% my own. The giveaway is sponsored by moo.com
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Posted in Admin
Tagged giveaway, moo.com, personalized business cards, personalized postcards
If you know me, you know I am not a fan of coffee. So when International Delight contacted me about their new Iced Coffee’s, I almost responded immediately with “sorry, but no.” But then I got to thinking about you, my dear readers. I know most of you love coffee. I am the strange one Plus I knew my Mother-in-Law would be visiting, and she loves her coffee.
Obviously I am biased, being that I don’t drink the stuff. But I don’t understand the draw of spending $4 at a coffee house at least once a day for something you could make at home. I realize I am cheap, but how can it be worth that much money. I get the convenience, but making specialty drinks at home can’t be that difficult. International Delight has introduced the first-ever iced coffee drink that’s made with coffee house quality 100% Arabica coffee, real milk and cream and served in a half-gallon container. They come in Mocha, Vanilla, or Original, for less than the price of one drink at your local coffee house. All you have to do is pour over ice, and you are done!
I sent my MIL to the store and she came back with the Mocha variety. I even tried some! It was actually pretty good (coming from someone who doesn’t like coffee). It was chocolatey, with a hint of coffee in the background. We did find that if you heat it and add it to your black coffee you have one delicious Mocha Coffee Keep that in mind when you have just a little left in the carton.
I decided to make muffins with some of the Iced Coffee. That should not surprise any of you. But really, coffee is a morning drink, so what better with your morning coffee than a delicious muffin. These muffins went over well with everyone. Even my 7 year old loved them. I still have a few left in the freezer, and he just was for them for breakfast this morning.
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Posted in Breakfasts
Tagged chocolate muffins, coffee muffins, giveaway, iced coffee, international delight, mocha, muffins
Look, I have my own Cookbook! Ok, not really It is just a photobook I made. I was contacted recently by the people at My Memories, is a digital scrapbooking program. I have never been much of a scrapbooker. I love the look of them, but don’t have the patience or the creativity to pull it off. I tried when my son was born, and got through the first 4 months his life. It still sits, 6 years later. I am not going to win Mom of the Year award that is for sure!
But now, with My Memories, I might actually stand a chance. My Memories Suite is rated #1 by Amazon and TopTen Reviews. Using this software, anyone can create digital scrapbooks, photobooks, cards, calendars and gifts without having to buy expensive and complicated software programs. It is all on your computer, you just drag and drop your digital photos in. My Memories has TONS of different backgrounds, and layouts to pick from.
It was super easy to use, and fun to put together. This would be great for Christmas time and making gifts for Grandparents. I am excited about the idea of making birthday invites for my son using this. Oh, and you could even make up little business cards for your blog! I just thought of that one, and am so doing it! This will be the closest I ever get to being a published author, so I am going to savor my photobook!
Now on to the good part. My Memories wants to give you a copy of this program as well! You can make your own cookbook, or maybe a scrapbook of your kids!
Here are the details:
The giveaway is open until Tuesday March 7th. I will draw one winner using random.org. The winner will be notified via email, and will have 2 days to get back to me. If I do not hear from them, a new winner will be chosen.
Mandatory Entry:
Leave a comment telling what you would use My Memories for
Additional Entries: Leave a comment for each entry in order for it to count
1. Like Dinners, Dishes, and Desserts on Facebook
2. Follow Dinners, Dishes, and Desserts on Twitter
3. Follow Dinners, Dishes, and Desserts on Pinterest (need an invite, let me know)
4. Follow Dinners, Dishes, and Desserts on Google+
5. Subscribe to Dinners, Dishes, and Desserts email updates
6. Share this post via twitter, facebook, blog post, whatever!
That is a total of 7 entries for you to win! Good luck!
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If you are like me you have recipes all over the place; in cookbooks, printed in a stack, bookmarked, on Pinterest, or even lost because you forgot about them We all say we want to organize them, and actually go through and make some of these great recipes. But with life and everything else, we never get around to it. Well, this great computer program Cook’n Recipe Organizer is a great tool to help you sort through your recipes!
I am not sure how it works, but it is pretty cool. You go to a website and you see a recipe you like, you just hit the capture button, and it is automatically added to your “cookbook”, along with the picture! You can set up different chapters to help organize everything (i.e. desserts, chicken, beef, soups etc.) It is super user friendly, and there is even a video that walks you through the whole process. If you have a few recipes from one cookbook that you like, you can manually add them so they are all stored in one place. Or old family recipes that are faded, and hard to read. Store them in Cook’n and you will have them forever to share with your kids and grand kids. It will even tell you the nutritional value for recipes (for better or worse).
One of the coolest things in my opinion is the menu feature. Once you have your recipes in there, you can go into the calendar and say what you are going to have for each day. You can print that so the whole family knows in advance what is for dinner. AND it comes up with a grocery list for you! You can go through and say you already have certain things, but it compiles all the ingredients for whatever menu you came up with and tells you all the stuff you need to buy. No more forgetting one thing at the store. Well, maybe there will be some forgetting, but that is just because I don’t always read my list carefully.
This program really is great for the busy person that loves to cook, and gets recipes from all over the place. You get to store them in one single program! They are even developing an App for the iphone, ipad, and Android – so you can always have access to it!
And another really cool thing? Cook’n is going to give one of you lovely readers this program for FREE ($80 value). Want to know how to win?
I will draw a winner using Random.org on Wednesday Feb 8th. Please leave your contact information so I can contact you if you win. The winner will have 3 days to get back to me, at which point if I haven’t heard I will pick a new winner.
You must leave a comment telling me how you would use Cook’n (this is mandatory to enter)
Additional Entries: Make sure to leave a comment for each entry
1. Follow Dinners, Dishes, and Desserts on Facebook
2. Folllow Cook’n on Facebook
3. Follow Dinners, Dishes, and Desserts on Twitter
4. Tweet this giveaway “I just entered Cook’n Recipe Organizer Giveaway @Dinnersdishes; make sure to go check it out! http://dinnersdishesanddesserts.com/?p=1111″
5. Follow Dinners, Dishes, and Desserts on Pinterest
6. Stumble this post (there is a button on the left)
7. Subscribe to one of my RSS feeds (email subscription, google etc.) If you did this before, you may be to do it again since I switched to my own domain.
That is 8 chances to win folks! Make sure to leave a comment for each entry for it to count. This giveaway is open to ANYONE!! Doesn’t matter where you live!
And you want to know what else? The lovely people at Cook’n want to offer you a 50% off coupon.
Use this code: mb-ddd on their site to get your very own Cook’n Recipe Organizer for 50% off the list price of $79.95.
** I received one or more of the products mentioned above for free using Mom Blog Society. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will be good for my readers. (http://momblogsociety.com)
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