Egg and Cheese Muffins

I have recently been on the hunt for more protein for the kids at breakfast.  A great friend told me how to make these little egg muffins and I love them. They are easy to fix, versatile, and I have left overs for at least another day or two of breakfasts.  I guess this isn't really a recipe but I'm recording it here so I don't forget about these little gems.

As you can see I made mini and regular versions this time so the pictures show the prep for both sizes!

Here's What You Need:

-eggs (One egg per muffin you plan to make. I usually make only 6 muffins at a time)

-shredded cheese

-spinach

-any other veggie you want to throw in

Here's What You Do:

1.  Preheat the move at 360 and spray the muffin pan with Pam for easy removal

2.  Fill the bottom with the veggies you are using.

3.  Fill the rest of the way up with shredded cheese and pat it down a bit.

4.  Whisk eggs together and put into a measuring cup (for easy of pouring).

5.  Pour the eggs over each muffin.

6.  Bake at 360 for 20-23 minutes.

So this time I made 4 regular sized muffins and 4 mini muffins to see if the kids would like them better. Elli loves these things and Jackson did fairly well with the mini ones (I still have to feed them to him) but he got it down.  He isn't a huge egg person so this is a victory for me.  My mini ones were done at 20 minutes and I let the larger ones cook for 23 minutes.  These are delicious straight from the oven but go ahead and put your left overs in the fridge. You can pop them in the microwave for 1 minute the following morning for an easy breakfast on the go.

Versatile? Yes!  Make these with spinach, bell peppers, chopped broccoli - the list goes on and on and on.

Hope this gives you a quick breakfast to get you out of the oatmeal rut.  Oh wait?  Was that just me stuck in the oatmeal rut? Well maybe you'll enjoy it anyway!!

Very Easy Quick and Cheesy Cheese Dip

If you follow my posts here, this recipe will not fit the standard. But if you do any challenges with me you will hear me say 100% of the time that my motto is "progress not perfection" and "moderation not deprivation."  My philosophy is that when we deprive ourselves of the foods we love, we end up over doing it later.  Plus depriving ourselves of the things we love is not a way to live!  My health philosophy is about finding balance - a balance between feeding our bodies the things it needs while also enjoying the delicious things the kitchen has to offer us.

So that being said, during Christmas I was in charge of bringing an apetizer to one of our parties.  I decided to make a cheese dip I've heard a lot about.  It was so easy to make and really was quite delicious.  Ok it was very delicious.  So make it for your next gathering and you will be the talk of the party. It seems like it takes more effort than it really does.  I had tons of friends recommend recipes for this and I ended up sampling from all the recommendations and this is what I came up with.  

Here's What You Need:

32 oz Velveeta block of cheese

14 oz can of Rotel diced tomatoes (I did mild but you can choose based on your audience)

1 lb of lean ground beef (you can also use pork or ground turkey)

Some people also add in a cream cheese to make this even thicker or just use the cream cheese instead of Velveeta so there are a lot of variations you can try out here!)