Diet Coke Cupcakes

My two favorite things are Diet Coke & Chocolate. These are also my best friend's favorite things. SO, for her bridal shower this weekend I made her Diet Coke Cupcakes. YES. You read that correctly.  Can I just say genius? I mean really. These are even better for you than normal cupcakes. Unless, you know - you are one of those who think Diet Coke is going to kill us all in 2 years. Anyway.

The recipe for utter bliss is below:

1 box cake mix (chocolate - duh)

1 12oz. can of Diet Coke

Yes, that is it. Instead of putting in the oil and eggs (or whatever else), put in Diet Coke. Simple as that, and that's why it's less calories than normal cupcakes.

The batter tasted like diet coke and chocolate (obvi) and was delicious. I may or may not have licked the spoon 10 too many times.

Once baked these things taste like regular cupcakes (you can't taste the diet coke) making it perfect for your hubs who has an aversion to the stuff.

YUM. Trust me. Just make them. Carrie loved them and I stuck one up her nose.

Well, I'm off to church now! Wanna get your church on, but don't wanna get out of your pi's? Watch it live at 11:15am or 6pm HERE! 

Real Cooking Take 2

It's no secret that I am not the typical domestic housewife. My definition of cooking is throwing something frozen in the oven or making spaghetti, burritos, or fettucini alfredo (yes the jarred sauce). No seriously, that's our food rotation if I cook.

Well, Friday night I decided to get a little adventurous in the kitchen. I have done this once before and it was a success, but it wasn't exactly real cooking. So anyway, Friday night I tackled a homemade baked ziti.  Hubs loves baked ziti so I was pretty excited to see how it would turn out. I was tweeting throughout this process so some of you may remember my issues with this. Let's just say I do NOT like working with tomatoes. So, so gross. I mean just ew. BUT the sauce turned out pretty darn tasty. Anyway, I had a few hiccups (didn't have garlic, got the wrong sausage, noodles were done way too soon, my olive oil expired a year ago,  etc.) but here's the finished product:

SUCCESS!! Hubs absolutely loved it! I mean look at his plate...I think that was his second helping too! I didn't love it, but I know it's because of the sausage I used. Next time I make it I will use the right kind of turkey sausage. 

Now, there was one fail...

The recipe called for "crusty bread" and well, I took that way too far. I kept the bread in the oven to keep it hot and it just made it hard as a rock instead. Whoops. So that's it all bagged up to take to the ducks at the pond. Oh well. It wouldn't be me if I didn't mess up at least one thing in the kitchen!!

You can find the recipe here. I totally recommend it and I'm sure it will be so much easier for you than it was for me! This is the girl who tweeted Kit and asked what kind of grocery store I needed to go to buy the ingredients. No, seriously.

I had a blast making it though and am proud to now have two recipes under my belt!