Veggie Stuffed 8-Ball Zucchini

1 8-ball zucchini (it's a big, fat, round one)
1 broccoli crown
1 package of mushrooms (white, baby portobellos, whatever is your preference)
1/8 - 1/4 cup of balsamic vinegar
salt, pepper, and garlic powder (or 1 fresh, minced garlic clove) to taste
2 tbsp of sour cream
1 handful (about 1/4 of a cup) of shredded cheese (I used the mexican blend, but whatever your preference is should suffice)

Heat the oven to 400 F. Then chop up the mushrooms and the broccoli crown and cook them in a sauce pan with the vinegar, salt, pepper, and garlic. I sliced the mushrooms, and took as much stem off the individual, small broccoli crowns as possible, but that was just a personal preference. The mixture should be liquid-y. Take about 2/3 of the veggie mixture out of the saucepan and put it in a container for later.

Then, cut the top off the zucchini and hollow out the inside. Chop up all of the inside and cook it with the remaining 1/3 balsamic vinegar mixture. Once all of the veggies are cooked, take the sauce pan off the heat. Mix in the sour cream and the cheese.

Pour/scoop the veggie/cheese mixture into the hollowed out zucchini. All of t should fit. Don't be afraid to let the "stuffing" overflow, and don't worry if there is extra. Put the zucchini on a baking pan with at least a little bit of a lip and place in the oven. Cook for about 15 minutes, or until the stuffing is bubbly and the zucchini feels soft. Remove from the oven and enjoy!

You can make more stuffed zucchinis with the leftover veggie mixture, or you can just eat it by itself (that's actually how I can up with this recipe, I already had the veggies from a prior meal). Also, if you have normal zucchinis you can make this like a boat as well, the cooking time should be closer to 10 minutes then.

Heathbar Coffee Bars

So, for starters, I got the original recipe for these from the Big Book of Baking, but I have edited the recipe some and changed the name. If you have the book, you can find the original recipe as Crumb-Topped Toffee Squares.

2 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 tsp. salt
1 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup cold butter
1 cup butter milk (if you don't have this, you can substitute by adding a tblsp. of white vinegar or lemon juice to regular milk (doesn't matter what %) and letting it sit for at least 5 minutes before using)
1 large egg
1 1/2 tsp. vanilla
1 tsp. baking soda
about 1/2 cup to 1 cup of crushed heathbar
1/2 cup chopped walnuts

To start, preheat the oven to 350 and Grease a 9 in. square baking pan (though a roughly similar rectangular one is what I generally use and will work just as well)

Sift the flour and salt into a large bowl. Add in both sugars. Mix in butter until the mixture resembles fine crumbs (you don't want a cohesive batter, you want a crumbly mixture). Set aside 3/4 cup of the mixture.

In the mixture that was not set aside, mix in the buttermilk, egg, vanilla, and baking soda. This you want to be a cohesive batter (like cakes or brownies). Then pour/spoon the batter into the greased pan.

Mix the 3/4 crumb mixture with the walnuts and heathbar crumbs. Sprinkle all of that combined mixture on top of the batter in the pan (half of it should sink to the bottom during baking). Bake for about an hour. It is done when it's golden brown and kind of pulling away from the sides of the pan. Be sure not to over cook it, they will be too dry.

Let cool, then cut into pieces, then enjoy!

Cheesy Chicken Bacon Puffs

1 Package of chicken - the equivalent of 2-3 breasts
1 package of bacon - I use thick cut for preference
2 cups of shredded cheese
1 package of filo dough

    First, preheat the oven to 375. Get filo dough out, it should not be frozen when you actuallyneed to use it. Then, cook the chicken to JUST done. It should be juicy and easy to shred/pull apart. While it cools, cook the bacon. Shred the chicken and cut the bacon into equallysmall pieces. As shredding/chopping the chicken and bacon, putthepieces in a large bowl. Mix in cheese.
    Follow directions on filo dough box for keeping moist while making the puffs. Pull 2-3 sheets of filo dough together in about a 1.5 in strip. Separate the strip into 3-4 even pieces. Get a small bit of the chicken mixture, place it in the center of the filo dough pieces and place on a greased cooking sheet. You may need a small about of water/melted butter to make the filo dough stick close to make the puff.
    When the baking sheet is full, put in oven and cook for approximately 10 minutes, or until the puffs and browned and juicing. Continue this until there is no more chicken mixture or filo dough.

Alternatives: Filo dough is super flakey, so if you want more "puff"-like puffs, use pastry-puff dough instead of the filo dough. With the puff pastry, you will need to make bigger puffs and the puffs will be more bready/doughy. Make chicken pesto puffs by using pesto and feta cheese instead of shredded cheese and bacon.