Teriyaki Bites and Cheesecake

Today was a busy day, but we had fun making a special dinner for Owen who had his first day of first grade today! Noah and I missed him like crazy, but we'll adjust, right? Anyway, here's our dinner tonight, you can find it at ourbestbites.com. We had Bacon-Wrapped Teriyaki Chicken Skewers, and we made them appetizer size rather than skewer size.  The chicken and bacon received a perfecct 10, but Owen and Aaron didn't like the pineapple as much so the whole toothpick received a 9.  Noah and I gave it a 10 even with the pineapple.  These were delicious, easy, and super fun for the boys.  They are also only 66 calories per toothpick, when you make 24 little bites. We also had tater tots which the boys in our family, including Aaron, swear are the perfect food :).

Now onto our special dessert. We were watching Throwdown with Bobby Flay, I love cooking shows and the boys have decided they like them too, anyway, we were watching the cheesecake episode, and Owen said he had to try the Caramel Apple Cheesecake.  Owen is not super into desserts, so I wasn't sure how well this would go over, but I told him for his first day back at school we'd have this cake.  So Noah and I made it, and Noah and I gave it a 10.  Owen gave it an 8, and Aaron gave it a 6, since we all know Aaron doesn't like desserts.

This was fun to make, although time consuming, and I only made tiny alterations. I didn't have walnuts so I used pecans in the crust, and didn't add any nuts on top, so I used 1/2 the nuts the recipe called for. I also don't cook with alcohol, so I used some cider instead, and I think it was too sweet because of that, but still delicious. Finally, I didn't have any creme fraiche so I just mixed a little sour cream and cream together and spread that on top of the cheesecake. The calories for 16 servings were approximately 550/serving. We had to watch what we ate so we could afford a slice of this cheesecake. This is worth making and definitely worth the calories to eat it. Yum!

Tomorrow we're having Chicken Spinach Stromboli.