Review: Home Chef Express at Kroger

 This post is sponsored by Kroger, all thoughts and opinions are my own.

If you’ve been following along for a while you know that my boyfriend and I became huge fans of Kroger’s Prep+Pared Meal Kits. These kits were like the ones you order online that come with everything you need to make a gourmet meal at home, except you could buy them right as you walked into your Kroger store. It was extremely convenient for us, not to mention we were able to make restaurant quality at home for under $20.

Unfortunately, Kroger has decided to discontinue their Prep+Pared Meal Kits – you have no ideas how heartbroken I was when I found this out. However, they did replace them with Home Chef Express Meal Kits. Home Chef has been doing meal kits better than anyone else in the business, and Kroger decided to partner with them and offer better than ever kits. I was invited to attend the launch event of the Home Chef Express Kits and try them out. My boyfriend was just getting back in town and was unable to go with me so I took my mum instead to give the new meals a try. For those of you that do not know my mum, she eats like a bird and is incredibly picky – thankfully they had a kit that she was actually willing to try which was the Chicken Fajitas with cheese and sour cream. This kit said it would be ready in 15 minutes, serves two and had a price point of $16.99. We began our cooking, and in fact it did take us 15 minutes to complete the meal, and it was absolutely delicious – even my ridiculously picky mother enjoyed it and said she would be buying kits…yay! The one thing that these kits do not have is a little something on the side, with the fajitas I would of liked to have some rice to go with it. So you’d have to buy a side dish to go with it, since most people will want a little something with their main course.

Christopher Robin Tea Party

 

Have you ever attended a tea party before? This weekend I had my first tea party experience and I am completely hooked. Aside from being an amazing blogger, my friend Becky is also an urban beekeeper, and Disney asked her to host a tea party in honor of the Bluray release of the movie Christopher Robin. The tea party was held at Tonia’s Victorian Rose Tea Room in the heart of downtown Rochester, and presented the cutest location for the event. Each table was adorn with mismatched tea cups and teapots, earl grey cookies to look like Winnie the Pooh characters as well as sugar cookie balloons. The teas at the table were earl grey and passion peach (my favorite). Becky spoke about beekeeping, which I found to be absolutely fascinating. So what do you have with tea? Sweet and savory items of course! We had ham and cheddar (cut out like a rabbit – so cute!) as well as cucumber tea sandwiches and spinach quiche. For the sweets there was an English scone shaped like a honey pot, dark chocolate raspberry torte, lemon curd tart and fresh fruit. All-in-all I had an absolutely amazing time at my very first tea party.

Friendsgiving

When it comes to the holidays, getting together with family and friends is something I always look forward to. Plus, it provides the perfect opportunity to attend pretty parties. Recently, Anne invited me to attend Friendsgiving at her house. Anne lives in a beautiful (serious house envy) old stone house that presented the most gorgeous location for a Friendsgiving get-together. The dining table was beautifully set with coordinating dishes and stunning tablescape made with items found at Hobby Lobby. Anne even wrote each of names at our place setting. The whole design was chic and rustic. There was a bar cart with a spiced wine (I don’t drink – but everyone said it was amazing). Now let’s talk about the food… ham, mac and cheese, green beans and sweet potatoes were provided by Honey Baked Ham. A delicious salad came from The Big Salad and dessert was from Nothing Bundt Cakes. My favorite part of the meal was the smashed sweet potatoes, oh my word so good, aside from the yummy cakes of course. The Friendsgiving was sponsored by Novi Town Center, and all the food and tablescape pieces were courtesy of stores in the Novi Town Center.