The last several months have been hard.  Too much loss in our family topped with work sucking beyond words, I’ve found little energy for cooking, crafting, and photography.  With fall mornings being cold, it was hard to get out of bed, so my exercise regimen fell by the wayside.  My annual vacation of 4 days of gluttony turned into 3 weeks of gluttony with too much sitting resulting in a dismal 9 pounds gained!

I don’t make resolutions.  What I do, is try to make healthy life choices.  I know with my love of pork and cocktails, it doesn’t always look like that.  I try to find balance in my lifestyle.  I exercise so I can eat what I want.

One of the nice things about a blog as a personal journal, there is a bit of accountability.  I have found blogs that were seemingly abandoned with no reason and now I can see how that happens.  Life happens and all of a sudden, it’s been a few weeks or a few months without writing.  When I cook, I take pictures and make notes with every intention of writing about it, but I just fall father behind.  I find this personal space quite cathartic and miss it when I don’t write.  It’s a nice dumping ground for the detritus in my head.

That’s a lot of words for saying, I’m back.  I’ve missed this place and I’m starting back with a crazy easy layered cheese dip that will surely be a hit at your next gathering.  This recipe was originally in Louisiana Cookin’ October 2012.

Cream Cheese Tart
2 8oz bricks of cream cheese
3/4 cup crumbled feta
1/4 cup softened butter
1/4 confectioners sugar (didn’t have any, used granulated and reduced by half)
6 tablespoons fig preserves (increased, prob doubled)
1/4 cup finely chopped pecans (increased)

*In a large bowl mix cream cheese through sugar. In another bowl, mix pecans and fig preserves.
*Line a 16 ounce plastic tub with plastic wrap, leaving extra to hang over sides.
*Spoon half of pecan mixture in bottom of tub then spoon half of cream cheese over pecan mixture. Repeat layers then fold excess plastic wrap over top.
*Chill for 2 hours. Serve with crackers

My variations: HALVE this recipe!! This actually made 2 tubs and I put the second one in the freezer.  This was figgy cheese goodness and there wasn’t a smidgen left (almost as if someone licked the plate clean).

Hope your new year is off to a good start.  Here’s to lucky number 13!