August 10, 2010

Last month I shared the Funfetti Firecracker Cupcake recipe with you for a fun way to turn cupcakes into little firecrackers. Here’s another way you can use those little exploding candies, Pop Rocks to liven up your next summer party. I made these fun cocktails for the 4th of July but they would also be very festive for a Labor Day party.

On the “Rocks”
(adapted from Food Network Magazine July/August 2010)

Juice from half a lemon
Strawberry (red) Pop Rocks
1 part vodka
2 parts juice or mixer (I used Rose’s Blue Raspberry Mix)
1 part seltzer water or club soda

Pound the Pop Rocks packet before opening to crush the candies into smaller granules, then pour them out onto a plate. Next, just dampen the rims of the glasses with lemon juice and dip the rims in the candies.

So you don’t disturb the candies on the rim, just mix the vodka and juice, or mixer, in a shaker first and then pour over ice and add a splash of seltzer or club soda. Serve immediately as the Pop Rocks will start popping as soon as you put them on the rim.

Note: These also turn out really pretty using cranberry or pomegranate juice with the Tropical Punch (blue) Pop Rocks. (As pictured in Food Network Magazine.)

To make these for the kiddos, just eliminate the alcohol and use any color juice and Pop Rocks. These are so easy, it would even be fun to let the kids help make their own.

~LilSis

May 31, 2010

On this Memorial Day, we take a moment to remember the service men and women who have given their lives defending our country and protecting our freedom.  We thank you.

We ask for God’s blessings on the families who were left behind when their loved ones made the ultimate sacrifice.  We thank you.

We appreciate the service of all of our veterans who did make it back home; some physically injured and some emotionally wounded.  We thank you.

And we think of our military personnel who are unselfishly serving right now all around the world.  We thank you.

Tomorrow, we’ll get back to work and our daily business, and we probably won’t think of you in gratitude as often as we should.  Today though, we thank God for you all and lift up this prayer on your behalf.

Dear Heavenly Father,

As we remember those who have made the ultimate sacrifice for our freedom, we think of how they have followed in the footsteps of your son, our Savior, Jesus Christ. Please hold our service men and women in your strong arms. Cover them with your sheltering grace and presence as they stand in the gap for our protection.

We also remember the families of our troops, and ask for your unique blessings to fill their homes and your peace, provision and strength to fill their lives.

May the members of our armed forces be filled with courage to face each day and may they trust in the Lord’s mighty power to accomplish each task. Let our military brothers and sisters feel our love and support.

In the name of Jesus. Amen.

~Memorial Day Prayer by Mary Fairchild

~BigSis

May 3, 2010

Is it really May already? I must say this every month, but it does seem like time is flying by faster than ever before.  I know we had an early Easter this year but where did the rest of April go? We’ve got Mother’s Day already right around the corner and before you know it we’ll be celebrating Memorial Day and the Fourth of July!

But before we get ahead of ourselves, we’ve got Cinco de Mayo sneaking up on us in just two days. So, whether you’re looking for an easy appetizer to take to a party or you’re cooking for a large group of friends and family, here are some of our all time favorite recipes that are perfect for a Cinco de Mayo celebration.

Hatch Green Chile and Garlic Goat Cheese

Ceviche Salad with Avocado, Cilantro and Green Chile

Super Simple Guacamole

Roasted Garlic Dressing with Green Chilli

Homemade Pita Chips

(This is a terrible photo, but this soup is perfect topped with grated cheese, sour cream and toasted tortilla strips)

Chicken Enchilada Soup

Classic Tortilla Soup

Spinach Mushroom Enchiladas

Shrimp with Garlic and Chile Pepper

This next recipe is one of Bry’s favorite appetizers but every time he makes them they’re gobbled up so quickly we never have time to take a photo! Yes, they’re that yummy!

Bry’s Stuffed Peppers

15 fresh jalapeno peppers
1 pound Italian sausage
1 (8 oz) cream cheese
1/2 pound bacon

Cut peppers in half lengthwise. Clean out seeds with spoon. Set aside on foiled lined cookie sheet. Saute sausage and drain. Add the cream cheese to the sausage and mix well.  Spoon into peppers and wrap 1/3 slice of bacon around each pepper. Bake at 350 for approximately 20 – 30 minutes. Put under the broiler for a few minutes to further brown the bacon, if desired. Drain on a paper towel, then serve warm.

And, lastly, we can’t forget about something sweet.

Mexican Chocolate Rice Krispie Treats

Hopefully, we’ve given you a couple of ideas to help you with your celebration, but whatever you decide to do on Wednesday, have a safe Cinco de Mayo!

~LilSis

April 5, 2010

I know we’ve thrown a lot of Easter projects at you over the last week or so, but believe it or not, I have a couple more!  After this post, I promise, no more Easter talk til 2011.

I worked on these little White Chocolate Smiley Face Easter Bunnies over a period of days, but then guess what happened when I was finally putting the post together on Saturday afternoon?  My internet went down, of course!  Ding dang Time Warner employee accidentally disconnected me when he was working on someone else’s service in the hood, and they couldn’t get anyone out here to fix it til Monday morning.

So call me selfish, but I am not going to let all that work go to waste without showing you the bunnies!  I don’t care that Easter is over!    Let’s just pretend that it’s still Easter!

Now, on with it.  I won’t bore you with instructions that you won’t need til next March, but I do want to show you the photos.  These are the White Chocolate Smiley Face Easter Bunnies.

Oh, and one more thing…Chocolate Fudge Easter Eggs; molded and decorated in pink, of course!

Now, we can all go back to our after-Easter worlds!  Thanks for indulging me!

~BigSis

April 2, 2010

Are you tired of coloring Easter Eggs the same old way? I am. I’m tired of just plopping a dye tablet in a cup, adding a little vinegar and water and taking turns putting the eggs into the cups. Boring!

And, if you’d like to be a little more health conscious and avoid the artificial dyes, you may want to consider using one of these natural dyes to color your eggs this year!

This was a little time consuming, but it was one of those projects that was so much fun because the end result is somewhat of a surprise. It reminded me of how I always feel when I open up my kiln after a glaze firing. It’s like Christmas! The anticipation almost kills me every time. When I had more time for ceramics, I would almost always find a way to incorporate some leaf or flower impressions in most of my projects. In my wall tiles and mosaic tiles, I’ve used a lot of the same leaves and flowers that I used for this project.

Alright, sorry I’m rambling about ceramics; let’s get back to the Easter eggs. This was my first experiment in making natural dyes so I was winging it a bit and didn’t have any idea of how these would turn out. I looked over a few recipes online but didn’t use one in particular, just the basic method, so let’s get started.

First, gather your leaves, flowers or stickers that you plan to use for this project. Here’s what I used.

Next, depending on which variation you want to make, you’ll use one of these.

1 head of Purple cabbage (If making the blue eggs.)
Yellow onion skins (I used the skin from 3 onions for this rust color.)
1 bag of fresh cranberries (For the disappointing brownish color.)

Whichever color you decide to make will determine the size of your pan. Obviously the whole head of purple cabbage will take a larger pan than if you use one of the other two ingredients.

Once you decide which color you are going to make, use the appropriate size pan. But, before you add the vegetable or fruit to your pan, place an egg in the pan and fill it with enough water to cover the top of the egg by at least an inch. Then remove the egg. Don’t add more water. If you use too much water, the color of the dye will end up being too diluted.

Place the sliced cabbage, onion skins, or cranberries into the pan and boil for thirty minutes, covered to minimize evaporation. Allow water to cool slightly, and then strain contents over a bowl, pressing pulp to remove any remaining liquid.

Rinse the pan, pour in dye water, cover, and return to low heat to keep warm while preparing eggs.

Here are the natural dyes all strained and waiting for the eggs.

Next, you’ll want to gather a few more items.

Vinegar
Scissors
Pantyhose
Twist ties
Slotted Spoon
Paper towels
Vegetable oil

Now, cut the pantyhose into 4 inch pieces.

(Some instructions I saw said that you needed to buy several pairs of knee highs and just use the toes, but I just bought two 99 cent pair of pantyhose, cut them into pieces and it worked fine.)

Now for the fun part.

One at a time, place leaves, flowers, or stickers on the egg as desired. Some of the plant materials will stick better if you dip them in water first.

Place the egg in your hand, and gently place the egg inside the hose, make sure your design is still how you want it, and then pull the hose securely it the back and secure with a twist tie. (I thought this was easier than trying to tie in a knot while holding everything in place.)

Trim the excess hose from the back.

Repeat with remaining eggs.

Return dye to a gentle boil and stir in vinegar. I used 4 T. for the purple cabbage and 3 T. for the onion skins and cranberries since they were in smaller pans.

Here are all my eggs ready to go into the dye.

Gently lower the eggs into the pan and boil for 30 minutes. Turn off heat, cover, and let stand for 2- 3 hours, or until desired color is obtained.

Remove eggs with a slotted spoon and place back on egg carton to cool slightly.

Here’s what they look like after you’ve taken them out of the dye.

Carefully untie the twist tie or cut the hose and unwrap eggs. Carefully pull off and discard any remaining plant materials or stickers.

I let mine sit for an extra 5 or 10 minutes after I unwrapped them just so they could cool a bit more.

Dampen a paper towel lightly with oil and buff eggs until shiny. Remove excess oil with clean paper towel.

Be very careful not to wipe too hard as some of the dye might come off.

Rust Natural Dyed Easter Eggs

Blue Natural Dyed Easter Eggs

Light Brown Natural Dyed Easter Eggs

Natural Dye Colored Easter Eggs

Natural Dyed Easter Eggs

Like I said before, this project was pretty time consuming, but it was so much fun for me! I feel like I got my creative juices stirring again.

A few notes:

I kept one egg without any decoration to put in each dye color and I didn’t care for any of those three at all.

I used just plain yellow onion skin on one egg in each dye color and a couple of those made some beautiful marbling. The one with the onion skin in the purple cabbage dye was probably my favorite. It had a gorgeous brownish-blueish marbling effect.

I was disappointed in the brownish color that I got from the cranberry dye, but on one egg where I used a purple flower, it gave off a beautiful blueish color in the center of the white flower. I don’t think that I would bother using cranberry again for this project. I was expecting a purplish color, not brown.

The dark rust color from the onion skins is probably my favorite. And this dye didn’t even need to sit for two hours before it intensified in color. You could probably even take these out after 30 minutes or so.

I just love this method of using the leaves and flowers for contrast in color on these eggs. I’m already thinking of ways to use this for another project.

I should have posted this sooner, but I hope you give these a try if you have a little time before Easter!

Have a great weekend and a Happy Easter!

~LilSis

April 1, 2010

When you hear the words “Marshmallow” and “Easter”, do you think of Peeps or maybe those super-sugary marshmallow eggs with the hard sugar shell?  I don’t because I don’t like either of those Easter candies.  To me, they’re the Easter version of the hard-as-a-rock peanut butter taffy wrapped in black or orange paper that you got at Halloween as a kid, and tried to pawn off on your unsuspecting little brothers in exchange for their chocolate candy bars!

I have a new Easter marshmallow treat to share with you, and these also have white chocolate.  This project isn’t quite as fancy and classy as the Easter Bird’s Candy Nests that LilSis made yesterday, but they’re pretty fun to make and I think kids would have a ball putting them together.

The key is to get yourself a candy mold like this.  It has bunny heads and bunny bases with feet and tails (bunny butts).

I got mine at my cake supply store, but you can find them online too.  I have bunches of these kinds of molds.  They’re only about $2.50 each, and you can use them for chocolate, candy melts or even soaps.  Buy just one or two, and you’ll be addicted to them.  You can customize candy for any kid’s party theme and color scheme.  Wrapped up in foil papers, people will be shocked that you made these cute candies yourself.  I made little green frog chocolates for a kid’s party once, and the kids were thrilled!

So back to this project.  Here’s what you do:

• Melt some candy melts or chocolate wafers (I like the Guittard White Chocolate Wafers; they come in mint too).  I nuke them for 30 seconds, then stir, and repeat til all are melted.

• Pour the melted chocolate into a squeeze bottle, and fill the cavities in the mold.  Once it’s filled, tap the mold gently on the counter to bring any air bubbles to the surface.  Add more chocolate if needed.

• Refrigerate the mold for a few minutes until the shapes are set and cold.  Unmold.

• Now the fun part!  Use more melted chocolate to lightly coat large marshmallows, then immediately roll in shredded coconut.  Chill for a few minutes to set.

• Decorate the bunny faces if you like.  I used food markers, but they tended to slide around a little on the chocolate, so you’ll probably come up with better ideas than BigSis-in-a-hurry did!

• Add a dab of melted chocolate to the bottom of the marshmallow and gently press onto the base.  Then, with a dab of melted chocolate, add the bunny face to the front of the marshmallow.

You just made a Marshmallow White Chocolate Easter Bunny!

~BigSis

March 31, 2010

I can’t believe Easter is just four days from today! If you’re like me and don’t enough time to make a cute Easter Bunny Cake or Easter Basket Cupcakes, here’s a quick and easy candy treat.

I decided to try two different versions of the Easter Bird’s Nests. They’re a little messy, but I think they turned out pretty cute.

For the first batch, I used this recipe that calls for butterscotch chips and peanut butter. If I made these again, I would just eliminate the peanut butter. These were more gooey and took longer to set than the ones with just the chips.

Bird’s Nests

2 c. butterscotch chips
1 c. peanut butter
2 c. Chow Mein noodles
Any egg shaped Easter candy (I used Robins eggs and M&M’)

Cover a baking sheet or pan with waxed or parchment paper. Either melt the butterscotch chips and peanut butter in the top of a double boiler or in the microwave (heat 1 minute, stir, continue heating in 10 second increments until melted and smooth.) Stir in Chow Mein noodles. With buttered fingers shape mixture into one big nest or individual ones. Place on prepared pan. Refrigerate until firm. Fill with jelly beans or other candy.

For the second batch, I simply melted 2 cups white chocolate chips and added 2 cups Chow Mein noodles. I thought the little white nests would look cute with some grass inside them so I made some green grass by adding a few drops of green food coloring to a little coconut and shaking it up inside a baggie.

I think that I like the white chocolate version better but I could have used an extra cup or more of Chow Mein noodles because they seemed a little runnier than they should have been. These firmed up really quickly though which makes it easier to get them decorated if you’re in a hurry.

So, what’s next in our Easter treat lineup? Come back tomorrow to find out!

~LilSis

March 30, 2010

Happy early Easter, everyone!  And happy good-excuse-to-use-pink-holiday!  I DO love me some pink, and I really love pink with green.  But actually, I love pink with any and every other color.  Pink is probably the most perfect color in the rainbow, don’t you think?  Ok, BigSis, you’re getting off track.  Focus, focus, focus, girl!  We’re talking about Easter baking today, not your obsession with all things rosy.

Sorry…back to the program!  I love Easter, I love color, and I love baking.  Voila!  Easter Basket Cupcakes!

You can use any recipe of course.  Since I’m 3 months into doing the vegan thing, I baked up a batcheroo of my all-time favorite Pumpkin Walnut Bread.  I baked tons of it for the last couple of bake sales, more for Christmas gifts, and I’m still baking it.  I can’t get enough of it, so here it is in its’ cute little Easter basket outfit!

I found these super-delicious Wilton Easter Basket Cupcake Wrappers at my Michael’s store, and I bet your local craft store has them too.  They may even be on sale this week like mine were!

Instructions?  I got ‘em for you:

• Bake any cupcakes you adore in a cute paper liner.

• Let them cool, then frost or not.  I chose not.

• Convince some coconut to pretend that it’s Easter grass.  I added about 6 drops of liquid green food coloring to about half a bag of shredded coconut in a ziploc baggie.  Mush it around until the coconut/grass is all pretty green.

• Add a pile of coconut/grass to each cupcake, and top with some jelly beans or whatever for an extra shout of faux egg color.  I didn’t have jelly beans and don’t really like them anywho, so I wasn’t about to buy any.  I used Skittles and M&Ms.  You’re the boss of these cupcakes, so you do what you want!

• Make the little basket wrappers, and secure with tape to be sure they don’t come unhinged at an inappropriate time.

• Drop each cupcake into the Easter Basket wrapper, and add the handle.  I just tucked it into the sides so it would be easy to remove for faster cupcake access!

That’s it!  Hoppy Easter!

~BigSis

March 27, 2010

It’s tempting to buy a cute little chick, duckling or bunny at Easter.  They grow up though, and then how do you care for them?  Little chickies are adorable, but a full-grown feisty chicken is another story!

How about sponsoring a farm animal instead of buying one that you aren’t prepared to care for long-term?  Farm Sanctuary has a great farm animal adoption program that could be a perfect solution.  Do you have children who have outgrown Easter egg hunts?  Maybe you have a grandchild out of state?  Or perhaps you have a niece or nephew who loves animals?  Maybe you’ve decided this is the year you’ll be more creative at Easter, and you just don’t want to bring a bunch of candy into the house.  What a great idea to sponsor a farm animal in the name of someone special!

All you need to do is go to Farm Sanctuary’s adoption page and choose a duck, bunny or chicken to sponsor for $10-$15 per month, based on a one-year sponsorship.

I’m especially partial to Buttercup!

and Howard!

You or your gift recipient will receive an adoption certificate with a color photograph of the adopted friend, an adoption card, an invitation to schedule a VIP tour to meet the adopted friend, and other great benefits depending on the animal. If a year is more than you want to commit to, you can also make a one-time gift that will be greatly appreciated.

So if you’re looking for something different to do at Easter this year, here’s a way to do that and help a great cause at the same time!

~BigSis

March 25, 2010

How many of us remember precious homemade Easter Bunny Cakes from our childhoods?  SisMama has made Bunny Cakes over the years, and they’re always seriously adorable and a big hit with everyone…not just the kids!

This is the one SisMama makes.  It’s the Kraft Easter Bunny Cake.

Kraft's Easter Bunny Cake

If you want to make the super simple version, you just need cake mix, Cool Whip and coconut.  Oh, and decorations like gumdrops, licorice and jelly beans.  But if you have a little more time on your hands and want to fancy it up a bit, use a homemade cake with good homemade frosting.

Betty Crocker also has an Easter Bunny Cake that’s way cute!  Again, use a cake mix if you want to.  Betty recommends a carrot cake mix with her canned frosting.

Betty Crocker's Easter Bunny Cake

I am so in love with this last cake that I can’t stand it!  It does require the purchase of a Wilton Bunny Pan, but take a look at this Easter cuteness!  Wilton calls it their Landing Feet First! Cake.

Wilton's Feet First Easter Bunny

So pick your favorite, and surprise your family and friends with a cute Easter Bunny Cake this year.  I bet they’ll remember it for years to come!

~BigSis