May 30, 2011

We wish everyone a safe and happy Memorial Day!

Last weekend, I attended a function called Operation Appreciation which was held at the Oceanside Pier in honor of Military Appreciation Day.

It was a great day because I was able to watch my son, Bry, with his Naval Unit working on the beach during the LCAC demonstration.

Here are just a few shots that I wanted to share today.

Our entire family is extremely proud of our newly-promoted Petty Officer!

We want to thank everyone

who has or is serving in our U.S. Military for sacrificing

their lives each and every day

to protect our country.

And, we honor all who have made the ultimate

sacrifice and lost their lives while serving our country.

Today is a day to remember them all!

~LilSis

May 8, 2011

BigSis was just talking about Mexican food for Cinco de Mayo and it's absolutely the truth when she says that we both LOVE our Mexican food. Whether that's fajitas, regular tacos, tacos al carbon (Mum's favourite) or just a good pile of nachos – you can't go wrong with Mexican food. Going out to a good Mexican resturant is one of our favourite things to do as a family, so I often try to create the recipes at home myself!

When it's my birthday or Mother's Day and my time to choose where we go, I always have a hard time deciding between Mexican food or brunch. For Mother's Day, most of the time I choose brunch just so everyone can take their time, have a few mimosas, and enjoy the meal without feeling rushed.

When at home, breakfast is also my favorite meal! During the week, it's usually just oatmeal, cheerios, or a multi-grain waffle and a banana. But on the weekend, when possible, I love cooking a nice big breakfast. Here are a couple of my favorites.

Garden Omelet

 

Spinach and Ham Frittata

 

Mini Asparagus Tomato Quiche

 

Spinach Quiche with Tomato Sauce

 

If you don't go out, have your family prepare one of these recipes for you and have a Happy Mother's Day!

 

 

~LilSis

April 16, 2011

By now, you may know that I don't do dairy or eggs, and chances are you know some other vegans.  You may be even more likely to know someone who is lactose-intolerant, or who just finds that dairy products don't agree with them.

What if your children can't have most of the candy that you find for sale at Easter time?  What if they can't have eggs?  What do you do for them to keep them from feeling left out when all the other kids are eating Cadbury eggs and hunting for colored boiled eggs? How about making some special easy homemade Easter chocolates for them or with them?

It's a stretch for me to even say these candies are homemade, because all you really do is melt chocolate.  First, choose a chocolate that's made without milk products; Trader Joe's semi-sweet chocolate chips are one example.

Then, find one of these Easter candy/chocolate molds.  If you plan ahead you could order it online, but if you have a cake supply store nearby like I do, you can find one there.  Craft stores carry some of these, but you usually don't find a very broad selection there.

I'm semi-obsessed with these molds.  You fill the little cavities with a small amount of melted chocolate or hard candy syrup, and refrigerate for an hour or so til completely set.  When you tip it upside down to unmold, you have the cutest little things ever.  I promise you people will be impressed and think you're some kind of culinary genius, when all you did was melt chocolate and buy a $2 mold!

For Easter, I chose this mold with bunnies, duckies, Easter eggs and lambs.  I like to put the chocolate chips in a glass measuring cup, and microwave them until melted, stirring every 30 seconds. It won't take very long; less than 2 minutes usually depending on how much chocolate you're working with at once.  I'd recommend a small amount in each batch so that it doesn't start to cool and thicken before you get it all into the molds.

I spoon the chocolate into a plastic squeeze bottle to fill the molds, but you could just use a small spoon to do it.  When all the cavities are filled, you need to carefully smack the filled mold on the countertop to settle the chocolate into all the little nooks and crannies.  You also want any trapped air bubbles to rise to the surface.  It might take a few smacks to get the job done.

After unmolding, this is what you have.  You can see that I got in too big of a hurry, and didn't get all the air bubbles out of my candies.  No worries though!  We're going to wrap each chocolate in a foil square, and the bubbles won't show.

I found gold and silver 4″ foil squares at my craft store, but I've seen pastel-colored ones at the cake supply store that would have been even cuter.

You could sprinkle these wrapped chocolates into an Easter basket, or you could use them as little Easter gifts or party favors. Remember the origami boxes I made for the painted glass marble cross magnets?  Let's use those to give these chocolates away.

Add some pretty paper shred or Easter grass into the box, fill with the chocolates, and voila!  You have an adorable little gift that is handmade with love, but no eggs or dairy!

~BigSis

April 12, 2011

I said the other day that Easter required chocolate, and I meant it!

These are my favorite chocolate cookies right now, since I made them for the SPCA Bake Sale last December.  They're Isa Chandra Moskowitz's Mexican Chocolate Snickerdoodles from Vegan Cookies Invade Your Cookie Jar, and they're delicious!

They do need to be dolled up and decorated just a touch for Easter though, don't you think?  I thought!  And this is what I came up with.

I found these cute Easter stencils at Hobby Lobby.  If you have a Hobby Lobby near you, you know that no one does adorable holiday food packaging and goodies like they do!  Most of our decorative bake sale packaging comes from Hobby Lobby.

Back to the Easter stencils.  For just $1.99, I got 6 reusable plastic stencils that can be used with cookies, cupcakes, or anything else that is flat.

All you do is choose a cookie or cupcake with a level surface.

Place a stencil on the cookie.

Sprinkle it with powdered sugar, as heavily or as lightly as you like.

Carefully remove the stencil and admire your pretty image!  How fun is that!

I experimented with colored coarser sugar on a cookie, and it didn't work out too well.  So I had to eat that one.  Oh, darn.  This blogging thing is rough.  🙂

Powdered sugar looks pretty on a cookie, but it doesn't stick so you have to be careful not to disturb the image.  I bet it would stick better if you sprinkled the sugar on a frosted cookie or cupcake.

I already showed you the “Happy Easter” cookie close-up.  Here's the Easter basket…

the Easter Bunny…

the flowers…

the butterfly with tulips…

and the chickie!

This was a fun and super-easy project to do, and I bet your kids would love to help with it!  You may be cleaning up powdered sugar til next Easter, but at least you'll have great memories to show for it!

We're still hatching up more Easter fun, so check back with us soon!

~BigSis

April 10, 2011

Here comes Peter Cottontail, hoppin' down the bunny trail.
Hippity, hoppity, Easter's on its way!

How's that for a non-traditional photo to kick off the Easter season?   I was out for a walk last weekend, and passed by this crack in the sidewalk.  It looks to me as though Peter Cottontail left an image of his carrot embossed here in the concrete to remind us that Easter is on its way!

Easter comes late this year on April 24th, so we have just 2 more weeks til it's here.  The meaning of the holiday is the heart of it of course: that Jesus died for us and rose again 3 days later.  It's also a holiday set on a backdrop of spring, pastel colors, new clothes, and oh yeah…candy!

Just because it's an important time in our lives as Christians doesn't mean that we can't also enjoy it and have some good, clean chocolatey fun too. 😀  Now's the time to get those bunny cake pans out of storage and get busy.

In the next couple of weeks, we'll be sharing some Easter joy with you.  We're planning some Easter cookies, crafts,and maybe even a bunny cake!

~BigSis

March 27, 2011

Even though Easter isn't until April 24th this year, it isn't too early to start thinking about which goodies you'll be making for your Easter celebration. Here are a few of our favorite Easter cupcakes, candies and baking ideas that might help get you started. 🙂

Easter Basket Cupcakes

Easter Bird's Nest Candy

Marshmallow White Chocolate Easter Bunnies

White Chocolate Smiley Face Easter Bunnies

Easter Candy Gifts

And you'll find some great Easter Baking Ideas in this roundup that BigSis put together last Easter.

~LilSis

March 12, 2011

Do the eggs on the Country Living Magazine's April, 2011 cover look familiar?

Do you remember this Natural Dye Colored Easter Egg post that I did for Easter last year?

Now that the April issue of Country Living Magazine is officially on the newsstand, we can finally announce this exciting news!

We were contacted by an Editor from Country Living Magazine back in January to see if I would be interested in recreating this Natural Dye Colored Egg Project for the April issue of their magazine. And, of course, I said yes! 🙂

It's true; the eggs beautifully displayed on this pedestal were made by me, in my kitchen in Southern California, and were carefully packaged and shipped overnight to County Living in New York City for their photo shoot!

The Editor had originally planned on the project being featured in the craft section of the magazine, but we were thrilled when we received the news that the Editors decided to feature the project on the cover. And the project is also featured on their website in the 10 Adorable Easter Craft Projects section.

If you've come to our site after reading about us in Country Living Magazine, we would like to extend a HUGE welcome to you!

If you like this project, we want to encourage you to Subscribe to our Feed and Like us on Facebook. We have plans to share more craft projects here on our site, as well as continue with our recipes, beauty product reviews and tips we discover that help us in our quest to live a fit, healthy and responsible lifestyle that’s still fun!

We don’t claim to be experts in any one thing, but what we do know is what women care about and like to talk about.  That’s what we love to share with you here on BigSisLilSis.

To celebrate this project making the cover of Country Living Magazine and to welcome our new readers, we decided to give away a Country Living book. And since the Editor at Country Living was so kind to donate FOUR books to us, we'll be having a Country Living Book Giveaway each week for the next four weeks.

To kick-start this series of giveaways, the first book we'll be giving away to one lucky reader is this gorgeous book!

Restore. Recycle. Repurpose. Create a Beautiful Home

(A Country Living Book)

And when I say gorgeous, I mean gorgeous! I LOVE this book!

(I really wanted to keep this book for myself, but it's more fun to give than receive, right?) 🙂

This book is full of beautiful photos and inspiring ideas on how everyone can create a home that's as harmonious with the environment as it is beautiful. The book is jam-packed with great, practical advice on ways you can “go green” in each room of your home.

Do you want to know how this lovely book can be yours?

It's easy!

Here are the details!

You can do any or all of these for a chance to win:

• Leave us a comment. Do you have any fun or unique ways to decorate eggs for Easter? Or any fun tips on “going green” in your home?

• Subscribe to our Feed and leave us a comment letting us know if you already subscribe or if you're a new subscriber.

• Subscribe via email. (It's easy to do in our top right sidebar!) Leave a comment if you already subscribe via email or if you're a new subscriber.

• Like us on Facebook and leave us a comment letting us know that you Like us.

• Follow BigSis on Twitter and LilSis on Twitter and leave another comment.

• Tweet this post and leave us a comment that you tweeted it.

• Stumble this post and leave another comment to let us know it's stumbled.

So, there you have it. You can enter up to seven times! Since the winner will be chosen at random.org; obviously, the more times you enter, the better your odds of winning this beautiful book.

This giveaway will officially end at midnight on Friday, March 18th and on Saturday, March 19th, we'll announce the winner and the next book giveaway!

(I’ll let ya in on a little secret. If you follow us on Twitter or Like BigSisLilSis on Facebook, we'll be giving you some bonus chances to enter during these next six days.)

~LilSis

March 9, 2011

Don't look too close! My royal icing didn't turn out too great!

We sisters have a little Irish in our genes, but not much. For some reason, though; maybe because my hubby is half Irish, we always have fun celebrating St. Patrick's Day. We usually have friends over, cook some corned beef and cabbage, listen to some Irish music and possibly have a green beer or two. Last year I made this Glowing Gecko Cocktail for some friends and it was a huge hit.

I love the legend about how every Leprechaun has a hidden pot of gold and how they'd rather turn you into a frog than be captured. Even though these guys don't look like it, they are considered to be faeries and I've always been a bit fascinated by the “faerie world.”

I was in Michael's a few weeks ago looking for something completely unrelated to St. Patrick's Day but when I saw their St. Patty's Day display, I couldn't resist picking up a four leaf clover cookie cutter and some green sprinkles.

To this day, I can't pass a clover patch without stopping to look for a four-leaf clover. 🙂

Even though I've made a few cookie recipes lately, I have to be honest and admit that I really don't like to bake. If you look at my Thanksgiving Turkey Cookies and my Linzer Heart-Shaped Sandwich Cookies, I usually choose a recipe that's more about the decoration, which is the fun part for me.

For these St. Patrick's Day Clover Cookies, I used Alton Brown's Sugar Cookie recipe that I found while browsing Food Network's website. And since I had pretty good luck with the Wilton recipe for the Linzer Heart-shaped Sandwich Cookies, I decided to go with Wilton's royal icing recipe.

I think I may have bitten off more than I could chew with the icing recipe. Who knew that royal icing had to be mixed for 10 to 12 minutes with a hand mixer? (And, yes, I have survived my entire adult life without owning a stand mixer.) I even had to recruit my hubby to help me with the mixing of the cookie dough when my arm got tired.

This sugar cookie recipe was pretty simple and the cookies turned out perfect! I'm not a big sweet eater but if I'm going to eat a cookie, I like a soft cookie and I prefer something like a shortbread so that's probably why I like these so much. They were soft and moist and not overly sugary!

For me, the royal icing was a royal pain in the “you know what” and these sugar cookies are perfect without it!

~LilSis

February 14, 2011

Happy Valentine's Day everyone!

Not that we need any more cookies in this house since we're still loaded with Girl Scout cookies, but I thought this would be a fun treat for Valentine's Day.

My friend from New York calls these Linzer Tarts and they're one of her favorite cookies so I'll be dropping some off at her house today so we don't end up with too many left to tempt me.

Even though I've seen a few variations of this recipe, I used the original Linzer Sandwich Cookie recipe that was on the package of the Linzer cookie cutters.

I was a little out of my comfort zone when making these because I haven't rolled out cookie dough in many years, but the recipe was pretty simple and I think they turned out pretty good!

HayHay came in right after I finished the photos and he must have thought they were okay because he devoured 3 or 4 in a matter of seconds!

Have a terrific Valentine's Day!

~LilSis

February 12, 2011

How about another colorful cupcake for Valentines Day?  By the way, have you made the Pomeranian Pomegranate Cupcakes that I talked about a few days ago?  If not, here's option #2 for your Valentine's Day, and it's another vegan one!

These are actually called Crimson Velveteen Cupcakes (I love the name!) and they're from Isa Chandra Moskowitz's book Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World: 75 Dairy-Free Recipes for Cupcakes that Rule. I have several of Isa's other cookbooks, but I just got this one and these cupcakes are the first thing I've baked from it.  This cute little cookbook was named the “Cookbook of the Year” by VegNews.

So, back to the baking.  There was nothing weird in this recipe that required an emergency trip to my favorite little hippie health food store (although that would be dandy with me since I love it there).  Just flour, sugar, cocoa, baking powder and soda, soy milk (I used almond), canola oil and flavorings.  It was super easy to whip up, so the recipe wins kudos for that too.

I also made the icing recommended for this cupcake, Old Fashioned Velvet Icing.  I can't say that I'm a fan of it though.  I thought I followed the instructions to the letter, but my icing came out grainy, and I hate to say, it was just a tad weird for me.  Sorry, Isa.  I only iced one cupcake for the photo, and just left the other eleven nekkid.  I'd rather have a nice traditional cream cheese icing on my red velvet cupcakes, so I'll try that the next time I bake these.

And I will bake these again.  They were easy, inexpensive, pretty, and most important of all: delicious and moist!  Run out and buy Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World, or use the Crimson Velveteen Cupcakes recipe I found online, but do make these cupcakes!

Happy Valentine's Day!

~BigSis