Going natural: quick, easy and not expensive at all

Happy Valentine's Day!

We passed a great milestone today, our dishwasher ran with the last toxic dishwasher soap cube. This means that the house is almost toxic cleaning products free! We still use conventional dish soap when washing dishes by hand but that is because we still have so much of it. I hate wasting stuff even it will kill you when you eat it. Does natural dishwasher do that? I honestly do not know.
(It's by the way very hard to blog and watch Hope Floats at the same time...)

My under the sink cabinet after removing (most) toxic cleaning products

It was surprisingly easy and quick to get rid of toxic cleaning products. I had already been changing our way of eating and the use of plastic over the course of a few months. This kept me online reading almost every day and then my in-laws told me there was a documentary on about products that are hurting our unborn babies.

How to of baby sign language part 2 and why you should persist!

We starting signing to our daughter when she was 4 months old. After reading wonderful reviews saying that their kids already knew 10 signs at 6 months, and 50 when they were a year, I was really optimistic. At first it did seem to work well. Our baby learned Sleep really quickly and it was wondrous! Our tiny infant could tell us she was tired and when we put her to bed she wouldn't cry at all! It was a parent's dream come true!
It was one part where we did not have to guess and so our baby was almost never cranky from lack of sleep :) It was a flying start... but not much more. At 8 months she hadn't learned any other sign and at 10 months with just the sign for Milk added, we stopped actively signing. But I did not want to give up.

I used Babysignlanguage.com to learn the signs and they have an overview of 10 starter signs. The site says Mommy and Daddy are some of the signs baby can learn most easily as she has most need of them. Sounded like logic to me so I signed Daddy for months when calling him when she went to sleep.

Easy felt flower diy

To complement a butterfly costume, I made a felt flower hair clip. It's really easy to make and versatile as you can make it in any color combo you like.

I'll make some more pics when I make another one.

Materials needed:

Needle

thread in the color of the top petals

Two sheets of felt in a color of your choice

A pom pom thingy 1 cm diameter (0.4 inch though 0.5 is fine too)

A hair clip (see pic) no larger than 5 cm or 2 inches

There are six petals to each level and all our the same size.

The bottom of the petal is 2 cm wide, 1 inch will work. The length is 5 cm, or 2 inches. 

Just draw a petal (with those measurements) that you find pretty on a piece of paper and use that to cut 6 petals of each color.

Cut a square out of the bottom petal color. The side should be the same length as your hair clip. You are going to sew your flower on here and attach it to the clip.

Bottom petal circle (light pink in pic):

Take three petals and sew the corners together. Do the same with the other three. You now have two circles of petals. Lay them on top of each other as seen in the pic above and center them on the square. Sew the petals on the square by whip stitching the inner circle.

Upper petal circle (dark pink in pic):

Take one corner of a petal and fold it over so the corner is now resting in the middle of the petal. See pic. Whip stitch back to the new corner. 

Take a second petal and attach the corner of the first to the bottom center of the second. Now fold the corner of the second petal as you did the first.

The corner of the second petal should be touching the new corner of the first. 

Whip stitch to the new corner of the second petal and repeat with the next 4 petals. The last petal should be attached to the first. You should now have a circle of petals that have one side folded over and are arranged as seen in the pic above. 

Center the second circle of flowers on the first and whip stitch on the square in the same way as before. 

Put the pom pom in the center and attach by pulling the needle through the square and the center of the pom pom leaving a good piece of thread behind. Then plunge right back through just next to where your needle came out. Tie a knot at the back of the square.

Your flower is done. You only need to attach it to the hair clip. 

Lay your hair clip diagonally on the square. My clip had a tiny hole on either side. I folded the corners of the square over and sewed them onto the holes. The other two corners I cut off .5 cm or 1/4 inch from the side of the clip. I linked these pieces by going under and over the clip tucking the corners in at the side. This way the clip is attached to the flower without being able to see it.

I probably should have made some more pictures to explain but it really is quite simple.

Let me know if you make one! 

 

 

How to: Black and white Mickey Mouse/Disney cake pops

My mom ordered cake pops but gave me the choice of how they would look. Those are nice orders because I can try out ideas I have without spending too much money on it. Of course I did not charge her for the fact that they weren't all the same and much more work than your standard cake pop, so it's a good deal for both of us (in my opinion anyway). 

I wanted to make black and white Fab 4 cake pops (sorry to me that will never be the Beatles..) with a color accent. Unfortunately I didn't have green or blue fondant in the house so I kept those black and white. I actually like them this way too. I think Donald Duck is very recognizable, Goofy could use a green hat and maybe some ears though.

Mickey would probably have turned out better if his buttons had been red. Wouter didn't recognize him at all, even with Minnie right next to it... Minnie turned out great in my opinion. The heart shaped confetti worked great as a bow. 

I also made these pops with the intention of adding as little sugar as I possibly could. I therefore tried to stay away from buttercream and Candy melts, instead using a sugarfree cake recipe, ganache and chocolate.

It was a good try with fairly satisfactory results!

For those of you who are interested in a more thorough description of what I did, I added a how to here. Otherwise you can stop reading and maybe pin my picture for me :)

HOW TO:

(also check out the Mickey Mouse no-bake cake pop post)

The filling consists of Honey Ginger Cake. I found the recipe on Homemade Baby Food Recipes.com where they also have a lot of other great sugarfree cake recipes.

I had some white chocolate ganache which I had taken out of the freezer the day before. After I crumbled the cake to pieces, I used this to stick it back together. The cake is quite moist on its own and I found that I probably could have rolled satisfactory balls without adding the ganache. Anyhoo... I rolled the mixture into balls which were way too big and then coated them with a bit of wholewheat flour just so they wouldn't be so sticky. I put them into a egg tray with plastic wrap over it and used yellow Wilton Candy melt to stick a lolly pop stick into them. (I used Candy melt because you cannot temper that small amount of chocolate.) I put the tray into the freezer for at least 15 minutes so the pops would be hard and easy to work with (hmmm sounds weird, hard and easy... you get what I mean right?)

While the pops were in the freezer I made the Mouse ears. I used chocolate drops and an apple corer. This made a nice round piece of chocolate that wasn't too thin. I also tempered white chocolate (don't know how? Check here).

I coated all the pops in white chocolate first. A quarter of the pops I put on a piece of baking paper, those were going to be the Goofy's and half I added ears to. Because the pops came from the freezer the ears needed to go on quickly, because the chocolate sets really fast. It's good though because you don't risk the ears falling off before it's set.

I wanted to use the gold balls as in the picture above for Mickey buttons. I had it all set up but then completely forgot to stick them on after dipping. When I remembered the chocolate had long since set. It beats having to draw them on though, so I would definitely do this next time.

After all the pops were dipped in white chocolate I put them in a pop holder thing and put them back in the freezer. Meanwhile I tempered dark chocolate.

Mickey, Minnie and Donald have their top half in dark chocolate and Goofy the bottom, though because his stick is on top what you're doing is the same.

Minnie got two heart shaped confetti candies on top her head and I made the spots on here dress with a lollypop stick dipped in chocolate. That's also how I made the lines on Goofy, though I think I'll use a brush for that next time.

Mickey's buttons are made from yellow Wilton Candy Melt, but as I said before I'll use the gold balls next time.

Goofy's hat and Donald's hat and bow are made from white fondant.

Make it beautiful!

Cream cheese frosting, made easy

Recipe of the week

Cream cheese frosting 
enough to top a small pie

Ingredients:

75 grams of cream cheese
50 grams margarine, room temperature
80 grams powdered sugar

Make sure the margarine is really at room temp otherwise you'll get lumps. Margarine tends to be a lot more solid at room temp than butter which is why I use it for this frosting. Something needs to hold it up with all the mushy cream cheese!

Put the margarine in a bowl and mix until it's light and fluffy.
Put the cream cheese in and add the sugar too. Mix another 5 minutes.
Keep the frosting in the fridge until needed.

You can top your cake or cupcakes by using a piping bag or just dollop it on with a spoon as I did in the picture.


Easy right!

Enjoy :)

My grandmother's pancake pie - easy and delicious

So last Friday I delivered my very first wedding cake. It was amazing if I do say so myself. Four tiers, carrot cake, champagne butter cream and fondant decoration. Luckily the bride and groom thought it was gorgeous and delicious too which is what matters in the end. Lots of the guest gave great comments also, check out the picture below to form your own opinion :)

I did find out that making wedding cakes takes a lot of time and a lot of material. I ended up charging way too little but as it was the first ever, that was ok.

Anyway, with all that work comes little time for other things so my dad baked me a pancake pie using my grandmothers recipe. He figured that I would have something to blog about without the work! Do I have an awesome dad or what?

This recipe refers to a Dutch Pancake Pie which to Americans and many other people probably, will look more like a crepe pie. The pancakes are thin and a little different so I'm just going to give the recipe for those as well. I'll blog it separately so check it HERE.

Grandma's Pancake Pie

Materials
- Pancakes (see recipe here)
- Jam, your favorite flavor(s)
- Instant custard and the ingredients you need to make it
- OR just use ready to use custard if they sell that where you live
- OR make your own custard if you feel up to it

You need to make the pancakes first. After that, go ahead and make your custard. It has to be a pudding. I'm not sure if instant custard is the same everywhere so you'll have to check the package to see how to make it.
It's easiest if you use your custard while it is still runny.

Now comes the super easy part:

Take a pancake and put it on a large plate with an edge. Pour some custard on it, or if using ready made just smear on there. Take another pancake and put it on top. Smear jam on that one and cover with another pancake. Now repeat until you have enough custard left to pour over your entire cake. (skip this part if using ready made custard) Pour the last bit over the top when it has congealed a little.

Let the cake stand until it has cooled and then pop it in the fridge.When it's cool dust some sugar over it and you're good to go :)

The wedding cake :)

 Make it beautiful!

Dutch pancake recipe

Dutch pancakes

(makes about a dozen)

These pancakes are typically eaten as dinner or made into a dessert. Or use it to make my grandmother's pancake pie!

Ingredients:

- 200 grams of self-raising flour
- pinch of salt
- 2 eggs
- 250 ml milk
- 250 ml buttermilk
- butter or oil

Sift the flour and salt in a bowl. Make a hole in the middle and break the eggs in it. Pour the milk in and mix with a hand mixer into a smooth paste. Keep mixing on low speed and add the buttermilk.

Leave the batter to sit for 30 minutes.

Heat a bit of butter or oil in a frying pan. Use a soup spoon to pour batter into the center of the pan. Pour until 3/4 of the pan is covered and swirl the pan to cover the rest.

Bake the pancake on medium heat until the top is almost dry and the bottom is lightly browned.
Flip the pancake and bake until the bottom is lightly brown too about 2 minutes.

Put the pancake on a plate.

Repeat until you used all the batter and have a nice stack of pancakes.

Eat the pancakes, rolled up with molasses, powdered sugar or regular sugar if you want them really Dutch. Or use butter, maple syrup etc.

OPTIONS
In The Netherlands the above is the classic pancake but they are also regularly made with all sorts of additional ingredients. Just a few really yummy ideas:

Apple: Thinly slice an apple, put a few slices in the pan and pour the batter over it. Bake as stated above.

Cheese: After pouring the batter in the pan, put a few slices of cheese on top and bake as stated above.

Bacon: Add bacon to the pan, pour batter over it and bake as stated above.

Raisins: Soak raisins in hot water for 10 minutes, squeeze the excess water out and sprinkle them on the batter after you poured it in the pan. Bake as stated above.

Banana: Add slices of banana to the pan and pour batter over them. Bake as stated above.

Also think about combo's like apple and bacon, my absolute favorite pancake!

You can basically add whatever you like to Dutch pancakes :) Then smother it in molasses syrup and you're good to go.

DESSERT
These pancakes make awesome desserts too. Just like crepes actually. Smear some nutella on a pancake, roll it up, microwave it for 30 sec on high and add a scoop of vanilla ice cream. Easy and super yummy!   

How to: temper chocolate the easy way using a microwave and no thermometer

How to: temper chocolate the pretty fail safe easy way using a microwave and no thermometer.

Check it every 15 seconds and give it a good stir

So everyone always says that tempering chocolate is really hard, but it's really not.

First of all what is tempered chocolate?
It's when the chocolate breaks, like a chocolate bar does. It snaps. If you melt chocolate and don't temper it or don't do it right, it doesn't snap but bends like a gummy bear does when it's completely cooled and back to solid.

Secondly you need to understand what you're doing when you temper chocolate so you understand why you're doing what you're doing:
Chocolate in its solid state is like New York, buildings on a grid. When you melt it, it's like a big storm went right over New York and there's trees and cars and mess everywhere. When it starts to cool down, nothing happens to that big mess, it's fixable but you need something that is going to clean everything up and get everything back in place. For this you need solid chocolate. Solid chocolate knows how to be a grid, it knows how to be neat and orderly and it will tell the rest of that melted chocolate to clean up. That will get New York looking good again and your chocolate back in snapping instead of bending stage.
And by the way, if you overheat chocolate it's like a fire broke out and burned that entire mess... you're never getting New York back or your chocolate. You'll have to start over with new chocolate.

I'm sure a scientist would have a much better explanation but you probably get the concept, right?

So how to temper chocolate:

Break your chocolate into pieces. They don't have to be super small about half an inch squared.
Take 1/4 of the chocolate and cut or grate it fine. It doesn't need to be a flour consistency, just small enough to easily melt.

Put your 3/4 chocolate in a microwaveable bowl and heat it on half power (400 watt on mine) for 1 minute. Stir and heat again for 15 seconds. Take care not to coat the side of the bowl when stirring because the thin film on the side will burn.
Repeat the stirring and 15 seconds heating until only small clumps of chocolate remain in a yummy bowl of molten chocolate. Stopping when small bits remain will keep you from overheating and burning the chocolate.

Take your bowl out of the microwave and add the finely chopped/grated chocolate. Stir so everything is combined and leave it for a few minutes. Repeat until no pieces of chocolate remain. It can take quite a while to melt everything and the chocolate, even though it's liquid will feel quite cool.

If it just doesn't want to melt, or you want to reheat the chocolate because it's gotten too firm to dip or pour or whatever you want to do with it, just reheat it for 10 seconds. Don't reheat it too much or long because then it will be that big mess again and you'll need more solid chocolate to get it tempered again.

Any leftovers can be reused, and tempered again. 

And try not to drink the molten chocolate, that's not good for you. Really yummy, but not good.

Recipe of the week: Basic pie dough for sweet and hearty pies

Recipe of the week

With a basic recipe for pie dough laying around you'll be prepared for anything.... well, in regard to cravings for pie anyway. This is a versatile dough which can be used for all sorts of pies and pastries. You can make tiny pies, large pies, sugary pies or quiche! It's a perfect beginner's dough because it's easy to make and roll, and it doesn't have a lot of ingredients to it. It also has to rest, very important for dough by the way so don't skip that part! But while it's resting you have time to eat something healthy and if you decide your hunkering for pie has past, no worries, just freeze the dough. And next time your cravings start acting up again you can just pop that out the freezer and get right to making one of those yummy pies ;)


Basic pie dough for sweet and hearty pies 
(enough for a 10 inch pie shell)

Ingredients

- 250 grams flour
- 150 grams cold butter in cubes
- 1 egg yoke
- 1/2 tablespoon lemon juice
- 1 1/2 tablespoons ice cold water

- 1/4 teaspoon salt
Optional:
- 2 tablespoons sugar for sweet dough

Put a bit of water and some ice cubes in a bowl and set aside. If you don't have ice cubes just put something else out of your fridge in a clean bag and hang that in the bowl.

Mix the flour, salt and if using the sugar in a large bowl. Add the cubes of butter to the bowl and rub the mixture between your fingers till you get a bread crumb consistency and no large pieces of butter remain.

Whisk the egg with the lemon and water.
Make a dent in the flour mixture and add the liquids. Stir with a fork until everything starts to stick together. Now use your hand to knead the dough until everything is incorporated. Don't over knead it or the dough will become tough. Make a ball of the dough and wrap it tightly in plastic wrap.

Put the dough in the fridge for at least 4 hours but better yet an entire night. After that you can roll the dough for large or small pie crusts see How to make an apple pie for tips.

Print out this recipe and put it near your flour, handy ;)

Make it beautiful!

How to: As easy as apple pie

How to:

Apple pie, easy, delicious and self made!

Not long ago I said to a friend "But everyone knows how to make an apple pie at least...". How wrong I was, of all the people there I was the only one who didn't consider that a challenge. Bakking to me is second nature, not hard, easy as... well... pie I guess. One of my first memories is baking cake with my mom. In our little kitchen in "the Valkenkamp" I helped her measure milk and mix the batter. That old mixer I still use. It's become a bit yellow, some bits broke off a long time ago and with heavy work it has been replaced by a splendid new KitchenAid. But I still keep it, partly because of the memories and partly because that old thing still works much better than that stupid new specimen my parents replaced it with. (Who invents a mixer where the batter gets pulled upwards instead of pushed down...) And sometimes mixing with a hand mixer is just better for your cake or for yourself. Nothing helps your frustrated persona better than 10 minutes of making figure eights with a vibrating deafening piece of plastic/ metal with the known fact in the back of your mind that you get to like the batter off that thing when you're done. But you don't know that if you doubt your ability to make something as easy as apple pie so get to work! Whether you bake for 12 or just for you, it's just as easy. I'll give you a How to of confidence to get you started and you'll find there is something else in the world you have no problems doing.

Step 1:
Buy apple pie crust mix (told you it was easy ;) ) You could buy a crust ready made but then my whole piece on mixing will have been for not... 

Step 2:
Buy appels but here comes the yummy apple pie secret: buy at least 3 different kinds. And I don't mean different names but different types: sweet and juicy, tart and crispy, etc. Figure out what you like about an apple pie, do you want it to be sweet or quite tart, do you want the apple to hold up even after it's baked to give some texture or do you like mushy pies? That will help you decide which combination works will for what you want. I usually use granny smith which is quite tart and holds it shape well, and jonagold which is sweet and juicy. I take these as the base apples which means I buy 3 of each and then I add a few different types of which I only buy 1. Generally the supermarket has signs that tell you about the different apples.


Step 3:
Buy custard powder (don't think you don't need it, you do) and sugar if your low on it, you don't need much.
optional: raisins, cinnamon (though you should really have that in your kitchen already), walnuts or almonds, depending on what you like in your apple pie, I'm sure you have a preference. (I'm presuming everyone has eating apple pie before. If you haven't I recommend you go to your parents and discuss why that is.)
Also check if you have everything you need to make the pie crust.

Step 4:
Make the dough as the package tells you to. Divide in 3/4 and 1/4 pieces make into a ball and then flatten into 1 inch thick discs. Tightly wrap both discs in plastic wrap and store in the fridge.
Cut all the apples into small pieces, about 1/2 an inch square. Put them into a big bowl, add sugar and raisins, nuts and/or cinnamon if you want. It's up to you how much, just know that if you add a lot of nuts it might be better to search for a recipe on nut pies, and I wouldn't recommend adding more then 1/2 a tablespoon of cinnamon.
Mix a tablespoon of custard powder into your apple mix. Make sure everything is mixed well and put your bowl aside, but not in the fridge.

Step 5: If your making a big apple pie you can usually take a 26 cm (10 inch) spring form or pie dish but check the crust package. If you want to make little pies, just grab a muffin form.
Spring form: Take off the rim, put a piece of baking paper across the bottom and put the rim back.

Grease the spring form or muffin form with butter, oil or better yet crisco. Make sure you get the corners but make it a thin layer. Add a handful of flour and pat the form while turning so it coats everything. Pat the form over your garbage can or sink to get the excess flour out.


Step 6: Put a piece of baking paper of about 15 by 15 inches on your counter top, get some plastic wrap and a rolling pin. Get the large piece of dough from the fridge and don't be afraid. A lot of people get nervous when it comes to rolling dough, but dough doesn't judge you and if it's not going right you can just start over.
Put the dough in the center of your baking paper and put one or two sheets of plastic wrap over it so they cover the entire baking paper. Start rolling and keep turning the baking paper so your dough stays a round shape. (It's only important for the big pie, if you're making little pies it's only important to get the dough the same thickness everywhere.) Roll from the center out, don't press too hard let the rolling pin do the work and don't roll the edge thinner than the rest of the dough. When the dough has reached a 15 inch diameter, you can stop.

Step 7:
Spring form/ pie dish:
Take the plastic wrap off. Pick up the baking paper on one side and slip your rolling pin under it. Pick your dough up with the pin, it's still on the baking paper at this point. Lay the dough (baking paper side up) 1,5 inches over the rim and carefully guide it over the entire form. It should be in the center, if not carefully move it. When it's centered carefully pull off the baking paper. Do not start pushing in the dough but lift it up on the side and guide it into the form. Try not to stretch it. When it's in you can carefully press it a little so it's in the corners. You can shape the edge now, or later when you add the strips on top.

Muffin form:
Press circles into the dough with a glass or lid or something that has the diameter of a muffin cup plus it's sides. Press down and shake a little so the dough is cut well. When you've made as many circles as you need, pull the plastic off. Pick up the dough and position it over the muffin cup then carefully guide it in without stretching the dough. You'll have to shape it a little and press it in.

Step 8:
Scoop the filling into form(s) and use your hand or the back of a spoon to level it.

Step 9: Take the little piece of dough and roll it out in the same way but try to make it a rectangle where the long side is 10 inches and it's about a 1/4 inch in thickness.
Cut strips of dough and lay them across your pie. You can make an intricate design, or not, it doesn't really matter. Pinch where the strips meet the rest of the dough and remove any excess dough, you don't want anything hanging over the side.

Step 10: Bake the pie as the package tells you to but keep in mind that it might take longer or shorter if you've made it larger or smaller. A fruit pie is done when you can see the juices boiling up at the side and the crust has come loos from the dish. Let the pie cool off in it's form at least till it's luke warm. The juices have to settle and if they don't get the chance they'll flow out when you cut into it. It's better to let the apple pie sit till it's cool (if you can wait that long) and warm the slices in the oven for a few minutes.

That's it! Easy as pie, though not really because that refers to eating pie but that's what you get to do now so yay! Mine went pretty quick, luckily I sold most of it because it was yummy!

Summary of what you need:
- Apple pie crust mix and anything the package says you need to make the dough
- At least 3 types of apples (if clueless buy 3 jonagold, 3 granny smith, and 1 each of apples that speak to you)
- custard powder

- sugar (or some other sort of sweetener in powder form) 
- crisco, oil or butter
- optional: raisins, walnuts, almonds, cinnamon
- plastic wrap and baking paper
- rolling pin
- spring form, pie dish or muffin tray
- an oven :)

I know you're thinking if you mention oven, you have to mention fridge, but you could put it into a cold cellar or outside if it's 7 degrees celsius.


Make it beautiful! Or in this case, just make it ;)

Super simple healthy and quick apple crisp (sort of)

I made my hubby a 4 minute chocolate cake in a mug found on pinterest (love that place!), and he promptly took it upstairs to his office which left me without and hungry for yummies. As I was contemplating getting all the ingredients together again I got a sudden urge to eat healthy. (I know, it's so not likely for a cake baker.) I wanted to eat something dessert like though and quick! I figured if you can make a cake in the microwave or a potato for that matter why not an apple? So I washed an apple, punched some holes into it to keep it from blowing up, put it in a bowl and microwaved it on high for 5 minutes. This left me with a very squishy apple which was easy to mash with a fork. I scooped out the core and the peel and added some cinnamon. I was craving for some crisp so I took a simple cookie and crumbled it over the top. Tada! Sweet, no added sugar, easy apple crisp. Sort of anyway :)

How to of baby sign language part 1

It took me a while to start blogging again. I guess that is what happens when you give birth to this amazingly happy and pretty little girl, she just takes up most if your time. Right now she seems to be fighting a cold her grandmother kissed on her, which means she sleeps a lot more than usual. So, I decided it would be way more productive to start my blog writing again than playing the Simpsons app...

While watching Ellen Degeneres I learned about baby sign language. My girl was just 3 months old but she could already get frustrated so I was super excited about teaching her some useful signs. I found a great website babysignlanguage.com and after reading the tips I decided to start off with the signs for things she was doing the most. I also did not want to do too many at once because she was so little. I figured it would just look like a chaos of hand movements to her and not like a sign. So I started with milk and sleep. Especially the last one seemed very useful as it was hard to tell the difference between just lazy and really tired.
The signs for both activities are really easy but when to sign them was not. When I put my girl to bed I sign sleep. That is easy enough but when she gets milk there just is not a good moment to sign because she gets breastfed. I try to sign right before the feeding, but she does not seem to make that connection and when she is already nursing she cannot see the sign very well, and frankly does not care either. So therefore after a month she signs sleep very well, and milk not at all. I might just drop milk until she is a bit older and start with mommy or something.

But to conclude my first try at baby signlanguage: it is amazing! If you have a baby, you should definitely try it. It cuts down on a lot of crying do to misunderstanding. When my girl signs sleep, I lay her in bed and she will not cry because that is where she wanted to be. Sometimes she does not even sleep right away but plays for a while first. Gives mommy some free time too :) sweet!

Check out part 2 HERE

Mickey Mouse (Christmas) cookies

I made some really cute looking Mickey Mouse cookies the other day. Mostly because I have to do something while sitting out the last weeks (days??) of my pregnancy, but also because they are fun and yummy!

Check out the recipe here, it's from Disney.

It does look like they might have coated the bottom of their cookies in chocolate. I considered doing that if the ears weren't sticking but they turned out great so I left them plain.







I also made an English Sticky Toffee Pudding out of a Disney World cookbook:

 

It's made with dates and put in the oven where it creates a nice chewy top with a pudding like center. Over the top came the toffee, which I totally screwed up by letting it overheat. It became really hard candy so we scooped it off. And adding custard, made from scratch which is ten times more yummy and just as easy as custard made from powder.

It looks a little unappetizing in this picture but I can assure you it's not!

Dora and Boots cake - how to

I made this Dora and Boots cake for a friend of mine who's daughter turned 3. It wasn't necessarily hard to make but it did take a while! It was like making a puzzle!

I started with a 24 cm round vanilla cake which I filled with strawberry flavored butter cream. I also thinly coated the outside with it. Usually I use ganache to make the cake straight and easy to work with but the roundness of the cake was already pretty perfect so I didn't feel it was necessary.

I then coated the cake with pink marzipan and let it harden overnight. This way I could trace my Dora and Boots picture into the cake so I would have a good reference for adding all those puzzle pieces.
The picture I took from internet. It was really tiny but I have an easy way of making it exactly the right size.

I open the picture in microsoft picture viewer and zoom in until it's the size I need. I then take some sturdy paper and trace the picture right off the screen. It saves the hassle of having to blow up the picture with a copier or something and printing it out.
After the marzipan had hardened a little I took the picture and placed it on the cake. I then used a thin pointed cake decorating tool (a scriber I guess) to trace over the picture. You have to press a little so the lines go into the cake, but not too much that it goes right through the paper.

After this I cut out all the different pieces of the picture so I had little templates. And then it was just a matter of cutting them out of fondant or marzipan. The hassle was really coloring all the fondant and cutting all those little pieces. Because the picture was scribed onto the cake it was very easy to put the pieces in the right place.

I placed the eyes on top of the face because I thought it would make them stand out more, as they also do in the animation. Dora's mouth I pressed down a little to create depth, and Boots' mouth I actually just painted on (except for his tongue) because I found it too delicate to try and cut it out properly with those extra lines. The noses are also painted on.
Boots' hair stands up a little and Dora's hair rests partly on her forehead, just for a little added depth. I also scribed some of the lines into the fondant pieces (like the collar of Dora's shirt) and painted some too (like Boots' hand). 

I added some big flowers from corresponding fondant colors to the side and the name plus age on top, just to finish it off.

I think it turned out really sweet!

How to make Easy No-bake Mickey Mouse cake pops

I really liked the No-bake cupcake tutorial and I had been trying to figure out how to make easy Mickey Mouse Pops so here's the combo!

Easy No-bake Mickey Mouse Pops
(Also check out my other Mickey Mouse/Disney Cake Pops How to. It has some other ideas for making and sticking on the ears. And has the stick the other way.)

I made the ingredients list so you know how much you need for the amount of pops you want to make, instead of making you make a certain amount of pops or having to due complicated mathematical things to figure out how much you really need.

Materials:
- Pack of Oreo cookies (2 oreos per pop)
- Cream cheese (1/4 tablespoon per pop)
- Dark chocolate, enough to be able to dip all of them. I'd use about 500 grams for a dozen I think.
- Red sprinkles
- Mini marshmallows (or large ones if you live in a country that charges about 50 cents per mini marshmallow like me)
- royal icing (or tiny white drops)
- Lollipop sticks


Preparation

 









Take your oreos and make them into crumbs. You can do that with a food processor or if you don't have one put the cookies into a plastic ziploc bag. Push the air out and zip the bag closed. Take a rolling pin and roll over the bag until the cookies are crumbs.
Now mix the cookie crumbs with the cream cheese until you get a dough like substance. Put this in the fridge for about 15 minutes.

Now if you have mini marshmallows you can skip this part, otherwise:

Take a few big marshmallows and something to make small circles. I used an apple core remover thing (sorry don't know the correct term for that) Push out little circles.

Making the pops

Take your cookie dough out of the fridge and roll it into balls about the diameter of a big marshmallow or walnut. Put these on wax paper on a plate and put them back into the fridge.
Now take a really small bit of chocolate and heat it in the microwave for 30 seconds on half power (400 watt on mine). Stir, heat for 15 seconds and repeat until it looks like the picture below. Don't over heat it or it will burn and be useless to you. Now just keep stirring and the pieces will melt. If not microwave another 10 seconds and stir again. This should temper the chocolate so it hardens when it cools.

Lay out your lollipop sticks, the mini marshmallows and the chocolate. Take your cookies back out of the fridge.

Dip a stick in the chocolate and push it into the cookie. If the ball becomes a little less round it's ok. If it is too much just reshape it with your hands.

Now take your mini marshmallows, these are the ears of course. Dip the marshmallow partly in the chocolate and paste one on both sides of the stick. Once again put the cookies in the fridge for 15 minutes.

While waiting on those cookies to cool, make the royal icing and temper the rest of your dark chocolate. This is not just melting so use my How to temper chocolate.
You need enough chocolate so that you can dip all your cookies in the chocolate all the way. Take the smallest deepest container you can find that will still fit your pop including ears. That way it will take the least amount of chocolate.
Set out the chocolate, red sprinkles and royal icing.

Take out your pops, dip them in the chocolate taking care to coat the ears but try not to coat the stick. Try also to do just one dip because otherwise the chocolate layer is too thick and there will be the possibility that the ears fall off. Let the excess chocolate drip off and then dip the pop half way into the red sprinkles. Put the pop back on the wax paper and into the fridge. Do the rest of your pops and put each back into the fridge as you make them. When they are all in leave them for another 15 minutes.

The chocolate I had left after dipping, I used to make little chocolate bonbons. Just pour it into a mold or spread it on some wax paper. Sprinkle the rest of your red sprinkles on there and you have some nice leftover treats. Pop in the fridge until set.

After the chocolate on the cookie pops has hardened take them out of the fridge and pipe little round circles on both sides of the "pants". If they stand out too much, use a moist finger (water not spit please) to lightly push it down.

Tada! I wanted to decorate the stick a little too but I couldn't decide how. So I just left it like this. Could have done with a white background too... hmm.
You could also make these pops into Minnie Mouse by adding more white circles on the "skirt" and making a tiny bow out of red fondant for on top, or make it in pink.
They would also be pretty impressive if you stuck the stick in the bottom instead of the top. Then you can push them in some styrofoam or a cup of sugar and you'll have a real eye catcher at your party!

My hubby and I tried them and they tasted yummy!!! Super snacks for kids birthdays or pretty party treats for goofy (well, Mickey really) grown ups.

Happy Popping!

No- bake Cupcake Pop tutorial

It's not mine but so worth watching if you plan on making cake pops.

No-bake Cupcake Pop tutorial

Sharing some treats

Just wanted to share some of my recent treats.


1personPizza

 First up is this 1 person pizza. Yummy! Pizza is so easy to make. I generally use wheat flour to make the bottom so it's good for your digestive system. As a sauce I just use tomato puree, adding garlic and Italian herbs. I like the puree because I hate runny sauce on my pizza. Then some nice serrano-ham, some cheese and after it's baked, top it off with rucola lettuce. Yum!!




Plum Strawberry Pastries

 Plum season has started again, or at least they are selling them in the supermarket again. To make these sweet treats take a square of puff pastry and cut out two opposite corners. (Take a close look at the picture if this confuses you.) Prick a few holes in the pastry between the two cuts. Cut your plums in pieces and add some cut up strawberries. Sprinkle with sugar. If your plums and strawberries are really sweet you won't even need this, unless you like your pastries really sweet. Put a bit of the fruit lengthwise between those two cuts. Now fold the loose corners over the fruit. Lay all the pastries on a baking sheet on a wire rack. Scoot into the middle of the oven which you preheated to about 380 degrees (190 celsius). They'll stay in there for about 20 minutes. With 5 minutes to go you can sprinkle some coarse sugar over the top.
After I took them out of the oven I glazed the fruit with a bit of diluted raspberry jam. Just to make the top fruits a bit moist.

Plum pie (which tastes surprisingly like rhubarb pie)

I had a few plums which were threatening to turn bad so I made a pie. The crust is cookie dough, easy and yummy. I rolled it out and pushed it into a small tin (about 6 inches/ 16 cm) using the leftovers to make the wire top. The filling contains mostly plums, a handful of cranberries and a few blueberries. I added about a teaspoon of cornstarch just to bind those juices. You have to adjust this amount when your plums are really juicy and/or when you make a larger pie. I also added a crumb topping under the wire top. It's made of a handful of crushed walnuts, the same amount of oatmeal, some sugar (depending on your sweet tooth, I'm not a great sugar eater) and a bit of butter to bind the crumbs. You could add a little bit of juice if you have it, that will give it a little more fruity flavor but it's no biggy if you do not.

Bake temp is about 360 F (180 C) and bake time ?? hmmm don't really remember. I think it was 35 minutes. Just check once in a while. Fruity pies like these are done when you see some of those juices boiling up thickly at the edges. Take it out of the oven and leave it on a wire rack to cool. You need it to cool down considerably so the juices will set. If you have a hubby like mine, who wants to eat everything the moment it's made (flattering but not always handy ;) try to make it when he's not home hahaha. Or remember to put a deep enough plate or dish under the pie when you cut into it. If you are able to wait, wait until it is lukewarm. That will give you a pie that can hold itself but is still that nice warm out of the oven taste. And otherwise eat it at room temp, also very nice!

How to make a raincoat

Ok it's been a while. But good news: I finished the raincoat and it works! So here is the rest of the how to. Read the first raincoat entry to see my original idea.
Btw, this is not for the novice sewer! Though it is quite easy to sew the coat, pinning it is not and you cannot rectify mistakes.

First find a coat pattern you are familiar with to use. I took the pattern for this coat which I already made twice. It's very important to take a pattern you know because you do not want to make a mistake while making a raincoat. It leaves a nice row of holes which do not vanish as you can see in the picture below and you want to keep the amount of holes to a minimum in a raincoat! Also, when choosing your pattern, try to keep the pieces it consists of to a minimum and no tiers. The fabric is very sturdy so it doesn't hang down the way other fabric does. This is especially important to note when you're thinking about making a tiered bottom like me. THAT DOES NOT WORK!! It will look weird, trust me I tried it! To make a skirt like bottom for your coat, just take one piece of fabric and make flat pleats. Because the fabric is so sturdy it will poof out with just a few.

I would recommend a coat pattern which contains a hood (obviously), mine didn't so I added one myself. As I wasn't quite sure what I was doing I ended up getting this nice row of holes right under the hood, oops.

  

Second, find the thinnest needle you are comfortable using and some polyester thread. To me it seemed logical that the raincoat would be most watertight (watertighter..?) if I kept the thread holes tiny. You need polyester thread because it repels water, so no cotton! Because that will soak up the water and pull it through those tiny holes. I tested this first (so you don't have to ;)) and the picture proves it works! (amazing my own ideas actually turned out right ha!)

Third, read these tips before you start:
- Make some tea and get some cookies, making a raincoat can be horribly frustrating (though not super hard) so you need some comfort food near you. Not too near though, you don't want to test the watertightness (?? these are not the right words hahaha) of your coat with tea.

- Get acquainted with your pattern. Know what your doing, it's very important.

-  Always keep in mind that every hole you make in your coat is there to stay. This means that I do not recommend putting ornamental stitching on your coat or any amount of stitching that is not absolutely necessary.

- Use a short stitch so everything is stitched strongly together with the least amount of space in between when you open up seams.


So are you ready to start?

Place your pattern on your fabric and scotch-tape it on there. DO NOT PIN IT because that will leave holes where you do not want them. Trace your pattern and measure on the seams. Now pin around your patterns within the seams. This way you don't have to cut out all the pieces separately but you can fold the fabric.

Now you can sew the coat together as you're used to doing. You do not need any extra stuff to seal the seams. There is rubber tape you can tape over all the seams, but I didn't and my coat works fine. Do remember that you can only pin on the seams, not anywhere else!

To make the seams extra sturdy but not have a row of stitches on the outside of the coat, I double stitched all seams like you can see in the picture below left. I did flat-stitch the bodice seams because I figured the water would flow off easier if the coat was as flat as possible (right picture). I only did this for seams that I was afraid would catch and hold the water while being rubbed while walking. Rubbing the seams with water on them makes them take in water and makes you wet.
















All right, so your pinning your pieces together in the seams and sewing like your used to. Keep trying out your coat to see if it fits, either on a doll or on yourself. If it's too small, you have to start over, sorry. It happened to me too, if it's any consolation :)

 Below you can see the bodice which turned out just as I hoped. After that I spent quite a while fixing on the bottom half. As I said, I tried the tiered bottom first and it was a disaster! I'm sorry I don't have a picture of it, it looked awful hahaha. But after a few tries and a considerably shorter bodice I got the skirt-like bottom I wanted. To close the coat I used a plastic zipper. I really wanted one of those invisible zippers because it would have been just that, invisible, but I couldn't find one. Instead I used a pink zipper as an ornamental addition to the coat. I made sure the zipper was of good quality so it didn't leave holes when closed.

 

And here is the end result in use at Walt Disney World's Christmas Party. Where sadly it was pouring rain which made it the most expensive cocoa and cookies I've ever had :)

 I hope you find the tutorial at least partly useful. I might have forgotten to mention something so if you get confused or have any questions or comments just post them here and I'll answer as quick as I can.