Browsing Tag

Cooking

Valentine’s Sweet Treats!

Hi Everyone Super quick Valentine’s idea today! I had seen these candy-cane white chocolate filled lollipops all over the Internet – but wondered how easy they would really be to make – so I gave it a go! So – you take your leftover candy-canes from Christmas, lay two side by side in a heart shape, soften them in a 160 degree oven for a few minutes, press a stick into the center, leave them to cool, fill with white chocolate and then add some sprinkles. That’s pretty much what I did but I did encounter the following minor difficulties!! The hardest and by far the most irritating part of this project was unwrapping 3 month old candy canes without breaking them – I was going to make 10 of these but gave up at 4! When you squeeze them too hard onto the stick they kind of crack and when you pour the chocolate in it seeps under the bottom and you have to scrape it off to make it look perfect for the photos!! However – all of the above matters not one bit to the kids of course – who loved them! I also wanted to share […]

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Easy Edible Christmas Treats

Hi Everyone Just sharing a couple of edible Christmas treats that are really easy to make – and you can get the kids involved too if you are feeling adventurous! White chocolate is such a great ingredient! Here I smashed up some candy canes, dipped some marshmallows in white chocolate and then the candy. Pretty much the same thing here – melt chocolate, thrown on the crushed candy canes, refrigerate and then break up for a really simple Christmas bark. If you want to get the kids involved – why not have them smash up some smarties or use cake sprinkles and dip some marshmallows in that. Here are my kids showing just how easy it is!! Heaps more Christmas ideas to come as Summer finally seems to be arriving here in New Zealand 🙂 Lowri I am linking up this project to these websites here.

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Homemade Halloween Bark – 3 ways

Hi Everyone – another candy post today! I mentioned previously it’s pretty hard to get Halloween stuff here in New Zealand, so I made this Halloween Bark using some easily available lollies and white chocolate. Skulls, Tombstones and Bats! In reality this is just some halved orange flavored jelly filled lollies, some white chocolate skulls and some licorice twists cut into slices to look like bats! Help Me – I’m Melting! More skulls here along with some blue and red tic-tacs and black and orange jaffas. Check out my tutorial on how to make Custom Colored Candies here. Free for All! For these ones I threw on all the little pieces of candy I could find! Chopped up liquorice lace and red liquorice sticks, coloured tic-tacs , crushed barley sugar and then I drizzled a little orange colored chocolate on top. Remember you MUST USE powdered food coloring when you color white chocolate – or you will just have a gooey mess. Very edible but not aesthetically pleasing. For all of these – just melt your white chocolate, spread onto greaseproof paper and throw your toppings on. I melt mine in the microwave. 1 large bar takes 2 blasts […]

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Custom Coloured Candy Tutorial

Hi Everyone First off today – a warning! If you are a person who does not like to use or consume artificial food coloring and/or additives, turn away. Now! Over the next week of so I will be posting some little tutorials in readiness for some upcoming work I am doing for Echo Park and the Christmas Countdown at Artfull Crafts. Coloured Candy This came about as I was looking for some Halloween Candy here in New Zealand – and of course no-one celebrates Halloween here so I was pretty much out of luck -so I thought I would make my own. I really wanted orange and black but of course you could use this technique to make your custom colours for pretty much any occasion. Imagine a wedding with party favors filled with custom coloured mints to match a dress. Tutorial Place a small amount of food coloring in a plastic tub Spread color around the base of container Add your lollies and shake Leave to dry for half an hour This worked well with all the smooth candies I tried – which were Kool-Mints, Jaffas and Tic-Tacs. Anyone outside New Zealand will now be thinking I am speaking […]

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Kitchen Cardset (Kaisercraft – Nan’s Favourites)

Hi Everyone – hope you are having a wonderful Easter. I am pretty excited about my post today! I love to make these fun cardsets, but I had never made one using Kaisercraft products before. When I saw the Nan’s Favourites collection I thought it would work great with the Kraft cardstock I use for the cards and folders. This line is very versatile and with this project I really wanted to bring out the fabulously “Kitschy” 1950’s feel that a few of the papers have. It’s just FUN! The inside of the folder has 2 sections. On the left are a couple of little notebooks I covered with the glossy paper from the 6.5″x6.5″ pad and a couple of chipboard pieces. On the right you can see the little cards I made using plain Kraft cardstock, some papers and elements from the 6.5×6.5 pad, a few of the die cuts and some chipboard pieces The Wooden Flourishes are some of my favourite embellishments from Kaisercraft and I am always trying to find ways to incorporate them into my projects. Here I have just used them as simple decoration on the spine of my booklet – both inside and out. […]

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Springtime Cupcakes, Flowers and Gratuitous Photographs!

Hi Everyone Some gratuitous photos today – but how can you go wrong with some Springtime Cupcakes and Cosmo Cricket!! I have really been trying to improve on my photography and having seen a few manufacturers request submissions with projects photographed on a white background – I decided to give it a go. I have made the cupcake toppers and flowers using the Cosmo Cricket Garden Variety collection. These flowers are super simple to make – why not check out the tutorial on how to make them here! You can see my tutorial on how to make the embossed icing on top of the cupcakes here. I really think these photos are WAY over-edited but I couldn’t figure out how to balance everything right – so now I not ONLY need to work on my photography – but I need to learn more about editing too! I have taken all of these outside but the light this time of year (approaching winter) is SO different to how it was all summer – so now I need to learn about lighting conditions too! These pictures show the same flowers against different backgrounds – it’s amazing how different they look depending on […]

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