Sugar Swings! Serve Some: fourth of july
Showing posts with label fourth of july. Show all posts
Showing posts with label fourth of july. Show all posts

Tuesday, July 3, 2018

Flag Shaped Coconut Macaroons



Any coconut fans out there? How about coconut macaroons?

I'm not talking about the super trendy macarons that are everywhere now.   I mean macaroons, the sweet and mostly coconut-y treats that I personally love!


I thought red, white and blue macaroons would be fun and I wanted to shape them into US flags for the 4th of July holiday.  Start by making a batch of macaroon batter divided into 3 bowls.  Leave one bowl as is and tint the other 2 with red and blue food gels.


Shape into flags and add non-pareil sprinkles as "stars" or use star sprinkles if you have them.


Bake until just done for about 15 minutes (depending on size of your flags and your oven) but watch them and take out at the first sign of browning of edges.


If you have coconut fans then these fun flag shaped macaroons will definitely be a hit!

flag shaped coconut macaroons by sugarswings.com

Bring them to a party for a unique sweet treat!

Happy Fourth of July to those who celebrate! How do you plan to spend your 4th of July??


Red, White and Blue Flag Shaped Macaroons
by July 3, 2018

Ingredients:

1 and 1/3 cup sweetened flaked coconut
1/3 cup sugar
2 Tablespoons all purpose flour
2 large egg whites
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
red and blue food gel
white small non-pareil sprinkles

Directions:
  1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees
  2. Add all ingredients (up to vanilla) together in bowl and mix well
  3. Divide mixture into 3 bowls
  4. Add red gel to one of the bowls and blue food gel to another
  5. Shape into flags using the mixtures (use spoon to drop mix onto baking sheet and butter knife to keep edges straight)
  6. Add sprinkles as "stars" on to blue section
  7. Bake for 15 minutes (depending on size of your flags and your oven) but watch them and take out at the first sign of browning of edges.
Prep time: 30 minutes Yield: about 12 macaroons.  Stores 1-2 days at room temperature (or 2 weeks refrigerated - you can also freeze them to last longer)
Other coconut treats you may like:

Coconut Covered Cake Bite Bunnies


Mini Snow Ball Cake Bites


Snow Monster Cupcakes


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Saturday, September 9, 2017

Let's Play Ball - Filled Red, White & Blue Baseball Cupcakes!


Holy crow I haven't posted or baked in a LONG time! 

And you know what? That's OK.  Totally OK! 

For the longest time I was putting pressure on myself to post at least weekly.  For anyone that follows along, you know that I have 3 kiddos (10 year old twins and now a 13 year old - A TEENAGER holy cow!) and I work out of the house full time.  This blog and baking/creating edible treats has always been an outlet for me.  A way to relieve stress and do something that was just for me and unrelated to my day job.  That said it was becoming more of another "to do" on my ever growing to do list.  

Just more of my type A personality showing its ridiculous head in the form of "Michelle you know you haven't posted anything really unique in forever so you must be losing the creativeness that people always compliment you on so you know get on with it even though you have kids that want to spend time with you and but they don't know about the ins and outs of the world yet which is a mess and really scary right now so you better model perfect human behavior and empathy but also you have a day job that actually pays you money and health benefits and you have a new boss so you better show what you can do at work and maybe start volunteering at a soup kitchen because you know your life is good and you should be giving back but your tired and over scheduled already but that's no excuse and you also need to spend some 1:1 quality time with you husband of 20+ years because you're both always tired and only complain or talk about schedules and kids and stuff keeps breaking down in the house oh and your daughter has a heart transplant and even though she's perfect and doing great is she going to have a normal life and will she have side effects from the plethora of meds she takes everyday and you spend $600 at Costco every 2 weeks but that's cool because at least you only have to physically buy toilet paper every 3 months" and then after thinking that or very similar everyday for a year your tell yourself to take a moment to breath (really BREATH) and to stop anything that doesn't have to get done and that's OK.  

It's totally OK.

SO.....I did!  And guess what?? Life went on.  I didn't make or bake anything ALL summer.  No stress on myself for not posting or baking and it was nice and actually a relief.  

Now work is still stressful and the kids are back in school (also a stressful) but now I miss the baking/creating.  So that means it must be time to go back! And I did tonite!

In all transparency these filled baseball cupcakes are from the June.  (LOLZ) And that's OK!


I made them for my kiddo's end of little league season in June.  I knew I wanted to do baseball cupcakes but with a little something extra inside.

Take out the center of your fav baked cupcake and then fill with buttercream.


I used red, white, and blue tinted vanilla buttercream to layer inside the homemade vanilla cupcakes.  Add first color with a squirt of buttercream and follow with the other colors layered on top of each other.


Totally optional as the baseball stitches work just as well on their own.


But the layered filling is very fun for 4th of July or for your favorite baseball fan.

We're huge Yankee fans here and they're doing pretty well this season so we're hoping for October baseball this year! Might need to make these fun filled cupcakes again!


So what did you do this summer?!! Are you ready for all that is pumpkin spice? I am!

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Thursday, June 25, 2015

Red Velvet Fauxstess Cupcakes with Swirled Glaze for the 4th of July


Hey Peeps!  4th of July is coming up very very soon, so I mashed up again a couple of my favs:  
  1.  Red, white, and blue food (I don't know why I love tinted food so but I do) AND
  2. Hostess Chocolate Cupcakes
Hostess cupcakes are my secret little indulgence - preservatives, artificial flavors, and all - sorry healthy people but I think you have to have a little bad food once in awhile or you may burst.  I'm pretty sure there is a study out there that has drawn that conclusion.


They are also red velvet because its for the Fourth of July (duh) and it keeps the red, white, and blue theme going!  Don't forget the typical hostess squiggles on top...


...and the creme filling.  Never ever forget the creme filling!

See all the red, white, and blue details here at she knows

Happy Almost Weekend!
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Tuesday, June 2, 2015

Red, White, and Blue Greek Yogurt Pudding Cups

 

It's time for all the red, white, and blue food! I always love seeing all the tri-colored treats for the upcoming 4th of July holiday.  This year I made some simple pudding cups made from greek vanilla pudding.  


Did you even know they made greek yogurt pudding?? I didn't so when I saw this instant pudding for the first time at the food store last week, I scooped up a couple of boxes.  Mix up the pudding as per the box directions then separate equal portions of the pudding into 3 different zip lock baggies.  Tint 1 bag blue, 1 red, and leave the last bag white.  


Snip an end of the baggie and squirt into cups, one color at a time.  I had some mini plastic square cups which worked great for this.  


Although the pudding is very tasty on its own, promise me if you make this that you'll add fresh strawberries.  Strawberries are my all time fav fresh fruit.  Don't they look absolutely delish??


After you add a spoonful of sliced strawberries,  go ahead and add some whipped cream and blueberries.  It doesn't have to look perfect, but it will taste pretty dang close to perfect as perfect gets.  


And there you go some mini pudding cups all red white and blue'd up in prep for the Fourth of July.  Plus there is fruit on them so that means you can eat 1 or 2 or 12.  

Have a great week peeps!

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Wednesday, June 25, 2014

Flag shaped soft pretzels for 4th of July



Do you love soft pretzels as much as I do? 


And do you love all that is red, white, and blue? Well mash those loves up and make some homemade flag shaped soft pretzels this 4th of July!  Making them at home is really very easy - and shaping them into flags is like rolling play doh.  Get the kiddos to help!


See the full tutorial here at SheKnows.



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Friday, June 13, 2014

Naturally Colored red, white, and blue flag fudge



The 4th of July is right around the corner, so that means all kinds of fun red, white and blue foods start showing up everywhere.  I so love that! My contribution this year is some red, white, and blue fudge.  

Super fun because the fudge is shaped like little US flags and bonus the red and blue color comes from fruit.   I won't go as far as calling it healthy, but at least there is fruit in it!  Perfect to bring along to a 4th BBQ or party.



You can always skip the flag shape and just make red, white, and blue layered fudge too.  
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Wednesday, July 3, 2013

8 Treats all Red, White & Blue - Happy 4th of July!


So I had hoped to have one more 4th of July post before the big day, but alas, life gets in the way.  I did look back and I seem to have a thing for these colors because as you'll see there's lots of red, white and blue all over here.  

Like these baked wheat donuts with sprinkles (above) - Plain glazed donuts, blah.  Add sprinkles and SuperFunHappyTime.

AND

these Little Uncle Sam cupcakes - I promise no fondant was harmed in the creation of these little guys.


Some sweet and salty pretzel snacks (using goldfish crackers) - Red, white and blue goldfish?? Win, win, and win.


More baked donuts - ok ok these are more red, white, and teal but look how cute they are! Again, sprinkles!


 Ice cream topped angel food cupcakes (the color au natural).  Seriously one of the best cupcakes I've ever made. For reals.


 Flag pretzel snacks - Please excuse my obsession with all things sweet and salty!


Red, white, and blue madeleines (also made with natural food colors) - Make these now!


Some marshmallow candy cupcakes - aka bite sized fun!


 Thanks for indulging my perusal down red, white and blue lane.  Hope you all have an awesome 4th of July holiday to those who celebrate!
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Thursday, May 30, 2013

Patriotic flag and graduation pretzel snacks


So how is it almost June already??? I know I complain about the time flying by so fast all the time, but seriously - it's almost summer! My kids are almost out of school and I still need to figure out summer plans for them...sheesh.  And I've had all these grand ideas of a bunch of spring sweets and crafts to do with them, and never got to really any of those I was thinking about doing in April and May and here we are at June.  Oh well, we played Chutes and Ladders and sorted Legos into colors so it's easier for them to rebuild some stuff, and we flew kites this weekend too.  I'm hoping that's more important and they remember that fun stuff when they look back versus me having a few more blog posts! Priorities right?!


Well I did get a chance to make a couple quick treats for a family party.  Some fun and easy flag pretzels and some mini graduation hat pretzel snacks.


The graduation hats are just the hats that you can find here but in mini form - that Bakerella is so smart and fun (shhh, I pretend I know her and we're friends, she's met so many people she probably would be too nice and polite to say otherwise!).  The bases are mini Reese's peanut butter cups (and because my kids have nut allergies) I also found mini Rolo candy.


For the graduation hats, start with a square pretzel base.  Add some white chocolate or candy melt to the pretzel, add the Rolo or peanut butter cup, and then add a small square of chocolate for the top of the graduation hat.  I just melted some chocolate and piped out squares freehand and let harden.  Once hardened, attach with more melted chocolate to the candy base.  


Add a tassel with some yellow candy melt (or whatever color works for your graduate!).  I added the year in black candy melt too.


The flags are also on square pretzel bases.  All the detail is candy melt in red, white and blue.



I didn't have any mini star sprinkles so just used some white nonpareils - which worked pretty well for this and it was quick, just sprinkle them on the blue candy melt while it's still wet.




These really didn't take much time to put together.  Really the longest part was melting the candy in the microwave in intervals to do the red, white and blue parts of the flag.

And you get some sweet and salty snacks that really are so tasty - you can't eat just one! These type of pretzel snacks really are easy and fun to bring to a get together.  I've done other versions here for 4th of July, here for a Super Bowl party, and here for Halloween.  All a little different but fun and best of all, quick and simple.


Congrats to my cousins as well!!! One graduated from 8th grade (a big high schooler now), one from college (dude, time to get a real job) and another from medical school (woohoo free medical advice!).  Very awesome and proud of the bunch of ya!  I'm actually the oldest grandkid in our family, so it really is amazing to see my "little" cousins in Swingers speak "all grows up"!

Hope you are enjoying the last days of May and the beginning of June - here is one thing I pinned ages ago that I am DEFINITELY doing this summer!  Thanks for stopping by and have a great weekend!

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Saturday, June 2, 2012

fourth of july uncle sam cupcakes....!


...so i'm a little early for 4th of july....but i couldn't wait to post more little edible dude toppers.....after doing gnomes here and leprechauns here....i went to sleep one night thinking of little uncle sams' (is that weird i go to sleep thinking of edible little dudes?)

buttercream piped with a wilton #104 tip

...the hat's are made the same way as the leprechauns....mini marshmallows dipped in white and blue candy melt...


....then add that to a little red disc (made out of red candy melt)....and let harden.....add a star sprinkle (attach with some more candy melt).....add stripes with edible food writer (try to keep your lines straight...obviously i draw on an angle!)


 ...the guys are made from a vanilla tootsie roll, a hershey's kiss, and more candy melt.....nuke the tootsie roll for about 10 seconds until just squishy....


  • roll tootsie roll into a ball
  • chop the very tip of the kiss off
  • attach the tootsie roll ball to kiss with candy melt, let harden


  • add a little bit of white candy melt to center of kiss (like in pic) - i just put some candy melt in a zip lock baggie, snip off end and piped some on
  • dip the sides of kiss in blue candy melt to cover all the chocolate except the white section and let harden


  • add hair with more white candy melt and attach hat while still wet
  • add tie with 2 sprinkle hearts on their sides
  • add beard and eye brows with white candy melt
  • add eyes with edible marker 
  • add nose and arms with skin toned candy melt (i did this with white with a tiny bit of orange candy melt mixed in)
....and you get a bunch of these little guys....!


....i'm not gonna lie, if i had to make 100 little uncle sams' i might have gone bonkers.....but i did a half dozen and it was fun :)  once you do 1 or 2 you kinda get the hang of it anyways....plus you can make them way ahead of time (i wrap them up in plastic wrap and store in a cool spot until needed).....added these to some homemade chocolate cupcakes with some vanilla buttercream....i also had some fun red and blue pin wheels so added a couple of those as well.....


....anywhoo hope you like 'em....i have a couple other ideas rolling around using this same basic concept for making little dudes (or possibly dudettes) so don't be surprised if you see more sometime soon...!

thanks as usual for stopping by....this blog is such a nice distraction from real life sometimes, so thank you all for indulging over here :)

linking up over at these blog hops (as usual!)

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