Sugar Swings! Serve Some

Thursday, November 29, 2012

cookie filled christmas tree candies....!



....so it's after thanksgiving and christmas commercials are being played so i think it's safe to post some holiday treats!...and i'm starting with some really super easy candies...  

you need a mold, some vanilla candy melt (or you can use white chocolate), cookies (a crunchy cookie works best that you can crush up), and some fun sprinkles...
   

i have some neat ice cube trays found at the dollar stores around here which i use for a bunch of things aside from ice!

Here are the steps:

  • Fill half way with candy melt/chocolate
  • Add some crushed cookie
  • Add more candy melt/chocolate (tap mold to eliminate any air bubbles)
  • Add some sprinkles


Let harden (i put in the freezer for about 10 minutes) and pop out of the mold


....i like these because the cookie gives a little more texture and flavor than plain vanilla candy....and you can mix and match flavors too


...and you get some super simple and fun candies to start off your holiday season....i'm making a bunch of fudge flavors for holiday gifts so i'm adding some of these to the tins as well to brighten things up!


....and can you believe it's almost December?? Where did 2012 go? oh well, enjoy it as much as you can!

Also entering these santa cupcakes in the Creative Holiday Recipe Contest being hosted by Confessions of a Cookbook Queen and Cookies and Cups! (wish me luck!)

Tidy Mom's I'm Loving It
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Sunday, November 25, 2012

durian and mangosteen fruit cupcakes.....!


...so i recently went to bangkok, thailand for my day job! and after just getting though hurricane sandy, a trip to thailand was a complete 180 for me since it was a hot and balmy 95 degrees when i got off the plane...!


since it was a work trip, i didn't have a ton of time to explore this neat city as i would have liked if it was a regular vacation....but i did explore a bit in the pockets of time i had.....i found these neat durian and mangosteen "puffs" at a store and since i couldn't bring home real durian and mangosteen i figured these would be the best next thing....


durian (the king of fruits in thailand) is a common fruit there and has a creamy fruit inside with a spiky outside---some say its smell is unbearable and has been described as rotting onions to gym socks...really it's not too bad, you do get an onion-y flavor and these puffs also have that mild flavor/smell....

mangosteen (the queen of fruits in thailand) is really very floral in taste and smell, it kinda reminds me of rose but not exactly....a great tropical fruit flavor overall...


the puffs are crunchy and delicate like a rolled up wafer cookie so i decided to crush them up and add it to some buttercream icing to give a mild durian or mangosteen flavor as a filling to these cupcakes....


then just filled some vanilla cupcakes with some of the filling and added a "puff" on top since i thought they were so pretty by themselves...



and here are some of the pics i was able to take while in bangkok (anyone on my instagram may have seen these already!)

me at the grand palace where the kings of siam (now thailand) used to live
the detail on the buildings was amazeballs!

also at the grand palace where they host formal events
traditional dancer on a river cruise
and of course i snapped some shots of the treats there!

i think this is seaweed
cupcakes at a mall
durian fruit being sold on the street
real pad thai!
thai rice pudding with pandan, corn, and spring onions!
coconut jelly sweet 
found some macarons to bring home too!

...and you get some cupcakes filled with some traditional fruits of thailand...the flavor was very mild so went great with some plain vanilla cupcakes topped with vanilla buttercream....since i probably won't be vacationing in thailand anytime soon, it was so great to visit this time and get to experience some of the culture and food, and bring home a little to share with you all....

Khob Kun Ka (thank you!) for visiting and hope you like this take on the king and queen of fruit of thailand! 

Tidy Mom's I'm Loving It
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Friday, November 9, 2012

mini candy and cookie turkey pops....!




so i'm back!!!! i'm in jersey and as most everyone knows, hurricane sandy really did a number out here when she passed through the last week of october....we were out of power for 11 days and many are still without power in the area even now....but i have to say with with 3 kiddos that seemed like forever...

...and without power and cable....there was no way to post! think i may have gone into a little blogger withdrawal over the past few days...

these little turkey pops were made before sandy came along....and for awhile there i didn't even think i'd get to post these before thanksgiving!


...but here they are and luckily they are super simple to throw together....use your leftover halloween candy corn, mini nilla wafers (which are leftover from these chocolate acorns), some melted chocolate or candy wafers, and some candy coated sunflower seeds...

  1. add some melted candy or chocolate in between the 2 nilla wafters (which by the way makes some really cute mini sandwich cookies too!)
  2. add sandwich cookie to a stick and let harden
  3. add some melted candy/chocolate to the top of the cookie and add the candy corn around the top (i just happen to have candy corn an a bunch of different flavors so was able to have a bunch of turkeys with colorful feathers!)
  4. attach a sunflower seed "beak" with some more melted candy
  5. add eyes with an edible food writer and that's it!

....and you get some really super simple and kinda cute turkey pops, that even the kiddos can make by themselves...i'm still not sure about turkey's being cute....as i've attempted them a few times (like here, here, and here!) and they always come out looking a little cute but a little bit creepy at the same time....

also if you're interested in re-visiting my last 11 days, i was able to post pics to my instagram and FB whenever i was able to scrounge up some charge on the iPhone....

...the nite Sandy made landfall was pretty rough....we lost power on a 10/29 and we all slept together in one room....

woke up to a huge tree down in the back yard
and our main power/cable/phone line down off the house                     
....reports from the town and power company were not good and it was estimated that it would take 7-10 days to restore power....

Vader kept us company for a couple days as he was the only battery operated radio we had!
...for awhile we didn't know how bad some places of nj and ny were hit since we couldn't watch any news....but as we were able to charge our phones at random places we talked to others and started seeing how badly the nj shore and parts of ny were so badly damaged....parts of the coastline will never look the same, and some families lost everything....

...as power was not coming back anytime soon....the kids and i got out of dodge and stayed with my sister for most of the first week outside of philly (thanks Aunt Ang!)

the kids definitely kept themselves busy although they may be in school til Aug!
....and we kept hearing from the power company that our power would be back soon so this past monday we came back up to north jersey, but still no power and gas lines were pretty long since some gas stations still had no power and there was a lot of demand for gas for cars and for generators (you could hear the generator hum all the time outside)...and there were forecasts for a nor'easter as well....

although it was taking a long time...the power companies were definitely working very hard since the hurricane....in our case a transformer blew during the storm and was leaking oil...we had heard that a hazmat team needed to be assembled before attempting to fix it, delaying repair of the circuit our house was on even longer....

Guys from JCP&L working late and during THE SNOW STORM!
....woke to no power and about 7 inches of snow this past thursday....

no power but lots of snow to deal with---thank you mother nature!
....the power crew worked all day yesterday and by the late afternoon our power was back!

We have power!!! Woohoo! 


...a huge thank you to everyone who has been working non-stop since hurricane sandy....in the grande scheme of things we are luckily and really just inconvenienced more than anything else (lost all my frozen blog "projects" but no biggie, that kind of stuff can be replaced)...but there are so many people still without power, or that have not been allowed back to their homes, or have literally lost their homes....for those of you that can, please donate to those in need....the Red Cross is probably the easiest and most efficient way to donate to those that need it...

...anyways i missed the you all and the blog and posting some fun things.....hope you like the turkey pops and thanks for stopping by and reading about my last 11 days :)

...have a GREAT week, and i hope it's a boring and normal week for anyone here in the northeast!

Tidy Mom's I'm Loving It
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Friday, October 26, 2012

witchy cupcakes for halloween....!



so are you sick of the little dude or in this case dudette cupcake toppers??? i mean i've made them so many times now i think i can do them in my sleep....(like gnomes, leprechauns, uncle sam's, the harry potter crew)....but hey it's halloween season and what's better than some green witches!


as with all the other ones, they are basically made with hershey kisses, tootsie rolls (in this case lime flavored!), and candy wafers/melts...


cut the very tip off the kiss then unwrap the tootsie roll and microwave it for no more than 10 seconds to get it pliable...roll tootsie roll into a ball (save a little bit from one of them to make some long witch noses) and just stick the nose onto the ball head (it will stick just fine without anything else to adhere it)


attach the head to the body with some candy melt/wafer....then once dry dip the body into some black candy melt (i use a small shallow dish to do this so i can control it better)...oh and if the candy melt is too warm it will melt the kiss, so make sure it's not way hot when you dip...don't worry if your dipping isn't perfect to the top of the green head...you can fill in with a color to cover up any imperfections...


for the witches hats, i originally used bugles dipped in black candy melt, but they seemed too large, so decided to go with candy corn dipped in candy melt instead...."pipe" a circle of black candy melt for the brim, then while still wet add a candy corn....once dry dip the rest of the candy corn into the black candy....


i wanted something a little fun for the cupcakes so went a yellow boxed cake mix and then tinted halloween colors....add to 3 zip lock bags and then pipe a little of each color at a time into the cupcake liners....


cool right? but i still can't decide if they look all "halloween-y" or maybe more "camo-y"!..either way i think it brightens up these cupcakes a lot!


pipe some yellow hair (or whatever color hair you prefer your witches to have) with yellow candy melt (add to a zip lock bag, melt in microwave, snip an end and pipe) and while the hair is still wet, attach a hat....add a white sprinkle to the hat as a "buckle", add some green "arms", and eyes with edible food writer.....the icing on the cupcakes is just tinted vanilla buttercream (grey icing-yum!) with some black sugar crystals on top....

and ta-da, you get some fun halloween cupcakes topped with some edible witches---which must mean halloween is right around the corner!


and holy cow if halloween is around the corner, that means turkey day and all the winter holidays will be here any minute as well....actually by the looks of popular pins over at pinterest, they are here! oh well what can you do, the time moves faster and faster every year and this note from my 8 year old proves i need to slow down a little and work on my "delivery" a bit more 'cause i surely don't want to be remembered as "mad mom"...i smell a new years resolution in there somewhere!


thanks for stopping by and enjoy your weekend!

Tidy Mom's I'm Loving It
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Friday, October 19, 2012

chocolate and pumpkin spice acorns....!


...so the fall weather is finally here! ....and the leaves are falling and we've got a ton of acorns all over the yard (which also means a ton of squirrels running around too!)....


these edible acorns were requested for a party based on these....they are so simple and made with hershey's kisses---in chocolate and pumpkin spice (i think there is pumpkin flavored EVERYTHING now....who knew they even had pumpkin spice kisses???)



...instead of crackers on top (couldn't find a good flavor combo)...used mini nilla wafers which were just the right size for an acorn cap! Attach with a little melted chocolate....let chocolate harden and use a edible food writer to add some detail on top of the cap...then add another little bit of chocolate on top for the "stem"

                           

and you get a bunch of fun and all edible acorns to feed to your "squirrels"!....and like i said, they are super simple to put together....the part that takes the longest is unwrapping all the kisses!...and you can always add to some cupcakes or just eat them by the handful (not that i do that sort of thing!)


the chocolate and nilla wafer is a really great combo and if you like pumpkin spice (ala a pumkin spice latte) then you'll dig the pumpkin spice acorns too! 

Don't forget online blogcon is coming up next week....hope to see you there!


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