Striped Meringues

Here I have an awesome trick that you don’t think will work but… Amazingly it actually does!

First, you will need to prepare the batter.
You’ll need:
3 large egg whites, room temperature. (to make them room temp. Faster pour warm tap water on them.
3/4 cup sugar
Large pinch of salt
Large pinch of cream of tartar
Gel-paste food coloring, any color
1. Preheat oven to 200 degrees. Combine egg whites and sugar in a heat proof bowl. Set bowl over a pot of simmering water, stir until sugar dissolves and mixture is warm, about three minutes.
2. Beat with a mixer on medium high speed until stiff, glossy peaks form and meringue is mostly cooled, about about 7minutes. (this is where you would beat in about a teaspoon orange zest if you wanted.)
3. Using a small paint brush, paint three vertical stripes of food coloring inside a pastry bag fitted with a 1/2 inch round tip. Fill bag with meringue, and pipe 1 3/4 inch circular shapes. 2nches apart on a parchment lined baking sheet. As you finish piping each shape, apply less pressure to a pastry bag, and swirl the tip off in a circular motion.
4. Bake meringues until crisp on the outside but still soft on the inside, about 1hour and 15 minutes. Let cool completely on a wire rack.

Have fun experimenting with lots of colors! Do school colors or holiday colors.
These are even better with a little vanilla or orange zest.

The Little Beautys

Hi! I went to michael’s craft store recently and I got inspired at the Wilton section… My favorite place in the whole store. I’ve made chocolate boxes before (check out my candy hearts) and I wanted to make a chocolate candy ever since I found a recipe for a peanut butter filling that hardens. Here’s what I made.

These are chocolate “Little Beautys” (as my sister named them). Inside is a mixture of peanut butter, butter and marshmallow cream. Yum.

First, you’ll need a mold. Any kind that is relatively small.
This is the size of mine:

Other things you’ll need: baking chocolate(sweetened), your favorite type- I used Wilton baking chips, light cocoa.
1/2 and 1/4 cups Peanut butter
1/2 and 1/4 cups butter, softened
3.5 oz. marshmallow cream

1. First, melt about 1/2 cup of chocolate.
Fill your mold about 1/4 full and paint up sides with a clean paintbrush. Make sure you have enough but not so much that you have excess on the bottom of the mold.
2. Set in fridge until firm.
3. Meanwhile, mix up peanut butter mixture: add butter and peanut butter to electric mixer. Beat at medium speed until it is smooth. On slow, gradually add powdered sugar and vanilla. Beat for 2 minutes after combined.
Add mixture to piping bag and add any tip you like/have.
4. Pipe into your chocolate cups. Make sure the peanut butter is even at the top edge. Place in fridge and let harden for about 45 minutes, if you had left over chocolate re-melt it and pipe over top when hardened. Make sure it covers all the candy and is relatively smooth.
5. Let the chocolate harden on top, then twist mold gently until they pop out. Enjoy!!

I had extra peanut butter mixture so I put it in a piping bag and…

I let these harden for 45 minutes and drizzled chocolate over with a plastic bag with a VERY tiny slit.

Sugary Hint:

If you like making fresh scones but sometimes don’t have the time: Make up a batch (or two) of scones like you are going to bake them, and cut them and lay them out on parchment lined cookie sheet. Transfer them to an airtight container and freeze them until you want some fresh scones. Up to 3 months. Then, bake them up like normal. Hope this helped!

You can also freeze cookie dough on cookie sheets. Drop them onto the cookie sheet (like you are going to bake them) then cover tightly. Freeze. Bake. Enjoy.

Fluff 1 and Fluff 2

Below I have a tutorial on how to make a tie pillow. These are very fun, especially to do with a sibling or friend. I did it with my sister so I will explain it for making 2 pillows.
In all this cost us 7 dollars per pillow. ( we got the pillows and fleece at a garage sale)
What you’ll need: 2 pieces of fleece that are 36 1/2 x 60 in.
2 18×18 in. Pillows.
Scissors
Tape measure

1 Cut one of fleece pieces in half.

2 place the pillow in the center of one half. Mark 5 1/4 inches out from the pillow. Cut out according to lines, it has to be roughly straight.

3 You should have two green squares ( if you did it to both halves of the fabric). Now, lay those on top of your other 36 1/2 x 60 inch piece. Cut out round the squares. Like I said,
it doesn’t have to be perfect.

4 lay one green square and one white square on top of pillow so all sides are even. Cut the fabric till it comes to the pillow at halfway, about three or four inches in and one inch wide. Do this to all four sides.

5 For the corners cut it in so that there is a square as a scrap.
6 Take the white piece and put it under the pillow. Using the bottom strands with the top strands tie together.
7 Your end result will look like this:

52 kitchen adventures!

I highly recommend visiting 52kitchenadventures.com. It is one of the coolest, most creative blog/websites i’ve ever visited!! The latest post was zebra cupcakes! How fun!
52kitchenadventures.com