Paper Carnation Blossoms

My husband's brother is getting married this August and we had the chance to go up to Chicago to meet the bride over the fourth of July weekend. We all hit it off quite quickly and when I found out that she didn't have anyone hosting a bridal shower for her I jumped up and took the opportunity to volunteer! Though I could have gone the way of wacky crazy fun, I decided that she should have something more sophisticated and "pretty"...cause that was my first impression of her. So I've started planning and without giving away too much the theme for the party is loosely based off the quote, "Bloom Where You're Planted." Having grown up in another religion and then joining the LDS church later in life, I understand her position in her family as the only member as well and the great adversity that comes with learning the truth about the Gospel and overcoming all the trials along the way to becoming the daughter of God that you're meant to be! I guess I just gave away more than I wanted!

Such a theme needed some pretty awesome decor, and I've just completed about 250 of these little paper carnation blossoms that will adorn several items. My camera is on it's out, but I hope you can see that these little flowers are quite beautiful! I found the tutorial to make them on PlanetJune.com This website has easy to follow directions and the results look even more amazing in person than they do in the pictures! I plan on using a variation of this to make some daisies as well and will post those when and IF I've succeeded in designing them. Hope you enjoy!

Blueberry Pie

I woke up this morning with a craving for blueberry pie, and so made a run to the market to pick up some cartons of blueberries while they were still cheap (Aldi, I LOVE you!) After rolling out the dough for the top crust I thought to myself, I bet those pretty butterfly cookie cutters I bought at The Cookie Cutter Shop would look amazing on this! So I pulled them out, cut several butterflies out and came up with this pretty pie! The sad part about pies that look so pretty...you don't want to cut into them. I'll get over it later tonight when it's cool enough to eat! Here's the recipe:

Blueberry Pie

1 recipe double crust pie pastry (I'll post below)
5 cups blueberries (about 2.5 cartons)
3 tbsp flour
2/3 cup sugar
1 tsp cinnimon

1. Prepare double crust pie recipe as directed.

2. In a large bowl, wash blueberries and drain. Coat with flour, sugar and cinnimon. Pour into pie pan.

3. Place top pie crust layer over top of blueberry filling and seal edges as desired. Be sure you have a center vent. Decorate as desired. Brush with milk...may add extra sugar to top if you'd like. I chose to use my butterfly cutters for the center vent and all decor. Place foil around edges of pie to prevent over browning or burning. Place on foil lined cookie sheet to protect oven from any bubbling over.

4. Bake in 375 degree oven for 25 minutes. Remove foil edging. Bake an additional 25-30 minutes or until blueberries are bubbly and tender. Remove from oven and let cool on a wire rack. Serve with scoop of icecream. Enjoy!

Double Crust Pie Pastry

2 cups flour
1 tsp salt
2/3 cup plus 2tbsp shortening
4-6 tbsp cool water

1. Combine flour and salt into large bowl.

2. Add shortening and blend until pea sized lumps form.

3. Add water 1 tbsp at a time and blend until moist but not sticky. Should stay together when squished in a fist, but still be crumbly.

4. Divide dough in half. Set aside one half for top of dough. Roll out one half of dough for bottom layer, rolling 1 inch larger than pie pan. Place in pie pan, insert filling.

5. Roll out second half of dough. Cut out center vent with decorative cookie cutter. Place over pie filling and trim 1/2 inch overlap to bottom layer. Tuck under first layer pie pastry and "pinch" edges closed. Decorate trim as desired. Cut slits in top next to pie vent.

Butterfly Cookies!

I disappeared for a while there, sorry about that! Hubby and I just moved into our new place and are still working on unpacking and getting settled in. However, my kitchen is open for business and I've already started working on some yummy treats! The inspiration for this latest one came from the beautiful butterfly cookies at Sweetopia. I'm new at the whole cookie decorating thing but I think mine turned out fairly well! My biggest excitement upon getting moved in was the arrival of my beautiful new butterfly cookie cutters from The Cookie Cutter Shop! As soon as I opened them I got to work on my first batch EVER of sugar cookies. The purpose for this particular batch of cookies: to say THANK YOU to all the great friends from our church that helped us move and clean our last apartment. So without further ado, I submit my cookies for your viewing pleasure!



The Cookie Cutter Shop sends a little card with their sugar cookie recipe, which is what I used. You can use your own recipe. For the glaze on top I used the following recipe:

2lbs confectioiners sugar (aka icing sugar)
1tsp lemon juice
2 egg whites

1. Beat lemon juice and egg whites in a mixing bowl, slowly adding sugar. Beat until soft peaks appear. Icing is ready for piping at this stage.

2. For liquid icing, add enough water to soft peak stage icing after piping that it remains slightly thickened. When a spoon drizzle blends easily into the mix it's ready.

So there you go! I'm hoping to make some more yummy decorated cookies in the future!

Summer Fresh Strawberry Pie

Hello friends! I hope you are all doing well! We've had some very crazy storms here as well as unbearable humidity, so my kitchen ventures have been few so as not to add to the heat. However, in lieu of Father's Day, I whipped up my favorite strawberry pie to celebrate! This is a quick easy recipe and you can make it too!

Ingredients:
1 baked pie shell recipe (posted below)
2 cartons strawberries
1 package strawberry flavored jello
1 cup sugar
2 tablespoons cornstarch
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup boiling water

Step One: Prepare baked pie shell recipe.

Step Two: Wash, hull and half strawberries. Set aside.

Step Three: In a medium sized saucepan over medium heat, combine sugar and cornstarch. Whisk till combined then add 1 cup boiling water. Add 1/2 teaspoon vanilla. Stir with whisk until thickened. Remove from heat.

Step Four: Add strawberry flavored jello to sugar and cornstarch mix and stir until smooth. Let cool, stirring occasionally.

Step Five: Arrange strawberries in pie shell. Pour cooled jello mixture over strawberries. Place pie in refrigerator and let chill about 3 hours before serving. Pie can last three days in refrigerator. Serve with a dollop of whipped cream. Enjoy!

Baked Pie Shell
Ingredients:

1 cup butter or shortening (I prefer shortening in my pastry doughs, but some like butter.)
2 cups flour
1 tablespoon salt
4-5 tablespoons chilled water

Step One: In a large bowl and using a pastry blender, combine flour, shortening and salt until small pea sized lumps appear. Dough should be slightly moist.

Step Two: Add water one tablespoon at a time until dough is moist when pushed, but still crumbly.

Step Three: Roll dough out into large circle, one inch larger than pie dish.

Step Four: Loosely place pie shell into pie dish. Cut out shapes for decorative trim, or decorate as desired. Prick bottom and sides of pie crust. Fill crust with parchment paper filled with rice or beans to keep crust from falling. Bake at 450 degrees for 10-15 minutes until shell is light golden brown. Brushing with milk just before putting in oven will make crust more golden. Remove from oven and let cool completely before adding filling.

Frango Mint Chocolate Chip Cookies

Living in the Chicago area you find lots of delicacies, and one that our family loves is Frango Chocolates. These little bite sized mint chocolate candies are to die for! When Marshal Fields closed, I panicked thinking that that meant no more Frango Mints! But, lucky for all us fanatics out there, Frango Chocolates has survived. Now that I live away from Chicagoland, I can't get these any time I want, so when my mother-in-law (who's recipe this is...and who is by far a more superior cook than myself) brought me this box during there last visit I squeeled! I admit I ate half the box before I decided to quite hogging all the chocolate goodness and share the wealth. Here's what you'll need:

Ingredients (I even took a picture for you!)
1 cup Imperial Margarine (two sticks)
2 eggs
3/4 cup brown sugar
3/4 cup white sugar
1 cap Watkins Vanilla (or one teaspoon the other stuff.)
2 1/2 cups flour
1 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
12 chocolate chips

How to:

Step One: If your using Frango Mint Choclate pieces like the ones above, you'll have to chop them up into little chips like so: (I know they look yummy, try not to drool on your keyboard.)
Step Two: In a large bowl cream together: Imperial Margerine, eggs, brown sugar, white sugar and vanilla. (Should look like picture below.)

Step Three: Add in flour, salt and baking soda. Combine until you get a nice moist consistency cookie dough.

Step Four: Add in chocolate chips (or in this case, Frango Mint Chocolate pieces)
Step Five: Spoon out balls of cookie dough about 1 1/2 inches wide on cookie sheet about 2 inches apart (or as you can see below, three across.) Bake at 350 degrees for 8 minutes. DO NOT GREASE COOKIE SHEET!

Cookies should look slightly doughy when removed from oven. Don't panic, your cookies are done I promise! Let them cool for two minutes on the cookie sheet, then remove to a cooling wrack for complete cooling.
These are sooooo melt in your mouth good, especially when eaten still slightly warm! Enjoy!

Mom's Famous Banana Bread

Growing up, my mom used to make this banana bread ALL the time. It as a family favorite then and still is today! I have several banana bread recipes, but this is the one I always turn to when I want the best! Today I'm sharing it with you! Aren't you lucky?!

Ingredients:
1 3/4 cup flour
2/3 cup sugar
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
2 very ripe bananas (like brown and mushy to the point of throwing them away)
1/3 cup margarine, shortening or butter
2 tbsp milk
2 eggs
1/4 cup chopped nuts (optional)

Step One: Mix all dry ingredients.

Step Two: Add all wet ingredients except for eggs. When that is all creamed, add eggs. If using nuts, add them last.

Step Three: Pour batter into lightly greased bread pan.

Step Four: Bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour or until knife inserted in center comes out clean. Let cool about 30 minutes before slicing and eating.

Try not to eat the whole loaf in one sitting!
Enjoy! Tomorrow, we'll be exploring the realm of Cindy's Tollhouse Cookies with special ingredient, Frango Mint chocolate chips. mmmmm

Creamy Potato Ranch Soup

My grandmother used to make this yummy soup when I was a kid. I was fortunate enough to attain it 6 years ago as part of a wedding gift of recipes assembled by my aunt. Digging through those same recipes today looking for certain ones that I wanted to add to a family cookbook I came across it and decided that it'd make the perfect anniversary dinner. Today I'm sharing with you the how to for this yummy soup!

Ingredients:
10-13 small potatoes
2 celery sticks
5 slices of bacon
Milk
Water
Salt & Pepper to Taste
1 cup Ranch Dressing


Step One: Peel Potatoes.


Step Two: Slice potatoes in thin slices, like shoe strings.


Step Three: Cut potato slices into very small pieces and add enough water to just cover potatoes. Boil until soft.


Step Four: While potatoes are boiling, cook five slices of bacon until very crisp (almost burnt).


Step Five: Clean and slice into thin slivers, celery. Set aside until potatoes are completely boiled. DO NOT DRAIN POTATOES!


Step Six: Once potatoes are softened, mash down until water is thickened like mashed potatoes. Add enough milk to make soup consistency, leave somewhat thick. Add celery. Break bacon slices into small pieces and add to soup. Add salt & pepper to taste. Add ranch dressing and stir till all mixed in. Simmer on low for about 30 minutes or until celery is tender.

The finished product is a nice creamy soup with just a hint of ranch flavor. Hope you all enjoy! Tomorrow, Banana Bread! mmmm