Writing Tip:

Fun Facts About Honey

- Honey is mostly sugar (WoW!) it is 80% sugar and 20% water (double WoW!)

- There are over 20,000 species of bees, but only 4 make HONEY

-Honey is the ONLY food that contains all the substances you need to survive (Including WATER)

-Children under the age of 1 should not eat honey… why? because sometimes it contains bad stuff called botulism and can cause them to get botulism poisoning (that sucks, even infants should taste the deliciousness that is honey)

-Honey will crystallize under optimum temperatures (this has a lot to do with how you store it)

-Bees produce honey to eat during the winter when there are no flowers and no nectar for them.

-A honeybee would only need an ounce of honey to be able to fuel a flight around the world (this makes for a very cultural bee!)

-A typical beehive can make up to 400 pounds of honey a year! (Wowza!)

Man, they don't let you have any fun.

Pumpkin Shaped Dinner Rolls

“On Halloween night, the Great Pumpkin rises from his pumpkin patch and flies through the air with his bag of toys to [give to] all the children.” - Linus, It’s The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown!

Happy Halloween everyone! I’ve been a huge fan of Charlie Brown for as long as I can remember. Every year, my family watches the specials on TV and I must have read each volume in my grandmother’s massive collection at least three times.

So, when I saw this tumblr post late last year, I knew exactly what I wanted to make for Halloween this year… but with a twist! After some trial and error, I’ve found a way to add cinnamon/pumpkin spice sugar to these rolls while avoiding a massive pocket of it.

So, grab your fall-themed drink of choice and check out below for how to make a batch of these delicious pull-apart dinner rolls for yourself! The great pumpkin may just pay you a visit for your troubles…

(Based on the post by Chef John from All Recipes and the tumblr post linked above.)

Keep reading

Adventures In Dark Green Chocolate

“i sure would like too” - saved snip title

I started planning MCC’s Green Guardians dessert back in July and little did I know that acquiring dark green melting chocolate would end up being the hardest part of the project. A real Indiana Jones style adventure lmao. 

(Click keep reading for The Adventure)

Not only does dark green happen to be the only colour Sweet Tooth Fairy doesn’t stock, but Wilton’s candy melts aren’t sold here (although apparently they taste bad now so *shrug*) and Bulk Barn only stocks Merken’s seasonally.

Really wanting to make this, I decided to try Wilton candy dye with white chocolate instead of using coloured wafers. However, the green dye ended up being too light, even when adding a lot, and mixing in black desaturated the colour. Not to mention that the black dye had turned into a paste in its container before I’d even opened it and made it near impossible to measure the amount being added.

Fortunately for me, Jay (chocolate crow) and Autumn in Philza’s chat were kind enough to help with the colour saturation issue (ph1lLove catKISS).

Unfortunately for me, after some trial and error, the Green Guardian’s dark green turned out to be more yellow-green then blue-green. Double unfortunate for me is that Wilton does have a candy dye pack with yellow, but those weren’t available.

Now back at square one, I headed to Micheal's, bought a box of Satin Ice candy dye since they looked darker and… walked into Bulk Barn for white chocolate to find they’d started stocking the Merken’s dark green wafers ahead of the holiday season. Yes, it was November by this time. Yes, it was pain and suffering to see them.

The Merken’s wafers were still more blue-green then expected, but adding some orange wafers (also in stock) helped keep the colour from becoming too light while turning it yellow-green. After that, all I needed to do was make it darker. 

The black melting wafers weren’t in stock (and, with my luck, probably won’t be until Halloween), but I still had the Satin Ice colour I’d bought. Although I might have been able to try melting some Sweet Tooth Fairy black wafers, I was worried that mixing brands would cause the chocolate to separate.

But, ta-da!, I got the dark green I was looking for! … Well kinda. The colour looked perfect in the candy mold, but was way too dark when piped or dipped into. At this point, though, MCC was set for December 3rd and I really wanted to share this, even if it wasn’t exactly right.

However, I do still think I was on the right track and that the edits to my process will net a more accurate colour.

So, what did I learn from this? Aside from Canada’s apparent hatred of dark green chocolate wafers /j. 

I don’t know… I think if there's one thing it would be patience? Even when I was lamenting back in July that the wafers weren’t in stock now, I had reason to assume they would be later. And waiting to see would have saved me money on the candy dye and white chocolate.

So, I guess the thing to bring into future projects is to really think about if what I’m looking for is likely to be in stock/back in stock before trying a workaround - even if I’m really excited. Especially if the season for that thing to be in stock is close(ish) and not after when I’m hoping to have something out for.

what happened w the grocery store posting U guys used to love romanticizing the grocery store

2021 HEROES’ FEAST GINGERBREAD SHOWCASE WINNERS

RESULTS ARE IN the winners of the unofficial 2021 Heroes’ Feast Gingerbread Showcase are:

In 1st place, @afinickyguide​ with their fancy inn!

In 2nd place, the cozy 3 Weird Elves inn by Samantha Nahra!

In 3rd place, Luboffin’s grandiose castle!

And in 4th place, myself with the Homely Halfling House!

Thank you to everyone who participated in the showcase and to those who voted - this couldn’t have happened without you!

being alive is great because there are so many different vegetables you can sauté. but then there are also the horrors

Cranberry Banana Muffins

“The tang of the cranberries is softened by the subtleness of the banana and the hint of nutmeg in this recipe.” - ~mystery book~, p. 218

For holiday cookies, our minds usually go to sugar cookies, gingerbread, and maybe the odd biscotti thrown in for fun. But, if you’re looking for a change up in your typical festive treats, look no further than these delicious cranberry banana muffins!

The sharpness of the cranberries is tamed by the accompanying ingredients and substituting the regular milk for coconut milk adds a whole new dimension of flavour. Not only that, but the grated nutmeg and orange zest makes your whole kitchen smell like instant Christmas while baking!

Consider baking these with the Earl Grey Cookies for an additional change up!

(This recipe is an adaptation from a cookbook my grandmother has tucked away. However, I don’t have the title of the book and I can’t find her copy anymore so it’s of ~mystery origin~.)

Prep: 15 mins               Cook: 1h               Overall: 1h 15 mins

Ingredients*:

2 ripe bananas

1 cup (200 g) granulated sugar

2 eggs

1 ½ cups (350 ml) coconut milk**

⅔ cup (151 g) butter, melted

2 tbsp. grated orange zest (about 1 large orange)

4 cups all-purpose flour

2 tbsp. baking powder

1 tsp. ground nutmeg

1 tsp. kosher salt

3 cups (330 g) fresh or frozen cranberries

* Makes enough for 24 large size muffins. You can make 12 muffins by halving all of the ingredients, but you’ll have to waste half a can of coconut milk.

** Use both the coconut cream and milk from the can. Freely replace the coconut milk with regular milk if you need to.

First, preheat the oven to 400℉ (204℃) and either grease, or use large muffin cups to line two muffin pans.

Then, in a large bowl, mash the bananas.

Add the sugar, eggs, coconut milk, melted butter, and orange zest and stir to combine well.

TIP: When measuring the coconut milk, pour the whole can into a glass measuring cup. Use a fork to whisk together the cream and milk until it’s mostly combined. Then, use a slotted spoon to remove any remaining larger cream pieces from the measuring cup. This should get you to ~1 ½ cups (350 ml) of coconut milk.

In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, nutmeg, and salt.

Add the dry ingredients to the liquid ingredients and stir until the batter is just moistened.

Before adding the cranberries, sprinkle ~1 tsp. flour over the cranberries and stir gently to coat (top-left). This will prevent the cranberries from sinking to the bottom of the muffins as they cook.

Gently fold the cranberries into the batter.

Spoon enough batter to fill each muffin cup about ¾ of the way full (top-left).

Bake for 20 to 23 minutes, rotating the pans 180 degrees halfway through, or until the tops turn golden brown and a tester inserted in the center comes out clean (top-right).

Allow the muffins to cool in the pan for 5 minutes before removing to a wire rack.

Serve warm or at room temperature.

Overall, I would give these muffins a 5/5. These are AMAZING when served warm with salted butter! I wanted to try something a little different for holiday cookies a few years back and I’m so glad I gave these a go. The blend of flavours really brings home the holidays in a way you don’t expect.

I highly recommend using coconut milk instead of regular milk if it’s available to you; it provides such a depth and richness of flavour without making the muffin feel heavy. Also, although I haven’t tried it with almond milk yet, I imagine that would also yield some tasty results!

Here are the cookies I made with the scraps leftover from the house I made for the Gingerbread Showcase (VOTE) ft. myself, @afinickyguide , Luboffin_ , and Samantha Nahra!

I really love how these turned out, especially the reindeer! I think I just found my new Seasonally Appropriate(tm) profile picture

Also, the hot chocolate shown here is the Hot Cocoa Broth from Heroes’ Feast if you’d like to try it for yourself!

I need a cooking show with these three as the judges. Please.