Having Fun with Pink Amaretti

I've been wanting to bake some Amaretti for a while, and it won't surprise you to see that my Amaretti are PINK! Never heard of pink Amaretti? Well, I really think that adding the color pink to anything improves the flavor! (LOL)

I just purchased these adorable bags from this etsy shop. As soon as I got them, I wanted to bake something pretty to fill them with! I don't think they are meant for baked goods because they aren't greaseproof, but I love them! (and Amaretti don't have any butter or oil!)

I couldn't decide how to decorate them, so I tried them three different ways. First, I pressed a royal icing flower onto the cookie before baking.....

Then I decorated some with sprinkles.....

And finally, I sprinkled some with powdered sugar before baking. I couldn't decide which I liked the best! The recipe is called Crisp Amaretti, and I got the recipe here. I must have done something wrong, because the cookies didn't turn out crisp, but soft and chewy. They have a really good flavor being made from almond flour, egg whites, powdered sugar and almond extract. There are many many different versions of Amaretti, and I'm going to try several more to compare.

Whether they are crisp or chewy, these little cookies are very yummy,and this recipe is very easy! The hardest part is waiting the 2 hours for them to sit before baking. (not all Amaretti recipes call for this step)

So get your pink food coloring, sprinkles and all your little do dads together and have some fun with Amaretti! Then share the love!

Lovely Lovely Meringues

I adore meringues...... that crispy, melt in your mouth cookie. I like the fact that you can pipe them any shape you want, and color them to match your party theme. I like that you can add a bit of flavoring to them, or add chocolate chips or nuts. Today I tried a meringue recipe that used powdered sugar instead of granulated, and egg whites. Just two ingredients - how simple is that?!

I got the recipe from here. I tinted mine a pale green with sprinkles for fun, then I used an open star tip and piped them in a sort of "S" shape.

Make these when you know you won't be needing your oven for the rest of the day because they go in at a very low temperature, then stay there until they are dry. They don't really bake, they dry. Some vintage recipes call these forgotten cookies because you tend to forget that they are in the oven!

Here are some other beautiful meringue photos that I found on Pinterest that I wanted to share.....

Gorgeous! Love the soft colors.....

Love the pale aqua with sprinkles to match the cloth underneath...

Lovely rosewater meringues!

Beautiful pink & shabby meringues...

Pink Meringues piped in a rose shape then dipped in chocolate!

The fear with meringues is that they don't do well in humid weather. I actually made these today with it raining outside, and they're fine. What you do when they are ready is take them out of the oven, cool them, and put them in a zip lock bag. They will be fine for many days as long as you keep them air tight! So get your creative juices flowing and make some lovely meringues for your next party! Just click on the link for the recipe. Have a great day!

Coconut Ice, Round 2

Today I decided to try another recipe for Coconut Ice.  I was first drawn to this lovely English Sweet by the color! I love anything pink! There are many different recipes for this candy and the first recipe I tried came from a cute cookbook called Life is Sweet, which actually comes from the owners of a cute British Sweet Shop called Hope & Greenwood.

That first recipe I tried was very easy to make. You just throw everything together and leave it out to dry before cutting into pieces. I think that many people like this version because it's so easy, but I want to really taste the coconut in my candy, and this easier version includes a whole can of sweetened condensed milk, and that is all that I could taste!

Today's recipe does involve boiling your sugar mixture on the stovetop, but it really is not very difficult, especially if you have a good candy thermometer.

The downside to this recipe is that it's difficult to cut after cooling. It tastes wonderful, and has a crumbly texture that melts in your mouth, but it is hard to cut into nice neat squares. The quick version, on the other hand, has a chewy texture and is easier to cut. (I cut my candy by pressing down with my pastry scraper.)

Today's recipe includes almost a full stick of butter, milk, powdered (icing) sugar, desiccated coconut, and coconut extract/flavoring. There is much more coconut flavor to it.

The desiccated coconut might be unfamiliar to some of you. It is a finely shredded unsweetened coconut that you can get from Amazon.com. You can also find it in the organic section of some grocery stores. You definitely don't want to go with the sweetened coconut, because this candy is very sweet already!

So, the choice is up to you! Do you want easy, neat & chewy or not as easy, not so neat but yummy? Speaking for myself, I'm going with not so neat but yummy!! If you want to try today's recipe, just click on this link! Have a great day!!

Irish Cream Fudge Cakes for St. Patrick's Day

I have a recipe to share with you today that you'll want to go ahead and put in your tea party recipe box! This is a foolproof mini cake recipe that comes from Southern Living Magazine. They taste wonderful, they're pretty and you can freeze them ahead if you are planning a party.

I wanted to do one more recipe for St. Patrick's Day and thought of this easy fudge cake recipe. I had some Bailys Irish Cream Liqueur with a hint of Mint Chocolate, and thought I might use it in place of the Rum Extract that the original recipe calls for.

I used my small cookie scoop to easily fill the mini muffin pan.

Bake for 14 minutes and let them cool for 4-5 minutes in the pan.

They come out of the pan with no problem! I use a grapefruit spoon to remove my cakes and it works perfectly! The recipe says to lightly grease the pan, and I use Baker's Joy no-stick baking spray with flour.

If you're going to sprinkle the cakes with powdered sugar like I did, you need to let them cool first. I added a swirl of ganache to stick my royal icing flower on the top, and if you want to do this, you need to pipe the ganache on before you sprinkle with powdered sugar or the ganache won't stay put.

I pulled out some of my vintage hats and my vintage tablecloth.

Love the peach and blue colors!

Isn't this pretty?!

These hat just say Tea Party don't they?!

Love the blue!

These cakes are perfect for any function that requires little bites of yumminess!! They're also great when you want to add a little chocolate to your party!

Thanks for visiting and Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Key Lime Pie Scones for St. Patrick's Day

I thought it would be so yummy to develop a scone recipe that tasted like my favorite pie - Key Lime Pie!  I wanted to have a filling that included the main ingredients of the pie - sweetened condensed milk and key lime juice, combined with whipped cream. Doesn't that sound divine?! So, here's what I did....

First I made the dough, which included the zest from 2 limes and 3 tablespoons of key lime juice.

Then I rolled the dough out and cut out my shapes. (I know, Valentine's Day is long over but I just love heart shapes!)

Now, we're ready to bake!

This scone recipe is different from other recipes because it has lime juice instead of cream or buttermilk. That doesn't mean that it's lower in calories though, because it has alot more butter!

I had two ideas for filling my scones. The first idea was to split the scone and fill with key lime filling, replace the top and sprinkle with powdered sugar......

I thought the scones looked very pretty. My second idea was to leave them intact, and pipe the filling decoratively on the top.....

These looked really pretty too..... but I wanted to go a step further.....

and sprinkle them with powdered sugar! Love them!

One thing about the scones - they are yummy and they melt in your mouth, but they are crumbly and do not slice well. I broke half of the scones that I tried to split. I recommend using a different scone recipe if you want to split and fill them. Here's the link to my toffee scones recipe. You can use that recipe and just leave out the toffee pieces and the crumble topping.

OK, here's the recipe:

For the Key Lime Scones:

2 1/2 cups all purpose flour

1/3 cup sugar

1 1/2 tsp cream of tartar

3/4 tsp baking soda

1/8 tsp salt

3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) chilled salted butter, cut into small pieces

2 tbsp lime zest

1 large egg

3 tbsp key lime juice

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Line a baking sheet with parchment. Mix the flour, sugar, cream of tartar, baking soda, and salt in a bowl. Add butter pieces and work in with a pastry blender until mixture looks like coarse meal. Mix in the lime zest.

Whisk egg and lime juice together and add to the flour mixture. Stir until just blended then turn out onto a floured surface. Knead gently until smooth. Roll out dough to 3/4" thickness and cut out shapes or divide dough in half,  pat each half into rounds and cut each round into 6 wedges. Place scones on baking sheet and bake until golden, 10-13 minutes. Cool completely.

For Key Lime Filling:

1 14oz can sweetened condensed milk

1/3 cup key lime juice (I used store bought juice)

1 1/2 cups heavy cream

3 tbsp sugar

In a small bowl, stir together the can of sweetened condensed milk with the 1/3 cup key lime juice until combined. In a medium (chilled) bowl of a mixer, with a (chilled) whisk attachment, combine 1/2 cup of the milk/juice mixture (you're going to have some left) with the 1 1/2 cups heavy cream and 3 tbsp sugar.  Beat until stiff.

At this point, you can split your scones and spoon or pipe filling or top your scones with the filling using a pastry bag with an open star tip. I got 25 scones using my 2" heart shaped cookie cutter.

I thought they turned out very well, and I wanted my filling to be the color green to honor the holiday.......but to make them really luscious, and more like key lime pie, I would split the scones, place 2-3 tbsp of the sweetened condensed milk/key lime juice mixture on botton half, then on top of that spoon a couple tbsp sweetened whipped cream, replace top then sprinkle with powdered sugar! Luscious!!

And now, an Irish Blessing for you dear reader, c/o my friend Lisa over at The Enchanted Oven :

May your troubles be less,

And your blessings be more,

And nothing but Happiness

come through your door.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Mini Sugar Cream Pies

I recently came across a recipe in a magazine that caught my eye. It was called Hoosier Sugar Cream Pie. It's a vintage recipe that has many variations. It generally consists of sugar - white or brown, cream - heavy or part heavy/part half & half, a thickener - flour or cornstarch, sometimes butter, and always vanilla.

All the recipes involved making a crust, but I had these cute little tart shells just calling my name, so I used them!  I love any dessert in miniature!!

Have you seen these? I get them at my local Kroger. It's so nice to have your shells already made, then you just whip your filling right up and you're ready for tea in no time!!

I chose a recipe called Grandma's Sugar Cream Pie. It's a super easy filling that cooks up on the stovetop! It's kind of like a thick pastry cream! Then you fill your pie shell and just stick it under the broiler for 2 minutes! So easy!!

This is the photo from the recipe - doesn't it look gorgeous?!!

The recipe calls for sprinkling the pie with cinnamon - yummy!

Here we are after 2 minutes under the broiler. I'm not sure why we do this step, must just set the filling. (I didn't use cinnamon on the tarts with the edible flower decoration.)

I had these pretty pansies in a pot that I thought they might be cute as a garnish.....I don't know though, might be a bit much?

Here's another recipe called Hoosier Sugar Cream Pie from Food Network.

This recipe uses part granulated sugar/part dark brown sugar, and it is baked in the oven for 40 minutes. So many variations! I would like to try this recipe in my tart shells, then sprinkle with powdered sugar after baking - so pretty!

If you not so sure about the edible flowers, you could just do the cinnamon sprinkle garnish or you could decorate with a tiny royal icing flower! These would be perfect for a Garden Party don't you think?!

You could also sugar your pansies, which would give them a softer look. The above photo came from a blog called Marzipan. Just click on this link for a great tutorial on how to sugar your pansies! I love this look!

I'm not really happy with the way mine looked. I was rushed for time and didn't have time to let them dry properly, but you get the idea!

The recipe is easy, especially if you have the pre-made shells, and they are delicious! I highly recommend this recipe! Just click on Grandma's Sugar Cream Pie link for the recipe!

I loved this vintage recipe so much, I think for Tea Party Tuesday, I'll start featuring vintage recipes. You don't want to miss it! Thanks so much for visiting!!