Surprise Packages

It's such fun to surprise someone with a themed package, so now that I have a nephew who is away at university I thought it would be fun to create a Halloween-themed package to send to him. 

First place to start was with some baking: meringue bones and almond shortbread witches' fingers.

Then a selection of Halloween candies: salt-water taffy pumpkin faces and ghostly chocolates.

Added in a black cherry-flavoured skull lollipop...

and an elegant mask, a tiny pumpkin that can be turned into a Jack o'lantern by drawing on a face with black marker, salt-water taffy treats and candy sticks in Halloween colours.

Mustn't forget a pair of bloody eyeballs.

Those witches' fingers really are creepy...

 Best to hide them away in a box packed with black construction paper that I put through the shredder.  I've sealed the box tight and mailed it off!

Lace Cookies

I really like this simple way of decorating sugar cookies. You can create these lovely lace patterns using a doily, either an actual lace or paper one.


Lay the doily over the cookie, then using a sieve, dust the surface allowing the icing sugar to accumulate in the holes. Carefully lift up the doily to reveal the pattern beneath.


The only downside of this type of decoration is that the result is rather delicate, so you can't pile one cookie on top of another without marring the pattern.

Happy Valentine's Day

It's Valentine's Day. Help yourself to a cookie. Which one would you like?

Afternoon Tea with Treats

These meringues were achieved by adding a drop of red colouring to the whipped egg whites. I thought they would be white with red swirls, but by the time they worked their way through the piping bag, they had turned pink with darker pink swirls. They still look lovely heart-shaped.

After baking all sorts of Valentine's themed treats, it is nice to sit back and relax with a hot mug of tea in one of my favourite mugs. I brought this Cath Kidston mug back from my trip to England this summer. I love its pretty floral pattern.


And of course it's only wise to try out some of that baking to make sure that it came out just right!

Teapot Cookies #2

I had another occasion to use my teapot cookie cutter not too long after my last post of October 1st. When I bought the cutter I knew that it would be perfect for making cookies for a tea party. What I didn’t envision at the time was using it for cookies for a class, let alone a class on tea. This latest batch of cookies was made to take to a course on Asian teas that I was taking at a local university, being given by none other than Jeff Fuchs: explorer, rock climber, photographer and author of The Ancient Tea Horse Road. Since we were covering the topic of teapots at our last class, I had the idea of trying to emulate the natural bisque of Chinese teapots as cookies. I used a gingersnap recipe for the dough, piped the details in chocolate royal icing, then stamped the cookies with food colouring using stamps with the Chinese characters for either “water” or “earth”. When you stop to think about it all four elements are needed for tea: water for growing and for making the tea, earth for growing the tea plants and for making the teapot, fire for boiling the water, and air for both growing and drying the tea leaves.

For more on Jeff, read the National Post article: http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/theampersand/archive/2008/06/21/q-amp-a-with-jeff-fuchs-travelling-the-ancient-tea-horse-road.aspx

Baby Face Cookies

These baby face cookies began life as simple round cookies. Surprising what a little royal icing, food colouring and round sprinkles can do for a basic plain cookie. These were made for a baby shower.

Teapot Cookies

Thought I'd give you a look at the cookies I made for a birthday tea. I had such a good time trying to make them look like blue and white chinaware. And I was pleased with the result and quite excited to bring them to the birthday. There’s rather a lot of icing involved, so they certainly aren’t a cookie you would want to consume every day. Nor would you want to eat many at one time. Much too sweet. But hopefully they are very sweet in the other sense of the word and everyone enjoyed them. I think they are pretty and were well suited to the tea theme. Happy Birthday D. and J.

The Return of the Mung Men!

I have been very busy lately, as you have probably noticed by the scarcity of my posts. But my absence has been for a good cause. I have been planning a get-together as part of a larger reunion with my high-school classmates. And in preparation, I have been baking for a few days now in order to treat the ever-growing gang who will be gathering this Saturday afternoon to a selection of baked goodies. And one of those treats is a very special type of cookie. These cookies are not special in and of themselves, what makes them special is their form. For they are mung men. Mung men took over our class year, a sort of band of mascot warriors. Before we knew it, they threatened to take over. They made an appearance on our winter carnival buttons, and on our school beanies, and of course they graced the pages of our yearbook. So in honour of the event, the mung men have made their return.

Won't You Join Me?

Come in and sit down, won't you? Would you care for a freshly baked cookie, along with a refeshing cup of tea?