Korker Ribbons

In my post yesterday about hair bows many of them featured korker ribbons (those corkscrew ribbons).

They're so easy to make at home, it's ridiculous!  I found a free tutorial for it at Girly Things.  When you read it you'll be like: "Really?  That's all there is to it?"  Yep, it's really simple, but they make such great boutique looking bows.  You'll make tons of them.  So check out the website.  It not only has the korker tutorial, it also has tutorials for all sorts of ribbon bows.  You'll be browsing for a while.......

Hair Bows

I sure have been doing a lot of cooking posts, so let's switch it up a little and post about some crafts.  My best friend in the entire whole world, Suzy,  taught me how to make hair bows for my girls.  My girls NEVER go out with some kind of hair pretty, so I was glad to finally learn how to make the cute boutique style ones.  Here are some that I've made:

I made almost all of these flowers that are hanging here:

I also made some hair bows that go with outfits I sewed for gifts:

 

For these dresses I used pattern #M6007 of Easy Stitch n' Save by McCalls (from Walmart), and the sweater is the Abagail Sweater from ravelry.com.  Thanks to Kay Squared Designs for it.  I've made this sweater at least 6 times for various gifts. I'll probably do a post about these sweaters later.

 

 

 

So there are my hair pretties I made.

Lemon Crackles

Ya know, someday I'd really like to have a fancy schmancy camera instead of my very old pocket-size digital one.  Everybody else's craft blogs have gorgeous professional looking photos like they were done on a set of some quaint farm cottage on a remote coast of Somewhere Land.  All the pastries and cookies look so delicate like they were baked by fairies.  That's what I want my pictures to look like.  For now, my simple homemade-looking pictures will have to suffice.  Let me just note that these cookies taste a thousand times better than the picture might lead you to believe.  Give 'em a go.

I invented this recipe but didn't have great success in the beginning.  I refined it over a year's time and finally came up with what  you see here.  I get requests for these cookies, they are so good, especially in the summer time for a back yard party or a social get-together of some sort.  Light and delicious, these ones!

Ingredients:
1 c. butter, softened
1 c. sugar
1 tsp lemon extract
1 large lemon to get 2 Tbsp lemon zest & 1/4 cup juice
2 eggs
15 drops yellow food coloring
1/4 tsp each baking soda, baking powder, salt, & cream of tartar
3 c. flour
Powdered sugar for coating

Preheat oven to 350 F. Grate the lemon to make the zest and squeeze it to get the 1/4 cup juice; set aside.

Cream together the butter and sugar.  Mix in the extract, zest, juice, eggs, and food coloring.  mix in the baking soda, baking powder, salt, cream of tartar, and half of the flour.  When thoroughly mixed, mix in the remaining half.

Roll dough in to 1-inch balls (I use a cookie scoop so they're all uniform size) and roll in powdered sugar to coat liberally, then place 2" apart on ungreased cookie sheet.  Flatten slightly with the bottom of a glass (they will "crackle" while baking).

Bake approx. 10 minutes, then let cool (I just take them from the cookie sheet and onto some wax paper on the counter to cool).  Store in an air-tight container with wax paper between layers.

You can certainly do these even more easily by rolling into balls and placing straight onto the cookie sheet without the powdered sugar or flattening them.  When they are cooled, use a strainer to dust them with powdered sugar like tea cakes.  They're beautiful served on a doily like that cottage in Somewhere Land.

Enjoy, y'all!

Cheesy Garlic Rolls

Need a bread idea for dinner tonight?  How 'bout some cheesy garlic rolls?  They're so easy and wonderfully delicious.  Too bad it only makes eight.  A double recipe would be twice as nice!

Here's what you need:
1 tube Pillsbury crescent rolls (8-ct)
2 Tbsp butter, melted
Shredded colby/jack cheese
Garlic powder
Dried parsley flakes
Real bacon bits (optional)
A length of thread or dental floss, about 12" long
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Preheat the oven to 375, then spread out some wax paper on the counter and then open the tube of rolls and open them out flat.  Next, brush the pieces with the melted butter.

Sprinkle a light layer of garlic powder and parsley flakes.  Then top with the shredded cheese (not too much or you won't be able to roll them up later).  I know it looks like the pieces are separated in the picture.  They're not supposed to be, I should have actually lightly pressed the perforations together to make it easier to roll up afterward.

 
Now you can add a small sprinkling of bacon if you want.

Now roll up the bread again. Use your length of thread or dental floss (unflavored please, not mint) and slide underneath and up then cross the threads over (see picture below).  Pull to cut through the bread to make a small pinwheel.  It might be easier to get 8 equal pieces if you cut the whole roll in half, then cut both of those in half, then each of those in half to get eight pinwheels.  I just eyeballed it and cut it as I went along the length of the roll.

Place on a greased cookie sheet or in a greased pan that is about 8x11" so there's room for them to expand.

Bake for about 10 minutes or until golden brown.

Now GOBBLE THEM UP!

If you want these to be even easier to make, just use a sharp knife to slice through the perforations in the dough before adding the toppings so that you can roll up the individual triangles when you're done and place them on a greased cookie sheet for baking.

Ribbon Jell-o

Okay, so to get things started we'll start off with something really impressive to hopefully keep you coming back to visit my blog.  My dream is that some day I'll have a button at the side of my blog like all those other famous blogging women that says "I was featured on________" (fill in the blank with a TV show or podcast or whatever).  Actually, I'd settle for ending up on Pinterest because that's so flattering to be on there when someone thinks your stuff is worthy of being pinned.

Isn't that so pretty?!  It looks so impressive, but it's really very easy (isn't that always the best!). I just had a friend ask for the recipe last night and it got me to thinking that I should post it here too.  So without further adieu :  Ribbon Jell-o!

I used seven flavors of Jell-o (the approx 3 oz size) and a pint of sour cream. You can use however many you want for any size container (big or small bowl or pan or bundt pan, etc).  I started by clearing a space in the freezer and putting a big writing tablet on it since the freezer usually has either a wire shelf or ridges on the bottom - you need it flat. I used a bundt pan for mine, but the original recipe from my cookbook just used a big Pyrex bowl. Use a timer so that each layer is getting the exact same amount of time in the freezer. Plan on making this the day before so you'll have plenty of time for it to set up well (overnight is best).

Add 1 cup boiling water to 1 package of Jell-o in a small bowl (I used another Pyrex one); stir to dissolve. Pour half the Jell-o into the bundt pan and put in freezer for approx. 14 minutes (until just barely set and still sticky enough to "glue" it to the next layer).  

At the same time, set the bowl with the other half into a bowl of ice to get it to thicken up like syrup.  When thickened add a heaping tablespoon of sour cream and whisk until well blended (I have a whisk attachment for my hand mixer which worked better than anything else).  Take the Jell-o out of the freezer and pour this over the first layer of Jell-o and return to freezer for another approx 14 mins.  Repeat with the other flavors. 

When done with all layers, put in FRIDGE, not freezer, to finish setting up with plastic wrap on top to prevent hardening of topmost layer. Let it sit for a good 8 hours or overnight to be well set before dipping pan in hot water for a few seconds to loosen the Jell-o and turning out onto a plate to serve it.

This will win you rave reviews at any event with friends or family. It's easy (though time-consuming) but looks oh so impressive.  

Getting started

So I am finally getting around to making a blog about my creations whether they be cooking or crafts, hence the name "Fiber & Food" since most of my crafts are fiber-related like knitting, spinning yarn, etc.  My background template wasn't fantastic so I asked around to find out where people got all their fabulous backgrounds for their blogs and then I went and tried to download one, but it didn't work out very well.  So now I have half of the old template and half of the new one.  Whatever.  My hubby is a computer programmer.  Surely he can help me fix it.  So I'm just going to add posts like there's nothing wrong and deal with it later.  Now, on to the first post about my creations:.................