Hosting a Tea Party - Part 2 - The Recipes

The best part of hosting a tea party is the company of course. Little Miss and I had such a lovely afternoon with the Grandmas. It's nice to send the boys out of the house and eat dainty things for an afternoon. 

Menu

Salad

Cucumber Sandwiches

Egg Salad Sandwiches

Scones with Jam and Devon Cream

Lemon Squares

Jam Tarts

Chocolate Dipped Crescent Cookies

Tea

A tea party wouldn't be a tea party without scones. They taste best warm from the oven. The night before I put the dry ingredients together and then the next morning I added the rest, rolled them out and put them on a cookie sheet and waited just we were about to eat before sticking them in the oven.

Scones

2 cups flour

1/4 cup sugar

2 1/2 tsp baking poser

1/4 tsp salt

4 TBSP butter

3/4 cup milk

Combine dry ingredients. Cut in butter into crumbly. Add milk and mix well. The dough will be sticky. Knead the dough for 30 seconds on a floured surface. Roll 1/2 inch thick and cut into triangles. Bake at 400 F for 10 -15 min.

Salad

Mixed greens with sliced green onions and strawberries, dressed with raspberry vinaigrette.

Sandwiches

Egg salad 

Cucumber - cream cheese and cucumber with a sprinkle of salt.

Now, the rest of the yummy goodies you could buy from a bakery to save time or if you just don't want to bake. I made these the night before.

Lovely Lemon Squares

Crust

1 1/3 cups flour

1/4 cup sugar

1/2 cup softened butter

Combine all ingredients and mix at low speed until the mixture is crumbly. Press into a 8-inch baking pan. Bake for 15 minutes at 350 F.

Filling

3/4 cup sugar

2 eggs

2 TBSP flour

1/4 tsp baking powder

3 TBSP lemon juice

powdered sugar

Combine all the ingredients except the powdered sugar. Beat at low speed until well mixed. Pour filling over hot crust. Bake for 15 - 20 minutes or until filling is set. Sprinkle with powdered sugar. Let cool. Cut into bars and sprinkle again with powdered sugar.

Jam Tarts

Pastry - follow the directions on the box. Use lard. One box of lard makes a ton of pastry. Divide it into six balls. Wrap each ball in wax paper and place in freezer bag. Free. Pull out one ball from the freezer and let thaw on the counter. 

Roll out pastry and place in mini muffin tin. Place a teaspoon of jam in each shell. Bake.

Chocolate-Dipped Crescent Cookies

1 1/2 cups powdered sugar

1 cup softened butter

1 egg

1 1/2 tsp almond extract

2 1/2 cups flour

1 tsp cream of tartar

1 tsp baking soda

1 cup chocolate chips, melted

powdered sugar

Combine sugar and butter. Beat until creamy. Add egg and almond extract. Mix well. Add flour and other dry ingredients. Mix well. Shape into 1 inch balls. Roll into ropes and shape into crescents. Place on ungreased cookie sheets. Bake for 8 minutes. Cookies do not brown. Cool. Dip on end in melted chocolate and sprinkle the other end with powdered sugar.

Everybody Loves Brownies

We all love brownies in this house. Especially these.
 1 1/2 cups flour
1 tsp salt
2 cups white sugar
1/2 cup cocoa
2 tsp vanilla
1 cup oil
3 eggs
1/4 cold water

Grease two 8" pans. Put all the ingredients in a bowl and mix until smooth, but don't over beat. Pour batter into pans. Bake for 25 min. They will still be a bit gooey, but will firm up once they cool.

For fun, cut the brownies using a cookie cutter and sprinkle with icing sugar. Yum.

Treat Tuesday - Giant Muffins

This girl, who just had her first manicure with the lovely Aunt Sarah, loves chocolate chip muffins.

I mean, truly loves chocolate chip muffins. And what's the only thing better than a chocolate chip muffin? A giant red chocolate chip muffin. They are so easy to make. In fact I cheated. A lot. I mixed up a white cake mix. Yup. A mix. Added chocolate chips to the batter and some food colouring left over from this. Easy, right? I'm all for homemade, but sometimes, just sometimes, a mix is where it's at.

Once you've mixed up your batter, all you need is a coffee filter and a ramekin. Now Le Creuset has some lovely ramekins, but ours come from Canadian Tire. Much more affordable. As in you could get 8 ramekins for the price of 1 from Le Creuset. But, back to the muffins.

Now place a coffee filter into the ramekin. And fill 3/4 full of batter. Bake. Yep. It's that easy.

They really are giant. And so much more fun! The muffin on the right is a regular muffin baked in a normal size cupcake pan. Go big. Go bold. Have fun. Because sometimes you just need to add a little sparkle to your muffins.

A Quick and Easy Treat Tuesday

Little Miss made this all by herself. I was in the kitchen cooking supper. Mr. Man had a play-date. The call of the mixer was drowned out by the allure of a fort.

This recipe is quick. It's easy. It's yummy.

Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars
Whip 1 cup butter. Add 1 cup brown sugar and 1 tsp vanilla. Mix until fluffy. Add 2 cups flour. Mix until fluffy. Add 1 cup chocolate chips. Mix. Put it into a 8" square pan. Pat it down. Bake for 20 minutes at 350 F. C'est tout!

Total Bust

Yesterday's Treat Tuesday was a total bust. Sure the kids had fun. The recipe looked good. It was even awarded "Best Loved". But after tasting the Revel Bars, I have to say, the love was missing. They're okay, but I don't feel like eating another one. Ever.

These babies saved the day. Garlic breadsticks. There was only one left. Lucky Mr. man got to take on his luch today.

Their favourite part of making bread is punching it down, second only to making sticks.

If you've never made bread, it's fairly easy to do. You just some time. It doesn't take long to mix up the dough, but you do need to let it rise. Twice. Like 2 hours. That's where the time comes in.

Here's what we do:
In  a small pot, melt 3 tbsp butter with 1/2 cup of milk, 2 tsp salt and 3 tbsp sugar. Once the butter is melted and the sugar disolved, remove from the heat and let it cool until it's warm.

While that is going on, warm the mixer bowl with hot tap water. Dump out the water. Add 1 1/2 cups of hot tap water (105 - 115 F) and 2 packages of active dry yeast. Let it sit for a couple of minutes until the yeast begins to disolve.

Add the butter mixture.

Add 2 1/2 cups whole wheat flour. Mix witht he dough hook for about 1 minute on speed 2.
Slowly add 4 cups of all-purpose flour a bit at a time.

Mix until the  dough clings to the hook and cleans the sides of the bowl. Mix for 2 more minutes.

Place the dough in a greased bowl. Cover with a tea towel and leave it in a warm place to rise.

An hour later, punch dough down. Divide in half. I make one half into a loaf - roll dough into a loaf shape and place in a greased loaf pan.

With the other half, roll dough into bread sticks. Place on cookie sheet. Brush with olive oil and minced garlic.

Bake at 400F for about 30 minutes.

Enjoy!

Oatmeal Crispies

It's Treat Tuesday once again. I would love to say that when the kids come home from school on Tuesdays, they are eager to bake, but they rarely are. They come to the counter dragging their feet, making excuses of other things to do. But as we begin, something magical happens. They begin to enjoy it. They begin to laugh and goof around. They begin to share their thoughts. This is the part I love most about Treat Tuesdays, the glimpse inside my childrens' hearts and minds.

As they measure and pour, scoop and dump, they talk. And talk. And talk. They say the funniest things. Like margarine is what grandmas use. It's like butter, but fake. (Sorry, Mom!) I don't know where that came from. There's no margarine or butter in this recipe. Just shortening.

Mr. Man was excited to report that oats will help reduce cholesterol and heart disease. "I'm going to eat lots of oatmeal cookies so that my heart is healthy. And I'm going to make these cookies once a week when I'm an adult." Um. I think the sugar and shortening might cancel out the oats, but I'll let him eat cookies anyway.

This is my great-grandmother's recipe. The recipe has been passed down for generations, so you know it's good!

Oatmeal Crispies
1 cup shortening
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup white sugar
2 well beaten eggs
1 tsp vanilla
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
3 cups quick-cooking oatmeal
1 cup raisins or chocolate chips

In a large mixing bowl, throroughly cream shortening and sugar. Add eggs and vanilla. Beat well. Add sifted dry ingredients. Add oatmeal.

At this point in the recipe we stop.  Andrew loves raisins. The kids love chocolate chips and well, refuse to eat raisins. So before we go any further, I divide the batter in half. Then I add 1/2 cup of raisins to my bowl and the kids add 1/2 cup of chocolate chips to their bowl. Then we continue on.
Drop off a spoon (or roll into balls) onto ungreased cookie sheet. (I use a silpat). Place cookies 1 inch or so apart as they spread. Bake in moderate oven at 350 F for 7 - 8 minutes.  Makes 65 cookies.

Um....I have never gotten 65 cookies out of this recipe. Grandma Davies must have  made them smaller than I do.

Who Could Resist This Face?

I took some time out from painting for Treat Tuesday.

Who could resist this face? On a quick trip to grocery store last week, we walked past the cake mixes. Mr. Man stopped. He oohed and ahhed. "Can we make a cake for no reason?", he asked. I knew saying yes, but that we had all the ingredients at home to make a cake, was not the same as saying yes to the cake mix. Saying yes to the cake mix was saying yes to something tangible, to a promise of good things to come. My word this year is sparkle. I want to sparkle and I want others around me to sparkle. Saying yes to a simple cake mix was keeping the sparkle in Mr. Man's eyes.

They are growing up too fast. They made the cake all by themselves. My only role was to put it in and take it out of the oven. They were so proud of themselves. They even iced the cake with no help. I think the best part about making a cake is sneaking a taste.

While they made the cake, I made these for supper. They are yummy. You can find the recipe here.

Treat Tuesday

These are a family favourite. We made them yesterday after school. For Treat Tuesday.

Molasses Cookies
3/4 cup shortening
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup molasses
1 egg
2 tsp baking soda
2 cups flour
1/2 tsp ground cloves
1/2 tsp ginger
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt
extra sugar for rolling

Melt the shortening. Add sugar, egg and molasses. Beat well. Sift in dry ingredients. Mix. Form into balls and roll in sugar. Place on greased sheet. Bake at 375 F for 8 minutes.

So yummy!

Treat Tuesday With Dad

I have to admit, I didn't think I'd like these, but I did.  You can find the recipe here. Sure, it starts off okay. ½ cup peanut butter and ¼ cup powdered sugar. Mix it well. Peanut butter. Sugar. Yummy.

Then find 32 Ritz crackers. Yep. Ritz crackers. This is where Andrew got all excited and I well, did not. Andrew licked his lips and I crinkled my nose. Mr. Man practiced his counting skills. 1/2 of 32 crackers on a sheet.

Put a spoonful of the peanut butter and sugar mixture on top of each cracker. Followed by the other 1/2 of the 32 crackers. Mr. Man carefully tapped them down. Andrew put them in the freezer to harden. Mr. Man took his job seriously. Andrew licked his lips and I crinkled my nose.

Enter the chocolate. I love chocolate. But on Ritz crackers? Andrew licked his lips and I crinkled my nose. Mr Man. helped Andrew melt 2 cups of milk chocolate chips and then dipped the cracker sandwiches into the chocolate. Andrew licked his lips and I crinkled my nose.

We each took a bite. Mr. Man gave it a thumbs up. Andrew licked his lips and so did I.