Peppermint Bark - YUM!

At the moment I am in full Christmas mode. My kitchen smells like what I imagined Santa's Kitchen would. Gingerbread cookies, mulled wine, butter and peppermint.

I would like to share something that is so incredibly simple I wouldn't even call it a recipe... more like a 4 ingredient combination to an amazing edible Christmas gift.... or treat for yourself.

Here is it the most loved Peppermint Bark - you could buy a small tin of this from a fancy store for $20+ or make your own for around $7.

What You Need: 

- 200 grams of dark chocolate
- 200 grams of white chocolate
- 1 teaspoon of peppermint flavour
- 6 candy canes crushed (I break them into pieces, place into a zip lock bag and smash with a rolling pin)

Cooking therapy. Grab your rolling pin and smash some candy canes!

What To Do:
1. Break Dark chocolate into pieces and melt in the microwave (I heated for around 90 seconds)
2. Pour onto a lined baking tray and spread until it is around 1/2 cm thick. (don't worry about the shape)
3. Let it set in the fridge for about an hour
4. Once the dark chocolate has hardened , Melt the white chocolate in the microwave (around 90 sec)
5. Mix the peppermint flavour into the white chocolate
6. Pour the white chocolate over the dark chocolate and spread so that it covers the same area as the dark chocolate
7. Sprinkle over the crushed candy cane
8. Put it into the fridge to set
9. Once it is set break it into pieces, I use a knife so that it looks more neat.


There you have it an amazing gift or a treat for yourself.... personally I like to make a steamy hot chocolate and enjoy it myself... Double chocolate you can't go wrong!

Loving the $2 gold Mason Jar Mug from Kmart! What a festive bargain!

* If you don't like Peppermint try a Peanut Butter and chocolate version. Instead of peppermint flavour add 1 Tablespoon of peanut butter and instead of crushed candy canes use crushed roasted peanuts.



Enjoy



xx Mel

Edible Christmas Ornaments

When my boyfriend and I first moved in together I asked him to order us a suitable Christmas tree for the apartment.What I ended up with was the tiniest Christmas tree I had ever seen!! Trying to place Christmas presents under the tree meant that 2 presents in we couldn't even see the tree anymore. Ever since we've had the tree I have been thinking of ways to make it more interesting... Therefore this year I had decided.... Edible Decorations!

I think the most important part when trying to make decorations look good is to think of a colour scheme and stick with it. I chose a teal, sky blue and gold my favourite combination.

Here they are! My sugar cookie decorations!

What You Need: 

Sugar Cookies:

- Christmas Themed cookie cutters. 

- 170 grams of unsalted softened butter

- 1 cup of white sugar

- 2 eggs

- 2 1/2 cups of plain flour

- 1 teaspoon of baking powder

- 1/4 teaspoon of salt

- 1 1/2 teaspoons of vanilla bean

- 1 pinch of cinnamon 

Royal Icing: 

- 1 egg white 

- 1 1/4 cups of icing sugar 

- 1-2 teaspoons of lemon juice

- Gel food colouring 

- gold lustre dust + a touch of alcohol to make lustre paint

What To Do:

Sugar Cookie:

1. Cream the sugar and butter together

2. Mix in the eggs and the vanilla

3. Mix in the rest of the ingredients until well combined and the dough looks smooth 

4. Separate into 3 discs and refrigerate for 1 hour. 

5. Once the 1 hour is up preheat the oven to 200 degrees

6. To roll our your dough dust your bench with flour and place thick skewers on either side of the rolling pin as thickness guides. 

7. Use your cookie cutter to cut out the desired shapes. All my Shapes were around 3-5 cm's . 

8.  Make sure you create holes in the shapes big enough for a string to threat through. (I used the tip of a small round piping nozzle)

9. Bake for 6 minutes or until golden on the edges

10. Allow the cookies to cool completely before decorating

If you have seen my old blog post you may recognise the rolling pin. That's right this is my dream rolling pin... I found sitting at my desk one day because my amazing boss surprised me with it! ... in love <3

Skewers, rubber bands and rulers are great thickness guides 

Royal Icing: 

1. Mix your lump free icing sugar with the egg whites and lemon juice. 

2. Once it is completely combined separate into 3 bowls 

3. Mix in your desired colours

* Tip: I hate sifting icing sugar so my lazy way of getting rid of all lumps is placing it in a food processor or spice grinder and blitzing it for around 20- 30 seconds. Gets rid of all the lumps every time!

Assembling:

1. Instead of piping the icing on, this recipe is super easy. You simply dip the cookies into the icing and shake off the excess. 

2. When the royal icing has dried you can paint white ones with gold lustre dust that have been mixed in a little alcohol. For the Baubles I used a spoon to add polka dots that I painted Gold. 

3. Make sure you keep the holes clear for string threading. 

4. Once everything has dried thread each of the cookies with some thin twine. 

5. Now for the fun part... decorate your Christmas Tree with these beautiful ornaments

Drum Roll please...... My tiny Christmas tree in all it's glory!

This is a great idea if you have guests at a party to have their names written on the baubles and they could take theirs off the tree and eat them. 

Enjoy

xx Mel.