Tuesday, July 24, 2012

Whimsey Jar Tea Swap I just made

Today I created a Teat themed Whimsey Jar for my Swap-bot Partner in our Tea Lovers Group. I love making Whimsey Jars and sending them. This was a swap I organized and I can not wait to send this to my Florida Partner! The swap called for a Tastefully Decorated Jar that had to be at least the size of a Peanut Butter Jar and could be plastic so I sent mine in a Mayonnaise Jar. You had to add 4 different tea bags, 4 napkins, a recipe and a tea light.

My swap partner likes Loose leaf tea like I do so I put together enough tea for a good sized pot of

Murchies Earl Grey  and

 Murchies Lavender Black tea


I added a Vanilla Rooibos tea with one of my tea labels that says "Keep calm and drink tea" that I ordered from Favors Favors Etsy Shop  and a Scottish Malt Tea.

I did include a recipe for Lonsdale Scones as well

1 1/2 cups flour
1 tsp baking soda
2 tsp cream tartar
1 tbsp sugar
1/2 cup butter, margarine or lard
Enough milk to make a soft dough.
Roll out and cut your dough or drop on to a greased cookie sheet .
Sift all the dry ingredient together, mix in the butter by hand until the mixture is like bread crumbs, add enough milk to form a soft dough.

Bake at 400 F for 15 min or until golden brown

Enjoy with tea and jam of course!

As with all my posts I would love to hear from you so please leave me a comment here or email me at karenmowen@gmail.com

Wednesday, July 4, 2012

Banana Milk Chocolate Chip Muffins

I made these for breakfast yesterday morning. Nicholas loved them but my other two did not love them as much. They prefer the dark chocolate chips and I used milk chocolate chips.
Here is the recipe:

1 3/4 cups flour
1/2 cup white sugar
1 tbs baking powder
1/2 cup chocolate chips ( I used milk chocolate chips)
1  egg
1/4  cup cooking oil
1/4 cup  milk
3 mashed bananas

In a mixing bowl place the first 4 ingredients. Mix well.  In a small bowl mix the remaining ingredients then add to your dry mix. Stir only until moisten and then  spoon into muffin papers and bake at 400F for 20-25 minutes. Makes 12 LARGE muffins.
Served with English breakfast tea and it was delightful.
As with all my posts I would love to hear from you so please leave me a comment here or email me at karenmowen@gmail.com

Tuesday, June 19, 2012

Chocolate Marble Banana Bread

Having found banana's on special for 49 cents a pound recently I have ended up with lots of bananas for baking so today I made a Chocolate Marble Banana Bread, my family really enjoyed.
Here is how I made it...
1 1/2 cups of white sugar
1/2 cup margarine
2 eggs
4 mashed bananas
1/2 cup milk
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp baking soda
2 cups flour
3 tbsp cocoa powder

In your mixing bowl place sugar and margarine mix together add banana, vanilla and eggs. Beat together and then add milk, baking soda and flour. Mix until thick dough forms.
Remove one cup of batter and to it add the cocoa powder.

Spray two loaf pans with cooking spray and divide the dough between them. Add spoonfuls of your chocolate mix to the top and use a knife to swirl the chocolate into the batter. Bake at 375 for 50-60 minutes or until a cake tester comes out clean.

Cool in pans 5 minutes before removing to a cooling rack.
Tea time, serve with your favorite tea. I had "dish water" Earl Grey with mine as you can see a nice lightly steeped tea to enjoy with a dense and delicious marbled banana bread.

Enjoy!

The Baking Lady, Karen Mom of Three
As with all my posts I would love to hear from you so please leave me a comment here or email me at karenmowen@gmail.com

Friday, June 15, 2012

Make an impression with Swirl Cupcakes at your next cakewalk, birthday party or BBQ!

My boys school is having an end of year BBQ with a cakewalk and the parent council asked for donations for it. I was thrilled to sign up to make cupcakes. After all who doesn't love a cake walk!
I used a box cake, I think box cakes are fantastic and wonderful to have on hand, when they go on sale I stock up, I found Walmart here in Canada has a great Chocolate Cake mix and it is only $1 a box. So for school functions and parties you can not go wrong with a boxed cake.
To make my cupcakes look like they were done for a "bakery" I used my favorite icing recipe for "butter cream"
1 cup margarine ( you can use butter but I use margarine)
1 bag of icing sugar ( I did not sift mine this time as I used a large piping tip)
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tbsp cream of tartar (this helps hold the piped shape and keeps your icing from melting )
 2 tbsp water
Mix all incidence together and use a whip attachment on your mixer to create volume.
For piping the icing I used a disposable Wilton  piping bag, blue food gel and 2d tip.

To make your own Swirl icing, you will need to have a tooth pick or clean paint brush for food gel.

First put your tip into your piping bag. Trim it to fit and make sure that your tip is secure in place.  Then using your food gel and your toothpick or paint brush, paint 4 lines from tip to top of you piping bag.  Then fill your piping bag 3/4 way with your white icing. As you pipe your swirl on your cupcake your icing will show a swirl color as mine has. It may take a few tries but you will get the hang of it very quickly. The first few cupcakes you decorate will have darker swirls of color and as you pipe all your icing your swirls will get lighter, you can add more color when you reload your piping bag.
After making and plating the cupcakes, I enjoyed a few left over cupcakes with some much needed peppermint tea.

Now we are off to enjoy the Year End BBQ and Cakewalk!
As with all my posts I would love to hear from you so please leave a comment here or email me at karenmowen@gmail.com

Tuesday, June 12, 2012

Rainy Day Chocolate Chip Cookies

It is a rainy day here and for an after school snack for the boys I made Chocolate Chip Cookies.
The secret to making these yummy cookies even taster is running out of vanilla extract and having to use almond extract instead. My boys loved it and did not even notice the almond flavor. Here is the recipe.

1 cup margarine
1 1/2 cups brown sugar
1/2 cup of white sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp almond or vanilla extract
1 tsp baking soda
2 cups flour
1 cup chocolate chips (* More if you would like)

In a mixing bowl beat margarine and sugars, add eggs and mix, add extract, baking soda, flour one cup at a time and add your chocolate chips. I use a small baking scoop so my cookies are all the same size but you can also use a spoon and drop dough balls on your baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Bake 8 minutes at 375. Cool 5 minutes and enjoy with milk or tea like me.


Enjoy!
The Baking Lady,  Karen Mom of Three
As with all my posts I would love to hear from you so please leave me a comment here or email me at karenmowen@gmail.com

Sunday, June 10, 2012

Double Chocolate Banana Bread

I have now made this recipe twice and my oldest son Nicholas told me not to loose this recipe. I love the flavor and how light this bread is despite being a banana bread. Here is the recipe.

Double Chocolate Banana Bread Or Muffins

1 1/4 cup of white sugar
1/2 cup margarine
2 eggs
3 mashed banana's
1/2 cup of soy milk
1 tsp almond extract
1/2 cup of cocoa powder
2 cups of flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 cup of chocolate chips

Pre heat oven to 350 F

In your mixer place margarine and sugar, beat together and add eggs and bananas. Add Soy milk and extract. Mix together and add cocoa, flour and soda, mix together until batter forms and flour is incorporated add chocolate chips. Spoon batter into prepared muffin pan or loaf pans see below.
 This recipe will make 24 muffins or 2 loaves or 1 loaf and 12 muffins. 
*When I make this batter up I split the mix in half and do 12 muffins and one loaf pan. I used a glass loaf pan, if you use a metal one you may find your loaf takes longer.
 Bake at 350 F for 30-45 minutes or until your cake tester comes out clean.
I made and served mine with a lovely loose leaf Earl Gray tea I received for my birthday called Famous Earl Grey (For Ronnefeldt Tea web site click here)

I hope you enjoyed this recipe and would love to hear from you so please leave me a comment here or email me at karenmowen@gmail.com

Enjoy!

Saturday, June 9, 2012

The Baking Lady by Karen Mom of Three has a new home


I am so often asked for the recipes of my baked goods and squares and thought this would be a much simpler way to share my recipes with those of you who love a good recipe and cup of tea.
My recipes have been published and shared by  raisingahealthyfamily.com and shared with many of my friends locally. I have a small baking business as well and truly enjoy baking almost every day. Here I will share recipes and photos of some of my favorite recipes.
Enjoy,
Karen aka Karen Mom of Three