quirky creations Archives - Page 4 of 11

Drawing on mini pumpkin pies – Bunny, jack-o-lantern, pumpkin pi!

bunny, humor, pie, quirky creations, recipes, smiley face | December 12, 2011 | By Jessi

One of the hardest transitions for me has been going from prepping and cooking mass once a month recipes to trying to cook tiny portions just for two.

For the most part, I’m failing miserably and the freezer is full of leftovers, oops.

So after sleeping in on Thanksgiving (hey, that’s the perk of not cooking for everybody, right?), I made too much food and didn’t get to the pie until almost midnight.

Muffin tin of pie crusts for mini pie tarts

It’s not Thanksgiving without pie, so even when I discovered I didn’t have a rolling pin, I plowed through with a can of tomatoes and rolled out each of these pie crusts individually. I thought I’d be able to roll out a full sheet and then cut them out with a cup or bowl, but no go. Each one got handcrafted with love…and a strong desire for pie. :P

See the knife marks in the top ones below? Trying to time it based on tiny pies instead of a full one, it took me three attempts before I was satisfied that they were completely done.

I still had a full pie’s worth of crust left and tons of filling, so I rolled out strips of crust with my tomato can to fill a casserole dish. If you want help with the image of me struggling with a tomato can, picture a 4’11” me, tippy toed above the counter that is way too high for me, putting my whole body into it. I was *exhausted* by the time the pies were in the oven.

^ The first makes me think of an alien. Check out those ears! And the last one? While I was moving it off the stove to try to take a better picture, I um, dipped the oven mitt in it. Yay for a pumpkin pie nose?

Also, see that little metal thing in the upper right hand corner of the picture? That’s the inner workings of the can opener I broke earlier in the day. Cooking utensils aren’t cooperating with me too much. :(

The next morning, I had some fun drawing on the ones ~~I hid in the back of the fridge~~ we didn’t eat. I knew the chocolate would harden quickly, so I worked fast, but what I didn’t take into account was that it’d turn solid as soon as it hit the cold pumpkin surface.

Pumpkin pi. :)

They’re not quite as pretty after separating some in the fridge over night, but still fun. And I actually preferred the little tartlets over pie because every bite had delicious crust to filling ratio. <3

Here’s the recipes I used. I did roast and puree my own fresh pumpkin, so yours will look a different color if you use canned.

Pie Crust Recipe

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour, plus extra for rolling

1 cup (2 sticks or 8 ounces) unsalted butter, very-cold, cut into 1/2 inch cubes

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon sugar

6 to 8 Tbs. ice water

Cut butter into flour, salt, and sugar, using pastry cutter or food processor. Slowly add ice water until well mixed. Form into a bowl, cover with plastic wrap, and refrigerate for 2+ hours before using.

Pumpkin Pie Recipe

1 1/4 cups pumpkin puree, canned or fresh

3/4 cup sugar (I used 1/2 cup instead)

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon ground ginger

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon (1.5 teaspoons of pumpkin pie spice instead of ginger/cinnamon works)

1 teaspoon all-purpose flour

2 eggs, lightly beaten (flax seed “eggs” work fine)

1 cup evaporated milk, undiluted (mix powdered milk using half the water as usual as a sub)

2 tablespoons water

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

Combine pumpkin, sugar, salt, spices, and flour in a medium mixing bowl. Add eggs; mix well. Add evaporated milk, water, and vanilla; mix well. Pour into pastry-lined pie pan. Bake at 400° for 15 minutes; reduce heat to 350° and bake about 35 minutes longer, or until center is set.

When QJ moves – Part 10 – We heart our trash men <3

art, baking, cookies, decorating, dessert, fun, moving, quirky creations | July 30, 2011 | By Jessi

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Part of the reason my move last year is getting so much blog loving is because it was a *big* move. We basically consolidated 3 different homes plus storage, all into one big house. It took weeks of preparation, planning, and packing….and a whole lot of boxes.

So even though we threw away a lot of stuff -before- the move, there was obviously a ton of stuff to be disposed of during and after the move as well.

Which meant our trash men had their work cut out for them the first couple weeks. Now they weren’t obligated to take anything beyond our first trashcan that could be picked up by the truck automatically.

But they did. They were awesome. And so while we were setting up a yard sale one morning and they came through to pick up their weekly mountain of trash, I sent one of the girls to go ask them what kind of cookies they liked. They said sugar, so the next week, I spent the evening making heart and truck-shaped cookies for them.

Now obviously I’m no SugarBelle and I didn’t take the time to learn how to flood and perfect. But a butter knife and ziploc bag of icing did fairly well, and I doubt the trash guys really cared what they looked like….they were just happy to get some cookies, hehe.

And in the process of showing my appreciation for their hard work, I also learned how to make hippo cookies.

Upper left cookie? Definite hippo.

Those were the results of trying to figure out just which cookie cutter lines I should follow in order to get something that resembled a truck. Upper left is a hippo. Or guinea pig even, ha. Bottom left has a bison head. Upper right? I have no idea what that miserable thing is, hehe.

Moral of the story: Make lots of extra cookies so half can go to the receiver and all the mistakes can be eaten.

Oh, and appreciate your trash people, mail men and women, etc. They may not always do things the way you like it, but when they do, make sure you tell them thanks….or use them as an excuse to make baked goods. :P

Hello Kitty tortilla pizzas

cartoons, cheese, kids, lunch, microwave, olives, pepperoni, picky eaters, pork, quirky, quirky creations, snacks, tortilla | July 19, 2011 | By Jessi

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You know Hello Kitty, right? If not, you should probably leave the internet now and never come back. :P

Pretty close, yeah? I used olives for the eyes and whiskers, sesame seeds for the nose, and pepperoni for the bow. Oh right, and a mozzarella cheese base, of course.

The girls had been watching me carefully cut the tortillas and once they finally guessed what I was making, they were so excited. It’s not even that I have any Hello Kitty fans, so much as it was that they loved being able to recognize what I was creating.

They were each slightly different, too. The bows weren’t quite right, so I kept fiddling. Some were fatter, some had higher whispers, etc. Some had funky ears.

Because they’re used to having tomato sauce with pizza-esque items, we had some red Hello Kitties, too, hehe.

I thought it was really funny how they each ate theirs, too. Instead of starting at one point and eating straight through to another (or requesting I cut it into pizza sliced triangles like they usually want), they each eat around the face in one way or another:

When I’d been cutting the tortillas, a couple of them were too kitty like and not cartoon Hello Kitty enough, so I pushed them to the side. With a little altering, though, they were still usable. My little sister came through and turned them into Pretty Kitties instead: