Spring

So spring is here and nearly gone. I have been wanting to share this one for a while, but have had some really good recipes that I had to add first.

We celebrate a few extra holidays in our house. You may remember the pumpkin pie from our autumn feast or have seen pictures of our yule feast on my Facebook page. We celebrate the standard ones too, but really enjoy having the old school seasonal celebrations. They fit with the weather, with fresh food available at the time.

On the 22nd September it was the spring equinox, so we had our Ostara party. Or I guess you could call it easter or Eostre. So you get the theme - flowers, bunnies, eggs, butterflies - Spring things. And what better way to do it than a garden tea party. The table was set with all my china along with glass jars and cups with fresh flowers (these were the rather smelly kind, if you're smell sensitive use ones that are low fragrance).

 
No new recipes for this party, just reshaping some that I already have.

Flower and butterfly shaped biscuit wands made to the iced biscuit recipe or the gum free recipe.  These were decorated with white icing and natural sprinkles and coloured sugar. This is so basic to do, but something I forgot about for a long time. You know exactly what you are getting with these, and if you use homemade colours they can be completely failsafe.     

I used the gum free recipe for these biscuits

Coloured Sugar
Ingredients

• 3 Tbsp sugar
• A few drops natural colour of choice

Method

1. Place sugar and colour in a small container or ziplock bag.
2. Shake until the colour is evenly distributed through the sugar
3. Store in an airtight container.

Also made using the coloured sugar were rice crispy eggs. To shape them I use little plastic eggs, the kind you would normally put treats inside for Easter.

Rice crispy eggs

Rice Crispy Eggs  
Ingredients

• 4 cups crunchy puffed rice
• 200g white marshmallows
• 80g nuttelex
• Coloured sugar

Method

1. Place rice puffs into a large mixing bowl.
2. Slowly melt marshmallow and nuttelex in a saucepan over low heat. Stir continuously to stop it sticking and burning.
3. When it is relatively smooth pour over rice puffs and stir until well combined.
4. Lightly grease the inside of the eggs and pack the rice crispy mixture into both sides and squash them together.
5. When they have set gently ease them out of the eggs and dip one end in coloured sugar.

If you wanted to do these as something the  Easter bunny has left you can coat inside half the egg with the sugar and leave them in the egg to make it less messy.

My friend made vanilla cupcakes that had a split marshmallow on top to look like a flower and tea cup biscuits which were an Orgran thistle shortbread biscuit topped with a marshmallow, sprinkles and half a lifesaver (not failsafe, but similar could be made from royal icing) all stuck together with royal icing.

Meringue peeps, Teacup biscuits, quiche, scones and iced biscuits

Meringues were piped in the shape of peeps or little chicks. I tried adding a bit of saffron to them for colour, but the little that I used gave no real colour, but drastically changed the flavour... not something I would do again. You could also add little dots of icing or carob to make eyes.

There were also scones & jam, little chicken & mayonnaise wraps, mini quiches and pink vanilla milk (rice milk for mine, cow milk for the others) in teapots for the kids to drink. 

Wraps, quiche and flower cupcakes

The activities were loads of fun, the kids made birdfeeders by sticking birdseed to toilet rolls using flour  and water glue and took them home to hang in the garden.

My friend brought blank animal masks and the children decorated them with glitter, sequins, pompoms and textas.

Making masks

The grand finale was an egg hunt in the yard for plastic eggs with treats.

They all took home seedlings to plant; a bean, a purple cabbage and a decorative one. A great non-food idea for easter too, just make sure your seedlings are right for the season.

Now to prepare for the Summer Solstice!

It's Another Party!

We recently came home from a holiday and got caught up in a lot of stuff that was happening, then suddenly realised that it was less than two weeks until our daughter's third birthday. Talk about a massive rush job party! Her party was on a much smaller scale than her older brother's was, partly because she is only three and partly because she doesn't have anywhere near as many friends as he did at that age.

Being three, she loves Charlie and Lola, so after a bit of messing around we settled on that as our theme, which is actually quite easy as it is all a mish-mash of colours and patterns. If we had planned it in advance we could have found a whole bunch of merchandise online for parties, but most of it would had to have come from overseas and there just wasn't enough time. So after a bit of searching online I came up with a colour theme and bought some of the items.

The food was a little different this time around. My daughter is not really failsafe, but almost becomes so by default since most of the food in our house is failsafe. Nor is she gluten or dairy free, but I wasn't going to make different food for everyone, and if we go to a party elsewhere my son has to eat different to every one else, so I figure that at home he should be able to have the same as everyone else. We also had a friend with an egg allergy, so I needed to make sure the majority of the food was egg free.

On the menu was fairy bread - too easy - I asked my friend to bring it as she wanted to help out. Bakers delight bread with nuttelex and some natural sprinkles. She also made some sandwiches. I pulled a couple of slices of gluten free bread out of the freezer for my son so he had some fairy bread and jam sandwiches.

There were also some doughnuts made with "egg replacer" instead of egg. I had plans of icing them, but ran out of time so just tossed them in caster sugar.

I made biscuits on sticks (these contained egg) and using the same dough I made some jam fancies. They were made by rolling the dough out thinner, using a scalloped round cutter to cut rounds, and then using a smaller round cutter to cut holes in half of them. Bake them and then spread jam on the ones without holes, and then top with the holey ones.

A large selection of biscuits, because biscuits are Lola's favourite and best.

I opened a packet of Orgran shortbread hearts and dusted them with a bit of icing sugar.

Using the same dough as my melting moments I made checker board cookies and honey comb biscuits. The honey comb ones just have smashed up failsafe honey comb mixed through the dough. I rolled it into a log and put into the freezer until firm, then sliced and baked it. For the checker board cookies I divided the dough in half and mixed a tablespoon of carob into a portion of the dough. Roll both portions to approximately 5mm thick and roughly rectangular (or press/roll it into a slice tin to get the shape). Cut it into thirds lengthways and stack on top of each other in alternating colours. Put back into the freezer until firm again. Slice lengthways about 5mm thick and stack again in alternating colours. Freeze again, then slice crossways and bake (this sounds a bit more fiddly than it really is).

To nibble on, we also had failsafe chips, some homemade lollipops, white musk sticks and marshmallows. 

The hot food was meatballs and chicken fingers. I used egg replacer and psyllium to make sure my meatballs stuck together and added less vegetables that I usually would. I used a cornflour slurry (with a bit of egg replacer mixed in for "insurance" - I had no time for stuff ups) to stick the crumbs to the chicken and added crushed garlic to it for flavour.

The cake was also a last minute decision and kids always love cupcakes and there is far less chance of them failing than with a big cake. I searched around for a recipe that I liked and that would adapt quite easily. I found one that I liked the idea of, but it needed a little bit of adapting. The cakes worked well without egg or dairy, but I had recently been experimenting with flour blending and the resulting flavour was not the best. I'm not sure quinoa flour is right for a mildly flavoured cake, it just overpowered it. So just stick to the flour that is suggested in the original or use a pre-blended pack like Orgran. The other thing that I found is that the sprinkles didn't really make much difference in the cake. I'm sure the bigger artificial ones would work better, but they are completely out of the question from a failsafe perspective.

Confetti Cupcakes
(I doubled this so that there would be plenty)
Ingredients

Cake

• 2 eggs (lightly beaten) or equivilent egg replacer
• 1/3 cup rice milk
• 1/2 tsp vanilla essence
• 100mls canola oil (or other FS oil)
• 1 1/4 cups flour (if your blend doesn't contain it - add 1/4 tsp xanthan gum)
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1 Tbsp natural sprinkles (optional)

Topping

• 3 Tbsp nuttelex
• 1/4 tsp vanilla essence
• 1 1/4 cups icing sugar 
• 1 Tbsp rice milk (optional)
• cochineal (to desired colour)
• Dollar Sweets Butterflies (Be aware the label says "contains ingredients derived from wheat", although I can't figure out what it could be)

Method

1. Preheat oven to 180℃ 
2. In a large bowl mix all dry cake ingredients
3. Make a well and add all the wet ingredients
4. Mix until just combined (if you want to use a mixer, just make sure you don't over beat it)
5. Spoon into patty pans and bake for 12-14 mins or until cooked and a skewer comes out clean.
6. Cool on racks before icing
7. Beat nuttelex and vanilla in a small bowl until soft and gradually add sifted icing sugar.
8. Add rice milk if a softer consistency is required or more icing sugar for firmer icing (not too firm if you want to pipe it)
9. Add cochineal drop by drop until you get the shade of pink you want
10. Pipe or spread onto cold cupcakes and top with butterflies.

"Pink icing always tastes the best."

A very happy birthday girl

 The cake was served with pink milk, another Lola favourite.  Vanilla flavoured milk with enough cochineal to make it pink (rice milk for my boy, dairy for the others). The kids don't even notice that the pink milk isn't strawberry flavoured, it is sweet and pink and that is all that matters.

Organised fun was kept to a minimum since the birthday girl was only three and didn't really care. There was a game of pass the parcel and we set up a colouring-in table with Charlie and Lola printables and butcher's paper covering the table.

Party boxes consisted of a small amount of failsafe lollies and a large amount of pencils, crayons, mini gel pens, mini highlighters, little erasers, colouring in sheets and curly straws all purchased at a cheap shop.

Even though it was a rainy day and everyone was stuck inside (and my poor time management skills meant that I was still cooking when people walked int the door) we all had a great day.

Now You've Made All This Food, Go and Give Them Something Better to Do

I suppose one way around food issues at a party is to take the emphasis away from the food. A great way of doing this is by playing games. They don't have to be involved or tricky to play, in fact I've now discovered that the simple games are the best.

We stuck with the circus/carnival theme with the games and set up a 'can toss',  'clowns' and old fashioned 'pin the tail on the donkey'. We also had a face painter. Not exactly failsafe, but it was fun for the kids. My son doesn't have sensitive skin, but he didn't end up having it on for very long. We also made a photo booth for everyone to play in and a piñata to smash.

Can Toss

The can toss was the easiest to organise. Collect your old cans, set them up on a table, find some tennis balls and let them go for it. Noisiest, craziest fun. By the end of the party the cans were rather squashed. I really thought the kids would have one turn at each game, but it was all they wanted to do. It helped that they won tickets for playing and those tickets were redeemable for prizes after the cake. I had allowed for two prizes per kid and had to let them know that no matter how many tickets they won there would be no extra prizes. They just didn't care!

Pin the tail on the donkey cost about sixty cents at the local packaging and party supplies wholesaler. I'm still amazed how at how much kids today still love the games we played as kids.

Still a winning game!

What is a side show without laughing clowns? Well my version involved an image found on google cropped, enlarged and printed on A3 paper at my husbands office, then stuck on a flattened nappy box, the mouths cut out and then propped onto a backyard toy. The kids had to try to throw juggling balls that we had made through the holes to get tickets.

 

The littlies liked to do this one up close.

So, what do you put in a failsafe piñata? Lots of cheap little toys. Noise makers, spinning tops, clown noses, little pinball games etc, and lots of lollies. Lollipops, werthers, milky bars. I kept buying things thinking that I would not have enough to fill the piñata, but it turned out that I had way too much and stood nearby with a bag full of stuff to throw on the ground when they broke the thing.

What do you hit the weirdo clown with? Why, a cricket bat of course.

The photo booth was a massive cardboard box that one of the kids christmas presents came in. We opened it up so that it was wider and didn't have a front, stuck it all together with packing tape and then covered the inside with black wrapping paper and some red crushed velvet that I bought on sale. We sat the box up on two kiddy chairs and had some accessories on the side. Clown noses, plastic bowler hats and moustaches on sticks. This was both fun for the kids and the grown ups.

I found the templates for the moustaches on Martha Stewart, cut them from thick black cardboard and used thick wire for the handles.


The prizes were a load of toys that I found at Big W for a dollar each. There were water pistols, bubble wands, light up yo-yos, frisbees, skipping ropes and binoculars. The kids could not wait to redeem their tickets at the prize booth!

Checking out what was on offer.

Working the booth under threat of rain

With a little planning you can really make the party not about food. Less food, more fun!