Showing posts with label recipes. Show all posts
Showing posts with label recipes. Show all posts

Thursday, October 8, 2015

Halloween Food


Picture of a pumpkin I carved as a teen.


No Halloween party is complete without food fitting the theme!  Whenever I have a party, I go a little overboard with the themed snacks. It's just so fun! Or you can just be a Halloween freak/horror nerd like me and love making spooky themed food all year long. Today's post I'll be discussing some of my favorite Halloween treats that I've made. You can find many, many more on my Halloween food pinterest board: https://www.pinterest.com/lipstickzombie/halloween-food/

(You should all totally follow me there by the way. If you follow me on Pinterest comment here or tweet me and I'll follow back!).

Without further ado, here we go! Forgive any sloppiness, my food always tastes wonderful...but can look a bit sloppy at times. Some of these pictures are quite old as well. 

Blood splatter ice cream



This is actually a Halloween food of my own recipe! My mom made home made strawberry syrup. I don't know what her recipe is, just that she used a package of strawberries, sugar, lemon juice and maybe water. Actual strawberry syrup is key or the red color. Hershey's syrup looks too pink.

Anyway, I thought it would taste good on vanilla ice cream so I put a little on top of it. I then realized it looked like blood splatter. So I went a little nuts with the syrup splatter and voila blood splatter ice cream! I used Friendly's Vanilla Bean ice cream here. I like to think of this as American Horror Story inspired since I made it for the night of the new season premier (which I'm hoping to discuss at some point this week or next week). 


Witch hat cookies






These are super easy to make! I got this recipe from Pinterest a few years ago when I was having a Halloween party. You just need some orange colored icing (you can make your own or buy it), hershey's kisses and Keebler fudge stripe cookies.

Take the cookies,place them chocolate side up. Then place a dot of icing in the center and top with a hershey's kiss.
Halloween Sugar cookies


This picture is like 4-5 years old now. I swear my decorating skills have vastly improved.





These are self explanatory. Make a sugar cookie dough for making cut out cookies and use Halloween cookie cutters. You can easily find some at Walmart or a party store. Then decorate with icing or sprinkles

Candy corn cheesecake mousse 



This is a recipe I found on Pinterest for a Halloween party I had. My friends are still complimenting it! Essentially this is a cheesecake mousse colored to look like candy corn. To make this you need:

  • One 8 ounce package of cream cheese
  • 1/2 cup powdered sugar
  • 1/4 cup milk or cream
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla 
  • 1 small container of cool whip, thawed
  • Orange and yellow food coloring
  • candy corn to garnish     

1. Beat the cream cheese in a large bowl with an electric mixer until fully smooth. You don't want any lumps! 

2. Slowly add the powdered sugar, then the milk/cream. Add vanilla

3. Continue mixing. Beat for about 1 minute on medium to medium high speed. 

4. Fold the  cool whip into the cream cheese mixture and stir until fully combined. I always use a rubber spatula to complete this step. 
5. Get a smaller bowl. Scoop about 1/3 of the mixture into the bowl, add orange food coloring and stir. Scoop another 1/3 of the mixture into another bowl and stir in yellow food coloring. 
6. Scoop the white mousse into a piping bag, squeeze a layer into the bottom of a small dessert dish of your choice. I used small glasses to keep the candy corn look. Repeat with a later of orange and then finally the yellow on top. 
7. Refrigerate your mousse for at least 30 minutes before serving. 
8. Garnish with candy corn. 




Vampire cupcakes


This one is also super simple. Bake cupcakes - any type you would like. Top with white frosting and put 2 dots of red food gel on top. Make sure to indent the tip of the tube of food gel into the cupcake a little to get it to look like an actual bite. 





You can also take some plastic vampire fangs, cut them in half horizontally and stick them into the cupcake.







You can also take black or even dark purple frosting and draw Jack Skellington's face on top.


My cake decorating skills were shit in high school. 


And what party isn't complete without drinks? There are tons of Halloween themed drinks on the internet - alcoholic and non alcoholic. Punch is a staple at my Halloween parties. You can make a punch in so many ways as well as decorate it to fit the theme in many ways.

My Halloween punch consists of a bottle of ginger ale, 4 cups pomegranate juice, 2 cups orange juice and 2 cups pineapple juice. Mix all of the juices together and add the ginger ale just before serving. I also may have added food coloring to this batch to improve the color.




And I like to get some rubber gloves, fill them with water and freeze for severed ice hands. You can also drop gummy worms into your punch.

There you have it, some Halloween food inspiration to go with our movie lists and music list. What should be next in my Halloween countdown? Comment and let me know!

Xoxo

Death of the party

P.S I'm noticing a weird formatting issue with my posts lately where they have a white background. I have no idea what's causing this but I'm working on it.

UPDATE: It was a simple HTML problem, I'm working on fixing the other posts like that. 

Saturday, May 16, 2015

Home Made Petit Fours Recipe

Hiii everyone! 




I'm so happy that so many of you enjoyed my last post about my tea party. Thank you so much for reading! I was so very excited to share that post with all of my internet friends. I have a question for you all! I know this is a long shot for an answer, but which would you all prefer for the next fangirl post? A post about fanfiction or Korean dramas? I can't decide!!

Wow it has been way too long since I have posted a recipe! Since I had fun making petit fours for my tea party, I thought that I would share my recipe for it with you all! They seem complicated to make but trust me they're surprisingly easy once you figure out what you're doing. I did a lot of trial and error with a recipe I found online and I ended up making one of my own. 




They are the perfect tea snack and a great dessert. When I first started planning foods for my party, I absolutely insisted on making these. 

Here's what you'll need:

  • 1 pound cake
  • seedless Jam
  • mini cookie cutters
  • 2 bags of meltable chocolate in 2 different colors
  • Piping bag or candy making squeeze bottle 

For the pound cake: Many bakeries sell them. You want a whole, unsliced one. Entenmann's makes a good one and so does Sara Lee (this one you can find in the frozen dessert section). You can use any jam that you would like, as long as it's seedless. I went with raspberry. If I had made a larger batch at the time, I totally would have done blueberry as well.

First, take the pound cake out of its container. You will want to slice off the sides of it, to get rid of the sort of "crust" exterior. Next you want to cut slices horozontally across the cake (instead of vertically, which is how you normally would cut it). You want each slice to be about 1/4 inch thick. If it's a little thicker than that, no worries!

Take one of your pound cake slices, and begin cutting out little shapes with the mini cookie cutters. I used the Geometric Crinkle mini cookie cutter set from Wilton, and they were perfect.

I had to find a picture online of them, I couldn't find my own set to take a picture of it.


Do this with every slice until you are unable to cut more.

Once you have all of your shapes, you can begin to put together your inner cake part of the petit four. Take one of your little slices, put a layer of jam on top and top with another slice. If your slices are looking pretty thick, you can stop at 2 layers. This is what I did for my thicker pieces that ended up being around a half inch in thickness. If you stuck with thinner slices, go ahead and repeat the process so that you have 3 layers of the cake and 2 of the jam. Each Petit four should be no more than 1 inch thick. Once you have put them all together, set aside.

Here comes the fun part! Take one of your bags of chocolate and melt. When I melt chocolate, I use the double boiler method. I fill a pot with water and heat it on the stove at a low temp. I will then put a glass bowl on top and fill the bowl with the chocolate. As the water boils, the heat will melt the chocolate. It's important to keep the heat low, if it even gets to medium heat your chocolate can burn or the texture will at least be ruined. 

You will want to completely coat your petit four in chocolate. There were two methods that I used that worked. Both of which start by dipping the bottom of the cake into chocolate. From there you can choose to carefully roll the cake around in the chocolate until totally covered. Or you can put the cake onto a fork and pour chocolate using a large spoon or ladle on top. Once totally covered, set aside on a plate or cooking rack to cool and harden.

When all of your petit fours are covered, melt the second bag of chocolate like you did the first. Then either fill a pastry bag or a decorating squirt bottle (they look like this:



 ) with the chocolate. Now you can drizzle that chocolate or do whatever design you want on top of the petit fours.

When I made my petit fours, I used Wilton candy melts in light cocoa (Regular chocolate flavor) and Wilton candy melts in a green, vanilla flavor (AKA white chocolate). 

Many petit four recipes call for you to make a gounache or glaze....Don't do it!! I tried and ended up wasting an entire bag of beautiful blue candy melts. I was so lucky that I had gotten a spare bag of chocolate. The gounache I made just soaked into the cake. Covering with the chocolate works best and it actually helps to seal in the cake's freshness. Also keep in mind that these don't have to look perfect since they are home made. Mine sure as hell didn't!

And there you have it! Now you can make petit fours. I already want to throw another tea party so that I have an excuse to make these again. They are that good! As always, if you end up trying out any of the recipes I have posted here please let me know how it works out! I would love to see a picture as well ^___^

Xoxo

Moon prism power, makeup! 

Monday, March 9, 2015

Cheesecake Mousse recipe

Hello my dears! I hope you all had a lovely weekend. This whole daylight savings time thing is REALLY throwing me off. How about you? I am looking forward to Spring though, this winter has been hellish. 

I realized this weekend that I haven't posted a recipe in a while! I thought it was time to post a dessert recipe! This one is super easy and no baking is involved so those of you that are cooking challenged can easily make this. I originally found this on Pinterest though altered it a bit.

I made and served it at one of my Halloween parties, where I colored it to look like candy corn and garnished it with some. It was a huge hit. 

I wish I took better pictures of this, instead of these messy ones. 

To make this, you will need:

1 package of cream cheese
1 small tub of cool whip
1/2 cup powdered sugar
1/4 cup milk
1 Tsp vanilla
Food coloring

You'll want to start by beating the cream cheese in a bowl with a mixer until it is fully smooth and creamy.  Gradually add the powdered sugar while mixing. Then gradually add the milk while mixing. Add the vanilla. I always add extra vanilla to everything, so I normally end up pouring in the amount called for then adding an extra dash.

Beat the mixture on medium speed for an additional minute. Drop in the entire tub of cool whip to the mixture, fold it in to mix. Then stir until well combined. Stir in food coloring as desired. I love using red food coloring and making the mousse pink, it makes it so kawaii!

It's important to regrigerate this for at least a half hour before serving. And there you go! Super easy, fun and of course good dessert. 

If anyone tries this one, let me know! If you try one of these recipes and send me a picture, maybe I'll post it! Either way, hope you enjoy! I have a bunch more requested recipes to post and a few of my own that I want to post. So fear not! When I remember to, I will post more! I just try to keep a good variation of posts and not post too many of the same type too close together. 

Xoxo

Moon prism power makeup! 

Saturday, February 7, 2015

Valentines day recipe - Chocolate raspberry muffins

I had an interesting adventure in recipe making last weekend. We needed to go grocery shopping very badly. When we don't have anything to snack on, I get very creative and make something based on ingredients we have in the house. I was DYING for muffins, but I only had frozen raspberries on hand (I normally make muffins with Blueberries). I'm not a fan of simple raspberry muffins so I thought, you know what goes great with raspberries? CHOCOLATE!!!

Thursday, January 29, 2015

My bacon mac and cheese recipe!

Hi everyone! Wow I've been posting a lot! I just have so many posts planned and I have so many drafts of them on my phone. I swear every time I post something, I get 5 more ideas. Yay for being creative and productive! This new blog really has endless possibilities, unlike my old one. Today I am going to be posting this along with another quick post later on so that I can get to more reader requests. I don't really aim to consistently post so much, I just have the time right now to write a lot. I do try to keep the variety up instead of just consistently posting about one area of interest.  I usually can't wait to share something new with you all

 As requested by a reader, here is another of my recipes. I do have more to post so don't worry! This recipe is based on one from my dad's favorite cook book, The Fanny Farmer cookbook (I would love to show you all the book, but it's packed away in storage somewhere ;___;). It is this pretty old country style cook book that he loved very much. Any time he needed a quick recipe for something, he would refer to that book.  I took this recipe and changed it to make it my own. 


A good mac and cheese recipe is always a recipe I recommend having. It isn't too difficult to make and it is fantastic for company. You can have it alone or as a side. I have a few different recipes for mac and cheese, but this by far is my favorite. I have had friends practically beg me for this recipe, but none of them have tried it with the latest addition: bacon.

You will need all of the following:

  • 1 package of bacon
  • 1 package of macaroni (I love to use Ronzoni brand small shells. They really grip the cheese.)
  • 4 Tablespoons of butter (For the cooking challenged tbsp is shorthand for tablespoons) 
  • 4 Tbsp of flour
  • 1C milk (C is shorthand for cup) 
  • 1C cream (I tend to use half and half since we always have it in the house, comes out just as well)
  • 1/2 Tsp salt (Tsp = shorthand for teaspoon) 
  • Pepper to taste (meaning you add the amount of pepper that you would prefer.)
  • 2 C of shredded cheddar cheese (I like to use a 16 oz block of cheese and shred it myself so that it is fresh. Also blocks of cheese tend to be cheaper than already shredded bags. I also tend to go for the white, sharp cheddar)
  • 1/2 cup buttered breadcrumbs (I usually take about a Tbsp to Tbsp and a half of butter, melt it and dump in some breadcrumbs until it is the way I want it. I LOVE my breadcrumbs on my mac and cheese. I like a lot)
The first thing you want to do is preheat your oven to 400 degrees. Boil water in a pot and cook your macaroni. Once cooked, drain and set aside.

As your macaroni cooks, take your package of thawed (meaning not frozen), not yet cooked bacon and cut it. One of my aunts taught me a trick on cutting bacon. Take it from the package and then with a good pair of scissors, cut upward not lengthwise. You want it to be cut into small pieces, this helps not only achieve the small pieces but it's a great time saver. After you cut the bacon, put it into a frying pan and cook on low heat until done. Always cook bacon on low heat, it burns VERY easily.  Keep tongs handy to flip. You don't want it too crunchy or overdone. There are also ways to cook bacon in the oven and microwave.

In a large saucepan, melt the butter. Then add the flour mixed with salt and pepper. Using a whisk, stir until well blended. You just made what is referred to as a roux! A roux is basically a thickening agent used in cooking, which consists of flour and butter. It is mainly used for soups and sauces.

Pour in milk and cream (or half and half) to your mixture gradually (meaning a little at a time) while also constantly stirring for 10 minutes. You don't want it to settle or burn at this point. Next you will add the shredded cheddar little by little and simmer (meaning cook on very low heat, uncovered) for about 5 minutes or until the cheese is melted. Once that cheese is melted, turn off the flame and combine the macaroni with the cheese in the saucepan and toss until well combined. You also would add your cooked bacon to the mixture at this point.

Transfer the macaroni and bacon to a buttered (I usually just spray it with Pam cooking spray) baking dish. Melt some butter and combine with breadcrumbs, as stated in the ingredients section. Sprinkle your buttered breadcrumbs on top. Bake for 20 minutes until the top is golden brown.

And there you have it! A really good, home made mac and cheese recipe...with bacon!! You can also emit the bacon and just use this recipe for mac and cheese. It is a fantastic recipe, my mom and I make it all the time and we make it a lot for when we have company. People just love it.

If any of you try this recipe, let me know how it turns out!! Tweet me a picture (@lipstickxzombie) or even post it on instagram and use the hashtag #KawaiiZombieBlog. I would LOVE to see how it turns out! ^__^. I hope the readers that have requested more recipes enjoyed this one I have many more to post eventually. What would you like to see next? Another dinner recipe or an easy dessert? Comment below and let me know!

I like giving my readers a say in the content that I post, so which would you like to see as my next fashion post? I will write the options below the poll for those reading from mobile who can't see it. If you can't see the poll just comment and let me know which option.


OPTIONS: What's in my purse, favorite necklaces, what is my personal style like?, my favorite skincare products and Korean cosmetics.


Xoxo
Moon prism power makeup!

P.S as requested by a reader, my top 5 anime men is in the process of being written and will hopefully be up soon. I'm having difficulty deciding who #5 will be! That will be a fun and spazzy post. 






Monday, January 26, 2015

Cooking tips and easy Italian Chicken recipe

Hi my lovelies! Wow it seems like I've been posting almost every day, I know I'm writing constantly! This is not intentional I'm just posting as I have posts written. I am truly passionate about writing again and I have the time to do it so I'm just letting the inspiration take me.

I hope everyone is preparing for the blizzard heading towards the East coast today/tomorrow. Sadly, I am in the direct  line of it and will get the heaviest brunt of snow (15 to 30 inches of snow...how fun >.< ). Stupid New England winters ;___; . I should be preparing, charging my electronics and gathering supplies in case we lose power but instead I'm spending way too much time dancing in my computer chair to Heart. Any Heart fans? Ann Wilson is fabulous. I'm really hoping I don't lose power! Anyway, if you will be getting this store please stay warm and safe! Don't do anything stupid, stay inside!! 

 One of my friends requested that I share some of my recipes on here and talk about cooking. I have no shame in admitting that I'm a very good cook. I have a recipe box of my collection of recipes, some from relatives, friends, and the internet. Some I have tweaked to make my own. 

Sadly, cooking is a lost art. Many people choose prepared foods or just order take out all the time. You will find that by making your own food, it is SO much cheaper! You will also have the satisfaction of having a useful skill. To those of you that may be kitchen challenged, cooking is actually very easy! The key is to follow the directions to a recipe precisely and to watch what you are cooking. One major problem people have is not paying close attention when they cook and having the heat too high. That is how things burn, my friends.

Unless instructed to do otherwise, when cooking on a stove top, keep the heat at medium low and watch it until it looks done or the recipe says it is. If you are cooking via oven, check your meal often to ensure it doesn't burn and cooks all the way through.

The first recipe I want to share with you all is one of my favorite dinner recipes and it is super easy! I'm sure those of you who think they can't cook can make this. This is an Italian chicken recipe that one of my best friends shared with me over the summer. I added a bit of my twist to it. What's great about this recipe is you don't need any precise measurements and you don't need a lot of ingredients. Plus it goes great with just about anything! 

For this recipe you will need:

  • 1 lb package of bonless chicken breast
  • Italian salad dressing (I normally use robust or zesty)
  • Italian bread crumbs
  • Ziplock bag
  • Foil
  • Cooking oil
  • Optional: you may want some sort of rubber gloves. You will see why.
The night before you want to make this, defrost the chicken and take it out of the package. I normally will take whatever cut of chicken we have - tenders, cutlets, big cuts and chop it into small pieces about 1 inch or smaller. I find that it cooks better in the smaller form, but you could probably use any cut you want.

Take your cut up (or not cut up) chicken and put it into a ziplock bag, pour italian dressing into the bag and ensure the chicken is totally covered. Seal the bag, give it a little shake and store in the fridge over night. You will every once in a while take it out and shake it up.

When you go to cook the chicken, preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Get the bag of chicken out of the fridge, one by one take them out of the bag and coat in the bread crumbs. This is where you will want rubber gloves, putting your hands into the bag will get the dressing all over your hands - it can be really messy. Not to mention it may make your hands smell a little afterwards.

For those of you that don't know how to bread chicken, you normally would use eggs as a binding agent but you don't need it for this recipe. Just pour some breadcrumbs into a bowl, put your chicken pieces one by onw into the bowl and toss/roll around in the breadcrumbs until totally coated. 

This is a tip from yours truly: any time you bread chicken no matter what recipe, transfer the breaded chicken to a plate and press down onto it, pressing the breadcrumbs into the chicken more and regrigerate for about 20-30 minutes. I have found that this helps the coating stay on better. Nothing sucks more than spending all of that time breading only for it to fall off. 

So you have your chicken breaded and ready to go. Pour a little oil into a pan on medium heat. If you use too much oil, the chicken will get greasy. I normally use high heat, but I wouldn't reccomend that unless you are an experienced cook. Wait until the oil in the pan is heated up and lightly brown the chicken. Browning the chicken is simply cooking the chicken enough to give the coating a nice brown color. You will want to keep flipping the chicken very carefully to make sure it is completely browned. I like to use tongs to avoid splashing oil when I turn them over and you can flip more gently with tongs. You want to be gentle to avoid ripping off the coating.

For those of you who have no idea how to tell if your oil is heated, here is a simple trick my dad taught me. Get a drop of water. Seriously, just one drop and flick it into the oil in your pan. When the water in the oil begins to sizzle, your oil is heated and ready.

After you brown the chicken, transfer it to a foil lined baking sheet and then bake for 7-10 minutes. I usually let it bake for 8 minutes but baking time depends on your oven and the size of the chicken you used.
After the 7-10 minutes are up, take your pan out of the oven and your chicken should be done! If you aren't sure if it is cooked all the way or not, cut a piece in half. If there is any pink, you need to cook is longer. 

 Serve with whatever you please, I normally pair this recipe with cheesy rice or mac and cheese. 

I tried to explain the recipe as simply and as detailed as possible for the cooking challenged. If you try this recipe let me know what you think! You can comment anonymously and without an account. I hope you all enjoyed this post! Good luck and happy cooking!

If you would like to see more recipes, tweet me (@lipstickxzombie) or comment below with which of the following you would like me to explain how to make. You can also email me now at KawaiiZombieblog@gmail.com.

The options:
  • Cheesecake mousse
  • Coconut chicken
  • Teriyaki chicken with home made marinade (happens to be a copycat from Red Robin's chicken teriyaki and pineapple burger)
  • Chocolate truffles

Xoxo
Moon prism power makeup!

P.S Stay safe in the blizzard everyone!!!