Jar-a-holics Anonymous

Last night I got to share some cute ideas with a super fun bunch of ladies, all having to do with jars!  It was fun to talk about my one of my obsessions with some fellow crafters. So, here is a quick takeaway from the night.  You can bake and freeze these little gems!  They are very sturdy and made for high temps, so bake away!  They can also go from freezer to oven. If you premake a pie or some other concoction and then freeze instead of bake it, you can just pull out the number of jars you need, put them on a baking sheet, and bake those goodies. If you are worried about cracking, put them in the cold oven and turn it on to preheat. I don't know that it really makes a difference, but it might make you feel better!  :)
So far, I have just been able to take any regular recipe and portion it into the jars and bake as usual. The only thing that might change is the length of cooking time, which might vary depending on what size jar you use, so keep a closer eye than usual until you have had a trial run of your recipe. Here is one of my faves, the cheesecake we had last night. It's one I combined from several different recipes and tinkered with until I was happy. 

Cheesecake in a Jar

2 cups cookie crumbs (I use Biscoff, available on amazon.com)

1/4 c brown sugar

1stick butter, melted

4 8 oz packages cream cheese, softened

1 1/2 c sugar

4 eggs, room temp

1 c sour cream

1 T vanilla 

Zest of 2 lemons

Juice of 2 lemons

Preheat oven to 350 F

Mix first 3 ingredients-place 1 T in each of 24 jelly jars ( the 4 oz kind) and pat down.  

In large bowl mix cream cheese and sugar until well blended. Add eggs, one at a time. Add lemon zest, juice, sour cream, and vanilla, and mix until blended. 

Using a large scoop, fill each jelly jar with about 1/3 cup filling, or up to bottom line. Place jars in large roasting pan or two cake pans and add hot water halfway up the outside of the jars. Bake for about 30 minutes. 

I found this recipe HERE on idearoom.net.  But I  tweaked it a little.  So you can go with the original one in the post, or my version, which is a little spicier.

Tami's Pumpkin Sugar Scrub

• 2 cups Brown Sugar
• 1/2 cup White Sugar (or Raw Sugar)
• 2 teaspoon Cinnamon
• 2 teaspoon Pumpkin Pie Spice
• 1 teaspoon Nutmeg
• 1 teaspoon Ginger
• 1/3 cup Coconut Oil

Mix ingredients well in medium bowl.  If a little dry, add coconut oil until desired consistency.  Put in airtight container.  This should keep in the refrigerator for a couple of months.

Another fun thing to put in a jar, this yummy snack-pumpkin payday mix!  Take a bag of candy corn, a bag of indian corn, a bag of pumpkins, and a jar of honey roasted peanuts and mix them all together.  It tastes like a Payday!  Seriously.  And it looks super cute in a jar.  But what doesn't, really?

Enjoy!

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Cake pops and stuff

Here's a quick review of class at TCC last week!  We made these cute little guys:

 Here are some cake pop basics:  

Best website: bakerella.com.  Not only is her site really informative, she has the best eye candy!  

Basic recipe:

1 cake mix, baked to instructions

1 can frosting

2 bags candy melts

lollipop sticks

Crumble cake with hands into large bowl.  Don't worry about crust pieces that don't crumble as easily.  They will soften when the frosting is added.  Add about 1/2 can of frosting.  Mix well.  If the mixture doesn't roll into a ball easily, add a little more frosting.  Use a mini scoop to scoop your cake mixture.  Roll in ball with your hands.  Chill the cake balls for about an hour, until firm.  When ready to dip the cake pops, melt the candy melts in a plastic bowl.  Usually, this works best if you microwave at 50 percent power for 1 minute at a time, and then stir.  Repeat until the melts are a nice consistency for dipping.  If needed, add a little shortening to make it thinner, or coat more easily.  Dip a lollipop stick into the candy mixture, just about 1/2".  Then insert the stick into a cake ball. Allow to harden for a few seconds.  Dip the cake ball, straight down and up out of the mixture.  Gently tap the wrist that is holding the cake pop with your other hand to remove excess coating.  Then, either put the cake pop on wax paper, upright, or insert into styrofoam block to cool.  Decorate as desired. 

Helpful hints:

Don't use cake mix with pudding in the mix.

Don't add too much frosting to begin with, you can always add more if you need, but if the mixture is too mushy, your cake pops will be hard to work with.

Coat twice if you want your pops to look nice and round and smooth.

Use toothpicks to apply extra coating, to "glue" on your candy, and to clean up edges.

After dipping for a little while, your melts will have some moisture in them, and also might be getting a little hard.  Zap them in the microwave with a little shortening to get the consistency right.

And last, presentation is everything!  Put them in a cute container!

Here are a couple more ideas from class:

Happy Mail!

 Start with a soda bottle, clean, dry and cut in half with a serrated knife and scissors.

 Gather some cute, lightweight items for the inside.

 Fill up both halves.  Put the bottle back together with packing tape.

 Then decorate.

Add a cute piece of card stock for a mailing label.  Address and put stamps on it.  You can check the USPS first class parcel rates HERE.  Throw it into the blue mailbox!  Enjoy your day, knowing you just made someone happy!

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