Aerogarden mini: Salad greens @ four weeks

We still haven't harvested any but I would say it is time!

Aerogarden mini: Salad Greens

These are the salad greens in the 3 pod mini Aerogarden. The
Aerogarden was a Christmas gift from my office staff and the salad
greens were a gift from friends who didn't want to do salad greens in
their Aerogarden. I planted the seeds about 3 1/2 weeks ago! Looks
like it's time for a salad!!

Cupcake courier

Once you make those cupcakes you'll need a place to store them or help
you to get then from home to the final munching spot in one piece!
After lookin at the many options I finally chose the cupcake
courier. It really likes the idea of something that could carry 3
dozen cupcakes and leaves room for the decorations on top of the
cupcake. The trays are removable so it doubles as a cake carrier as
well. I loved this orange color but it comes in pink and blue as well.

How to make yogurt!

I love to make my own yogurt! It is so easy and considering how much
yogurt we eat it is considerally less expensive and I get to control
the sugar content.

You can make as much yogurt as you like with whatever milk you like.
Currently we are using skim milk and use about 3/4 gallons in a
batch. You need a pot to heat the milk to 180 F on low heat.

Once to temperature, pour milk into a heat safe bowl. I like the
pyrex bowls as they have plastic lids I can top them with when the
yogurt is finished and ready for the refrigerator.

Leave the milk to cool to between 90-120 F. Once to temperature add
some plain yogurt with live culture (a couple of tbsp is fine) with a
clean spoon and whisk. We have tried a variety and have liked Activia
the best. We use the Activia vanilla flavored yogurt. There is a bit
of the vanilla flavor (which is yummy) in the first batch but by the
second batch it is gone.

Once you add your yogurt culture, place the bowl(s) in the oven. If
you can set the temp to 100-110 F do so, else you can just wrap the
bowl in a towel (oven off).

In 8-12 hours you'll have yogurt. You can use some right away
otherwise cover and refrigerate.

We take a few scoops of yogurt out of the corner of the bowl to create
a pocke for the whey to accumulate. You will notice the yogurt will
get thicker as you drain more of the whey off. Try drinking some...it
is quick refreshing and a bit lemony. You can slurp it out with a
straw if noone in your house minds you drinking from the communal
yogurt bowl.

We use the whey in the yogurt smoothies we make along with some
heaping spoons of yogurt, frozen strawberries, a banana and a teaspoon
or so of sugar.

Hello, Cupcake!

I am enjoying my new cupcake book which was a gift to myself for
Christmas 2009. It has wonderfully creative ideas for upcakes and
many tips and techniques that anyone can master with some practice and
determination. I used the banana chcolate cupcake recipe and topped
it with an "especially dark" chocolate frosting (recipe on the back of
the Hershey dark chocolate cocoa container). I think the kiddos at
daycare are going to love these! My two enjoyed a preview after lunch
today. You'll notice I simplified the decorations a bit ...for my own
convenience ...yet I think they still look cute.

PB&J Sweetbyte

This is half of my sons heart shaped PB&J sandwich. He ate the other
half so fast before I could catch a photo. This was also sent by my
mother. I started using canapé cutter shapes to make the kids
sandwiches...stars, hearts, etc. It is a great way to teach shapes
and cuts the sandwiches into bite sized pieces. Now that they are
bigger they do well with the the two sandwich halves this cutter
creates.

Grilled cheese dinobytes!

My mother sent us some dynobyte sandwich cutters and thy are a big
hit. Today it was grilled cheese but I've done PB&J as well as ham or
turkey and cheese! Somehow cool shapes just make the sandwiches taste
better!