Tuesday, July 31, 2012

Macaron fail & Olympic knitting

I was at work Saturday night and we were going to get out early, so I thought what better than to bake! I grabbed 2 great gal pals from work and we set out to make Macarons. We made it from THIS BOOK, and thought we were so legit because everything was going to plan! Just look at our baking skills.



Attempting to have the peaks with the egg whites.



Letting the food processor get our crushed almonds and flour and hazelnuts all mix together. We actually doubled our batches because we wanted to feed everyone at work our fabulous macroons.



So much so that we needed so many bowls.



This is where we think we might went wrong. Or at least partially. This is our version of sifting the dry ingredients. I must say that this morning, my handsome man of mine, has gotten me a sifter =). I am very excited to try some of the ingredients that have failed because of this damn sifting necessity.



Piping the macarons are not too hard, but we think we had runny batter. . . This doesn't keep shape of a proper macaron. We were also piping onto wax paper, which I think is the same thing as parchment paper, just cheaper.



After piping, you have to let the macrons sit for 20 to 30 minutes. We let them set for 25 minutes. Then we put them in the oven and baked them for 10 minutes. You then have to let them cool for 10 to 15 minutes. After all this waiting you can attempt to take them off the parchment paper. Let me just confess that this is way harder than you think.

1. We were very anxious.
2. After confessing our epic fail to the pastry chef at my work, we should have put the cookie pans in the freezer for a few minutes so the cookies could peel off the wax paper easy.
3. Apparently French Macarons are IMPOSSIBLE to make.



We made a double batch, which should have given us 32 sandwich macarons. We got 8. It was super sad, but we each had 1, and my mother snacked on the rest because I forgot to take them to work. We were proud with what we accomplished, and will try these again, but they took 2 hours to get all the ingredients, prep the batter, wait for them to sit, bake, cool and put together. These Hazelnut Chocolate Macarons are hard to make, but what we did, were good.

The girls were very happy they helped me. They said it would've been nuts to try these on my own, and I agree.

Now onto my knitting =)



I started this exactly when the opening ceremonies began in London. I am very proud of my progress but still know I have to keep moving. I'll be knitting everyday and I have to. I'm excited to have a sweater :)



Lastly I wanted to show off some flowers I got for my room =). Just wanted a little bit of pink flowers to brighten my room up.

Until next time, I'll be knitting ;-)

<3 Carly

Thursday, July 26, 2012

Cookies & SHOPPING!

First I'll show you my finished pillow =)



Just a quick pin and I decided to put in the stitches as a decorative fashion.



Can't wait to put it in my new apartment. I think I'll do a few more but need some more fabric. I want one that has a big "BEAUTIFUL" on it. If you know me, you know that is my favorite word. I'm waiting to hear back from my roomies if they have any requests, so definitely stay tuned for more pillow projects :).

Now onto the cookies. I asked what I could make my wonderfully handsome boyfriend for his road trip to the Lumberjack World Championships! He simply wanted some chewy chocolate chip cookies. He gave me a foodnetwork magazine and HERE you can check out the recipe. The magazine had a basic guide to how to make cookies crispy, chewy, and cakey.



On the right track with the butter and sugars, the batter looked fine. I got fresh dark brown sugar and unsalted butter just for this occasion.



Adding the dry ingredients it still looks like it's right on track. Just put the chocolate chips in and it'll be good to start baking right? NOPE!



I didn't read the entire recipe before starting the cookies. I had to refrigerate for "at least 1 hour, preferably overnight". And I wanted to make these before dinner with my man. So I packed up my batter that had been chilling for an hour already and put it on ice in a cooler and set way to his house. Once I got there and put the batter in the fridge to chill a little more. After chilling the dough and preheating the oven, I started the cookies.

Each batch took about 10-12 minutes. I set my timer for 12 because I was using chilled dough. I checked on it after 10 minutes and they looked good. Nice and fluffy, yet probably chewy. I waited until my timer went off and went to the oven to take out my perfectly chewy cookies. FALSE! These cookies were flat flat flat. I was making them when my man was distracted, so I altered the oven to 25 degrees lower and set my time for a minute less. At 10 minutes on 375 they looked perfect! This had to work. NOPE. They were still coming out flat. I tired other alterations that were all slight and still nothing really stuck.



My man wasn't distracted long once he could smell freshly baked cookies, and who would be? Well we tried troubleshooting together and still nothing would work. I finally went over the recipe again and noticed a tip up in the corner. You are supposed to SIFT the dry ingredients in order to let air get more into the batter. I felt very bad but handsome assured me they were good. I made many many cookies for him and he shared with everyone on their 15 hour drive to Wisconsin. He even sent me a text when they were a few hours away with the message "cookie love" and one of his friends at the wheel and chomping on a cookie =)

Next is my shopping trip. Oh how Tanger Outlets are fabulous. I also had a bunch of coupons for the Tanger Outlets that let me have 20% off a single item at certain stores. Well here's my loot.



Up in the corner are some lovely NINE WEST boots with a little heel. They were on super sale and just $22 and very cute for fall.

Next and right underneath is a pair of shorts and jeans with the holes from PACSUN. They are both a great fit for my tiny bum, haha.

Underneath is that lacey white top and it's lovely with the orange shorts right next to it, which are from GAP OUTLET. So are the jeans right next to the orange shorts. Again, all great fits and great prices.

Now this plaid shirt right here that is an actual button down that fits me great is from JCREW. I can't explain to you how long I've looked for a button down, and one that fits all aspects of me.

Lastly I got a romper, my true addition in clothes for the summer, from GUESS.



Didn't mean to have my head cut off but I can't take a picture of myself that well, even with a timer- haha. Rompers are such an addiction. I can't not get them. Haha-

Well I'm off to enjoy the rest of my baklava from the farmers market, until next time,

<3 Carly =)

Tuesday, July 24, 2012

Craft Day & Pirates

Monday was great. My banana friend and I got to craft ALL day =)

First off, we went to DORSTOP for breakfast. It's in Dormont, right on Potomac off of West Liberty. They've been on Diners, Drive-ins and Dives! We both had Bob's Specialty, which includes 2 eggs, toast, German potato pancakes and it's SO GOOD!
It's also important for my breakfast, if I'm going out to get it, is to have eggs. =)

Anyway, we've been working on our T-shirt blankets, but it is a lot of work and when it's raining out, quote pillows just seemed like the ideal project.



My pillow has "NEVER REGRET anything because at one time it was exactly what you wanted."



Banana's says, "Hope does not disappoint" and the reverse has "the ONLY thing that counts is FAITH expressing itself in LOVE."



We had to try out the letters between each word. "T" is such a common letter and there was only 1 in the stencil sets (we got a small, medium and large set). So just take the time to look at my second and third line and how time consuming that was, haha. TOTALLY worth it though!



My pillow is stuffed and just waiting to be sewn up the edge. I wanted the stuffing to set a little before sewing it up, just to also admire an unfinished, but beautiful pillow =)

Now I haven't forgotten about my knitting either. My socks are actually coming along quite quickly.



And I've knit even more since this picture =)

I also want to show off the project I will be knitting during the Olympics. Now first I must direct you to this article, but understand, I am just knitting a project during the same amount of time that the Olympics are going on. It's quite crazy how the article is so against knitters & crocheters doing projects and having teams along with the Olympics. They say things such as, it's insulting to the athletics - it distracts from the real Olympics. All in while, they are donating money to the Special Olympics. . . . Some people just want to be rude I guess.



This is the "Weekend Swoncho" from the magazine, The Love of Knitting. I don't know when I started getting this magazine but I'm glad I did. Now the yarn in the photo is from my favorite yarn stores big summer sale, Bloomin' Yarns. It is so soft and I just can't wait to knit it up. The needles are also from the summer sale and they are beautiful lantern moons. =)

After banana and I crafted all day, I dropped her off back at school and went to dinner with my handsome man. We went to the Double Wide Grill in South Side before going to the Pirates game. I had free tickets from work and I love an evening with my man ;-). I completely enjoyed the pulled pork from dinner and then we got to enjoy dipp'n dots from PNC Park.

The whole day was great. Crafting, great food, great company, great summer =)

Until next time,

<3 Carly

Tuesday, July 17, 2012

Favorites: knitting & tea

I offered to do a project for my favorite yarn store, Bloomin' Yarns. It was a Weekend Wrap (you should be able to finish it in a weekend). I think it's so cute and tempted to do one for myself =)



I think it went with my outfit today too ;-). I'd like to do mine in a basic cream color, so it can go with more and give a real beachy summery feel.

Now I must show my first finished sock from the flirty pair and how far along I am on the second one.



They fit like a glove :)

Lastly, my tea love. I made a Tea Wreath. Now as a crafter, I am a member of not only Ravelry, but Pinterest as well. These sites I could spend hours on just looking up great projects to do.



I'm really glad I finally did this project because I'm going back to school in just the shortest amount of time ever and I'll be in an apartment with some other tea loving friends. I'm sure we'll all enjoy using this.

Now, not listed, but all my friends know a favorite is movies. I am SO excited to see the midnight premiere of The Dark Knight Rises. It was filmed right in front of my school, the building I live in and just my campus in general. I am so excited and I geek out when I see any previews. My handsome and I are going and I'm so excited =)

Until next time, I'll be knitting and tea drinking ;-)

<3 Carly

Saturday, July 7, 2012

Cookies and CAR! =D

Oh yeah, I got a car.



it is a Honda Civic 2012 EX

=D

and I'm making cookies for a party I'm going to tomorrow. The kitchen sink ones again. They were a big hit last time with my handsome and I wanted to make them again. I'm worried because I was freezing the nuts to keep them fresh, but I don't know, I'm always very critical on my baking.

I'm also working hard on my socks and should be finishing the first one very shortly :). I'm working on a project for my favorite yarn shop as well and stuck in the one part of doing YO backwards. I'm usually not confused with my patterns, but I'm going to have to look up how to do this arm hole.

Until next time, I'll be driving around in my new car ;-)

<3 Carly