Cinnamon-Tossed Mulled Self-Picked Apple Cider Marshmallows

Will you believe me if I tell you they taste even better if you make them with apples you picked yourself? Honestly, I have no idea if they do — the apples Jed and I picked will be saved for cheddar-apple pie and chai-spiced apple bread.

I use ready-made grocery store cider for mulling, because I don’t actually have the time or energy to press enough apples to get a decent quantity of cider. 🙂

They still come out DELICIOUS.

Recipe here: https://serendibkitchen.com/2019/11/14/1859/

Delightfully Chaotic

One of the fun parts of packing the Patreon boxes is pulling all the sweets out of the freezer, adding the other items, and making lots of little piles on the kitchen island. Chaotic, but in a delightful way. 🙂

I wouldn’t want to do this more than a few times a year, though! There’s only so much chaos my brain can take.

Fairies Are a Lot of Work

Patreon shipping day at Serendib House — Stephanie Bailey, Darius Vinesar, and Emmanuel Henderson are here to help me pack up and ship out the treat boxes.

My PLAN had been to finish these last week, before the semester started, but I didn’t quite make it, so this week has been somewhat more harried than I intended. Still, it’s done now, and I’m going to try not to think abut the next box for another month or so.

(Which is hard, because I totally want to start thinking about it…shh, Mary Anne. One thing at a time. (Ha ha ha ha ha. (I am laughing in ADHD.)))

I’m pretty happy with how the “fairies and starlight” themed box came out, though my ambition to make everything tiny-sized meant that I ended up feeling like I needed to make more items than normal to compensate. Fairies are a lot of work. 🙂

Sugared Violets

Y’all, I love the *concept* of sugared violets, but I just don’t have the patience. I find the process of brushing them with egg white and dipping them in powdered sugar so fussy, and the end result is never as neat as I want it to be, since the petals tend to stick together.

Maybe if I did it all the time, I’d get good at it, but I think I’m just going to accept that sugaring violets is really not my thing. 🙂

I did like making a violet simple syrup, though…

Fairy Dust Experiments

Kitchen experiments for the Patreon boxes — homemade marshmallow fondant (tasty, easy to make, stretchy and therefore easy to work with, very sweet, the kids like it). Also used an embossing set for these fairy dust cookies (and then gilded the embossed portions).

The result doesn’t look super-professional, but I figure fairies probably aren’t super-professional either. 🙂