Dragon S’more Marshmallows

• Homemade vanilla marshmallows = good.

• Homemade vanilla & smoke marshmallows = better. (More interesting flavor, with that hint of smoke.)

• Homemade vanilla & smoke marshmallows sprinkled with sea salt = even better. (A touch of salt adds a great contrast and really wakes up the marshmallow.)

• Homemade vanilla & smoke marshmallows dipped in dark Callebaut bittersweet chocolate = better yet. (Because chocolate — also the slight bitterness helps the marshmallows from being overwhelmingly sweet.)

• Homemade vanilla & smoke marshmallows dipped in chocolate and sprinkled with graham cracker crumbs = best. (If you can’t be sitting by the campfire, or having a dragon toast your marshmallows for you, this will have to do.)

Dragon S’more Marshmallows

3 packages unflavored gelatin
1 c. water, divided
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
1 cup corn syrup
1 T vanilla extract
1 t. smoke extract
1/4 teaspoon salt
powdered (confectioner’s) sugar
butter (for greasing the pan)
sea salt for sprinkling
1 c. bittersweet chocolate chips

1/4 c. graham cracker crumbs, crumbled

1. Add 1/2 c. water and gelatin to the bowl of stand mixer (whisk attachment). Stir briefly to combine.

(NOTE: If you don’t have a stand mixer, you can make marshmallows in a large bowl with a hand mixer — you just have to be willing to hold and beat it for 12 minutes. Prep the pan and spatula for the marshmallows ahead of time.)

2. In a small saucepan (a bigger one will be heavy and hard to hold steadily at a later stage) combine 1/2 c. water, granulated sugar, corn syrup, and salt. Cover and cook over medium high heat for 4 minutes. Uncover and cook until the mixture reaches soft ball stage (240 degrees if you have a candy thermometer), approximately 8 minutes. Once the mixture reaches this temperature, immediately remove from heat; if it continues, it will swiftly turn into hard candy.

3. Turn mixer on low speed and, while running, slowly pour the sugar syrup down the side of the bowl into the gelatin mixture. (Be very careful with the sugar syrup, as it is scaldingly hot and will burn you badly if it gets on your skin.) Once you’ve added all of the syrup, increase the speed to high.

4. Continue to whip until the mixture becomes very thick and is lukewarm, approximately 12 minutes.

5. While it’s whipping, butter a large 9 x 12 pan and dust with powdered sugar. In the last minutes, add vanilla and smoke extracts. Prepare an oiled spatula.

6. Pour the mixture into the prepared pan, spreading it evenly (and swiftly) with an oiled spatula. Sprinkle with salt.

7. Dust the top with enough of the remaining powdered sugar to lightly cover. Reserve the rest for later. Allow the marshmallows to sit uncovered for at least 4 hours and up to overnight.

8. Turn onto a board, cut into squares and dust all sides of each marshmallow with the remaining powdered sugar, using additional if necessary.

9. Melt chocolate in double boiler or at half power in the microwave, then dip marshmallows in them, letting dry on a piece of parchment paper. (If you want chocolate to stay glossy, you’ll need to temper the chocolate, rather than simply melting it.)

10. Sprinkle with graham cracker crumbs. May be stored in an airtight container for up to 3 weeks, or frozen.

Milky Way

Shipping out the “Milky Way” Patreon treat boxes today, $20 / month, shipped quarterly, so I was aiming for $60 value. Honestly, I think this is more like $100 value or a bit more, if you were buying these items separately, but I want my Patrons to be blown away. I think the recipients will be happy. 🙂

These include (roughly left to right):

– a Serendib Home tea towel (this recipient picked “Plaid-ish,” part of the Chess Battle collection)
– 8 oz. curry powder
– an assortment 5 dragon greeting cards (drawn by me and Kavi)
– mini bookmarks (I think I did two sets of 5 flower and 5 food)
– a large bar of knitted dark chocolate with cranberry
– two medium bars of Dragonfruit Nebulae chocolate (dragonfruit, citrus, white pepper) — one of the recipients doesn’t like white chocolate, but I included these in hers anyway because they really don’t taste like white chocolate, which can be a little sickly sweet on its own — these are Kavi’s favorite chocolate bar, and she’s a little annoyed with me that I’ve posted the recipe and didn’t keep it secret to pass down to her, oh well, sorry kiddo, your mom is good at sharing and terrible at keeping secrets…)
– an little confection assortment with cayenne chocolates, milk toffee, blood orange toffee and a little more Dragonfruit Nebulae chocolate (nice for gifting on if you are feeling like this is a lot of sweets for you…)
– spiced hot chocolate mix (with dark chocolate Callebaut chips and mini marshmallows to mix in)
– homemade marshmallows: strawberry-rose, mulled apple cider, dragonfruit/passionfruit
– two big pieces of cashew milk toffee
– two little jars of candy-coated fennel seeds in holiday colors
– crystallized blood orange shortbread
– a few cardamom-rose knitted shortbread cookies
– a few chocolate-cayenne gingerbread dragon egg cookies
– two pieces of Sri Lankan love cake
– two iced rose-pistachio dragon cookies
– one test tube of jasmine & rose black tea
– one yarn ball candle

– five different soaps: knitted mitten (pomegranate-vanilla), knitted tree (fir), ice dragon crystal (sweet orange & naiouli), dragon’s blood egg soap (rosewood, clove, and cinnamon), dragonheart knitted soap (pettigrain and cassia cinnamon)

Whew. Kavi said, as she watched me pick them up, “That’s a lot!” Yes, yes it is.

There’s one more level above this, “Interstellar.” I just need to make a few more items for it… 🙂

Join now to get the “Unicorn Garden” treat box in March… link here.

Stretching Leftovers

Had some Thai seafood curry sauce left from takeout a few days ago, and some rice that was starting to dry out. Sauteed a filet of red flapper in a tiny bit of oil, added the sauce, added some frozen peas, stirred in the rice — that’s dinner, breakfast, and lunch, all v. tasty.

Thank You Gifts

Finished up the knitting-themed treat boxes (employee thank you gifts) and sent them off. They include:

– Rose & cedar soap (rose scent)
– Knit mitten soap (pomegranate & vanilla)
– Candy-coated fennel seeds
– Sri Lankan pistachio & cashew love cake (2 pieces)
– Sri Lankan gilded cashew milk toffee
– Dragonfruit chocolate bar (white chocolate with dragonfruit, citrus & white pepper)
– Knit dark chocolate bar with dried cranberry
– Pomegranate and cayenne chocolate (2 pieces)
– Cardamom & rose shortbread cookie (with sheepies)
– Jasmine & rose black tea in test tube (caffeinated)
– Thank you postcard (that they can mail)

– two little flower bookmarks

🙂

Composing the Dragon Box

This was nice to put together — someone contacted me and asked about treat boxes for their employees; I put together 7 dragon-themed boxes and 4 knitting-themed boxes for them. I can’t scale up to doing this kind of thing in bulk (not without hiring a lot more staff), but doing a few orders like this is fine, and it’s fun composing the boxes.

This is what goes in the dragon box (I couldn’t figure out how to photograph it so you could actually see everything):

– Ice dragon soap (sweet orange & niaouli)

– Bronze dragon soap (cedar leather)

– Blood orange taffy (4 pieces)

– Sri Lankan pistachio & cashew love cake (2 pieces)

– Dragonfruit chocolate bar (white chocolate with dragonfruit, citrus & white pepper)

– Pomegranate and cayenne chocolate (2 pieces)

– Sri Lankan gilded cashew milk toffee

– Chocolate-gingerbread with a touch of cayenne gilded dragon egg

– thank you card (also a postcard they can mail)

– two little food bookmarks

Not Completely Off-Base

Sometimes you have an idea, and you get all excited, like — oh my gosh, wouldn’t it be great to have a pumpkin curry tea towel to sell along with the Sri Lankan cookbook!!!

So you design it and Kavi draws you a pumpkin, and you get it printed, and you sew it up, and all the while, you’re wondering if anyone will actually think it’s as cool as you do. Cool enough that they’ll want to actually spend real money on one for a gift, along with a cookbook and maybe some curry powder?

And then yes, someone actually orders it. Whew.

I am not going to get rich off pumpkin curry tea towels, but it’s still rather nice to know I’m not completely off-base with the concept. 🙂

Higher Tiers of Help

About a month ago, we added some higher tiers to the Patreon subscription boxes that go out once a quarter. If you’re stumped on what to get someone as a gift, maybe a Serendib House 2021 subscription box might be nice? 10% off for annual subscriptions!

We’re happy to customize the boxes to work with people’s allergies (although keep in mind that we do use nuts and gluten in the kitchen, so trace particulates may be present for those extremely sensitive; we don’t use peanuts at all, though). We can also accommodate scent sensitivities, either by skipping body & bath products entirely and substituting in other items, or by sending unscented versions.

The base level (“Earth”) is $10 / month (which works out to $30 / box). This is what’s going in the next level up (“Sol System”), $15 / month ($45 / box):

– eight servings South Asian-style spiced hot chocolate mix, with marshmallows
– one test tube jasmine & rose black tea
– two pistachio-rose dragon iced sugar cookies
– one cardamom-rose knitted textiles shortbread
– two chocolate-cayenne gingerbread dragon eggs
– one candied blood orange shortbread
– three kinds of homemade marshmallows (rose & strawberry, passionfruit & dragonfruit, mulled apple cider)
– a set of five confections (two pomegranate & cayenne dark chocolate, dragonfruit, citrus, and white pepper white chocolate, blood orange taffy, silver-gilt milk toffee
– one little jar of candy-coated fennel seeds
– one dragonheart soap (pettigrain & cassia cinnamon)
– one dragon’s blood egg soap (rosewood, clove, & cinnamon)
– one jasmine soap (not on theme, but I had some extra, so)
– one yarn ball candle (amber & cedar leather)
– two little bookmarks (not pictured)

– and a silver star, just for fun

These are shipping out today! The theme for the winter box was Dragons Knitting; the spring box will be Unicorns in the Garden.

Link to Patreon here. Quantities are very limited, as they kind of take over my life for two weeks, and that’s about all I can spare, time-wise. 🙂

What’s great about these boxes (and Patreon generally) is they give me a nice reliable income stream, small but steady, that helps me make sure I can make payroll for my part-time staff, Stephanie Bailey, Darius Vinesar, and Emmanuel Henderson, without whom none of this would be possible!

South Asian-Style Spiced Hot Chocolate

(5 minutes, serves 2)

When I visited Paris, I got to try hot chocolate the way they make it, which is pretty much melted chocolate & cream — very different from the rather watery (and sometimes gritty) version Americans often encounter.

This recipe is a touch lighter than the French version, and inflected with spices you’d find in chai. The key to maximizing its deliciousness is to use high quality ingredients — dutch-process cocoa, excellent chocolate chips (I use Callebaut or Ghirardelli), and nutmeg grated fresh (your microplane grater will make this easy).

The end result is luxurious enough to serve at a dinner party, but is also just right for comforting your stressed out student facing exams, or for just indulging yourself at the end of a long week. And if you want to make it just a little more French and a little more indulgent, feel free to substitute in half a cup of heavy cream for half a cup of milk!

2 c. whole milk
2 T unsweetened cocoa
1 t. cinnamon
1/4 t. ground cardamom
1/8 t. ground cloves
pinch of nutmeg
pinch of cayenne (optional)
1-2 T granulated sugar (2 T is more American-style; 1 T a little more bitter & French-style)
1/2 c. bittersweet or semisweet chocolate chips

mini marshmallows for serving (optional)

1. Place milk, cocoa powder, spices, and sugar in a small saucepan. Heat over medium/medium-low heat, whisking frequently, until warm (but not boiling), and the cocoa and sugar have dissolved. Add chocolate chips and whisk constantly for another thirty seconds or so, until the chocolate chips melt and distribute evenly into the milk. Serve hot, ideally with a few mini marshmallows on top!