Easy and Fun Recipe: Homemade Cottage Cheese

My daughter recently watched a television program about making cottage cheese and she became very interested in wanting to make her own. A few minutes on the internet and we found dozens of recipes and how- to's.  The recipe we followed was from Val Harrison at Allotment.org.uk. I was curious and hesitant to try the cottage cheese but I must say it tasted good!

Here's what you need:                                            

2 pints of skimmed or semi-skimmed milk.               

2 tablespoons of lemon or white vinegar. (we used lemon)

Pinch of salt

saucepan

wooden spoon

sift or sieve

Here's what you need to do: 

• Pour the milk into the sauce pan and heat until hot but not boiling.
• Stir occasionally and cool down for a few minutes
• Add 2 tablespoons of lemon or white vinegar
• Stir and watch the milk separate into curds and whey
• After cooling put the mixture into your sifter to catch the curds
• Discard the whey
• Transfer the curds into a small bowl and add a pinch of salt

Dorinda's shop, Raising Green Kids, offers eco-friendly products for your family. Follow her on Facebook and twitter and at her blog.

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National Pancake Day

Happy National Pancake Day!!
Hope you are enjoying some pancakes for dessert tonight. Why not try a new recipe for super fluffy pancakes?

Ingredients: (makes about 30 small pancakes)
280g Self-raising flour
50g Caster sugar
2 Eggs
300ml Milk
Pinch of bicarbonate of soda
Pinch of salt

Instructions:

1. Mix the flour, sugar, bicarbonate of soda and salt in a big bowl.
2. Mix the eggs and milk together in a separate bowl.
3. Make a well in the flour mix and add 1/3 of the milk mix. Mix it all up and keep adding more of the milk mix slowly so you don't get any nasty lumps!
4. Once it is all mixed together you can decide if you want to add extras (like raisins, lemon juice & zest, blueberries etc)
5. Dip a kitchen towel into some oil and wipe the bottom of a frying pan with it. You really need very little oil for these pancakes! I oil the pan once at the start only, no need to do it more.
6. Heat the frying pan over the lowest heat on your stove. Using a dessert spoon, spoon 3 lots of pancake mix into the frying pan to make 3 small separate pancakes (you may be able to fit 4 in at once if you have a large frying pan).
7. Leave the mix alone (really don't touch it!) When the tops of your pancakes are all covered in bubbles (usually 2-3 mins), carefully flip your pancake.
8. Leave for another minute or so. To test if they are done try nudging them gently with your spoon, if they move freely they are done, else give them a bit more time.
9. Dress with chocolate sauce or maple syrup and enjoy!!

Thank you Stephanie from Toastie Studio for sharing this yummy recipe, we hope you enjoy your pancakes!!

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Ready for Halloween? Lunch Boxes!

Halloween is creeping closer!! Get the kids excited and worked out with some fun Halloween themed lunch boxes. We have 5 great bento and lunch boxes that we are loving this Halloween.

Mummy Pizza Bento box from Happy Little Bento

Frankenstein Bento Lunch box from Kitchen Fun with My 3 Sons

{Driving Me Batty} bento box from "I should be mopping the floor"

Lots of different Halloween bento's from Wendolonia

Frankenstein Monster Wrap from Another Lunch

And to send all these spooky snacks to school here are some Halloween food sacks and bibs from our team members.

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Ready for Halloween? Treats!

Either your throwing a party, or plan to have a treat bowl out for the neighbourhood kids finding something to fill it with can be super fun!!
If you want to creep it up we have found some great recipes for spooky treats.

Ghost pops - Banana on a stick, coated with shredded coconut, or you could dip them in white chocolate. View recipe at Nugget Market.

Witches Hats - fudge striped shortbread cookies, with Hershey kisses on top, super easy to make! View recipe at Rada Cutlery.

Spooky Jell-o - simple to make with orange or blackcurrent jell-o. View recipe at kraft foods.

Ghost Toasts - All you need is some bread, whipped cream cheese and currents to make these spooky snacks. View recipe at Spoonful.

And with all these yummy Halloween treats, you need something to collect them all in! And we have some adorable treat bags from EtsyKids Team members just for that!

CurlyMaeDesign... $2.25	TinyRoseBoutiq... $18.00	ladesigns2 $25.00	fAverittecreat... $20.00
mamamade $24.00	MargauxMakes $3.00	subtlesimplici... $13.00	BurpieBundles $16.00

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Fun Snacks this Summer

This summer I have seen so many creative ideas to make fun creative foods for kids. Fruit and vegetables, breakfast, lunch and snacks! Here are some of our favorites, enjoy!

Berry Fish Bread from Funny Food Recipes

Peanut Butter Banana Split Sandwich from Inspired RD

Carrot & Zucchini Bars from MOMables

Rainbow Fruit Kebabs from Sumptuous Spoonfuls

Lemon Squares from Babble (plus other deserts)

UFO Banana Bagel from Spoonful

Peachy Parrot from Kitchen Fun with my 3 Sons

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Olympic Breakfast

If your house is like mine, the Olympics have been the only thing on our television for the last 10 days. We’re enjoying watching the athletes compete, learning about new sports, and celebrating the victories. Today, my son told me water polo is his favorite Olympic sport. Random, but he does love to swim and play in the pool.

These scones are super easy and a fun breakfast or snack while you watch the games. Scones are served with afternoon tea in Britain, with clotted cream and jam. Cheers!

Scones and Nearly Clotted Cream

Scones

Mix together

2c flour
3t baking powder
1/2t salt
2T sugar

Cut in

1/4c softened butter

Mix in

3/4c milk
1 beaten egg

Roll to a 1-inch thick circle. Transfer to baking sheet and cut into 6-8 wedges but don’t separate. (This time I cut them into 16 because I made them to share.) Bake 25 minutes at 400 degrees. Serve with nearly clotted cream (below) and jam.

 Nearly Clotted Cream

Combine

1c sour cream
1t brown sugar
1t vanilla

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Urban Farming: Involving the Children

Sarah, of ThatsAWrapBaby, has been sharing a short series of posts on her blog Three Little Monkey's on Urban Farming.  Today she shares of one of the projects in her series.  You can visit her blog (see her May 2012 posts) for other projects in the series.  

The kids and I set about creating a tiered herb garden yesterday afternoon. This project was inspired by one in the book The Ultimate Step-by-Step Kid's First Gardening Book. The book is fabulous and brimming with wonderful, kid friendly gardening ideas.

This project is perfect for kids of all ages. I had an 8 year old, 5 year old, and 4 year old helping, plus a 2 year old watching on. We modified the plans a bit to accomidate our meager budget! Instead of pretty terra cotta pots of varying sizes, I found some plastic and metal pots in the dollar bins at Target (small, medium, and large. Make sure they'll nest). They aren't as pretty, but they'll serve our purpose well. I am also banking on the herbs growing large and hiding the pots a bit.

First things first, make sure you have the right tools gathered. We had our three nesting pots, a bag of soil, a trowel, some seeds, and a few small herbs. We chose basil, thyme, lemon balm, chamomile, and curly parsley. There is a bit room for more, but that's what we had. Steer clear of mint, as it grows rampant and will take over your pots! Have fun choosing your favorite herbs or try new varieties. There are so many to choose from.

After we gathered our tools, we set the medium sized pot inside the largest pot and filled in all around with potting soil. We had a few herbs that were already a bit large, but mostly we had seeds (trying to be economical!!). We planted a couple types of seeds and a couple larger plants in this bottom tier. 

We filled in a bit more and then set the smallest pot into the middle one and filled in around it. We planted a few more herbs in our middle pot.

We then filled the top pot with soil and planted a lovely bit of curly parsley to crown our herb garden.

This fun project was quick and easy! It was perfect for including all of the children and gave them a real sense of ownership in our garden. 

 Try this project with your own little ones! Keep it in a sunny place and let them water it each day. Very soon, their own herbs will be gracing the kitchen!

We would LOVE to have you join in the conversation with comments or links to your own adventures in Urban Farming!

Sarah can be found on Facebook, at her Blog, and on Etsy at her shop ThatsAWrapBaby:

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Toddler Sensory Activity: Colored Spaghetti

I was making dinner the other night {spaghetti and meat sauce} and though how fun it would be to play with the spaghetti! I knew coloring it would make it even more fun so I did some browsing and found this video on how to color spaghetti. It's really easy...just take a look.

I didn't have any watercolors so I used food coloring. It worked just fine but didn't distribute the color all that evenly.

If you don't have a sensory table {I don't} then you can use a bowl, tupperware, one of those disposable lasagna pans {which we used}...pretty much anything your little heart desires. There are also tons of sensory table DIYs around the internet if you are handy enough to make one yourself. We also have a water table that we like to use.

Bug had so much fun playing in the spaghetti. In fact, it was an all day project! Here are all the things we did with it:

First we played with it using our hands.

 Then I broke out the toddler scissors.

 She had some trouble with them so I showed her to lay it over a cup and use 2 hands to cut.

 Then I held it and she used 2 hands to cut.

Bug served me some scoop-fulls using kitchen tongs {great for motor skill development}!

I even dared to let her take it out by the carpet to cook in her kitchen.

She stepped in the tub and wiggled her toes. {I think she liked this best - be careful though, it's slippery}

We took the spaghetti to the kitchen floor and made some shapes with them too!

It was so much fun! How will you play with spaghetti?

If you like this post and want to see more toddler activities please visit my blog, Tutus and Tea Parties. You can also follow me here: Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Pinterest.

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