My little chocolate factory

by Karolina, 17th December 2013

I'm a bit behind in Christmas preparations this year. We were away for pretty much all November, so December and Christmas in general, just crept up on me!

But I didn't give up :) I prepared some quick edible gifts for my friends and family. 
This time I played Willy Wonka. My kitchen was turned into small chocolate factory, thanks to the chocolate molds I bought a couple of weeks ago. 

If you don't have those, don't worry, you still can do it using small silicon ice-molds. If you don't have any, you can make just a chocolate bark which you can then artistically break :)

It can't be simpler really. Melt chocolate, pour it into mold,  add your favorite toppings: smarties, nuts, dried fruits...whatever you wish.

I went quite crazy...dark chocolate, milk chocolate, white chocolate. Pistachios, dries cherries, apricots, smarties,  peppermints, you name it!

What's your favorite home-made chocolate taste?

It's time....

by Karolina, 15th December 2013

It's time... to come back :)

It's been a looong, looong time since I was here the last time. 
And being completely honest I missed it a bit. 
If you've missed me - good news, I'm back. If you haven't missed me...well, I'm back anyway :)

It's nearly a year ago that I posted the last time. And it's about time to put up my sleeves, dust the cobwebs of my blog and start over again. I hope you'll join me on this ride...

And on this note I'd like to thank one particular person that kicked by backside and nearly forced me to start blogging again. Yes, you know very well who you are :)

And for a good start couple of photos to get you in Christmas mood...

Merry Christmas!!!

by Karolina, 24th December 2012

May your world be filled with warmth and good cheer this Holy season, and throughout the year!

Wish your Christmas be filled with peace and love.

Cranberry and orange cake...to get into Christmas mood

by Karolina, 22nd December

It's been quite a while since I was here...I wish I had time machine...like a pasta maker :) So I could produce some more of it! But before I find one (preferably on sale :)), I'll have to do with these 24 hours per day.

I have sooo many Christmas ideas and inspirations...but I guess I won't be able to share it this year. A bit too late now....time ticking to Christmas.
And don't get me wrong - I'm excited :) I just wish I had couple more weeks left....
Oh well...next time!

So now, just quickly  lovely cranberry, orange and nuts cake that would be lovely for Christmas.

The general recipe for this cake comes from lovely Joy the Baker.
She uses pecans and coffee in her cake. I replaced the pecans with honey covered peanuts and omitted the coffee. And not streusel (sorry Joy - that was too much for me :)).
You can either go with Joy's lovely recipe or just change it a little bit like I did.

What I really like in this cake is that is made with orange juice which keeps it very moist and tangy and sweet at the same time.

Check it out!
And keep warm :)

It's raining babies!...Dessert table

by Karolina, 12th December 2012

Today's the time to show you the dessert table I made for my sister's baby shower.
The colour scheme was blue and yellow.
So check it out:

Above I featured some details of the table.
My favourite - lemon cake baked...in the lemon! (I'll post the recipe soon).
Then cute small bottles with mix of juices with pretty striped straws.
Because it was a baby shower, I couldn't skip these lovely milk bottle sweets.
And last but not least tea cupcakes with mascarpone and flower made of dried pineapple.

But that was not all :) I loooooooooove dessert tables...so, there's more :)

Here you can see a bit more overall look and feel of the table.
I added some yogurt covered dried fruits and nuts in the apothecary jars.
My mum prepared yummy chocolate filled yeast dough cake :) And after a few perturbations and a bit of search, I added two-tone blue jelly with cream. I really like the jeweled tones of it!
How do you like the backdrop?

Do you think it's all?
Of course not!
There's more :) Yes, I wish you were there as well ;)

Here are a few extras:
- chocolate dipped mandarins
- cotton candy in a biiiiiiiig vase :)
- creme brulee spoons

OK, even I have a bit of sugar rush now....
I think it's enough sweets for today. What do you think?

I'll try to post a few of the recipes here in coming weeks.
But if you're particularly interested in some of them, drop me a note or comment below and I'll share with you straight away!

It's raining babies party - savoury table

by Karolina, 9th December 2012

Today I wanted to show you savoury table I made for my sister's baby shower.

I kept it quite simple this time.

Snacks included:
- Pesto and dried tomato pinwheels
- Apricots stuffed with goat cheese and walnuts with rosemary
- Mango and salmon bites
- Cranberry and herbs buns
- Mango and dried ham bites
- Mushroom stuffed puff pastry in form of clouds (the main theme of this party :))
- Hot tomato, melon soup with cheese toasts (personally my favourite taking rather cold weather outside)

If you're interested in recipes, let me know and I'll share it :)

Take care and till soon!

It's raining babies!

by Karolina, 2nd December 2012

In the last few months quite a few of my friends have become mothers or future mums.
I don't know if there's something in the air but babies seem to show up like mushrooms after the rain :)

And in our family we have one VIP (very important pregnancy :)) - my sister's!
I can't really imagine that in a few weeks my little sister will be a mum...

Because of this special event coming, I was in charge of baby shower...a surprise baby shower.
I won't be telling you about all the logistics around it.. let's just say it that it required a lot of work and ideas to keep it secret (special thanks here to Dad, Pawel and Bartek). But we managed!!!

I'll tell you more about the party in the next few posts, but today, I wanted to share quick DIY.

The theme of the party was clouds and I made this cute cloud mobile for the occasion:

All you need to make it is:
- wreath
- cotton (to cover the wreath)
- paper (for clouds)
- socks
- thread, wool or ribbon

Step 1
Cover the wreath with cotton or wool and secure with thread.

Step 2
Prepare the socks by filling it with cotton or paper and then tie the pieces of thread or ribbon to it.
Cut the clouds out of thick paper, make a hole in each of them and tie the ribbon or thread.

Step 3
Tie the socks and clouds to the prepared wreath.
Hang it (in my case from the chandelier) using ribbons.

That's the final product.
And what's even better, it's the gift at the same time- socks make a lovely gift for future mum. 
Do you want to make it extra special? Fill the socks with additional gifts - sweets, small trinkets, money etc.

 How do you like it?
I'd love to hear from you!