Month: July 2014

Princess Party Favors: Candy Necklace Cards

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Planning Eve’s birthday party each year is always so much fun coming up with new themes. And this year we’re doing a Princess Birthday Party. Making adorable decorations and favor bags has been a blast. Get all the details on how to make these Princess party favor candy necklace cards for your next party!

Princess Party Ideas

There are so many princess birthday party ideas flooding the internet. After wading through endless princess stuff, I decided to use more of a traditional princess theme rather than a Disney princess party. I knew I wanted some custom party favors, but I didn’t really find anything out there I loved for purchase, so I decided I needed to create my own.

First up was the princess crown Candy Button favors. I love the nostalgic feel of the old-fashion candy combined with ultimate princess accessory.

Next up, candy necklace cards. These cute candy cards were the hit of the party. The girls just couldn’t love them more. Who wouldn’t love candy jewelry, right?

Princess Candy Necklace Party Favors | Five Marigolds

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Homemade Birthday Cake Ice Cream

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Homemade Birthday Cake Ice Cream | Five Marigolds We’ve established that I’m a big fan of ice cream. But, cake. Oh how I love cake, too! Eve chose Birthday Cake ice cream as one of her flavors for our ice cream truck and it didn’t take me any convincing to agree. I set to work researching recipes, but yet again found that most recipes called for eggs, which was not what I was going for.

So took my favorite ideas from the interwebs, then adapted a basic vanilla ice cream recipe to create this fabulous birthday explosion for the tastebuds.

What you’ll need:

  • 1 C. Whole Milk
  • 1/4 C. Granulated Sugar
  • 1 Box Yellow Cake Mix, separated (I used Funfetti)
  • 2 C. Heavy Whipping Cream
  • 1 t. Vanilla Extract
  • Buttermilk Icing (I made 1/2 of this recipe and used about 1/2 of that. You could also use store bought icing!)
  • Sprinkles, if desired

What to do:

  1. Reserve half of your cake mix, and prepare the remainder in an 8″ or 9″ round pan. When it’s done, remove it from the pan and place it in your freezer.
  2. Place small drops of buttermilk icing on a small sheet of freezer paper, and then place it in the freezer to set up. I used an icing bag and a small round tip to make mine uniform because I was photographing it, but you don’t need to make these pretty. I also colored my icing to make it festive and pretty.Homemade Birthday Cake Ice Cream | The Scoop
  3. Mix the milk, sugar, and 1/2 C. cake mix until the sugar and mix are dissolved.  Stir in the heavy cream and vanilla, and place the mixture in the fridge.
  4. Cube 1-2 cups of the frozen cake into the size of croutons.
  5. Place the liquid mixture into your ice cream maker* about 20 minutes until it thickens. Then, slowly pour the 1-2 cups of cake cubes and desired sprinkles into the machine until it is lightly mixed.
  6. Place the mixture into a sealed container in the freezer for at least 2 hours or overnight.

*No ice cream maker? No problem. Freeze the chilled liquid mixture for 2-4 hours or until slightly thickened/frozen and then gently stir in the cake cubes and sprinkles. Chill overnight.

Homemade Birthday Cake Ice Cream | Five MarigoldsYUM! Your kids will beg you to make this recipe again and again. I hope you enjoy this recipe! Please tell me what you think in the comments below.

Sweet Treat: Easy Homemade Candy Buttons

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There’s just something about Candy Buttons. These nostalgic candies are surprisingly easy to make, and are perfect for birthdays, party favors, or just a fun sweet treat.

To make Candy Buttons, all you need to do is prepare a simple royal icing recipe. You can use the recipe listed on the can of Meringue Powder, but I used the following recipe, inspired by Sweet Sugarbelle:

What you’ll need:

  • 1 lb. confectioner’s sugar (4 3/4 cups)
  • Meringue powder (about 1/4 cup)
  • 1/3-1/2 cup water
  • 1-2 tablespoons flavored extract (I used almond extract because it’s what I had on hand, but there are tons of fruity flavors at the craft store that would be fun to try!)
  • Food coloring
  • Electric mixer
  • Freezer paper
  • Icing bag and small round tip (or a resealable bag with a tiny corner cut off would work in a pinch)supplies

To prepare:

  1. Whisk the dry ingredients together.
  2. In a separate measuring cup, mix the flavored extract into the water.
  3. Slowly begin pouring the liquid mixture into the powder mixture while it mixes.
  4. Mix the frosting on medium-high speed until the frosting forms stiff peaks (around 7 minutes)
  5. Add food coloring to achieve desired color. (I first made pink frosting, and later added a few drops of blue to make purple to get two colors out of one batch.)

Next, tear off a sheet of freezer paper – large enough that you can fit a large batch of buttons on (you won’t cut the paper until these are dry).

Fill your pastry bag (I used my Pampered Chef Decorator Bottle Set*) with frosting and twist the top, removing excess air. Now, simply pipe evenly sized dots across the paper. If possible, print a template in advance and place it below the freezer paper. Be sure that the design will fit into your final packaging. If you’re using pretzel bags for your packaging, your design will need to be approximately 2.15 x 5″ to fit the pretzel bags I would be placing them in.Candy Button Crown Template | Five Marigolds

Candy Button Heart Crown Party Favors _ Five Marigolds_45mLet the Buttons sit overnight to dry. Any excess frosting will keep in a resealable bag refrigerated for two weeks.

Now for the fun! Once the Buttons have set up overnight, you can begin cutting the freezer paper to your desired shapes.Candy Button Heart Crown Party Favors _ Five Marigolds_35m

Package your Candy Buttons for the occasion. I placed them in Wilton pretzel bags that I got at JoAnn’s for $1.37 using my 40% off coupon. Think of the possibilities! Birthday party favors, Valentines, and more!Candy Button Heart Crown Party Favors _ Five Marigolds_15m

Valentine's Candy Button Hearts _ Five Marigolds5m

Valentine Candy Buttons

 

In addition to being featured on the fab blogs listed on the right of this blog, this post was also featured on Huckleberry Love.


Homemade Malted Milk Ball Ice Cream

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I just love the tasted of malted milk powder! As a kid, my mom would often top plain vanilla ice cream with sprinkling of this powder, and our favorite ice cream shop in town had a popular malt with 2x the malt powder. Yum!

I wanted to introduce my kids to the same flavor, so when we came up with the idea to create our own ice cream truck, I went on the search for a good Malted Milk Ball ice cream. Unfortunately every recipe I found included eggs, which I didn’t want to mess with. So, I came up with the following recipe using our Cuisinart Ice Cream Maker*.

What you’ll need:

  • 1/2 C. Malted Milk Powder (I used the chocolate flavor because it was all I could find at the grocery)
  • 1/2 C. Granulated Sugar
  • 1/8 C. Brown Sugar
  • 1 C. Whole Milk
  • 2 C. Heavy Whipping Cream
  • 1 T. Vanilla Extract
  • 2 Cups Malted Milk Balls, chopped + more for garnishing, if desired

What to do:

  1. Whisk together the dry ingredients in a mixing bowl.
  2. Add the milk and use a mixer or whisk until the sugars are dissolved.
  3. Stir in the cream and vanilla.
  4. Set it in the fridge to cool at least 2 hours or overnight.
  5. Pour the chilled mixture into your ice cream mixer* for 15-20 minutes or until it’s thickened.
  6. Slowly pour the desired amount of Milk Balls into the drum while the ice cream mixes, or fold it in at the end.
  7. Freeze in an airtight container for about 2 hours. Enjoy!

The result? Amaze-milkballs.  Ahem.

Homemade Malted Milk Ball Ice Cream | Five Marigolds

What do you think? Are you a fan of Malted Milk Ball ice cream? I’d love to hear your favorite ice cream flavor in the comments below.

*No ice cream maker? No problem. Once you’ve reached step five, simply put the container in the freezer for 2 hours or until it begins to freeze slightly. Stir in the malted milk balls and stir after another hour to evenly distribute, if necessary.  

Homemade Malted Milk Ball Ice Cream | Five Marigolds

Homemade Cookie Dough Frozen Yogurt

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Cookie Dough Frozen Yogurt Recipe | Five MarigoldsDub has the heart of an entrepreneur. And marketer. He’s always saying things like, “I want to open a restaurant and name it ____,” or, “I wish I was old enough to start my own ______ business.” I love this quality about him, so this summer I wanted to show him that he can bring his ideas to life.

We chose to hone his kidpreneurial ambitions through his dream of owning an ice cream truck because, his mom really likes ice cream what better timing than summer? He immediately knew he would name it “The Scoop” and his pitch would be “Get a scoop, double scoop at The Scoop!” I encouraged him and Eve to brainstorm some ice cream flavors. They each came up with two ideas and we’ve been enthusiastically experimenting to finalize our menu.

Today we landed on our first unanimous winner.  It’s a frozen yogurt that’s just as tasty as ice cream, with a super-sweet cookie flavor blast for the tastebuds.

Cookie Dough Frozen Yogurt Recipe | Five MarigoldsWhat you need:

  • 1/2 C. unsalted butter, softened
  • 1/2 C. packed brown sugar
  • 1/4 C. granulated sugar
  • 2 t. vanilla or almond extract (I’m a huge fan of the almond extract for this recipe!)
  • 1 C. flour
  • 1/4 t. baking soda
  • 1/4 t. salt
  • 1/2 C. mini chocolate chips
  • 1/2 C. crushed crunchy-style chocolate chip cookies (around 4 Chips Ahoy cookies)
  • 1 C. vanilla yogurt – I highly recommend Dannon Lite & Fit Vanilla yogurt for the best flavor

Directions:

  1. First, mix the butter and sugars with a mixer.
  2. Then, in a separate bowl whisk together the flour, baking soda and salt. Add chocolate chips and crushed cookies.
  3. Gently fold the flour mixture into the sugar mixture until well combined, then thoroughly mix in the yogurt.
  4. I like to use my CuisinArt Ice Cream maker for this recipe. Make sure to freeze the vessel for at least 48 hours before churning. 
  5. If you don’t have an ice cream maker, freeze overnight in a sealed container, then fight the urge to eat it for breakfast.

Cookie Dough Frozen Yogurt Recipe | Five Marigolds

That’s it! No fancy ice cream maker necessary. Try it for yourself and let me know what you think!Cookie Dough Frozen Yogurt Recipe | Five Marigolds

For those of you who have asked where I got the ice cream container, I found it on a clearance shelf at TJ Maxx, but you can also buy it online in several colors on Amazon. I’m going to buy several so I can have several flavors sitting in my freezer at once 🙂