Mr K's Shortbread: Recipe for Success

I welcome myself back to the blog to share with you the recipe used to create our Christmas shortbread in this post.

I find this to be the most simple, clean, cheap and of course, satisfying recipe I have yet to come across.
 

MR K's SHORTBREAD

Ingredients:

500g butter
500g plain flour
200g caster sugar
2-4 tsp vanilla extract


Method:

1. Preheat fan forced oven to 180 degrees (360 fahrenheit) & line oven tray(s) with baking paper.

2. Cream softened butter and sugar with clean hands in a large mixing bowl until a thick "paste is formed. 
(I find the softness of the butter to be a crucial part of a successful recipe. Too hard (refrigerated) and it will not have the ability to be creamed with the sugar creating a lumpy and uneven texture & too soft/melted which will create an unstable and unworkable liquid. I find the best method is to slice butter into 1-2cm pieces and rest on a chopping board while measuring the other ingredients.)

3.  As palates vary, fold in the desired amount of vanilla extract to suit your liking, until combined.

4. Add the flour (unsifted is fine) and fold into the mixture until combined and evenly distributed. A ball of dough should form in the bowl once this step is complete.

5. On a floured bench, knead the dough lightly before rolling. 

6. Using a rolling pin (or anything somewhat cylindrical) roll the dough to a 50mm thickness and trim the edges, creating a large square of dough.

7. As we decided to place small squares in jars, and after getting frustrated with a knife, I found it fast and easy (and overly enjoyable) to use a pizza cutter to cut the dough to the required size.

8. Once cut, pieces were placed on trays & trays & trays and placed into the oven. Oven heat was then reduced to 150-160 degrees (celcius) 302-360 (fahrenheit).

9. Cook for approximately 30 minutes or until golden brown. (I found some pieces towards the edges of trays were required to be pulled out early due to the airflow in the oven.)

10. EAT! EAT! EAT!


A fast and simple way to create a recipe for all the family to enjoy this festive season!

I take this opportunity to wish you all a very Merry Christmas, and hope this can bring lots of happiness and full bellies into your little corner of the world!


Until next time,

Mr. K

Born for Boon.

Its no secret I love Boon! I've posted about my love for Boon here before, but haven't purchased anything else for quite some time. This week however, I am in love with my mail man.

I ordered some babylicious new Boon plates and bowls in an effort to break Stella's current food strike. What toddler wouldn't want to eat out of gorgeous colour combinations like 'grape and kiwi', 'cherry and berry' and 'raspberry and tangerine'. Not to mention they are BPA free, dishwasher safe and throw and drop proof. And they arrived this morning! It's easy to see why I get so excited about some baby gear.

So far our Boon collection included the suction catch bowl, the snack ball and the squirt spoons. But, we lacked anything suitable for an older toddler. So now we are the proud owners of the saucer plates and the interlocking plate and bowl set. I test-drove them tonight and low and behold... the food was eaten!

Not only is it exciting for Stella to eat from colourful and practical feeding gear, but its exciting for me to fill them up with colourful food!

And whats very dangerous? That I have just discovered a new range available in Boon. Oh look out mail man!

Gift guide for little musicians.

Stella has become more and more intrigued with music. She will move and groove to any kind of tune that plays and strums Nicks guitar whilst singing a little tune. She really does have ryhthm! More recently we have started getting out the big keyboard for her to accompany Mr K on the keys. We can spend a whole afternoon playing the instruments, singing songs and having a dance. Its one of my favourite things to do as a family and I just adore seeing my little musical bunny enjoy herself so.

I've put together a quick gift guide for little musicians you may know this Christmas and in the process had some ideas for Stella myself.

...enjoy...

* Jingle feet by Robot Holidays

 

*  Natural wooden zylophone by smiling tree toys.

 

*  Antique wooden childrens grand piano from Simply Chi.

*  Lullaby renditions of Christmas rock classics by Rockabye Baby

 * Musical Baby App for iPhone.

 * Baby's musical hands App for iPad.

Happy musical Christmas days! 

A moment.

 I'd like to take a moment to say Thankyou to everyone for their congratulations and warm well wishes. I am so grateful to have not only the support of friends and family, but the support from complete strangers. People whom I have never met, yet stumbled across in this blogosphere...other digital mamas and papas.

I am so excited to be sharing this journey with you and cant wait to bring weekly and monthly updates along with the exciting countdown to baby #2 gracing us.

An announcement

 The word on the street is...

...Is that we are having a baby! 

We are thrilled, excited, surprised, nervous, elated, clucky, content and proud.

Happiness to the Eye

I snapped these photos a while ago and have been meaning to share them for quite some time. It really is the little things that bring happiness to the eye around my home. Something as simple as a brightly coloured rose just blooming or some pretty new thrifted silverware,crystal and glass.

I like to use simple and vibrant colours around our home along with plenty of black and white. Anything that reflects light such as mirrors, silver and glass seems to brighten everything and allow the sun to dance in all directions.

Interior designers have long known that room decoration affects mood. What pretty things do you surround yourself with to induce a state of calm and happiness? Is it a certain smell you like to burn? A lamp you like to have lit? Or a colour you have in abundance? The psychological effect of  your home decor truly is amazing. Who would have thought that adding a colour or moving a vase could actually improve your mood!

A Christmas DIY

 With all the Christmas organisation going on around this house, it leaves a little extra time to let the mind wander to more interesting things. Things like creative projects and DIYS. What better a way to spend an evening than baking, crafting and creating with your loved ones? One night last week, Nick and I set to work making small Christmas gifts for our family and friends. We giggled and chatted whilst baking, taping and taste-tetsing!

Over time, I have quite the collection of glass baby food jars and wanted to put them to good use. We decided on a cute, packaged up jar of homemade Christmas shortbread. It was a small and simple gift that was low on cost and totally handmade.

I washed and scrubbed all the baby jars and dried them thoroughly. Then it was a matter of simply wrapping gold paper around the jar, taping, then adding a cut off doily tied with twine. I had cut out 'tag' shapes in card, written greetings on them and also attached these with some thread. Its as simple as that!

...Almost!  Nick, being the better chef out of the two of us, baked 25 small serves of shortbread. (He will share his recipe with us later on) We then placed around 7 pieces in each jar and covered with a small circle of cling-wrap. And there you have it! A Christmas DIY.
Baby jars + shortbread + gold paper = Sweet Christmas gifts.

Giving something handmade this Christmas has helped to quell my unease with the excess of materialism and consumerism surrounding us at this time of the year. Call me a party pooper, but I just cant help but think of how much wrapping paper, how many store-bought cards and how much packaging ends up in landfill come boxing day. I wander through the shops and see people bickering over prices and the quantity of products, I see tired, over-stimulated children nagging at their parents for the latest version of 'such and such' and the must-have brand of 'such and such'. It makes me feel deflated and if honest, quite nervous. I don't like thinking of incredible amounts of waste and flamboyance in purchasing. Don't get me wrong, I too enjoy giving. I get excited about the buzz that hits stores in the form of carols and decorations, but there is something about this excessive gift-giving that makes me incredibly uneasy. I think it partly comes from growing up in a household of not many "things". At times, money was stretched and material things were sacrificed, it bought me up with a conscientious mind of waste, want and need.

Giving handmade and using recycled resources makes me feel good, I often hold onto supplies and bits and bobs for this purpose entirely, so that I can re-use it to create and give. If you are creative minded and enjoy crafting, why not do the same this Christmas? Make your own decorations, create your own gifts. Buy less and give more, all it takes is a few resources and some time in 'the zone'.

Happy handmade Christmas!