Brielle's Notions

Vegan Strawberry "Milkshakes"

Greetings,

So....I wanted something sweet and some lovely strawberries were sitting on the counter. Hmmm....the possibilities.

Now. Let's pretend my kitchen looks like this....

All those bottles, tins and cannisters are exactly something I would love to have in a kitchen. Not to mention a giant marble table.

Here is the finished concoction of strawberry goodness.

I don't actually have "a recipe" per say, for this concoction. I was inspired by this recipe that I saw a link to from Glamour Magazine.

Here is what I threw into the blender...

• - Lots of strawberries! (I think...I used 8...or  9?) Not sure. opps!
• - Coconut Milk (So Delicious Brand) Just poured it into till it looks right.
• - 2 heaping tablespoons Almond Flour (I made my own) 
• - 4 heaping tablespoons rolled oats.
• - dash of pineapple juice as a sweetener (or you could use honey, etc...)

I put the oats and almond flour in first to grind it up. Then added the coconut milk and let it sit for about 10 min. Then I came back and added the strawberries and dash of pineapple juice. Blend, blend...blend! 

The oats and almonds once soaked sort of take on a more "creamy" texture. So this way I get that dairy feel without having to use any milk at all. Awesome!

Pour into glasses and add a cut strawberry.

This makes 2 servings. (You can share. Or drink them both yourself...)

 So adjust how you need to for your own recipe. I don't often measure for smoothies, I just pour it in until the mixture looks right for how much I want to make.

Enjoy!

I think I am officially addicted to smoothies.

Green smoothies are my favorite thing for breakfast....and fruit smoothies make a great snack/treat.

 

Do you enjoy blending up your own drinks?

 

Elven Bread Recipe

Suilaid, Im gelir ceni ad lín!

I really like Lord of the Rings. alot. I grew up reading the books and then watching the movies.

It is something I shall never grow out of. I still want to live in Rivendell...

If you are a fan you might recall the Lembas bread!

Well here is my own version of it.

This Lembas Bread was made for my cousins hobbit birthday party.

I found the recipe online about 3 years ago. (can't remember where..sorry!) 

I modified it and added a few touches of my own. So the recipe below is the result.

Lembas Bread Recipe

1 cup of Butter (or vegan butter)

1 1/2 cups White Flour

1/2 cup Oat Flour (or rice flour)

1/2 cup Honey

1/4 tsp Vanilla

3 teaspoons brown sugar

1 teaspoon finely ground almonds

dash of ground cloves

dash of nutmeg (more or less to taste)

dash of Cinnamon

____________________________________________

I pre-heated the oven to 350.

Mix together the flours and ground almonds in a bowl. Set a side.

Cream the butter with the Honey and Vanilla in a mixer or another bowl.

Now add the flour mixture (slowly!) into the sticky honey mixture.

You want the dough to look like a scone mix. (or muffins) So it isn't too sticky, but not too hard.

Add more flour if you need to.

Take the dough and place onto a floured surface. Smush out into a round shape, that isn't too tall. Like just shy of an inch. ok, once you have that nice round shape cut the dough into slices.

You are left with slices of Lembas that needs to be placed onto a cookie sheet.

Bake for about 15 min. So they are that perfect golden brown color.

Once removed from the oven spread a bit of melted honey on the top. yummy!

 The taste and texture is like that of a british shortbread.

I think Tolkien would approve.

*I doubled mine for the party, but the above recipe will make one batch.

If you want to get creative you can wrap them in large elvish leaves. I also served it with homemade blueberry/peach jam.

Thanks for reading!

If you give the recipe a try let me know. :)

Namárië

A hobbit birthday cake!....

Greetings!

I was recently invited to attend a sweet sixteen birthday party for my cousin.

With a Middle Earth Shire theme complete with hobbit style food.It was a very lovely party full of festivites and good family time.

....I made the cake. What do you think?

Well my grandma baked it and made the 3 perfect frosting roses...and my mom made the frosting. So I just got to do the fun part! (aka decorating and painting...)

We wanted to make my hobbity cousin something fun that was a hobbit theme.

Of course we could have done Bilbo's birthday cake, but...it didn't seem unique enough for our occasion. So I thought, oh! a Lord of the Rings book of course.

I used her favorite colors and covered the book shaped cake in "pages" of rolled vanilla fondant and painted it with food coloring. The cake is lemon with cream cheese filling.

The "one ring" was actually my grandma's idea. She had it left over from when she used to decorate wedding cakes years ago.It added that perfect finishing touch.

Thanks for reading and looking at the "girly hobbit/LOTR birthday cake". 

Happy Sweet 16 Meggie!

Inspired by Chocolat

Greetings,

(this post is best read while listening to this song or this soundtrack)

I recently watched the movie "Chocolat" and it made me want to be a gypsy and travel around making chocolate.

However, being that isn't very practical at the moment I decided to create some "Maya" inspired hot chocolate instead. (I'll work on that traveling around like a gypsy later)

 
The costumes were very well done also. I loved the fact that Vianne and her daughter wore red wool capes...very fantasy like.

Renee Ehrlich Kalfus was the costume designer for the film and was nominated for best costume design award in 2001.

She did a lovely job! The whole look for the costumes was historical, but old world/modern fantasy at the same time. I think my favorite looks were the outfits she styled for the gypsies(Pirates!)....and of course Vianne's gowns were quite cute.

 
 So here is the recipe I came up with...feel free to change it up! I just added a bit of this, and a bit of that until I had the taste I wanted.

 

~ Maya Hot Chocolate ~

• 1 cup of coconut milk (so delicious brand) * you can use real milk also
• dash of cinnamon
• dash of fresh ground nutmeg
• dash of chili powder
• drop of vanilla
• 2  heaping tablespoons of  sweet baking chocolate (best quality you can find) ... or more depending on what you like.

Heat milk on medium/low heat and whisk in powder ingredients. Add the drop of vanilla and whisk until heated. Pour in a pretty cup and enjoy! Best if served with a chocolate truffle or slice of chocolate cake....

 

 I poured mine into a vintage tea cup for a late night treat.

 
 

I want to start making real chocolate from scratch...such as truffles, candies etc... so we shall see how that goes.

Thanks for reading!

Oh, if you decide to watch "Chocolat"... there is a good review on it here.

Night Shade Smoothie Mix....

Greetings,

Today I thought I would share a smoothie recipe and a bit of what I add to my daily smoothies.

 

I was over at Sayward's blog reading her post on how to make your own "green powder" for smoothies. What a great idea! (not to mention so much cheaper than getting it at whole foods) So I set to work on drying up a laundry basket full of fresh organic kale.

Here is what it looks like dried...

 Next step was to grind it up in a fine powder. (I actually used a food processor for all of it, but I wanted to try with my mortar and pestel for a small batch...because it is way more fun)

 
 Once I had all that crunchy dried kale turned into a fine green powder it was time to store it.

I decided to put it in my "Deadly Night Shade Jar" from Disneyland. Sally, (from Nightmare before Christmas) is on one side...and the words "Deadly Night Shade" are on the other side. The lid seals tightly and is perfect for storing powders of all kinds.

 Here is a front shot of the jar. Also, you can see the fine ground kale powder and the fresh kale side by side there. I found that 2 full tablespoons of kale powder was equal to one bunch of kale. Pretty awesome how concentrated it becomes.

 
 Why use Kale in smoothies?

Kale provide excellent sources of several essential nutrients. Potassium, Vitamins C and K as well as lots of dietary fiber. Kale is also a huge source of calcium. You can use fresh kale in your smoothies (tastes awesome!) or you can use the powdered kind (can't taste it at all).

Blue Berry "nightshade" Smoothie.

• about a cup of fresh blueberries (frozen is fine too)
• 1 frozen banana
• 1 cup of orange juice (more if needed)
• 1/2 cup of organic unsweetened so delicious coconut milk
• about 1/2 cup of fresh marion berries (or frozen black berries are fine too)
• a cup of frozen strawberries.
• 2 tablespoons of kale powder...aka, deadly night shade mix. ;)

 

Throw everything in the blender and mix for about 2 min until totally smooth.

Pour into your favorite tall glass and enjoy! The glass I am using is from Rainforest Cafe...It was free when you bought a poison python drink.

 
What kind of smoothies do you like?

I will also be doing a post on my Bright Green Smoothies.

Thanks for Reading!

Baby Dragon Tea

Well I suppose it isn't baby dragon tea, but a baby dragon tea thermos.

I have a fondess for all thigs to do with fantasy dragons and I drink tea constantly, so when I saw this it simply had to go home with me.

 

I liked the simple little design on the front and the sleek silver look. The lining is actually made of clay so it doesn't have that "metal taste" or "plastic taste" that a lot of travel mugs have. I will be using mine for all my chai teas.

One of my favorite chai teas is the Maharaja Chai Oolong Tea from Teavanna. It has a spicy flavor that reminds me of tea from ancient times or a fantasy world. It is extra delicious with a bit of honey in it as well. The blend of cinnamon, ginger, pepper, cloves, cardamom and nutmeg are just perfect for me.

 

You can purchase a tea thermose like mine Here .

This was not a sponsered post by Teavanna, I simply wanted to share my little dragon find. :)

Thanks for reading!

Sewing Energy Food! (sweet treat edition)

Greetings,

I have a weekend of sewing ahead of me and thought some "sewing energy" food was required for the journey.

 

•´¸.•*´¨) ¸.•*´¨)
(¸.•´I happened to see that my favorite chocolate brand was on sale, so I picked up 2 bars of all natural dark chocolate in 2 flavor varieties.

One is Intense dark chocolate with cranberries and almonds (has a wolf picture on the front) and the second bar is the one pictured here with the bat on the front.... Yes, usually the packaging sells me on chocolate and these taste amazing too, so I get the best of both worlds.

I also need a giant mug of herbal tea!

My Pirates of the Caribbean mug from disneyland works best for this.

•´¸.•*´¨) ¸.•*´¨)
(¸.•´ Another treat/snack of my weekend is fresh raw coconut...it is tastes great cold and is nice to go cut off a little chunk for a bit of a tropical treat.

And last but not least. Organic Red Raven Plums.

ok. I really like ravens. alot. I always wanted a pet one like Maleficent had in Disney's Sleeping Beauty movie. I would just need a cool staff like that to have it perch upon. Anyway...

All that to say when I saw red raven plums with a raven sticker on them, I simply had to buy a few.

 So there are my "sweet treats" for this weekend.

What do you eat as a treat when you are sewing/working/studying?

 

Thanks for reading!