They’re called Scotch Eggs. Don’t ask me where I got the idea to make ‘em–I don’t remember! What I do recall is reading about them some place and making a note to kitchen-test them when I had the chance.

Don’t let their name fool you. Scotch eggs are believed to have been cooked up in a London food shop in the 1700’s, not by a chef in Scotland. Each one is a hard-boiled egg wrapped in sausage mixture, breaded and deep-fried. Sinful? Yes. Yummy? Abso-scottish-lutely! (Hehe.)

To make these less, er, bad, I decided to try the recipe with turkey sausage instead of pork. I threw in some fresh thyme into the sausage mixture after I removed it from the casings; somehow thyme is just awesome in sausages, so I figured it would give the dish a little extra curly twist.

Other than that, all I did was wrap the hard-boiled egg, dredge it in flour, dip it into beaten egg and gave it a final coating of breadcrumbs. Have to admit that it was a bit tricky because I had to remember to use one hand to do the dipping (which was wet) and another hand to do the flour-dredging and the crumb coat (which were dry). But I survived and cooked these in really hot oil two at a time to try and maintain the heat in the pan. These would be a breeze in a deep fryer!

These are a traditional picnic food because of their portability. They’re often eaten cold with pickles, but they were delicious when we sampled them warm. I imagine these would be great with different dips on the sides like ketchup, ranch dressing or honey mustard.

What I ought to do is try making smaller, bite-sized versions with quail eggs. Those would be way cuter and would be easier to handle. If you get the chance to make the mini ones, let me know how they turn out!

Have a great weekend, laddies!

Toni of Wifely Steps is celebrating five years of the wife life (and the blog life!) and this is my way of joining in on all the anniversary fun at her site.

When I made the decision a couple of months ago to start blogging, I decided that Wifely Steps would be a writing prompt. Toni’s Peaches ‘n Cream March ‘08 Blog Carnival became one of my first posts and connected me to a lot of other curly friends who have since then come back to visit me. Plus, it gave me a chance to finally try the recipe for my Peach Be With You Cupcakes–one that I had wanted to kitchen-test for the longest time! Joining the carnival was a shot in the dark for me because I had just started blogging, but that shot hit a lot of blogging birds.

Aside from the fun and insightful posts on Wifely Steps, the blog continues to hold top spot on my Bloglines list because Toni, being a blockmate from college, is a lifeline to a city that I truly miss. Being a curly girl on the other side of the world is not so tough when I can still read about life in Manila.

They say that the traditional fifth year anniversary gift is WOOD. For all the crafting I do, I can’t quite fashion anything from lumber (hammers are scary!), so I’m going with the modern anniversary gift for a momentous fifth year—SILVERWARE. And since I know squat about HTML, all I can make is a fun sparkly badge! (Pinilit talaga.) I’m TRYING! Teehee. Plus, look closely, it’s a boy-and-girl salad server set by Patrick Meyer (check Uncommon Goods for details), jazzed up with a curly catchphrase.!

So, all the best to Toni and her H, and here’s to more years of Wifely Steps (maybe they’ll have made all the Twilight books into movies over your next five!)

Ah, to be a kid again, and have cupcakes like these at your birthday.

Or have a bouncer like this, shaped just like the Mystery Machine, with a slide inside that convinced even adults (including your crazy, curly-haired aunt) to bounce the afternoon away!

I was tasked with making cupcakes for the kids at my nephew and niece’s birthday last week. I had a lot of fun making them because I got to tint the frosting in Scooby colors (they actually sell gel icing colors as a Scooby set).

The cupcakes were vanilla ones from a recipe by Alyssa Torey and Jennifer Appel of Magnolia Bakery fame, with buttercream icing, also by the same folks. They were moist and yummy and brought all kinds of happy memories. After all, they’re called Traditional Birthday Cupcakes in the cookbook!

I felt like a cheat because all I did was tint the frosting and put a pre-made Scooby hard sugar topper on top of each cupcake after frosting it. Haha.

I just noticed how the bottom right Scooby looks like he’s up to no good!

Here are all the cupcake colors, after arranging them on cake stands with a sprinkling of confetti.

A great compliment I got about them was when my Tita Jess, the kids’ grandma exclaimed, “Look at the cupcakes J. made,” to which my cousin Josie (the kids’ mom) said, “I never have to worry when I ask J. to make something!”

And of course, this smile from my niece, was the BEST compliment of them all.

Shaggy: Who’s your best buddy?
Scooby Doo: Raggy
Shaggy: That’s right. And who’s my best buddy in the whole wide world?
Scooby Doo: Rooby Doo!

little ms firely sent me this feline pal because I was one of her featured friends.

To keep up this meme, I’m tagging these blogger friends. Probably not all of them are curly girls like me (well, Via is!), but I’m sure they’re just as curly minded like I am!

Via, Rachel, Toni, Mitzi, Odette

1. Via is one of my featured friends.
2. So when Via makes her featured friends for the week, she has to include my name and she should pick 4 or 5 more from her own list of friends.
3. She has to inform all her featured friends to try and keep the ball rolling.

Here’s a badge for my featured friends to use on their own blogs, crafted from a photo I took of some cupcakes made last week. They’re Vanilla Cupcakes from the Magnolia Bakery Cookbook, topped off with Buttercream Icing from the same. Oh, and sprinkles, yum! (More on these cupcakes in my next post!)

Happy meme-ing to all.

…of my Curly Universe!

It’s been a little over a week since my last post, eek!

My curls and I have been swamped with many (wonderful) things, hence the absence. But, those post-less days made me nervous and edgy. Is there are term for that in the blogosphere? Post withdrawal? No-post malaise? Post-less anxiety? Teehee.

Since my last post:

1) I became a kid again by sliding down a bouncer with my niece at her fabulous birthday party. (More on the cupcakes I baked and all the fun at this Scooby Doo-themed celeb later!)

2) A new post at work made me rediscover the old-school charm of red China Markers.

3) I’ve gotten new crafty books and am jumping out of my skin to bake and sew from these wonderfully written resources:

4) I undertook the gargantuan task of reorganizing my closet. Took two days, lots of hard decisions about parting with certain things and lots of plastic bins and labels. I can now make full use of my shoes after storing each pair in containers like this.

And patiently labeling each one with the type and color of each pair (i.e. Heels: Blk Strappy; Sneaks: Nvy Stripe and so on) with a labeler like this from Dymo.

A bit much? Teehee, I DO have my curly quirks! (But seriously, I owe my closet’s full functionality to that labeler. Thanks to Ana for lending it to me!)

5) Despite the strange weather, Summer is announcing itself through nature’s colorful telegram: jacarandas in full bloom along our street. I never really liked purple, but these are practically pretty. I want to borrow the colors for a sweet-little-something-sewn.

6) On an un-crafty note, and because Sex And The City opening weekend is just a few days away, I saw Charlotte’s Mr. Harry Goldenblatt (Evan Handler) in Father’s Office in Culver City last Friday! I wanted to say something, but was too shy.

That’s been my week. Looking forward to more posts, blog-hopping, hopefully joining contests, answering memes and everything else possible, just to prevent another bout of post-less anxiety!

Hello again to all, and welcome back to me.

It’s called Softie Sweet, and is a “decorative cushion cake kit” cooked up by Rani, an OTIS College Of Art And Design student. I saw it at that art show I wrote about a couple of entries back, and it was my favorite toy design among the many that I saw. It’s ingenious, fun and makes me wish I was a kid again!

It’s a basic round felt box that’s also storage for all these “cake” pieces (different types of fruit, pretend tufts of cream, a second cake tier, etc.), that you can take out and attach to the felt cake as decor. It has Velcro on the bottom of the pieces, so you can detach and arrange the pieces however fancy strikes you.

Rani had conceptual designs for other baked goods too - like cupcakes and pies, etc.

Eyeluvit!

Any box with French words in script on it, especially if one of the words is “Patissier”, is bound to have scrumptiousness inside, waiting to take a hold of you the minute you lift the lid.

My brother’s girlfriend got this box at a conference and showed it to me. And oh my, I’m so glad she did. Look at all the yummy things inside!

Wait, don’t bite into these (even virtually!) just yet. Look closely. Each of those confections is actually a terry cloth towel, rolled up to resemble a cupcake, a slice of mocha cake and a chocolate roll. I kid you not. I had to do a double take because they looked just like the real things.

These faux treats are done by a Japanese company called Prairie Dog. They have an entire line of towel treats, each one so cute I don’t know if I could eat–I mean use–them! See all of their eye-candy linens on their website HERE, or stay a while and enjoy these mouthwatering images:

 These ingenious fake bakes are available at Japan Trend Shop.

Hmm, do you think it’s:

a) a new type of vending machine?

b) a tear through the space-time continuum and that’s actually a hand from, er, Mars?

c) a pakulo at an art students’ senior show that I didn’t want to go to at first but ended up enjoying?

You’ve probably figured the answer out, smart cookie that you are! (Ross, however, would say B!)

Last Friday, I allowed myself to be dragged to the OTIS College Of Art And Design Senior Show. I didn’t want to go at first. I didn’t know what to expect and didn’t want to be stuck spending a perfectly good evening staring at an abstract painting, with people beside me nodding and saying, “Ah, yes! Ze colors! Ze anglez! Ze light!”, with me pretending to understand what they see. As I’ve mentioned before, I’m not artistic at all, not in the fine arts sense. Crafty, yes. Visual, a little bit. But artistic? Even my stick figures raise their little stick-y arms in protest at how bad they look!

But the show was great! I looked at (and throughly enjoyed) art pieces in all sizes, shapes and manner. Those OTIS kids are awesome. So much talent. Even their refreshments for the night were artfully delivered by black-gloved hands sticking out of holes in a white wall. For some reason, a lot of people were wary of taking the free treats! But some did, and it was fun watching the arms go back into their holes, only to come out with other treats (even tissue!):

What made the night for me was a costume display by the fashion students, a retrospective on classic Disney characters’ costumes. I had to keep my jaw from dropping. Look at all this beautiful work.

Needless to say, I was snapping photos right and left. I was giddy with all the colors and shapes that filled my head. It turned out to be an inspiring night. The moral of this post is: ALWAYS go to an art show. That, and don’t be afraid of gloved hands sticking out of a blank wall.

Learn more about OTIS’ art programs HERE. And for more inspiring photos from that evening, including some really fun toy designs, go to the GWAC Flickr photo set HERE.

Leaving you with my favorite painting from that night, and yes, of course, it’s of a girl and her cake mixer.

As a frustrated dressmaker, I’m fascinated by the creative genius of clothes designers. The whole lot of ‘em, even the ones whose clothes I’d never consider wearing (or making). It was after this TVC came out that I started paying attention to Chanel. (It’s Baz Luhrman’s 2-minute take on the Roman Holiday storyline, starring Nicole Kidman. The ad had me as soon as that poofy pink dress unfurled!)

Since then, I’ve been guilty of gawking at anything Chanel.

I’ve spent undisclosed amounts of time in bookstores and Amazon, inhaling stuff like this:

Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel was a beloved figure in couture history. And now French filmmaker Anne Fontaine is making her life into a movie! Audrey Tautou will play Coco in Coco Before Chanel, a biopic that will attempt to portray the designer’s life in Paris before she became a rising star in haute couture.

I’m confessing: I can’t wait!