City Sidewalks Busy Sidewalks, New York City 2012

One of my favorite traditions of the Christmas seasons is the annual girls trip that we take with my Mom, Sister and I.  This year however, we got to bring my darling 11 month old niece.  Our first night, my Mom and Sister went to a musical while I got to babysit this little munchkin.  

 The next morning, we went decided to take her to Macys to meet the REAL Santa Clause.  When you arrive you stand in a really long line, and watch the Miracle on 34th Street windows.

 Here is another window, there are five, but ill save the rest for when you get the chance.

 Here is the line next to the train...

 A picture of the train, and then when you walk inside the train cards, it gently rocks with the sound of a train. It's really cute.

When you get off the train, you enter the North Pole.  Where there is the talking tree, and animated snowmen, penguins, and elves.

 There are also Elves that interact with you while you are waiting in line. Lyla loved it!

 She BELIEVES!!! No fear for this little one when she first met Santa.  She was amazing, and so was her Mommy!

 Trees and ice skating in New York City, look at the beautiful decorations on the live tree.

 Crumbs bakery, a must stop when we go.  They always make our favorite cupcakes.  White Hot Chocolate, Peppermint Swirl, and Red Velvet.

 Store windows and the snowflake hanging in the middle of the city.

 Little miss was a trooper and it had been a long day, shuffling through the crowds and city all cozzied up in her sleeping bag.

 Rockefeller Center Christmas tree, and ice skating below with other shops and there lights.

 Anyone who knows me, knows I have a slight Anthropologie obsession. So here are some of the darling store windows across from Rockefeller Center.

 Alices Tea Cup is a must stop for us every time!

 I may have a love for cupcakes but my little sister has a love for Pies!!! So her friends told her to check out this darling little shop and get a pie.  For a non pie lover, the LITTLE PIE SHOP, sure knows how to make some incredible pies!

 Time Square where we were staying.

 Saks 5th Ave Store Windows. The theme was snow.  Sorry for the lousy pictures kinda hard to get.

 Of course we had to go to a few Musicals. This is one of the plays we went to that my sisters friend Nikki was in.  She did an amazing job! We also wen to Newsies and Peter and the Star Catcher.

 We decided to skip Normals this year and try out Max Brenner Chocolate Bar.  It was good, but it doesn't hold a candle to Normas!

 My sister got the BLTA with waffle fries.

 My Mother got the Breakfast burrito with a chipotle salad.

 I was naughty and got the waffles with strawberry sauce and white chocolate.

 This was a church we saw on our walk to SOHO.

 View from our window at the Marriott.

My little sister and I saying goodbye to Time Square!

Treacle Tart

One of my favorite desserts that I had on my visit to England was Treacle Tart.  Its a lovely tart that has this buttery, carmely flavor. Its quite difficult to describe but its a must try.  I am even considering making it for Christmas day.  Sorry about the quality of the pictures, I took this at the quaint little inn we were staying at.  This is the actual Treacle tart that I got to try!  When I make it for Christmas day, im going to use this recipe and let everyone have there own.  So here is the recipe in case you want to try it, or if anyone out there has an amazing recipe, please share it with! 

Treacle Tart
Makes one 9 inch tart, or 2 dozen tartlets

Ingredients

FOR THE CRUST
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/3 cup confectioners’ sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup (1 stick) cold, unsalted butter, cut into 8 pieces
3-4 tablespoons ice water

FOR THE FILLING
18 oz. golden syrup (or 12 oz. light corn syrup combined with 6 oz. molasses)
2 eggs
finely grated zest and juice of 1 small lemon
3/4 teaspoon ground ginger
2 tablespoons heavy cream
1 cup fresh bread crumbs

For the crust: In the bowl of a food processor, combine the flour, sugar, and salt with 2 or 3 pulses. Evenly distribute the cold butter over the flour mixture and and pulse 10 to 12 times, until the mixture resembles coarse corn meal. Sprinkle 1 to 2 tablespoons of the cold water over the flour mixture, and process with 4 to 5 pulses. After processing, the mixture should look sandy. Transfer the mixture to a large bowl. Sprinkle another tablespoon of the water over the mixture and use a rubber spatula to press the dough together. When the dough looks shaggy and a bit dry, but holds together, turn it out onto a lightly floured surface and knead 3 or 4 times until the dough comes together completely. Add more water, up to 1 tablespoon, as needed. Handle the dough as little as possible to prevent melting the butter.

Continuing to handle the dough lightly, shape it into a disk six to seven inches across. Wrap the disk in plastic wrap and chill in the freezer for 30 minutes, or the refrigerator for at least two hours.

Once chilled, Place the dough on a lightly floured surface. If making many small tartlets, work with half of the dough at a time. Roll the dough to about one-eighth of an inch thick. Line tart pans as directed above.

Place the tarlets on a baking sheet and chill for at least 30 minutes, preferably in the freezer.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Once chilled, line the tarts with bits of foil or parchment and fill each one with a small amount of pie weights or dry beans. Bake mini tartlets for 15 minutes. Bake a full size tart for 20 minutes. Allow to cool completely before filling.

For the filling: Combine all of the ingredients in a medium bowl and pour into the cooled tart crust.

Bake for 20 minutes (for tartlets), or about 30 minutes (for a standard tart), or until the filling has set.

Allow to cool completely before serving. Serve with clotted cream, vanilla ice cream, or fresh whipped cream.

Christmas Tea

The Christmas season is always a very busy time of year for me.  In fact, this year it started very early for.  I work in a Design store that sells high end Christmas decor during the season.  So with working long hours of designing and selling, plus designing clients homes for the holidays, along with my own I have been a very busy girl.  With little time to get blog post out, I'm sadly behind this year.  Though Sunday I will have another post out of Christmas in my house and so on...

After I finished putting Christmas up in my little home, to celebrate our house being finished, we decided to have a midnight Christmas tea while we watched a movie.  So I whipped up some English scones, clotted cream and jam.  Made up a fresh pot of loose leaf berry tea from England. Took out some fresh cakes from the local bakery, and some shortbread cookies and curled up by the soft glow of the Christmas tree.

Stay tuned for more exciting post, and a very special Sugar Plum Fairy party in January for my darling little nieces 1st Birthday!

Mini Pumpkin Spice Cake with Salted Carmel Frosting and Cream Cheese Frosting

TO make this pumpkin cake, I put two small bundt cakes together, with salted carmel frosting inbetween, and cream cheese frosting on top.  Then placed a broken twig in it.  I love the rustic look that it has to it, and its the perfect November treat!

 I'm sure many of you have seen pictures of the carved out apples with apple cider inside of them.  How about Carmel Apple Cider??? I used left over carmel from the sauce, added it to some store bought apple cider, and used a cinnamon stick to stir it.  It tasted amazing!  Then to make the cake I found this amazing recipe on Two Peas and Their Pod that you can find here!

Brown Butter Pumpkin Cupcakes with Salted Caramel Frosting

Yield: 15 cupcakes

The best pumpkin cupcakes you will ever eat!

ingredients:

For the Brown Butter Pumpkin Cupcakes:

3/4 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 2/3 cups all-purpose Gold Medal flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
1 cup canned pumpkin puree (not pie filling)
1 cup packed light brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 large eggs

For the Salted Caramel Frosting:

Salted Caramel Sauce:
2 cups granulated sugar
12 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature, cut into pieces
1 cup heavy cream, at room temperature
1 tablespoon fleur de sel or Maldon sea salt flakes

Frosting:
3/4 cup butter, at room temperature
2 cups powdered sugar
1/2 cup salted caramel sauce

directions:

1. To make the brown butter pumpkin cupcakes: preheat oven to 325 degrees F. Line muffin cups with paper liners and set aside.

2. In a saucepan, melt the butter over medium-low heat and continue to cook, swirling occasionally, until butter turns golden brown, Skim foam from top, and remove from heat. Pour into a bowl to stop the cooking, leaving any burned sediment behind; let cool.

3. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves. In another bowl, whisk together the pumpkin puree, sugars, eggs, vanilla extract, and brown butter. Add the flour mixture, and whisk until just combined.

4. Divide batter evenly among lined cups, filling each three-quarters full. Bake, rotating tins halfway through, until a cake tester inserted in centers comes out clean, about 20 minutes. Transfer pans to a wire cooling rack and cool completely before removing cupcakes.

5. While the cupcakes are cooling, make the salted caramel frosting. First, make the salted caramel sauce. Make sure you have all of the ingredients ready. Once you start the caramel sauce you have to pay close attention so you don't burn it. To begin, heat the sugar over medium high-heat in the bottom of a heavy 2-3 quart saucepan. When the sugar starts to melt, start whisking the sugar. The sugar will clump up, but keep whisking. It will continue to melt. When the sugar is melted, stop whisking. You can swirl the pan to move the sugar around.

6. Continue cooking the sugar until it reaches a deep amber color. Make sure you watch the pan very closely. This is where it is easy to burn the caramel. You want the caramel to reach 350 degrees F. If you are new to making caramel, I suggest using a thermometer.

7. As soon as the sugar reaches the dark amber color, carefully add the butter. Whisk until butter is melted.

8. Remove the pan from the heat and carefully pour in the heavy cream. Whisk until cream is incorporated and caramel is smooth. Whisk in the fleur de sel or Maldon sea salt flakes.

9. Let the caramel sauce cool for about 10 minutes in the pan. Pour the caramel into a large mason jar and cool to room temperature.

10. To make the frosting: beat the butter in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment on medium-high speed until light in color and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Reduce speed to low, add powdered sugar, and mix until completely incorporated. Turn off the mixer, and then add the salted caramel sauce. Beat frosting on low to combine, and then increase to medium-high and beat until airy and thoroughly mixed, about 2 minutes.

11. Frost the cooled pumpkin cupcakes with the salted caramel frosting and and drizzle cupcakes with extra salted caramel sauce, if desired.

Cream Cheese Frosting

1 pkg. Cream Cheese at Room Temp.

1 Cube of Butter at Room Temp.

1 T. Vanilla

2 T. Heavy Cream

4 C. Powder Sugar

In a mixer combine cream cheese and butter until they are blended smoothly together.  Next, add the vanilla until it is incorporated throughout the mixture.  Add 1 cup of powder sugar at a time, alternating between the heavy cream.  Once it is all mixed together, beat on high until the mixture because fluffy.  If the mixture is too thick to spread, then add a little more cream. If its too runny, add a little more powder sugar.  Add in some orange food coloring at the end to create the pumpkin look.  I went for a more rustic/natural look with this.  But you can make the pumpkin more detailed if you like.

Orange Chocolate Chip Cookies

 Ever get tired of eating the same old chocolate chip cookie. I do, but I love how quick and easy they are to make.  One of my favorite holiday combinations is orange and chocolate.  So I thought, why not add it to a chocolate chip cookie.  I took a basic chocolate chip cookie recipe, and added just a few extra ingredients to turn it into this!  I hope you enjoy!

Orange Chocolate Chip Cookies

2 1/2 C. All-Purpose Flour
1/2 t. Baking Soda
1/2 t. Salt
1 tsp. Cardamon
1 C. Unsalted Butter, softened.
1 C. Dark Brown Sugar
1/2 C. White Sugar
1 T. Vanilla
2 Eggs
1 T. Orange Zest
1/2 of a fresh orange, juice.
2 C. Milk or Dark Chocolate Chips

Preheat over to 350 degrees. Add all the dry ingredients together, flour, baking soda, salt, and cardamon together.  In a separate bowl, mix the butter and brown and white sugar together.  Next, add in the eggs one at a time, mixing until the mixture because light and fluffy. Add vanilla and orange juice and zest and mix.  Your batter may separate a bit, dont worry too much because it will turn out fine in the end.  Next add in the dry ingredients a little at a time. Last, add 2 cups of chocolate chips. Bake for 10-12 min.  The cookies shouldn't brown up, if they do they have cooked too long. You want them a little soft, let them sit on the cookie sheet for 2 minutes, then on a cooling rack until cooled.

Halloween Painted Pumpkins& Vintage Picture

 Carving pumpkins can be a fun tradition, but they never last very long.  So I thought something fun to do would be to paint pumpkins and making them have a stone look to them.

 Start with a plastic pumpkin, this one is actually really cute so its the only one I had that wasn't painted. But the painted ones were just plain orange ones.

 First step, spray paint a grey primer on the pumpkin and let it dry.

Paint with the Orange Martha Stewart Terra Cotta paint, and blot it on the pumpkin with a sponge brush.

Once dry, paint on in various places Martha Stewart Living textured Metallic.  Finish off with Martha Stewart Living Mettalic paint in white.

The finished product!

 I placed them next to a old fence post by the fireplace, and made it look like a pumpkin patch!  I love how they turned out!!!

 For the vintage painted picture start with an old picture frame.

 Spray paint the picture the base black.

 Take out some pages out of an old dictionary and glue them to the board.

 When it is done, it should look something like this.

 Decide what image you want painted on, I choose a pumpkin, and paint the image on top of the pages.

 Next, I took some basketball ornaments and painted them orange, and then added a face to them.

 Once dry, I tied them up to the top of the picture with some fun Halloween ribbon.

 Then added some on the sides.

 

Halloween Books and Wreath

Have you seen those cute stacks of Halloween books in stores, and think, that would be fun to buy but its just not in my budget.  Well how about revamping your "vamp" books. 

 I took my Twilight books, and decided to use them for decoration on my table.

 I used a page from an old dictionary, cut it to cover the sides and glued it on. If you dont want to damage your book, you can always just tape it on.

 Then I painted little pumpkins down the sides of the book, put them together, and tied them up with a bow.  Totally simple craft, but brightens up the room and makes it look totally cute! If you dont want to ruin the sides, why not take off the paper covers of the hard cover books, tie it together with ribbon, and   place them on your coffee table.

 Sometimes we find a good deal on a wreath that doesn't exactly fit into a decor, so the key is to make them fit!  I found these wreaths at Sam's Club, and decided to make them fit into my whole vintage theme a little better.  The tinsel fits with the vintage vibe that I was going for, and my little splash of candy corn works in my theme.  

 To start cut out a few pages out of an old book, I used an old dictionary.

Pinch the page down in the middle to gather it together to make a paper flower.

 Like so...

Use a hot glue gun to attach them to the wreath. Place a glob of hot glue on the bottom of the flower.

 Place it deep in the wreath.

 This is what it looks like when its done.

 Glue two pieces of ribbon in the middle of the paper flower coming out.

 This is what it will look like when its done.

Hang it up with a long piece of ribbon and tie on the top of a nail.  Then ENJOY!!!