Sugar Bowls Experiment

One day last week, Eric headed out to trivia night with his buddy, so the kids and I had an evening to fill. As if by divine intervention, earlier in the day, my co-worker sent me a link to a tutorial that shows how to make bowls out of melted sugar. I told the kids that after they were done with their homework, we could do a fun project but it was a surprise until then. (They are so easy to manipulate!!)

They diligently worked on their homework and as soon as they were done, we got to work making our very own edible bowls. We melted the ingredients (sugar, Karo syrup, and water) and cooked them until they hit the right temperature. It was a nice opportunity to teach the kids about reading a non-digital thermometer ... learning never ends! Once the mixture was hot enough, we turned off the flame and added our colors -- Annika chose red and Conor chose blue, so we got a nice purple-ish stained glass effect. I carefully poured the mixture over the water-filled balloons and we set a 30-minute timer to let them cool. I quickly realized that I should have made 1.5x or 2x batch to cover all three of our balloons, so I whipped up another partial batch to ensure the bowls would have tall enough sides. Looking back, I probably should have just used smaller balloons because our bowls were huge!! (Note to self: make smaller balloons next time and prop them up on cross-sections of an empty paper towel tube instead of the ramekins.)

Eventually, the bowls were cool enough that I felt confident we could separate them from the balloons. While I held a bowl, the kids helped snip a small hole in the neck of the balloon so we could let out the water without getting the bowl wet. (Easier said than done!!) Fortunately, the balloons released without difficulty (only some random spray) and I was able to put some ice cream in the kids' bowls. They were in heaven... ice cream AND a bowl made out of sugar that they could nibble on. Kitchen fun win for all!

Our cooling sugar bowls

Pretty colors

"Mom, stop making us smile so we can eat these, please!!"

Conor's sugar bowl creation

Annika's sugar bowl masterpiece

My sugar bowl ... too sweet to eat, but fun to make!

S'mores Ice Cream Experiment

Last week, I was peeking around on Facebook when I noticed my sister-in-law (Staci) added a post about making s'mores ice cream (recipe courtesy of Brown Eyed Baker). Hmm.... I was intrigued. We've recently introduced our kids to the ooey-gooey sticky world of s'mores, and I thought the ice cream would be the topping on the cake (so to speak).

The key to the recipe? Toasting the marshmallows! Genius! Most recipes call for marshmallows, but this one really thought about what makes a s'more a s'more.... the toasting! To make our marshmallows have that "just off the campfire" taste, I used our kitchen torch to brown 'em up a bit... and only had to put out a couple of small fires. Too much fun, if you ask me!!

The next step was making the custard, and I had to agree with Staci, it was beyond amazing!! The trick is to make the custard and toasted marshmallows in the blender and create a smooth (albeit unattractive thanks to the cooked/burned marshmallow bits ... seriously, you've never seen a funkier color of ice cream!) concoction. Funky flavored, but soooo yummy!

Looking back, that's where I should have stopped.

After letting the ice cream custard hang out in the fridge overnight and letting it do its thing in the ice cream maker, I added the crushed graham crackers, as was called for by the recipe. In theory, great idea. In practice, not so much. It gave the final ice cream a soggy graham cracker texture that I didn't really find appealing. I'm a big texture person ... nuts don't belong in brownies, chunks don't belong in peanut butter, and soggy graham crackers don't belong in ice cream.

I also made and added the chocolate fudge swirl that the recipe called for. While I love that I have a better technique for adding swirls to my ice cream, I don't think the chocolate really did much for the final ice cream. I'm not a huge chocolate person, so that may be why... I also might have such a hard time moving past the graham cracker effect that I can't appreciate the chocolate. Either way, I've decided if I try again, I'll stop with the toasted marshmallow ice cream and call it a winner!

Last night, I have the kids some of the ice cream for dessert and they LOVED it... devoured it, in fact. Perhaps it is grand as is and I'm just weird.... who knows??

Who wants ice cream???