The crème de la crème of my daughter’s American Girl Tea Party Birthday were these Ice Cream Flowerpots. They were all she talked about after visiting the American Girl Bistro for a friend’s birthday a year ago, so I knew they absolutely had to make it to the tea-table when we had our own American Girl party. They took a little time, but the delight on the girl’s faces when I brought them to the table made the energy put forth totally worth it!
After begging for an American Girl doll the past three years, my daughter’s greatest desire was granted her last birthday with the gift of a green-eyed, curly blonde haired mini-me. She promptly named her doll “Maddie” and they’ve been inseparable ever since. The gratification of at last owning an American Girl doll all of her own could only be topped by celebrating her birthday this year with a themed American Girl tea party extravaganza. She wanted all her friends to come over and play dolls with her, while enjoying a delightful (and very grown up) tea. So here’s my great big American Girl Tea Party Birthday post, complete with free printable invitations, menus, name tags and all the food and craft ideas you could hope for!
Perfect hard-boiled eggs require very specific boiling time, and the max you can boil at a time (perfectly) is about 12. My hard-boiled eggs recipe has served me well for many years. But there’s a new sheriff in town. Alton Brown. More specifically, his gloriously creamy, perfectly cooked, dozens at a time baked eggs.
If you have a child between the ages of 3 and 13, chances are, you’ve seen The Lego Movie and have endured enjoyed endless hours of “Everything is Awesome” being sung, hummed, whistled and generally trapped in your subconscious. My little rugrats can be found most days sprawled on the floor singing as they create masterful designs with their Legos. For my son’s 6th birthday, we went all out Lego awesomeness.
Here’s the great big Lego party post including great (well, I think so anyway) free printables from me, the best cake and frosting recipe ever, and a round-up of the amazing things others have created that helped me pull of a party enjoyed by folks from ages 3-87.
Since it’s Halloween, you absolutely must have a few sweet things to munch on. Try this easy Scarecrow Crunch or as I call it for grown up parties “Tooth Decay Fodder”. It’s a perfect mix of sweet and salty with enough good (bad) stuff in there for every kind of munchie tooth!
Love this recipe idea? Check out more Halloween party food on my Fabulously Freaky Halloween Fodder post. It’s full of devilish and delicious ideas!
Print Recipe For Scarecrow Crunch
Scarecrow Crunch
adapted from Ryan Bakes
4 cups crunchy oatmeal cereal squares (such as Life cereal or Quaker Squares)
4 cups pretzel sticks
1 (24 oz.) bag candy corn
2 cups Reese’s Pieces (or 1 cup Reese’s Pieces + 1 cup peanut M&Ms)
2 (6 oz.) boxes caramel popcorn with nuts
1 bag Fritos
Mix all ingredients together in a very large bowl. Serve as desired.
Deconstructed apple pie equals awesome chip and dip. This stuff tastes like the filling of an absolutely perfect apple pie. Spiced homemade chips are the perfect shovel for getting all that apple goodness into your mouth. Yuuuuuum!
Love this recipe idea? Check out more Halloween party food on my Fabulously Freaky Halloween Fodder post. It’s full of devilish and delicious ideas!
Print Recipe for Spiced Bone Chips and Apple Entrails
Spiced Bone Chips and Apple Entrails
adapted slightly from The Peach Kitchen
for the apple pie dip
2 cups peeled, cored, and diced apple
2 tbsp fresh lemon
3 tbsp brown sugar
¼ tsp cinnamon
1 tsp cornstarch dissolved in 1 tsp water
for the chips
5 (6-inch) corn tortillas
½ teaspoon cinnamon
1½ tablespoons sugar
Directions
You can either cook this on the stove-top or the microwave.
Combine all the dip ingredients in a small pan/ microwaveable bowl except the cornstarch-water mixture.
Heat for a few minutes until it’s boiling and has extracted juice from the apple.
Add cornstarch-water mixture to the “sauce”
Put back in the microwave/stove top until boiling and the sauce has thickened.
Set aside. You can serve this warm or chilled. It doesn’t matter. It will taste delicious.
Cut tortillas into desired size. {wedges}
Put in a slightly greased baking pan.
Spray the tortillas with a canola oil spray (or you can brush with butter)
Sprinkle with cinnamon and sugar, and bake at 210º C {410ºF} until golden brown, about 5-8 minutes.
Let them cool before serving and serve with the Apple Pie Dip
Summer will never be the same. Cherry pit removal with a straw. Easy peasy.
Take a straw. I used a hard plastic one from a reusable hot/cold coffee cup. Place it at the base of your cherry. Mmmmm. Succulent Rainier cherries.
Then push thru the top. Boom. Done. Mind blown.
Devour. Repeat. Or, do a bunch a time so you can shovel handfuls of delicious cherries into your mouth while laughing like a maniac. Not that I did that.
A couple housekeeping items before we get to the deliciousness here. Notice the new watermark gracing the corners of my photos? Isn’t it lovely? Hopefully it will help keep people (who are not me) from passing off my stuff as theirs. Sometimes I’m so disappointed in humanity. Also, just above the actual recipe details, you’ll find a link to print a pdf of my deliciousness. Hooray! No more highlighting text to print it! Now, on to something that makes me very happy. Camping food.
(happy sigh) I love camping food. It’s the best. I’ve shared my smore bars before, with a graham cracker crust, chocolate middle and mallow topper. They’re quite delicious. But, they aren’t very camping friendly. It’s hard to broil the top of a layered dessert when hanging out around an open campfire. Leave it to Betty Crocker to have a solution. Crunchy graham cracker cereal tossed with buttery marshmallow goodness, with chocolate chips and mini-marshmallows sprinkled throughout. Like a delicious graham cracker rice crispy treat. With all the flavors of smores mixed in. Genius! These gorgeous bars take just minutes to put together and require no baking!
I just have to warn you that I’m extremely angry right now. I came home from a lovely Memorial weekend of camping in the great outdoors to find that someone has stolen content, copy and photos from Bakerlady and passed it off as his own. So here’s my great big “you thieving rat” post.
“Boy Meets Bowl” and “Cocinando con Alena” (both appearing to be run by the same person) have stolen the following recipes, original content and photos from Bakerlady. They’ve been pinned over 50,000 times from “his” blogs. I’ve reported the infringing posts — but until they are taken down I’m going to get on my soapbox (tiny as it may be) and let everyone know that these links are stolen. I’ve included my original links and photos below. If you or a friend has pinned, shared or reblogged any of these photos from the offending sites, please re-post with the correct content/links back to Bakerlady. What these blogs have done is theft. Pure and simple.
Alton Brown’s Stovetop Macaroni and Cheese
Disneyland’s White Chocolate Raspberry Cookie
Chocolate Peanut Butter Pretzel Bars
Yes. All of these were taken without permission. Passed off as original photos, content and recipes by “Boy Meets Bowl” and “Cocinando con Alena”. Seriously. Who does that? Currently I feel like I’ve been defrauded, robbed and impersonated all at the same time. Asking my readers to spread these original links is the only course of action I have while I wait for my legal people to get the infringing content down.
Thank you from the bottom of my royally pissed off heart.
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I love throwing Halloween parties. Mostly because I get to make delicious food and give it disgusting names. Here’s a round-up of all the deliciousness I made this year and the nastiness I called it. Most of these items are easy to make (and can be done ahead of time) so you won’t be slaving away in the kitchen while your guests are having a goulishly good time! My hot hubby and I dressed up as Johnny and June Cash this year. We had a blast!
Bakerlady 