Unicorn Poop Marshmallows

Unicorn food is taking of the world right now. Its all over Pinterest, its in ever cutesy indie cafe, and I’m loving it.

I’ve seen lots of recipes for unicorn hot chocolate recently, and while I think they’re all incredibly cute, I think they’re missing one finishing touch.. Unicorn marshmallows. Making marshmallows is one of my favourite things to do, and I personally think they taste a million times better homemade, so I took inspiration from one of my favourite Lush bubble bars to create these pastel perfect unicorn poops.

Making the marshmallows is fairly straightfoward, but does take a little bit of time and you’ll need a candy thermometer!

In a heavy based saucepan, mix together 200ml water, 450g caster sugar and 1 tbsp golden syrup. Pop in the candy thermometer, and start heating the mix, without stirring, until it reaches 127C.
While its heating, soak 9 gelatine leaves in 140ml water in a bowl and leave to one side.
In a large bowl, or stand mixer, whisk 2 egg whites until fluffy. If you’re using a stand mixer, just keep this running at a medium speed, or if you use an electric hand whisk, stop when soft peaks form and wait for the sugar mix.
Once the sugar boils up to temperature, remove the thermometer and pour in the gelatin/water mix and stir until fully dissolved, then slowly pour into the egg whites, mixing as you go. I cannot stress enough how hot this mix is, so please be careful and don’t have small children around while you’re doing this as it will hurt!
Whisk this mixture on a high speed for around 10 minutes, until it forms peaks.

While the marshmallow is whisking away, get three bowls ready with a few drops of gel food colouring in each. Pour 1/3 of the mix into each bowl and stir so the mallow is evenly coloured.

At this point, I used my Wilton colour swirl kit, but you can also use regular piping bags by filling each one with a colour, and then placing all three bags into another, fitting with a large open nozzle.

Prepare a large tray by covering it with greaseproof paper, and sprinkling a mixture of icing sugar and cornflour, then get piping away! If you don’t want to pipe, you could also use a square cake tin and layer the colours instead!

Let the marshmallows set for 1-2 hours, then sprinkle with more icing sugar/cornflour! These will keep in an airtight container for about a week or two – if you let them last that long!

Twitter / Bloglovin / Instagram

April 1, 2017Lottie 2 Comments

Homemade Toasted Marshmallow Ice Cream

Marshmallows are life.

Ice-cream is also not just for summer, so now we’re heading into the autumn months its time for a few warmer flavours, and I think this is my new favourite. Move over Ben and Jerry, Lottie is on the scene right now.

Toasted Marshmallow Icecream

And d’you know what? This was so easy.

Are you ready?

1. Preheat an oven to 220C.

2. Whisk 500ml of whipping cream until its stiff enough to hold peaks, but not overwhipped.

3. Cover a baking tray with greaseproof paper, spread out 2 cups of mini marshmallows, and bake for 4 minutes

4. While the marshmallows are baking, pour a can of sweetened condensed milk (397ml is the standard size) into the cream, and fold in carefully with a metal spoon.

5. Once the marshmallows have baked, quickly scrape all the melted marshmallow goop into the cream mixture and stir through the mix. Don’t worry about larger lumps or more toasted bits, they add great texture!

6. Pour the mix into a large loaf tin or container, and freeze for 6-8 hours, then scoop and serve!

Toasted Marshmallow Ice Cream

Toasted Marshmallow Icecream

You could turn this into a s’mores sundae by adding warm chocolate sauce and cookie crumbs and enjoy by a bonfire while toasting more marshmallows..

You are welcome.

Twitter / Bloglovin / Instagram

September 3, 2016Lottie 6 Comments

Treat Yourself – Fluffernutter Bars

Chocolate, check! Peanut butter, check! Marshmallow fluff, check! This is such an easy recipe but I could eat these bars all day!

SONY DSC

Fluffernutters are an American thing, but I see absolutely no reason why the UK can’t enjoy peanut butter and marshmallow together and its my dream combination of sweet food!

You’ll need: 250g biscuits – I used chocolate chip cookies, 1/3 cup butter, 1 1/2 cups peanut butter, 2 tbsp icing sugar, 2 tsp vanilla extract, 1 jar Marshmallow Fluff and 200g milk or dark chocolate. You’ll also need an 8 inch square tin.

SONY DSC

1. Start by lining your tin carefully with greaseproof paper. Crush up your biscuit of choice into fine crumbs, then melt the butter and combine with the crumbs, then press into the base of the tin. Pop this in the fridge to harden while you work on the peanut butter.

SONY DSC

2. Don’t worry about using a fresh bowl here, any remaining biscuit crumbs won’t hurt! Scoop out your peanut butter; I used smooth but you could absolutely use crunchy if you fancied it. Add the icing sugar and beat together. If your PB mix is really thick here, add the vanilla to make it more pliable. Scoop this nutty paste onto the biscuit base and spread evenly.

SONY DSC

3. I apologise for this next step; working with Marshmallow Fluff is like working with tar, good luck. Empty the contents of your jar onto the peanut butter layer and spread it out as best you can. I recommend scattering blobs of the stuff all over the place, then letting it settle in its own time – you’ll find the whole thing a lot less stressful than fighting it with a spatula.

SONY DSC

4. Once your fluff has settled and you’re happy with the coverage, melt your chocolate, and pour evenly over the marshmallow. I say pour evenly because if you dump it all in the middle, the gooey fluff is gonna melt away underneath, so work quickly to pour it out and spread it to cover the whole of the tray.

5. An hour or so in the fridge, and these babies are ready for chopping up. You may find the chocolate shatters as you slice, but who needs uniform edges on their bars, right? Store your bars in the fridge, otherwise your marshmallow is going to try and escape.

SONY DSC

*drools at screen, then goes back to fridge for another slice*

Twitter / Bloglovin / Instagram

March 5, 2016Lottie 2 Comments

Baking Magic – Marshmallow Pop Treats

Don’t you just hate it when you’ve spent so much time in the parks eating your favourite treats, only to come home and live without them? Yep, me too 😦

SONY DSC

BUT this series is about bringing some of your park favourites to life in your everyday kitchen, and today is a combination of two of my favourite things: marshmallows and caramel! Marshmallow pops are available in so many designs and flavours in a bunch of locations in the parks, and today I’m gonna share how easy they are to create!

Ingredients wise, you’ll need: regular sized marshmallows, classic toffee sweets, condensed milk, chocolate/candy melts and whatever kind of sprinkles and sweetie decorations you like.

SONY DSC

1. First up, you need to melt down your toffees. I seriously recommend you do this in a metal bowl over boiling water – it’ll take a while, but will save you a burnt disaster! It’ll basically become one huge toffee lump, which while delicious, would be a nightmare to work with, so I add condensed milk to smooth it down; about 3tbsp for every 20 toffee sweets.

SONY DSC

2. While your toffee is melting into a caramel goop, get sticking your marshmallows onto whatever you fancy: lollipop sticks, straws, etc.. Squeeze them nice and close together into a column of squishy goodness.

SONY DSC

3. Once you’re happy with the consistency of your caramel, using a rubber spatula, scoop and smooth it all over the marshmallows. You can try and dip them, but may find they get stuck.. Give each stick a twirl to cool it off a little – it’ll dry quite quickly – then place onto greaseproof paper or tin foil, and get them into the fridge for half an hour or so.

SONY DSC

4. While the pops cool down, you can start to prepare your decorations. If you want colourful pops, I recommend Wilton Candy Melts as they’re really easy to work with – just melt down and mix with a little bit of vegetable oil to give it a shine – and you can also get different flavours (peanut butter!!!). Now you can let your imagination go wild; recreating your favourite designs from the parks or imagineering your own spectacular creations – just be sure to have fun with it!

SONY DSC

5. Once you’re done decorating, get the pops back into the fridge to fully cool and set, and voila!

What’s your favourite Disney park treat?

Twitter / Bloglovin’ / Instagram

February 18, 2016Lottie 4 Comments

Treat Yourself – No Bake Smores Cheesecake!

Another new food series for 2016, yay! Treat Yourself is all about rewarding yourself with amazing food, and I’ll be posting something new and delicious on the first Saturday of each month, woo!

Cheesecake is something that I’m slowly coming around to; I used to be completely repulsed by the idea of it, but in the last few years I’m starting to change my mind.. What I do love forever and always though is smores. To me, its the epitome of dessert goodness. Hello combination idea..

SONY DSC

You will need: a 9 inch springform pan, 200g Oreo cookies, 50g butter, 550g cream cheese (full fat is much easier to work with!), 70g icing sugar, vanilla extract, 100g milk chocolate and 2 cups of mini marshmallows. I work in cups for marshmallows because its the volume that’s more important than the weight! You’re also gonna want an electric hand mixer!

SONY DSC

1. Break up your Oreos by whatever method floats your boat – food processor, chopper, beating with a rolling pin.. – so long as they’re in crumbs, its cool. Melt down the butter and mix with the cookie crumb, then press the mix into the bottom of your pan and put into the fridge to start setting.

SONY DSC

2. Get your cream cheese and icing sugar in a bowl together and get your hand mixer ready to go. Pop your marshmallows into a microwave safe bowl and blitz in 15-20 second intervals until they’re soft and they melt into a fluffy paste when you stir them.

SONY DSC

3. Working quickly, get that marshmallowy mix into the bowl with the cheese and sugar and get mixing – leave it too long and those marshmallows are gonna start to get super sticky and lumpy! Add a teaspoon of vanilla extract, and after a minute or two of good whipping, you’ll have a lovely creamy consistency.

SONY DSC

4. Pour this mixture onto your biscuit base, then pop back into the fridge while you melt your chocolate. You can do this however you like, microwave or double boiler are best, then pour the melted goodness onto the top of your cheesecake. This is where you can get fancy with squiggles or shapes; I like to dump it all on top, then use a skewer to swirl it into a sort of controlled chaos! Now get it back into the fridge for at least another 4 hours before serving.

SONY DSC

YUM YUM YUM

February 6, 2016Lottie 4 Comments

Sea Foam Marshmallows

One of my favourite sweet treats to make (and eat!) is marshmallows. Most people don’t believe you can make marshmallows yourself, let alone how easy they are, so I’m going to share, with a mermaidy twist!

You’ll need: 450g caster sugar, 9 gelatine leaves, 2 eggs, water, 2 tbsp golden syrup or glucose syrup, and a candy thermometer as well.

First of all, get your gelatine soaking in 140ml water.

Mix together the sugar and golden syrup with 200ml water in a saucepan, and start boiling, with the candy thermometer. You don’t need to stir the mix at all.

Separate your eggs, you only need the whites. Whisk them until soft peaks form.

Once the sugar mix hits 127°C, take it off the heat and add the gelatine, water and all. Stir, and it’ll bubble up a lot at this point, and its really hot, so watch out!