3rd of July

Oh, the sweet anticipation of celebrating the 4th of July!  Dad always has a cookout w/ a ton of food (he could probably feed the whole block with what they cook) that's delicious.  We always eat way too much, but love every single bite.  We each bring something to share, and this year I was asked to bring cupcakes . . . I've added something else to the mix though.

Here are the main ingredients for my desserts.  I will tell you that I made two different types of desserts.

Yes, one of them was cupcakes.  Any idea what the other was?  All will be revealed in due time.  By the way, don't you love the beautiful Formica counter top circa late 1950s??  It's the original counter top to the house, unfortunately.

Well, since I'm baking to celebrate the 4th of July, and knowing there will be several teenagers and several 1st grade and younger there, I knew I wouldn't make but a couple of people happy no matter what kind of cupcake I made.  So, I kept it simple - white cupcakes and then varied the icing a little . . . 8 of them have half strawberry icing (closest I could get to red) and half vanilla icing dyed blue; then 6 have all strawberry icing, 6 have the blue icing, and 4 have white vanilla icing.  I could at least keep with the patriotic theme via color scheme (not everybody likes cherry, so I couldn't do a maraschino cherry on or in them; not everybody likes strawberry, so I couldn't use JUST strawberry).  I was tempted to put jelly beans in them and on top, but believe it or not, there are people in my family who don't like jelly beans!

Have you figured out what I did with those marshmallows and the 2 boxes of Jello?  Hint:  only a very small amount of water was used, and it wasn't boiled.  I'm thinking this might go over pretty well with the younger kids . . . I made one using the watermelon jello and tasted it before I made a bunch of them (if I don't like it, I won't give it to others!).  I thought it was pretty good.  It's definitely a light dessert!

Have it figured out yet?

Here's the result:

They taste kind of like Peeps!  The pinkish ones are watermelon flavor and the blue ones are berry blast.  They were so easy to make that I'm taking the "extras" with me tomorrow just in case they are a big hit.

Yes, I'll share the "recipe."  Select the Jello flavor of your choice (I really liked the watermelon one!), and open it into a small bowl.  Use a lollipop stick or straw if that's what you have handy.  You could probably use a toothpick if small kids weren't part of the festivities.  I put some cold water in another small bowl, then dipped the stick into the water before inserting the stick into the marshmallow.  Once the stick was inserted, I dipped the marshmallow almost all of the way into the water, then shook the excess off.  Then I rolled and dipped the marshmallow in the dry Jello mix until it looked good to me.  I just used a coffee mug to hold them while they "set."  I had some bags for lollipops/cakepops and I used those to individually wrap each of the Cheeps as I'm calling them (I posted on Facebook to a friend that they were "kind of like a cheep, er cheap, version of Peeps").

I had initially planned to try to do some stars on the icing for the cupcakes, but decided against it . . . it seemed too much like work.  I love to bake, but only the easy stuff most of the time!