Gingerbread Halloween biscuits

Today we made gingerbread men and then using white icing made them look scary! We used a Delia Smith recipie

Ingredients:

75g light soft brown sugar

2 tablespoons golden syrup

1 tablespoon black treacle

1 tablespoon water

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 rounded teaspoon ground ginger

pinch of cloves

finely grated zest of ½ orange

95g block butter

½ teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

225g plain flour sifted, plus a little more (if needed)

1 tube of white writing icing (to decorate)

Method

Put the sugar, syrup, treacle, water, spices and zest together in a large saucepan.
Then bring them to boiling point, stirring all the time. Now remove the pan from the heat and stir in the butter and the bicarbonate of soda.
Next stir in the flour gradually until you have a smooth manageable dough – add a little more flour if you think it needs it. Now leave the dough covered in a cool place to become firm (approximately 30 minutes).
Pre-heat the oven to 180°C.
Now roll the dough out to 3mm thick on a lightly floured surface and cut out the gingerbread men. Arrange them on the baking sheets and bake near the centre of the oven, one sheet at a time, for 10–15 minutes until the biscuits feel firm when lightly pressed with a fingertip.
Leave them to cool on the baking sheet for a few minutes before transferring them to a wire cooling rack.
To decorate, use the icing to write names or make faces.

#30dayswild Day 12: Fowlmere Bullfinches RSPB Wildlife Explorers

Today G and E attended their first Fowlmere Bullfinches RSPB Wildlife Explorer meeting. They went looking for the reptile and amphibian inhabitants of Fowlmere. Sadly, the weather was against them and we didn't see anything! However, we heard a turtle dove and saw the southern marsh orchid. The girls then made salt dough snakes and a great-crested newt (which are currently drying at home before being painted!).  They both had a fab time and can't wait for the next meeting.

At home, P was then inspired to make one too! We used this recipe for salt dough:

1 cup salt
2 cups all purpose flour
1 cup luke warm water

Directions
1. In a large bowl mix salt and flour.
2. Gradually stir in water. Mix well until it forms a doughy consistency.
3. With your hands form a ball with your dough and kneed it for at least 5 minutes. The longer you kneed your dough the smoother it will be.
4. Then  make your animal!

P made a nest with eggs in, a lizard (and so did I), a snake, a dog and an insect.

Homemade modeling clay

WE made this dough today and used it to make models from Alice in Wonderland. It is a very soft and nice to work with.

Ingredients

2 cups bicarb of soda (you can order large boxes from Amazon)
1 cup corn flour
1 1/2 cups cold water

Instructions

Put 2 cups of bicarb of soda, 1 cup of cornflour and 1 1/2 cups of cold water in a pan. Stir the ingredients until you have a smooth consistency.

Place the pan over the hob over a medium heat. Stir the mixture until it boils.

Continue stirring to remove any lumps and cook until it has the consistency of mashed potatoes. Keep a close watch on the pan and stir every few minutes to avoid burning the mixture.

Allow it to cool. Then sprinkle a little cornflour on a clean kitchen surface and knead the mixture until pliable, then use as desired.

 Knead in more corn starch, a little at a time, as needed if the dough is too "wet".  Keeping a damp kitchen towel over the extra dough, it will keep for some time.  It could be coloured with food colouring at the cooking stage too!

We have left it on the window to dry and then we will paint our models! 

Squeeze and Snap Dough

(So called 'Squeeze and Snap' because you can squeeze it and snap it!) I guess this is like moondough as it is made with Corn flour. It is quite messy as it crumbly so I made P play without outside

What you need:

1 cup of cornflour

2 tablespoons of oil (to start with)

2 tablespoons of shampoo or washing up liquid (to start with)

We put one cup of cornflour into a bowl with the oil and stirred it up.  (it will go lumpy - don't worry!)  Then we added shampoo on one and washing up liquid to another.

This is where this dough can appear a bit tricky. You have to get your hands in and work it for a while before it comes together. If it feels too dry then add more shampoo/washing up liquid. 

crown part 2

We made some cooked yellow play dough and cut out crowns which we decorated with sequins.

snow play-dough

Today, using the recipe from here: http://www.theimaginationtree.com/2012/01/recipe-for-white-play-dough.html we made snow play dough.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup cornflour
• 1/2 cup salt
• 1 tbsp oil
• 1 tbsp cream of tartar
• 1 cup boiling water
• few drops liquid glycerine (not essential
•  
• Mix all of the dry ingredients in a bowl and add the oil
• Next, pour in the water (adult only if using boiling) and mix it up
• Leave it for a little while to cool down, in which time it will come together more
• Knead it until smooth and soft
• Add in glitter and any scent (if desired)
• If it's too sticky, add some more cornflour

We mixed all the dry ingredients in a bowl (E enjoyed measuring them out). Then we added the oil and stirred it. Then I added the boiling water and mixed it. It seemed very runny. We left it awhile. When it had formed a dough consistency we added some snowflakes and glitter and made snowmen and homes for our penguins!  

Corn flour clay pengiuns

Today we made corn flour clay penguins to go with our arctic winter topic. The clay is very easy to make and has a nice smooth texture. It is easy to manipulate. All the girls enjoyed modeling with it.

Cornflour clay
1 cup cornflour
2 cups salt
1 1/3 cups cold water

Put salt and 2/3 cups of water in a sauce pan and bring it to boil. Mix rest of cornflour with remaining water and stir well. Blend the two mixtures and
knead into clay. Mould the clay and let it dry for several hours, it can then
be painted.
It can also be baked in the oven at 95oC  for 1 1/2 to 3 hours depending upon it's size.

Dec 21 - Christmas Playdoh

Today I made some playdoh for P to use her Christmas cutters with and scented them Christmas spices - we had one ginger batch, one nutmeg batch and one allspice batch (although they soon got jumbled up). Today I used this recipe for playdoh -
1 c. flour
1/2 cup salt
1 T. cooking oil
1 T. cream of tartar
1 c. water
Measure ingredients into the saucepan you will be using to cook the dough, but mix them well before putting the pan on the hob.  Over medium heat cook the dough, stirring constantly until it forms a ball.  (NOTE:  When it starts to pull away from the sides somewhat and clump together and most of the "wet-looking" parts look dry, it's ready to remove from the pan.)  Turn dough out and knead until smooth.  Add spices, colouring and anything else you wish.

Incidently this explains the science behind Play dough http://entertainment.howstuffworks.com/play-doh.htm/printable
sad aren't I

Play-doh snowman.

Today's challenge in the unseasonally warm weather was to make a snowman from play-doh. E, G and I quickly made up a batch. We used this recipe:
1 cup cornflour
1/2 cup salt
3/4 cup boiling water
1 tablespoon cream of tartar
1tablespoon vegetable oil
and of course magical silver glitter

Mix all the ingredients in a large bowl until your dough forms!

I also have the girls some raisons (for eyes and noses), pipe cleaners for arms and bits of ribbons for scaves. They had fun making snowman ... but for E the play quickly changed into making cakes and biscuits and then G make a Father Christmas and his raindeer.

Cloud dough aliens

I have been wanting to try cloud dough ever since I read about it on pininterest  I (well I say I but actually E made it) used 2 and half cups of flour, a little bit more than a half cup of baby oil and some black food colouring.  It defiantly has a different feel to play dough. It is more crumbly but has a nicer feel and smell!

E enjoyed adding buttons to make little cakes which I had to buy and then to fit in with the space theme she made aliens using wiggly arms and pipe cleaners!

Play dough

At school we are doing a topic on dinosaurs, so I made some grey play dough to be rocks and the children made pretend fossil imprints of plants and dinosaur footprints. I have never made cooked play dough before.. it is certainly more like shop bought play dough and easy to make (although I got the husband to wash the pan for me). Here is the recipe:
Ingredients:
2 cups of plain flour
1 Tbsp. of cooking oil
1 tsp. cream of tartar
2 cups of coloured water
1 cup of salt
Directions:
Place all of the ingredients in a medium size or large pan. Cook slowly on medium-high and stir it until the play dough thickens. Keeps best in the fridge in plastic containers.

They really enjoyed pushing things in to it and it led to some great discussions about materials that would be good to leave imprints in (mud at a waterhole for example).  This followed on from reading this great book on how fossils are made:

Incidentally, I also fancy having a go at this cloud dough: http://www.flightsofwhimsy-ece.com/2011/10/playdough-no-cloud-dough/