Food for Thought: Color Crush...RED

I'm a pretty monogomous girl with my all-time love of the color purple.

(*shhhh* don't tell.  It isn't a HIGHLY popular color right now...it's kinda like admitting your wedding colors 10 years after the fact. Oh wait. That WAS one of my wedding colors.  [you can send sympathy cards to my hubby later.  when we hit 10 years of marital bliss. just try not to laugh in his face.  it is still kinda fresh for the poor dude. lol.])

However, I do get constant little seasonal color "crushes".  I think I'm allowed.

Red.

Fiery, romantic, full of warmth and passion.  Earthy, bold, and influential. 

Oh...and good to eat.  mmmm.  (Truly, I think I'm quite capable of becoming a 500 pound woman if I weren't so incredibly vain and stubbornly on a perpetual diet to curb myself into eating NORMALLY.  I just love food THAT MUCH.)  *sigh*

I ran out of liquid food coloring at a critical moment making these raspberry meringues, or they would be much pinker.  (I went through almost a whole bottle this weekend having WAY TOO MUCH FUN making mini volcanoes for Jeron and his neighbor friend.  Geez...I LOVE the smell of vinegar.  not.)  They may not be candy cloud pink, but they still taste fabulous with coffee, or...my fave of late...wine, cheese, and meringues.  It makes every moment between 8pm (kids are in bed!!!) and 10 pm (Byron goes to bed weeknights) feel like a spectacular holiday. 

(recipe below)

Isn't it funny how you get a style crush and you start seeing it everywhere?  Yah...here is my lunch today. Red pepper and tomato soup with a little cheese for yum factor. I love this orange-y red paired with a dark turquoise.

Throw in a big of black, green, and yellow...awww.  Perfection.

Not so sure WHY exactly I love Babybel cheese so much.  Maybe because it beats the kids' cheap string cheese by a long shot.  Mabye because the wrapper makes me feel like it is Christmas.  In the fifties.

Maybe because the happy wax looks like a constipated PacMan.

Not gonna lie.  I LOVE that part.

Kids' mini volcanoes

Fill up a Dixie cup with baking powder about half way. Add a few drops of food coloring (let them pick).

Poke a hole in the bottom of a second dixie cup, turn it upside down and place it atop the first cup.  Tape them together around the rims of each cup.  Take your volcanoes outside, or put them in the sink.  Let the child (or help them to)slowly pour in vinegar (through the hole) until it bubbles out.  Once it stops, they can pour more and more.  It'll just keep going...for.e.v.e.r.

Susie's notes: Forget the whole topper thing unless you have tape that somehow works on wax.  My Scotch tape doesn't, and it is a royal pain in the ... to get the cups together.  The kids are just as enthralled with it sans top, and you have way less work to do.  Also, you can do multiple colors for a fun effect.  When you add the baking soda to the cup, add about a 1/2 Tbs. at a time, a drop or two of color, and then more soda.  Keep going, layering soda and color until the cup is as full as you would like.

Raspberry Meringue Hearts

Whites from 3 lg. eggs (room temp)

1/4 tsp. cream of tartar

3/4 cup sugar

1 tsp. Raspberry extract

1/8 tsp. liquid red food color

Garnish: powdered sugar

Position oven racks to divide ofen into 1/3s; heat to 225 degrees F.  Line 2 large baking sheets with parchment and trace heart shaped cookie cutters (with a pencil) to cover each sheet.  Flip the paper over.  Beat eggs with cream of tartar on MED until soft peaks form.  Turn that bad boy up to HI and add sugar...sloooooowly....  Beat 8 munutes or until stiff, glossy peaks form and the mix doesn't feel grainy.  Beat in extract and color until blended.  Pipe mixture onto the hearts, swirling from the outside edges in toward the middle in a concentric pattern, until heart is filled with mix.  Bake 2 hours.  Turn off oven.  Leave meringues in 2 more hours or overnight.  Peel off parchment paper and dust with powdered sugar.  Store airtight or freeze up to 2 months.

Susie's notes:  Scared of "piping" stuff?  Use a large ziploc baggie with the end snipped off.  The hole needs to be kinda big for these to look nice and puffy, so aim for an opening on your piping bag to be not-quite-as-big as the tip of your pinky finger.  I fill up two HUGE cookie sheets with 2 1/2" hearts (40 hearts) and then I make polka dots (like Hershey's kisses) all around the cookies with any remaining mix.  The meringues can easily be used for cake decorating, as toppers on cupcakes, etc.  Here is a pic from my baby shower (with Aislynn).  There is one cookie on the top and then you can see the little polka dots around the bottom, with the roses. 

Enjoy!

What is your color crush this week?