Food Friday . . . plus some

Well, sometimes our experiences, crafting or not . . . are nothing more than learning experiences. This Food Friday experiment ended in nothing but lessons to remember for a next time.

My mother got me subscription to MaryJanesFarm Magazine. The newest issue (Dec/Jan) has a recipe to make home-made candy canes. I thought this was a marvelous idea. It'll be an even better idea when I can get it to work.

First, it took me forever to find a Silicon Baking Mat. I finally found one at Target.


The beginning of the sugar, juice, and vinegar together.



It's cooking up nicely.


After peppermint is added, it is poured onto the mat.


Mine took more than the 25 minutes to cool down enough to be worked with.


Here are some designs I tried out.



Lesson Learned from batch #1:
~Candy cooking may seem tedious, but takes attention. If talking on the phone with your mother while doing it, be careful not to burn the liquid.

Lessons Learned from batch #2:
~Recommended amount of peppermint in recipe only leaves a faint taste of peppermint. Tastes more fruity and sugary from juice and sugar.
~There is plenty of time to work with the candy.
~Juice did not give it the rich color the recipe said it would.

Thoughts for next time:
~Try food coloring.
~Try more of flavoring, but use something other than peppermint, since it's not a flavor I care for enough to have a whole batch of candy canes around. Or to continually taste through this recipe-working-out process.
~Wash dishes after doing this, not the next day.

Overall, it was a nifty experience and I will definitely try again when I have more time. Lots of ideas. When working with the candy, I really wanted to make more complex designs with it.



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Here is the third project I was working on. A hat, for someone close to Channon of Chan Knits.

This would have been done much sooner (like a few days after her post), but I miscalculated the first time I made it and it came out too pointy. This yarn doesn't not rip, as it clings to itself. So I knit another one and it went much slower. Mailed it off yesterday. I am a huge fan of the Tychus pattern, I just modify it to the specific needs.







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Lastly, I am not sure how much knitting there will be over the next few days. When making dinner tonight, I almost dropped a pan, so stupid me went to grab it with my bare hand. Not too much got burned, because I realized what I was doing quick enough. But the inside of my knuckle(the worst place) of my middle finger on my left hand is burned. I knit continental and use this finger A LOT. So, we'll see how it is when I get off work. Hopefully, they'll let me work register tonight and not make food . . . it could be painful.