Recommended supplies to order before you try making this at home!
	Nuts.com - 1lb of Tapioca Pearls ($4.99)

Thai Bubble Tea Recipe:

Ingredients for 4 people:

Steps:

1 cup Pantai Thai Tea 5 cups Filtered Water 3/4 cup Sugar 1 cup Tapioca Pearls Honey or your choice of sweetener Half and Half

1. Thai Tea:  Pour 1 cup of thai tea into large thai tea filter and set aside. In a medium saucepan, bring the water and sugar to boil and then slowly dip in the tea filter until the leaves are all wet. Be careful not to let the opening of the filter to touch the water. Let the tea boil for 5 minutes and then remove from heat and continue to steep the tea for 30+ minutes. Remove tea filter and squeeze out remaining liquid with tongs. Place into a sealed container (water bottle) and place in the fridge to cool. 2. Bubbles: Follow the directions on the package for the tapioca pearls purchased. The Nuts.com pearls only really need 30 minutes to boil and then 30 minutes to sit in the hot water off of the heat. Rinse with warm water and place in a small container to then add your sweetener. I usually add a tablespoon of honey. 3. THAI BUBBLE TEA:  Spoon the pearls into the bottom of your glass and then add ice about over halfway up the cup. Then add in your Thai tea and save room to add in desired amount of half and half. 4. ENJOY!

Enjoy your Thai Bubble Tea!!

Okay, this is a re-post from my old blog but it was one of the most popular and visited posts, so I wanted to share it on here in time for the holidays. The recipe comes from Lorraine Pascale, a British chef that we used to watch over in the UK on the BBC but she has also moved over to the States. I need to check out the latest food shows she is featured on... Anyway, this simple recipe was from her Baking Made Easy series and is a great addition for Christmas, New Year's, or whatever party you may be having this holiday season.

Now before I get into the recipe, I want to push one thing that doesn't seem very popular here in the States yet but it totally should be... and that is a kitchen weighing scale. I have a digital scale and there are tons of options to choose from on Amazon. I still have a lot of books from the UK listing amounts in weight measurements and I wish more books in the States had the same as it is definitely more accurate for baking. So I was going to convert this recipe from grams to cups but I'm not sure how accurate the online conversions are to use in recipes. For example, 300g powdered sugar is approximately 1.58305 US cups... and if I round that to 1 and half cups I'm not sure how that would affect the recipe. My advice is go buy a digital scale and find recipes that have weight measurements. Here is one of my absolute favorite recipe books to start you off, The Hummingbird Bakery: Cake Days. The Hummingbird Bakery started in London and I just loved their cupcakes and their recipes to make at home always turned out great! OK on to the recipe!

Peppermint Creams Recipe

Ingredients:

Steps:

300g Powdered Sugar 125g Condensed Milk 1/2 tsp Peppermint Extract 100g Dark Chocolate

1. MIX together the powdered sugar, condensed milk, and peppermint extract until everything has combined and you can make a ball out of the ingredients. 2. DUST your work surface with some icing sugar, and roll out until it is about 3-5mm thick. Use a pastry cutter to create discs of peppermint creams and place on a tray lined with baking paper. 3. MELT the chocolate and dip the discs halfway into the chocolate and place back on the tray to set or drizzle chocolate all over them. 4. ENJOY!

Check out their video recipe:

I love fudge but stay away from the recipes where you have to use a candy thermometer, I like the easy recipes! One of these days I will try fudge making that way, once I get around to actually buying a candy thermometer. For now, here is a simple recipe I first saw on Pinterest and then on one of those Pinterest fail sites. I love cake batter anything, so had to try this recipe out. I was worried it would come out looking more like the failed version, which they described as "meat colored fudge", gross! I learned from their failure to add the sprinkles in at the last minute with minimal mixing in, which the original recipe does mention as well, so very important step. Use whatever cake mix you can find in the shops, I want to try out a chocolate version! This fudge is amazingly yummy!! It is very sweet and initially I thought one square was enough for a little treat but I found myself going back for more and more.

Try out this super easy and yummy recipe @ Baked from a Box: Cake Batter Fudge.