Easy Peasy chocolate truffles...

14/02/2011

 
Happy Valentines Day everyone! 

So, just a quick one today... and not at all jewellery related.

As it is valentines day I thought I'd share a quick and easy recipe for making your own chocolate truffles. I tested them out on my other half as a Valentines treat, and although mine may not be the most beautiful truffles ever, they do taste YUMMY - even if I do say so myself.

So here's what you need and how to make them:
1 (200g) tub cream cheese, softened350g icing sugar, sifted500g plain chocolate, melted1 1/2 teaspoons vanillaIn a large bowl, beat cream cheese until smooth. Gradually beat in icing sugar until well blended. Stir in melted chocolate and vanilla until no streaks remain. Refrigerate for about 1 hour. Shape into 2.5cm balls.
Then roll them in cocoa powder, crushed nuts, or coconut, or simply decorate with melted white/dark chocolate.
 

Valentines - a few things to inspire you

07/02/2011

 
With valentines day a round the corner (Monday 14th Feb in case you didn't know) I thought I'd share a few little bits to help inspire your own ideas of what to do for your other half...

Combining cards and gifts/proposals:
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You can make or buy a card and pop your present on it...

such as a necklace threaded through holes on the front of the card (as seen in my example). you can also do this with earrings or a bracelet etc. 
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You can make a home made card to propose with, simply write the question and buy a mini wooden peg from a craft store (I got a pack of these cute little pegs with hearts on from hobbycraft). You can use the little peg to hold the engagement ring.

This is quite a nice idea as your partner will be very surprised as she will think it is just a card for valentines.
Alternatively, you can use a piece of ribbon to hold the ring, or even tie/peg it on the inside of a normal valentines card as an extra element of surprise.
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This is another idea of how you could propose, although you could write "happy valentines day" instead if you aren't ready to propose yet but would like an unusual gift presentation. I simply used a card butterfly and empty box with a little bit of blue-tac to hold this ring and wrote "marry me?" across it's wings.
A sweet idea:
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Ice the letters on the individual chocolates, so that when your partner opens the box they will get a lovely surprise, you can then get down on one knee with the ring. You could also pop the ring in the place of the last chocolate in the box -if you have a bigger box of chocs than I bought. (yes, that does mean you get to eat one of the chocolates first!) 
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If your not quite ready for that step, you can always just ice a nice message on the chocolates instead :) 
here you can see a simple example, but you can ice whatever you like.
Now, get thinking about what you are going to do for your loved one this valentines day...

...or you could always just buy a pretty piece of jewellery (use the "contact" page of the website to see what is currently in stock, or to discuss a commission).

HAPPY VALENTINES DAY!