I wish I were better at celebrating holidays. I love the idea of making a few holidays a year super special, but more often than not, I end up throwing together something at the last minute that is passible, but not memorable or worth repeating year after year. The one exception is Christmas.
This year, I am doing better! I made a photo book of Fox's first year for Adam for Valentine's Day, and even made these beet waffles for dinner so that we would have something pink and festive to eat! We also made these terrific lava cakes with powdered sugar hearts. I am on fire!
Obviously that means I have no idea what to do for Easter. We are Christian, so I want to celebrate Easter in a memorable and meaningful way, and to make it fun for Fox, but I am still deciding what we can do that won't accumulate a ton of junky toys or Easter eggs that we don't need, and don't have room to store.
I think a few packets of seeds in the Easter basket to plant a mini garden on our apartment balcony could be fun (although Fox is still a bit young), or maybe naturally dyeing eggs could be cool (we have a plethora of beets from our CSA share, but I don't like boiled eggs much, so maybe not...). Maybe I will have to scour Pinterest for some cute ideas of eco-friendly activities with babies. If you have any to share, please let me know!
I made this recipe for Valentine's Day, but I think it would be perfect to make for Easter morning!
Pink Beet Waffles:
adapted from Better Homes and Gardens
Makes 12 waffles
1 small roasted beet, shredded (instructions for roasting a beet here)
1 3/4 cup milk (I use whole milk)
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
2 Tbs granulated sugar
1 Tbs baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
2 medium eggs
1/2 cup cooking oil
1 tsp vanilla
In a medium bowl, pour your milk over the shredded beet and let them sit for 30 minutes at room temperature.
Meanwhile, in a large bowl, combine flour, sugar, baking powder and salt.
Once the milk is really pink, strain out the beet, and save it for this soup, and add eggs, oil and vanilla to the bowl. Stir until they are thoroughly mixed in.
Pour the wet ingredients in with the dry ingredients and lightly stir until they are combined, but still slightly lumpy.
Using a 1/3 measure cup, pour some batter into the waffle iron and close the lid. Do not open the lid until your light indicator shows that the waffles are done. Remove from the waffle iron and serve immediately topped with a mount of lemon whipped cream (see recipe below). Enjoy!
Lemon Whipped Cream:
3/4 cup cold heavy cream
1/8 cup white sugar
1/4 tsp vanilla
1 tsp fresh lemon zest
In a stand mixer (or a bowl with beaters) combine the heavy cream and sugar and beat for 5 -7 minutes, until the cream is fluffy. Add the vanilla and zest and stir a few more times to combine. Chill until ready to serve.
Also, I contribute to Mode.com a few times every month! This fun round up is full of delicious recipes that I am dying to make!
Check out 8 Creative Ways to Use Up Tahini
by Landen McBride at Mode
If you're not into boiled eggs, you could try using empty eggshells to dye. You poke a hole in each end with a needle and blow the yolk and white out of the egg. Then you can use the eggs for whatever cooking you're doing, and dye the empty shells. That way you won't be wasting food.
ReplyDeleteYou can also prop the eggs in a glass for the yolk and white to drip out if you're worried about blowing germs into all the eggs. It will just take longer this way.
DeleteThis is brilliant! I have heard of doing this before, but had forgotten about it in this context! Thanks for reminding me! I think we are going to try to dye some eggs today!
DeleteOne year my sister had us dye regular eggs rather than boiled ones since we don't care for hard boiled eggs either. One or two of the eggs got broken while we dyed them because we had little hands helping, but it still went well, and we were left with pretty eggs we could use rather than a bunch of hard boiled ones.
ReplyDeleteThis is a great idea! Thanks for letting me know this is a good option that works!
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