To celebrate, I threw my first birthday party in at least a decade at the delightful casa de Sparta (our humble abode)*. I was reading about tips to make an outdoor party a success and came across a great list of rules that can apply to any party. I regrettably forget the website, but by far my favourite suggestion was to only make what you really love and buy everything else. I'd add to that: buy stuff that requires no prep wherever you can. Last party I made 2 hot dips, 1 cold dip, hot appetizers, cheese plate, punch, the whole deal. I didn't do any prep the day before so I spent the day of the shindig running around crazily, trying to time everything perfectly and ending up incredibly stressed out, to the point that I failed to pay attention while making the guacamole and sliced right through my thumb an hour before everyone arrived. This led to an overly-maddening last minute dash to finish everything without the use of my left hand, as well as the invention of at least 3 new swear words ("fucktumbler" was the stand-out)
This time around I decided to play it cool(er). My sister made posh cucumber sandwiches (which were so good that I instantly gave birth to the Royal Baby) and sangria (she's the sangria whisperer) and I made guacamole (cruelty free, this time) and smoked salmon dip (insanely easy and amazing). I had planned on buying mini cupcakes from one of the stores in town but that turned out to be one of those things I should have done ahead and instead resulted in me taking the bus to three different shops before I said "eff it" and made a dozen cherry chip cupcakes with cream cheese icing an hour before showtime. Faboo! I cut up some cheese, put some veggies on a tray, tossed out some crackers and chips, bought a 2-4, made mojito Jello shots and called it a day.
<record scratch>
Say what? Mojito Jello shots?
Oh yes, son.
I took my recipe from this fabulous website and I have to say - it turned out really well. I kind of want to make this my signature dish. Meatloaf be damned.
How we do?
Ingredients:
6 limes
12-15 Mint leaves of average size
6 tablespoons of sugar
1/4 c. of water
3 tablespoons fresh lime juice
1 package of gelatin
1/2 c. of rum (I used a dark rum because it's what I had on hand, but I suspect a light rum would produce a clearer colour of "Jello")
1/2 c. sparkling water or club soda (I used lime Perrier). You could use still water too, in a pinch.
Tips N Tricks:
We began this process the night before the party (starting at 11:30 to be exact. Great time to try new things. Always.), in order to give the gelatin time to set. This isn't a "oh my god, I have to bring something to this bachelorette party and I only have an hour!" kind of thing. A bottle of Skinny Girl margarita mix is probably a better bet in that case.
I put the finished lime halves in an empty egg carton I had reserved for just this task. This way, any spillover was just fine - there was no "drip-through" and we recycled the egg carton when we were done with it. The webpage I linked to above uses a muffin tin with crumpled up foil inside the cups - I suspect that would do just fine as well.
If you're using fresh mint from your garden (this girl was), make sure you don't pick the mint leaves for garnish too early - they'll wilt after a couple of hours. Ask me how I know.
Break it Down:
1. Cut the limes in half lengthwise and scoop out their innards. Reserve the juicy lime innards and liquid in a bowl.
The most time-consuming part of this recipe is hollowing out the limes. We had three people on the task and it probably took 30-45 minutes for 6 limes. Bonus: you find out pretty immediately if you have any existing cuts on your fingers! What fun! I don't own a grapefruit spoon, but I bet it would be an awesome tool to have here. As it was, we used steak knives and soup spoons to do our carving. Flipping the almost-empty lime halves inside-out and scraping them with the spoon seemed to work well to get the last of it out. Don't worry if you can't get every bit out - it's fine. Make sure not to damage the lime peels too much - these are your showstoppers in this recipe, after all.
2. Wash the emptied lime halves and dry them lightly with a paper towel. Place the fruit cut-side up in your 'holder'.
3. In a small saucepan, combine the 12-15 mint leaves and the sugar. Muddle the hell out of it with a wooden spoon (or if you're some kind of domestic god/dess, use your fancy muddler). I used 12 leaves and I thought the end result could've used more mint, so next time I'd use 15 or so.
4. Add the quarter cup of water and the lime juice. I guess you could be fancy about straining out the pulp at this stage, but I just took a couple of spoonfuls from the bowl of lime innards. The shots still came out pretty damn clear.
5. Sprinkle the gelatin package over the top and let it sit there for a minute or so. Turn the stove on low and stir until the gelatin disappears, about 5-10 minutes.
6. Pour the liquid through a strainer into a container with a spout - I used a 4-cup Pyrex measuring cup. The strainer will get the lion's share of the mint and lime pulp.
7. Add the rum and sparkling water to the mixture and stir.
8. Pour the finished product into the lime halves, filling them to the top. I had a little more liquid than needed for the 6 limes/12 lime halves.
9. Carefully move your little beauties into the fridge. I left them there overnight so there'd be no last minute freakouts, but my (admittedly limited) experience with gelatin makes me think that 4 hours should be sufficient.
10. Carefully slice the lime wedges in half. I had thought I might do them in thirds but frankly, this size looked better.
11. If you're into garnishing, take the small mint leaves and affix them to the side of each shot.
12. Place on tray, serve, get daintily crunked.
Final tip? Make sure to tell everyone that these are awesome "Jello" shots otherwise everyone will just quietly stare at them, thinking they're just a tray full of lime wedges and judge you for being a citrus-obsessed weirdo.
Enjoy, grown-up-fancy-ass-you!
<record scratch>
Say what? Mojito Jello shots?
Oh yes, son.
I took my recipe from this fabulous website and I have to say - it turned out really well. I kind of want to make this my signature dish. Meatloaf be damned.
How we do?
Ingredients:
6 limes
12-15 Mint leaves of average size
6 tablespoons of sugar
1/4 c. of water
3 tablespoons fresh lime juice
1 package of gelatin
1/2 c. of rum (I used a dark rum because it's what I had on hand, but I suspect a light rum would produce a clearer colour of "Jello")
1/2 c. sparkling water or club soda (I used lime Perrier). You could use still water too, in a pinch.
Tips N Tricks:
We began this process the night before the party (starting at 11:30 to be exact. Great time to try new things. Always.), in order to give the gelatin time to set. This isn't a "oh my god, I have to bring something to this bachelorette party and I only have an hour!" kind of thing. A bottle of Skinny Girl margarita mix is probably a better bet in that case.
I put the finished lime halves in an empty egg carton I had reserved for just this task. This way, any spillover was just fine - there was no "drip-through" and we recycled the egg carton when we were done with it. The webpage I linked to above uses a muffin tin with crumpled up foil inside the cups - I suspect that would do just fine as well.
If you're using fresh mint from your garden (this girl was), make sure you don't pick the mint leaves for garnish too early - they'll wilt after a couple of hours. Ask me how I know.
Break it Down:
1. Cut the limes in half lengthwise and scoop out their innards. Reserve the juicy lime innards and liquid in a bowl.
The most time-consuming part of this recipe is hollowing out the limes. We had three people on the task and it probably took 30-45 minutes for 6 limes. Bonus: you find out pretty immediately if you have any existing cuts on your fingers! What fun! I don't own a grapefruit spoon, but I bet it would be an awesome tool to have here. As it was, we used steak knives and soup spoons to do our carving. Flipping the almost-empty lime halves inside-out and scraping them with the spoon seemed to work well to get the last of it out. Don't worry if you can't get every bit out - it's fine. Make sure not to damage the lime peels too much - these are your showstoppers in this recipe, after all.
2. Wash the emptied lime halves and dry them lightly with a paper towel. Place the fruit cut-side up in your 'holder'.
3. In a small saucepan, combine the 12-15 mint leaves and the sugar. Muddle the hell out of it with a wooden spoon (or if you're some kind of domestic god/dess, use your fancy muddler). I used 12 leaves and I thought the end result could've used more mint, so next time I'd use 15 or so.
4. Add the quarter cup of water and the lime juice. I guess you could be fancy about straining out the pulp at this stage, but I just took a couple of spoonfuls from the bowl of lime innards. The shots still came out pretty damn clear.
5. Sprinkle the gelatin package over the top and let it sit there for a minute or so. Turn the stove on low and stir until the gelatin disappears, about 5-10 minutes.
6. Pour the liquid through a strainer into a container with a spout - I used a 4-cup Pyrex measuring cup. The strainer will get the lion's share of the mint and lime pulp.
7. Add the rum and sparkling water to the mixture and stir.
8. Pour the finished product into the lime halves, filling them to the top. I had a little more liquid than needed for the 6 limes/12 lime halves.
9. Carefully move your little beauties into the fridge. I left them there overnight so there'd be no last minute freakouts, but my (admittedly limited) experience with gelatin makes me think that 4 hours should be sufficient.
10. Carefully slice the lime wedges in half. I had thought I might do them in thirds but frankly, this size looked better.
11. If you're into garnishing, take the small mint leaves and affix them to the side of each shot.
12. Place on tray, serve, get daintily crunked.
 |
| The final result. I realize the plating is somewhat lacking but if you knew how I lived normally, you'd be mega-impressed right now. |
Final tip? Make sure to tell everyone that these are awesome "Jello" shots otherwise everyone will just quietly stare at them, thinking they're just a tray full of lime wedges and judge you for being a citrus-obsessed weirdo.
Enjoy, grown-up-fancy-ass-you!
*One guess which one of us gave it that name. One.
