Archive for the ‘Gear and Gadgets’ Category
Snow White is a classic children’s story and the original Disney movie is a favorite across generations. I have a feeling that the new Snow White & The Seven Dwarfs Cakelet Pan from Nordic Ware is likely to become a favorite with many people, too. The pan is one of the most detailed cakelet pans that I’ve seen, with the whole body of each of Disney’s seven dwarves and Snow White reflected in a magic mirror. The pan is heavy duty cast aluminum with a nonstick finish inside, for easy release of the cakelets. Each cakelet cavity holds up to 5 ounces of batter, which makes the finished cakes slightly larger than your standard cupcake.
To get the maximum amount of detail in your cakes with this pan, you’re going to want to grease and flour your pans before adding your batter. A denser cake batter, such as a pound cake, is going to give you more definition than an airy sponge cake will, and tapping the cake pan on the counter after filling it will help knock out any air bubble before baking.
The cakes will not necessarily need to be decorated to get the full effect of the Disney designs, but they can be frosted to give them a little bit of color and increase the “wow” factor of these Snow White characters. They’ll definitely impress at a birthday party over a batch of plain cupcakes!
An ice cream sandwich is a delightful hot weather treat, and they’re even more enjoyable when you can put together your own. This doesn’t mean that you necessarily have to bake your cookies and churn your ice cream from scratch (although that is always a good option). Instead, it means that when you are assembling your own sandwiches you have full control over the cookie flavors and the ice cream you use, so you can come up with flavor combinations that are unique to you. Cuisipro’s Mini Ice Cream Sandwich Presses are little tools designed to help you make bite sized ice cream sandwiches quickly and easily. The press is very easy to use. It is made of plastic and you simply press the open end down onto a cookie, brownie, blondie or other baked good to cut out the base of your sandwich. Next, you can scoop some ice cream right into the press using the open end like a scoop. Finally, you push the press into another cookie to seal the sandwich. You will need to move the plunger back between steps to make sure that there is enough room in the press for all of your components, then you can use the plunger to slide your sandwich out when it is finished.
The finished sandwiches with these presses are almost too cute to eat, but their small size means you never have to feel guilty. The best part about them is that they are going to increase the number of ice cream sandwiches in your life because you will be a lot more likely to make, serve, store and eat these little sandwiches all summer long.
The hull is the leafy stem of the strawberry and the small part of the fruit that it is attached to. This part of the berry always needs to be removed before cooking with them, or chopping them up for a salad or other dish, and there are several ways to go about it. You can simply chop off the whole top of the berry, or you can use a small paring knife to cut out the hull. I usually use the paring knife method, but was tempted into trying out the Chef’n Stem Gem on a recent trip to the kitchen store.
The Chef’n Stem Gem is a neat little strawberry huller that looks like a berry and promises to make very short work of the strawberry hulling process. You simply push the button on top to open the stainless steel claw at the base. Press the claw into the berry, around the hull, then release the button and twist the gadget to remove. The claw doesn’t have sharp edges, just uses pressure and good design to cut through the berry. This little gadget also works well with tomatoes, easily removing the stem and “hull” of those fruits, so it’ll multitask every time you want to make gazpacho or salsa.
It works very well and is very efficient. I never had to go back to a berry to get anything it might have missed and it never gets too much “good” berry as it hulls. It might be a fraction slower than my paring knife (if I’m working very fast), but the difference is not noticeable and this is much easier to use. I’m definitely glad I gave in and picked one up because it’ll get a lot of use in my kitchen this strawberry (and tomato) season!
Cookies are associated more strongly with fall and winter – thanks to the Christmas holiday where cookies are an absolute staple – than they are with summertime. This is a shame because the summer can be a fine time to bake cookies. The days are longer, so we usually feel like we have a little extra free time and, if you have kids around, you can get some extra helping hands to shape and decorate them. Nordicware’s Summer Series 3D Cookie Cutters is a summer themed cookie cutter set that allows you to make three dimensional cookies that can stand up on their own. The set makes six different shapes with twelve cookie cutters, and the shapes include a boat, a dolphin, an airplane, a unicorn, a dinosaur and a teddy bear. The first three tie in to a summer, travel-theme, while I will admit that the latter three aren’t as obviously summery. They are, however, very cute and because the dinosaur is my favorite cutter from the set I’m willing to overlook the fact that not all of these are beach themed.
The cookie cutters come with a cookie dough and icing recipe that works well with them. If you are going to use a different recipe, choose one that doesn’t spread very much during baking (such as a stiff butter cookie dough, rather than peanut butter or chocolate chip cookie dough) because you need the cut outs to hold their shape, or you won’t be able to fit them together. The cookies are generously sized (4-5 inches) and there is a lot of surface area to decorate, which is fun for kids and adults – and not a bad way to spend a warm summer evening at home.
The hardest thing about making a layer cake is getting evenly sliced layers. It never seems like it will be that difficult to level the rounded top off of a single layer or cake, or to cut a taller cake into two even pieces, but even pros end up with uneven layers sometimes. The trick to getting even layers is to have a very large knife and a steady hand, but if this kind of thing isn’t your forte, a Frieling Layer Cake Slicing Kit is much more reliable than “eyeballing” your layers. The cake slicing kit comes with a large, adjustable ring mold that fits around cakes from 8 to 10-inches in diameter. The mold has seven evenly spaced slots on it, and you simply run the included knife straight through those slots to get even layers. It is foolproof, and lets you cut a cake into anywhere from 2 to 8 layers in no time at all. Once the cake is cut, you remove the ring and use the included cake lifter – which is a very large, flat spatula – to pick up the layers easily. You can then reassemble your cake, frosting and filling as you go, on your cake stand.
This tool kit isn’t a kitchen must-have unless you bake a lot of cakes, but if you do a lot of layer cake baking, it can really streamline the assembly process and save you a lot of time in the long run – especially because you know that with the ring to guide you, you’ll always have perfectly even cake layers every time you use it.
