French Macarons

 I have been wanting to make some french macarons for quite a while now, and today I finally got around to making some! I plan on making some for my sister's wedding and wanted to have a trial run before the big day. I think I will experiment more with some homemade fillings, but these that I made today were very simple and easy to make! I combined a couple recipes to create this one. 

The main recipe I followed was by Martha Stewart here. I love the muted colors of her macarons, however I decided to make mine a bit more colorful!

Ingredients for Macarons:

• 1 cup confectioners' sugar
• 3/4 cup almond flour
• 2 large egg whites, room temperature
• Pinch of cream of tartar
• 1/4 cup superfine sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/2 teaspoon lemon extract
• 1/2 teaspoon strawberry or raspberry extract
• Teal food coloring
• Yellow food coloring
• Pink and Burgundy food coloring (i added burgundy to help make a brighter and darker pink)

Ingredients for fillings:
(use about 1 teaspoon of filling for each macaron)

• Lemon curd
• Strawberry or raspberry preserves
• Nutella

Directions are listed at the bottom of post.

Striped Jello

I made this striped Jello for Hudson's Superhero Party, it is easy to make, just a little time consuming because you have to wait for each layer to set before pouring the next one on top. I never put the recipe up after the party; so here it is:

Ingredients:

• Four 3oz boxes of Jello (I used strawberry, orange, lime, and blue raspberry)
• 6 envelopes of KNOX unflavored gelatin
• 1 cup of sweetened condensed milk

Directions:

Mix 1 cup of condensed milk with 1 cup of hot water. Next mix 2 envelopes of Knox gelatin with 1 cup hot water, then combine it with the milk mixture and set aside to cool.

Now combine the blue raspberry jello, 1 envelope Knox gelatin, and 1 1/2 cups of hot water. Let it cool, then pour into a 9×13 pyrex dish. (I sprayed mine because I was nervous it would stick, but other recipes say it isn't necessery to grease the dish) Put the dish in refrigerator to set for about 30 minutes. Make sure it is sitting level in the refrigerator, this will help to make the layers even once you're finished.

Now pour about 1 cup of the milk mixture for the next later and refrigerate to set. Each layer will only take 15 minutes to set now.
Now combine the lime jello, 1 envelope of Knox gelatin, and 1 1/2 cups of hot water. Let it cool, and then pour carefully over the milk mixture. Place it in the refrigerator for another 15 minutes.
Repeat the milk mixture….
Now the orange…
Then the milk mixture…
Then end with the strawberry! Let it set until you're ready to serve and cut the jello into squares.