Tuesday 26 June 2012

Rainbow jelly cups and weekly menu plan


At Chubs's rainbow birthday party I made these jelly cups. Very simple, but required forward planning; you need to start two or three days before you need them so they have time to set.

I used four packs of jelly to make about 14 cups. If I was to do it again, I would change the order of the colours so there was more contrast; I think that would have looked better.

It's quite simple to make. I put all the cups into the crisper drawer of my fridge; alternatively you could put them in big plastic container or on a tray. Anything that you can take out of the fridge and put back in again and which will catch any jelly drips is good.



Make up one pack of jelly of the colour you want to be on the bottom, according to the directions on the pack. Pour a small amount into transparent disposable cups and pop them in the fridge. The need to set completely before you add the next layer. This takes about 12 hours, and no - putting it in the freezer won't speed it up! (Freezing will cause ice crystals to form which will ruin the bonding the gelatine is trying to do, ruining your jelly in the process.)

Every 12 hours, add another layer and pop back in the fridge. On the day of the party, I just took the whole crisper drawer out and took it to the park. The jelly cups were yum!



It took about 20 minutes of active prep (five minutes four times) but with 12 hours in between, so make sure you start two or three days before hand. It only takes one premature layer to wreck the un-set one below, and there will be no rescuing the jelly cups after that!

More rainbow party ideas

Menu Plan Monday

Last week's round up:
Monday: DH to make stir fry Yes, all good
Tuesday: Steak and veggies Yes, all good
Wednesday: Bolognese from the freezer I can't remember, I think we had this...
Thursday: Chicken curry from the freezer We didn't have this but I can't remember what we had. I had tortelleni one night and Dear Husband had some frozen leftovers, perhaps it was Thursday?
Friday: Possibly out to dinner? If not scavange... I'm really rubbish at this, but I think we had stir fry?
Saturday: Possibly out to dinner? If not scavange... I remember this one! We went out to dinner and had a marvelous roast at a friend's house. A lovely evening (even if Chubs didn't sleep as we had hoped) and I really enjoyed the night. That's when we had the cake to express my thanks.
Sunday: Bolognese I was planning on taking some chicken curry to dinner but that ended up not happening, so I put the chicken in the slow cooker with a Tucan Meatball packet sauce. It's not designed for slow cookers, so I'm not sure if it will work or not.

This week's plan:
Monday: Stir fry
Tuesday: Bolognese (from freezer)
Wednesday: Tortelleni (me) and leftovers (Dear Husband)
Thursday: Slow cooker chicken curry (from freezer)
Friday: Bolognese again
Saturday: Scavenge
Sunday: Hmmm, we'll see. Something from the freezer?

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2 comments:

  1. They were awesome jelly cups too. I tried this idea for my Harry Potter party a while back but failed slightly because I sped up the process a little to what you did.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I think time to set properly is the key thing - as you know there's no rescuing them if they aren't set.

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