Tag Archives: children party food

Warning: proud parent alert. Those of you who get all twitchy when your Facebook friends post pics of their kids can read Top 5 Meals I Wish I’d Never Eaten or browse my archives instead. 

My daughter turned seven yesterday. Seven!

Here she is the day after she was born in Shanghai.

My ex and I like to say she was Made in China. Ahem.

She’s grown a lot since then.

Unlike previous years where we’ve celebrated E’s birthday at home — see her 6 year old party and Throwing a kids’ party without losing your mind — this year we celebrated her birthday party at a YMCA gym. The session was for two hours and came with two instructors to teach the kids how to use all of the gym equipment – balance beams, bars, climbing rope, climbing walls, mats, trampolines etc.

The YMCA venue meant that all the party food had to be transported or prepared on the spot. The food also had to be simple as I had a nasty cold and didn’t have the energy to do anything too elaborate.

So this was the menu yesterday:

• Ham & pineapple pizzas made by my ex – he made them up and baked them on the spot;
• Sausage rolls made by my ex – he premade them and baked them on the spot;
• Mini berry and chocolate trifles – made by me the day before;
• Fruit skewers – made by my mum in the morning;
• Mini cupcakes – made by my mum in law the day before;
• Honey joys – made by me the day before;
• Chocolate crackles – made by my mum the day before; and
• 4-layer vanilla birthday cake with  raspberry Swiss meringue buttercream and rose fairy floss – made by me the day before.

With such a big group of kids I’ve decided not to publish any photos from inside the gym. But I took a few photos outside with my dad and ex acting as hand models.

Did the kids have fun? Oh yes. They had a ball.

I also enjoyed myself. With two instructors looking after the kids, I was free to watch, do minimal food prep and chat. After the party there was a bit of tidying up but all the family pitched in and it was done in 20+ minutes. We were then free to enjoy the rest of the day. Gotta love that!

Happy Birthday, darling E. We love you to the moon and back.

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Recipes

Honey Joys

Ingredients

• 1/3 cup rice malt syrup
• 80 grams unsalted butter or dairy-free substitute e.g. Nuttlex
• 4.5 cups cornflakes

Method

• Heat up oven to 160 degrees Celsius.
• Arrange cupcake wrappers on a baking tray (20-24).
• Heat up rice malt syrup and butter in a small saucepan until foamy.
• Pour over cornflakes and stir to combine.
• Immediately spoon into cupcake wrappers and bake for 10 minutes.
• Remove from oven and leave to cool completely.
• Store in an air-tight container.

Vanilla Cake with Raspberry Swiss Meringue Buttercream and Rose Fairy Floss

I adapted this recipe by Sydney baking star, Raspberri Cupcakes. Mine is very similar, but I adjusted the ingredients and quantities as I went for a raspberry/vanilla cake with raspberry icing instead of Steph’s pink and white cake with sprinkle icing. Instead of macarons I decorated the cake top with sugar crystals and rose-flavoured Persian fairy floss. The fairy floss should be added just before serving as it quickly starts to melt into the cake and lose its form.

In hindsight — always a marvellous thing — I would have strained the raspberry puree before adding it to the icing as the raspberry seeds added bumps to the icing that detracted from the overall look. I would also have refrained from adding raspberry juice to the vanilla cake batter and made it as a plain vanilla cake. It still tasted fine though.

Pizza and Sausage Rolls

There are some brief instructions here.

Mini Chocolate & Berry Trifles

These dairy and egg free trifles comprised biscuit crumbs, stewed mixed berries, chocolate mousse, chocolate flakes and rose Persian fairy floss. There were OK but not amazing, mostly due to the chocolate mousse which was not sweet enough. I’m going to experiment a little more and will blog this properly later.

My toddler recently turned three years old so we hosted a little shindig at home to celebrate.

Like my daughter’s birthday party last year, I wanted to have a relaxed do focused around lunch and a few party games. The theme was Lightning McQueen / Thomas the Tank Engine as my son couldn’t make up his mind. So we went with red and blue balloons to suit both

My son is mad about cars and trains so here’s what was on the menu:

• Ham & Pineapple Pizzas
• Sausage Rolls
• Fresh Fruit Skewers
• Car Biscuits with Marshmallow Fondant, an adaptation of this recipe by Nigella
• Racing Car Tim Tams
• Double Chocolate Cake, an adaption of this cake by Sweetapolita
• Stick Shifts (a boy version of these Fairy Wands)
• Winners’ Garlands (Cheerio necklaces)

My ex made these sausage rolls on the morning of the party using puff pastry and good quality sausage mince.

My mum made these fruit skewers – don’t they look pretty? I like skewers because they help keep fingers clean without the need for cutlery.

For the cut out biscuits I  used a set of vehicle cutters I’d been saving up all year so we had car, truck, boat and plane biscuits. The marshmallow fondant tasted so much better than normal icing or fondant and was surprisingly unsweet. I say unsurprisingly because it’s basically melted dyed marshmallows and icing sugar kneaded until soft. The fondant is thicker than I would have liked because I simply could not roll it any thinner – you need serious muscles to be a baker!

Do you like these racing cars? I saw something like this online and thought it was such a simple idea. My kids’ grandmother is visiting from Germany at the moment and she and the kids had a fun time making these the day before, using icing to stick the smarties and cut jellybeans onto the Tim Tams.

The table centrepieces were jewellery trees made by my ex. They were on double duty as I also used them to display the Winners’ Garlands (Cheerio necklaces).

As The Hungry Australian Facebook fans will know, there was some debate about the cake in the days leading up to the party. For months my son has been telling me he wanted a Thomas the Tank Engine cake only to change his mind and declare Lighting McQueen to be his new favourite a few days earlier. At the 11th hour he changed back to Thomas.

My son loves chocolate cake so I made a double chocolate cake with good quality cocoa in the cake and milo in the Swiss meringue buttercream. My daughter made the flags and I attached them to some twine hung between two straws.

Some little fingers have already had a go at the icing!

I gave the trains a good wash in hot soapy water and rinsed them clean before placing them carefully on top of the cake.

Did he like it? Oh yes.

I like to cook a similar menu for my kids’ parties each year so regular readers will notice the similarities between this menu, my daughter’s 6 year old party menu and my daughters 5 year old party menu. Both these posts contain recipes and helpful tips on how to throw a kid’s party without losing your mind.

I have such good memories of my own childhood birthday parties. Each year my parents would throw me a party and my mum would bake me the cake of my choice from the iconic Australian Women’s Weekly Cookbook. It’s a tradition I’m more than happy to pass onto my kids, even if nowadays I’m just as likely to search for menu inspiration online.

Is there a kid alive who doesn’t love fairy wands? I made these for my daughter’s five year old birthday party a month or so ago (see Throwing a Kid’s Party Without Losing Your Mind) and they were a smash hit.

They’re super easy, too. You just dip some Grissini in melted chocolate, roll them in sprinkles et voilà – instant Parent of the Year award from your admiring kids.

For a party I’d make probably 1.5 per child, so you have extras.

These fairy wands come by way of my friend Sophie, who made them for her son’s birthday party a few years ago.

I’ll pass on your thanks to her.

INGREDIENTS

1 packet Grissini (bread sticks). If the Grissini are extra long you can break them in two as I did.
50-100gms chocolate melts.
1/4 cup sprinkles

METHOD

Melt chocolate in small ceramic cup or bowl – the smaller the better so you don’t waste any chocolate. I put the cup in the microwave for 1-2 minutes on low to melt the chocolate, giving it a stir midway through.

Put sprinkles in small cup or mug.

Dip grissini end into melted chocolate and coat evenly. Now hold it upside down and jiggle it around so that the excess chocolate drips off and the remaining chocolate partly sets. If you dip the Grissini into the sprinkles when the chocolate is still really hot the sprinkles melt into the chocolate and disappear.

Once you have a nice even layer of chocolate, dip the end into the cup of sprinkles and swirl so it coats the chocolate evenly.

Stand the Grissini up in a small cup to dry so that the wet end is sticking up over the cup rim. Make sure the wet ends of the Grissini don’t touch each other.

I will cheerfully admit that the fairy wands in these photos are far from my finest work – my toddler was  rampaging through the house as I made these so I was a bit distracted. But even though they’re misshaped they still look pretty darn cute and the kids were ecstatic.

That’s the way I like it.