Baileys Fudge Goodness!

So yesterday I started off a batch of Baileys White Chocolate Fudge, as a gift to the teachers at preschool.
I am happy to report it was a complete success!
Delicious, melty in the mouth, not grainy and oh so decadent...you're salivating now aren't you?

So after chilling in the fridge for 3 hours, I chopped that goodness up and covered a piece of cardboard with Christmas wrapping. Then it was a simple matter of wrapping it all up in cellophane and attaching one of our mini home made cards!

I dunno about you, but I think that looks pretty impressive for a home made gift!
To recap, I've added the recipe in again below

Baileys White Chocolate Fudge

150ml Baileys

50ml milk
30g butter
350g caster sugar
300g good quality white cooking chocolate, broken into squares
(0.126 standard drinks per piece)

Line a square 20cm cake tin or baking dish with baking paper.
Measure out 125ml of Baileys and pour into the saucepan.
Add the milk, butter and caster sugar and put the pan over a low heat. Stir occasionally, until the sugar has dissolved and the butter melted(this takes about 10 min).
Turn up the heat to medium and stir while the mixture gently simmers. You want the bubbles to be calmly breaking the surface for 10 min. Remove pan from the heat and stir in chocolate and the last 25 ml baileys**.
Keep stirring until chocolate has melted and you have a smooth consistency. If the chocolate is slow to melt, put the pan over a low heat and stir until smooth. Transfer to the tin and chill for at least two hours. Cut into small squares.

**We added all the baileys at the beginning purely because it was going to the preschool teachers, and it just didn't seem right to send along an alcoholic gift from our nearly 4 year old daughter lol!
Still works just as well, just has the alcohol cooked out this way.

Although the (700 ml) bottle of baileys will set you back about $39 (damnit! it was on special for $24 last week but I didn't get around to buying any!)
It still works out to being a pretty cheap gift, as you only use 150ml of Baileys per batch, and the rest is normal pantry/fridge staples (well for me anyway).
One batch was more than enough, I sent half of the batch along to preschool, it's very, very rich so you'd only really want maybe 2-3 pieces in a sitting. Which leaves half a batch for me to wrap up in individual little cellophane parcels to put on the dinner plates for Christmas dinner as a little sweet treat for my guests.

Leaving me with nearly a whole bottle of baileys in my liquor cabinet, waiting to make another  batch whenever I see fit....orrrr to drink in the evenings over the silly season! Im thinking it will probably be the latter haha.

So there you have it, a simple, delicious gift for the teachers, or make small ones with 3 pieces in each as a gift on the dinner plates at the Christmas table!

For now get delicious and stay beautiful! x

Pinteresting isn't it?

Today the sicky tummys seem to have gone *touch wood* and I bring to you, two Pinterest projects I pinned and actually got around to trying out! (Amazing isn't it? I thought this day would never come!)

So first up was the Baileys White Chocolate Fudge Recipe which I mentioned a couple weeks back on the 19th of November.......wait wait wait, I've just realised it's the 19th of December today....woahhhh where did that month go?! Blimey!

So anyway, I thought it would make a nice little gift to send along to Alia's Preschool teachers tomorrow on her last day for the year.

Soooo far so good, its setting in the fridge, but I guess the proof will be in the pudding (haha bad pun... ok, stop looking at me like that!) as to whether it has set with a nice silky texture and not a grainy one.
I have never attempted fudge before as I keep hearing there is a real knack to getting it right, so just avoided it and thought...'yeah one day'...well today is that day! Mmmmmm yes before you ask, I totally did lick out the remains in the pot!...Perhaps a tad on the sickly sweet side and would take cake batter over fudge remains any day but still nom nom nom all the same.

I didn't have the right size baking dish to set it in, so I had to use that old NZ initiative (we call it the number 8 fencing wire trick over here in Kiwi Land) and find a way around it....here's what I came up with:

....haha yup sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do!!

Stay tuned for the finished product!

Onto the second of my Pinterest projects to try out, was this ever so cute, DIY baby keepsake
(Instructions here http://pagingfunmums.com/2013/08/29/diy-baby-keepsake-using-homemade-clay/)

Thought, yep, that looks and sounds pretty straight forward and easy, will give that one a try and post them over to Nana over in England once we've framed them.

Sooo following the instructions very carefully, I got to my "thick mashed potato consistency" and quickly took the pot off the heat, spooned out onto my baking paper, covered with the damp tea towel and waited....
and waited....
and couldn't wait anymore...So in my excitement to get the project finished, I awoke my sleeping angel baby (I knoww terrible mother, should have left him to sleep! But if you knew my son, you'd know he is soooooo chilled out he really wouldnt mind...and he didn't!) to squish his feet into the gooey dough.... he obliged and was given a quick cuddle and returned to bed...and being the amazingly chilled out little dude he is, he went straight back to sleep! (I know, lucky aren't I? I call it Karma...I have put up with nearly 4 years of the most not chilled out daughter ever, so the good Karma has come around now and I have been blessed with the best behaved baby ever!)

Anyway...lets finish this little project story!

So I squished his feet in, popped it straight into the oven on the cookie cooling rack (as suggested in the website instructions) at 100 degrees C and left it to do its thing.

What I was greeted with after about an hour was NOT the smooth lovely keepsake I was hoping for...Really should have taken a photo of that disaster!

It was horrendous, cracked, funny discouloured bits, lumpy...just plain awful. And I put this disaster down to not waiting long enough for the dough to cool properly.

So I tried again, and this time waited until the dough was COMPLETELY COLD before doing anything with it. The result?
BEAUTIFUL! Finally a success story!They are by no means perfect but they are still pretty awesome and with a coat of cold spray paint over, they will look even better! Haha.

Good things come to those who wait, could not be a truer statement in this case.

Here was my (nearly) finished product... one pair of cutesey little Alexander feetsies,  one hand print and one toe print from Alia...Yes a toe print...I tried to do a thumb print for a christmas tree ornament, but her thumb prints are soooo teeeny tiny that it looked ridiculous....so a toe print it was!

I left this one in a wee bit long and it got a bit of a suntan and a few cracks but like I said above, nothing a bit of gold spray paint wont fix!

So that about covers it for pinterest projects I have ACTUALLY executed!

But I will leave you with the beautiful simple idea for dressing up the dining chairs for Christmas day which I intend on doing...

For now, get Pinteresting and stay beautiful! x

Lets get the kids busy!

Apologies for the gap in posts,  we've had some sick tummys in our house for the last few days. 

I bring you this post from the couch, curled up feeling sorry for myself! Both kids have been under the weather as well, hubby is the only one who's managed to avoid it, so he's home from work looking after us all this afternoon.

Onto the continuing topic of hand made Christmas cards. This will be my last post on cards, for this season, before I do it to death!

Just wanted to show a couple more designs that are super easy, and a couple of designs that the kids can help with to make extra special

As much as I love giving them free reign to let their creative flair run wild, sometimes you still want to have a particular design, BUT with the kids input as well.

For example: These two I just got out the glue, glitter and paint and let Alia go for it!

But then I wanted to do some with a particular design so we did these ones together, I gently guided her on what to do, and they turned out beautifully but still very obviously  made with her input.

The glittery silver tree is perhaps more impressive. We did this buy clipping out a flower shape from some card, and then using this as a stencil.

I held the stencil in place while she painted with the sponge dabber.

When we pulled the stencil off, she sprinkled the glitter on top...this never got old, the smile on her face watching the sparkly glitter go EVERYWHERE (and I really mean everywhere, we're going to be finding glitter in the carpet for the next 10 years I think!) was just gorgeous!

Then we cranked out the UHU glitter glue pens and I just let her go nuts dabbing colours on wherever she wanted. I added in a few bits to look like strings on tinsel and then she did the random coloured splodges to look like baubles.

Sooooo glittery, its like a fairy threw up in here!

I'll leave you with a couple more "grown up" card designs here...

These really don't need much explaining, grab some ribbon, crank out your hot glue gun and criss cross your ribbon up, gluing in place as you go.
Add some embellishments and hey presto, pretty pretty!

Unfortunately the Merry Christmas one I was trying to glue the ribbon in a hurry so its a bit messy, but you still get the idea....and maybe I'd use all capital letter stickers next time to avoid the Y and the end looking out of place. Obviously couldn't place it down in line with the rest because the ribbon is in the way.

Right back to sleep for me, for now, get glittery and stay Beautiful! (And not sick if at all possible :P )

Still Got my Christmas Crafty Pants On!

In continuation from Friday, I have made some progress on my card making. Seeing as for the most part I have been making them up as I go along, it's been rather time consuming. Putting bits here, and there, seeing if this goes well with that, and after way too much time playing around with my design, finally gluing it in place...next thing I know, its already midnight and I've only finished one card! (Don't worry they don't take this long to make if you're organised and already know what design you're going to do) Uh Oh! I'd better get a wiggle on if I want to get them posted to the Family in the UK on time for Christmas!

 Last year I procrastinated waaaaaay too long and ended up posting them a week before Christmas. BAD MOVE! We always send them all over in one big A4 size envelope to the Grandparents house, then they then distribute them to all the family members for us. 

One A4 size envelope, you wouldn't think would cost too much to post right?

*ahem* "That will be $46 please...." The polite post office woman said.
"WHAT DID YOU SAY? $4 to $6 right...???..."
"No, FORTY SIX..."

Could not believe my ears.

So the moral of that story is, don't put off dealing with the overseas Christmas cards unless you're rich.

Anyway, back to the point of this post, the making of the Christmas cards. I've put together a tutorial for you if you are interested in recreating them.

I think the stockings is my favourite design so far...

I have used KaiserCraft large mat stack scrapbook "paper". It says paper, but it's really more of a thin card, so its PERFECT for card making.

Begin with a piece cut out to 22cm x 16cm. (or really whatever size you want, this just happens to be the size I made mine.)

Please excuse my huckery nail polish...2 kids...limited time...enough said. Its actually amazing that I even have any nail polish on to be honest haha, it would suggest I actually had some down time at some stage in the not so distant past.

Now fold it in half, so you have the print on the INSIDE of the card. I love making cards like this, it gives the recipient a bit of a "OOhhh!" when they open it.

The print doesn't necessarily have to be typically Christmas either. I actually have no Christmas themed paper laying about at the moment (I know, can you BELIEVE it!? I can't!) so just found some fancy prints that I thought could work well and went with it. I personally think they turned out pretty nicely.

 Once you've decided on your print, cut and folded your cards, you need to lay some tracing paper (or an equally thin/transparent paper) over the top so you can write a message that doesn't get lost in the magnificent print you just picked out!

I painted on a little black dotted border but that's just because I can never leave well enough alone and felt like it "needed" something.

Now glue this in with the tiniest little smidges of modpodge, not too much or you risk the paper wrinkling up and looking terrible. Hot glue could be used here too but because the tracing paper is so thin, the hot glue often leaves too much of a bump showing where it's set.

In another one of my cards, (which I'll show next) although it didn't NEED it, once again I couldn't resist embellishing the tracing paper by adding the ribbon as a border and a hand tied bow (that bow actually covers where my ribbon edge finishes) to make it super fancy and special.

Now for decorating the front of the card.
1.    Start with the background, you could just leave it plain white, but I wanted to give it something a little extra (typical I know, but you know me now, I have a problem!). So I created a snow effect by mixing some silver glitter with white paint and using a paper doily as a stencil, then dabbing the paint over the top like so.

It only takes a couple of minutes to completely dry and then it has a beautiful sparkly snow effect.
The pictures don't really do it justice, but I promise it looks good when and is worth the extra couple of minutes it takes to do.

2.   Next just sketch out a really basic stocking shape onto some scrap booking paper and add a little strip of a complimenting colour to the top of the stocking.

You can leave it like this (as on the left) which is simple and effective. (looking at it now, I'm thinking outlining it with a black fine tip pen would bring it out more.) Or if you want to add more detailing, you can paint on some white stitching around the edges, or even some little black # marks for a scruffy old stocking look.
If you can't be bothered getting the paint out for this tiny amount of work, using a twink pen is a clever trick for this.

3.  Now cut a long piece of twine, (I've used florists hessian twine here, you can get this from spotlight, and probably from any emporium) and glue this across the top, BUT ONLY ONE LITTLE DAB AT EACH END, don't glue all the way across or you wont be able to attach your stockings.

4.   Cut three, 4cm strips of ribbon or twine and attach as follows,
place ribbon under the twine, and then fold over.

5.  When folded over, take a wee dab of hot glue and secure the ribbon ends together, but don't glue to the paper yet. Now using a tiny dab of hot glue on the very top part of your stockings attach JUST to the ribbon, again don't glue to the paper yet. By doing it this way it gives you a chance to move your stockings along the twine to space them out to your preference. Obviously once they are glued to the paper there is no going back.  So taking this series of steps can leave you with a much better end result, than if you glue them straight to the paper one by one and then get to the end and go, whoops, I wish I'd popped that first one a bit closer to the edge etc.
Now you've got your positioning how you want them, a quick dab of hot glue on each stocking to secure to the card and you're done.

Now for a couple of Christmas tree cards, one quick and super simple, one more elaborate and fiddly.
Don't let elaborate and fiddly put you off though, promise its not too difficult!

First up the elaborate fiddly tree on the left. It was inspired by a design I pinned on pinterest here http://www.pinterest.com/pin/196258496232781493/

The picture doesn't really do it justice, as the frilly doily bit gets lost in the picture, but it looks great in real life. The doily looks a bit like snowy layers on the tree.

Starting with paper doily's (I love those things! so great in so many art/craft projects!) cut out 3 pieces of the lacy looking bits, one for the bottom layer of the tree, one for the middle and one for the top, descending in size. 

The rest of the tree is made up of little pieces of patterned scrap book paper rolled into little cigars and glued in place with modpodge.

Modpodge does work well, but if you're in a hurry, might I suggest cranking out the hot glue gun? I got half way through this tree with the modpodge technique and then swapped to the glue gun. Can be messier with strings of glue going everywhere but if you're careful you can achieve a gorgeous card very quickly.

Over the top of the doily sections, I used bits of beaded wire hot glued into place to look a bit like a beaded garland, or I suppose it could imitate Christmas lights if you use a multi-colour beaded wire?

To top the tree I have used a little square diamante embellishment I picked up from an emporium. Then used a little hand tied the red bow to fill up some of that empty background. It just looked too bare without it. Or maybe that's my inability to leave it as is coming out again ;)

It is the inside of this one which I went all out on the inside with.

For the simpler card, I very quickly cut triangles of complimenting green scrapbook card out and glued them in place. Then added the beads to look like bauble ornaments.

 Add a quick silver bow and we're done with that one!

Eeeeasy peasy!

*phew*

I try to get these done while my little girl is either A. at preschool, or B. at night when she'd in bed....but of course sometimes the mess is too elaborate to tidy away for the night, just to pull it all out again the following evening.
So of course she discovered my treasure trove on Saturday morning and after much begging, pleading and promising to be good all day! She was allowed to make a Christmas card of her own.

Possibly the cutest card I've ever laid eyes on, (I could be a bit biased here) and I think I'll be letting her make a few more for the Grandparents on Wednesday when she's home with me. I'm sure they will appreciate them!
(Wednesday is not a preschool day and I'm constantly trying to think of things we can do to keep her entertained.) 

So in conclusion to this mammoth post, we have completed 4 different Christmas card designs, I encourage you to let the little ones loose on a few, they have sooooo much fun, and really, its not actually any  creating any more mess than when I make them!

For now, get your Christmas crafty pants on, your kiddies all painty and stay beautiful! x

Getting Christmassy and Crafty today!

Home made Christmas cards, as inspired from this card idea I found on pinterest http://www.pinterest.com/pin/196258496232781493/.

I LOVE making home made cards, and hubby HATES buying cards, (Says its a big fat waste of money ...*cough GRINCH cough* ;) )  I guess it works out well for us.
So as it is a preschool day today for Alia, I am able to pull out my crafty bits and pieces and start playing!

Just LOOK at the mess I've already made!...

You can understand why I save getting my craft stuff out for preschool days can't you? It's a treasure trove just for me, let alone an almost 4 year old!
So I am going to shoot back to my mess and continue on my Christmas card making quest. Have to get as much done as possible before the baby boy wakes up. And before we head down to the local primary school hall for the Preschool Christmas Production at 2:30 this avo...gosh I'm cutting my time fine aren't I?? (Its already 11:20am, eep!) Ok off I go. But stay tuned for some card making updates!

For now, get crafty and stay beautiful x

Yuck!
Its hot, muggy and overcast today, so everyone in my household is getting grizzly and out of sorts...well except hubby...purely because he is at work, so I don't know what state of grizzles he may or may not be in...but they don't have a summer uniform, just a long sleeve, long pants, heavy boots, woolly socks, year round uniform...so I'm betting he probably feels like grizzling too! I would! Ick, can anyone say, clammy? *shudder*
Anyway, so whats a mum to do to cheer up a grizzly nearly 4 year old, and herself while shes at it?
make something decadent and chocolaty!
...but before we get to that, I did promise yesterday that I would post about the Choc Banana, Peanut butter smoothie!

I unfortunately didn't take a photo of it as it looked so delicious, I lost all rational thought and downed it before thinking about the pictures! Just think of a thick chocolatey looking mixture in a glass...it doesn't really need a picture :P
But it goes like this

Banana Choc Peanut Butter Smoothie

• 200ml low fat milk (or chocolate SoGood brand soy milk, delicious!)
• 1 large banana, quite ripe...I'm talking brown spots here, not blackened ok?...(when my bananas start to turn like this I throw them in the freezer straight away so I always have the perfect smoothie or baking bananas at hand....little tip if u hate peeling off the gross freezy skin when you go to use them (I hate this bit anyway), slice em up and stick them in a container in a single layer until frozen, then transfer into a freezer bag or another container and keep piling them up that way...or keep in individual containers in small quantities so you have the perfect amount to pull out and throw straight into a smoothie when you're short on time...I actually do this with most my fruit when its starting to turn, specially pears...gosh pears are rock hard for what seems like forever and then they're ripe for about 3 seconds before they rot! If you're a fan of stand up comedian Eddie Izzard, you will relate to this statement!
• 2 heaped Tbsp natural peanut butter (that you just made yourself cause you're totally awesome!!)
• 2 heaped tsp cocoa or cacao powder
• 3 heaped Tbsp wholegrain oats
• 1 Tbsp linseed (optional)
• 1 Splash of vanilla extract
• 1 Shake of cinnamon

Whizz up in the blender until as smooth as your blender can manage and go, ooooh lordy this is good!
Makes a seriously filling and tasty breakfast to keep you going all morning, and best of all, it tastes naughty, but is totally not!

Nowwwww onto the chocolatey goodness...
This recipe is actually the result of a botched up batch of Chocolate Frosting shots, as seen here
http://chocolatecoveredkatie.com/2012/01/16/chocolate-frosting-shots/
Now I'm not 100% sure what I did wrong, but my coconut cream, even though I left it in the fridge for 2 days after I bought it, just didn't get thick...so it didn't work (Don't you worry, I'll be trying every brand of coconut cream I can get my hands on until I get this recipe to work though!!)
BUT I am one of these, life hands you lemons, make lemonade people...at least when it comes to anything involving chocolate I am anyway. (Come on, who isn't??!!)
So instead of admitting defeat, I used my runny, botched up mixture to make something else delicious and added some dates in along the way...you should do this too! Its amazing.

Gather together:

• 1 can of full cream coconut cream
• 1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa
• 5 pitted dates
• 1 tsp vanilla extract

1 tsp powdered sugar or stevia if you HAVE to have it sweetened...I like without but this is purely because I've been weening myself off sugar for several years

Throw everything in a food processor and whizz until the dates are chopped up as teeeeny tiny as physically possible...we want to avoid too many "bits". You could leave the dates out completely and maybe substitute with banana or frozen fruit? (If you do this, please please comment and let me know how it turned out!)

Now you have one of a few options...
Pour it into a big glass, add a few ice cubes and drink it as the most delectable (albeit a wee bit calorific with the coconut cream, but heyyyy this is a treat!) chocolatey smoothie.

OR if you can resist downing it there on the spot, you could try what I am currently trying at the moment...

Pour about 200ml into a bowl or glass, add 2-3 heaped Tbsp of chia seeds stir through gently and leave in the fridge for 2 hours to set into a chocolate chia seed pudding...DIVINE!! Oh my gosh, my daughter just helped me polish off a batch of this... we could probably eat this forever and still not have had enough!

Alright, I'll be the first to admit the chia seeds make it looks like something that came out of...*ahem* I don't need to finish that sentence, lets just say, having a baby, I see something similar most days...BUT SERIOUSLY give it a try! Its worth it I promise you!

She knows this is gonna be good!

Sooo lovely and thick, almost like a mousse...just not as fluffy.

That my friends, is a chocolately face of success!

OR  put some in the freezer and see if it turns into some kind of ice cream!....The icecream one is yet to be seen, as it's still in the freezer awaiting results.

For now cool down and stay beautiful x

Day four of December, and that scary C word is everywhere I look!
No, unfortunately I'm not talking about Christmas...(Thats a lovely word!) no no, I'm talking about CUT....yes, Hair CUT to be exact...
2 nights ago, my darling dearest nearly 4 year old angel faced baby girl...CUT HALF HER HAIR OFF!!!!
Twas, long and blond with the most divine natural curls at the ends. The bearer of constant compliments wherever we went. My absolute pride and joy!!!

You see, my own hair and I, do not see eye to eye, it's thin, it's dry, it's not quite straight and not quite curly, it frizzes at the slightest drop of moisture in the air and I cant grow it any longer than just below my shoulders! That's ok though, I came to accept this a long time ago, and since Alia's hair is long and silky and basically perfect in every way imaginable, I lived vicariously through her!

Until 2 nights ago...when she did this...

 

This is the pile of hair we found hiding behind the door...complete with hair tie still tangled in it.

*Sigh* So off we went to the hairdresser in the morning to have it salvaged as best as possible...

Now my sweet darling dearest nearly 4 year old angel faced baby girl, well, her halo has slipped just slightly, and now although still cute...looks like this. Very sad Mummy right here! Even Daddy is upset!

Anyway, after going on and on and on about it for the past 48 hours I have promised her that the matter is closed and we wont give her anymore grief about it...so onto a new subject

Home made Peanut Butter! And what could be better than home made peanut butter??

Well, a Banana Choc, Peanut Butter Smoothie of course!!!
Full of protein and fibre, fills you up...and best of all, tastes naughty but is totally nice to the waistline!
But we will get to that tomorrow...

First off lets talk about how I made some peanut butter this morning...why didn't I just buy a jar at the shop and save all the faffing about, you ask?

Because I like natural peanut butter, no salt, no sugar, no stabilisers and god knows what other nasty chemicals they put into it at the shop.

"But they sell the natural stuff at the shop" I still hear you shriek...

Yes, that's true, and if you cant be bothered making your own...or haven't got a food processor, then I urge you, buy the natural store bought one. So much better for you. 

HOWEVER, regular peanut butter ranges in price from about $2-$5 for a standard 400g jar...cheap and nasty...Natural peanut butter (and I'm not even talking organic here, just natural stuff with no nasty additives) usually starts at $6 (if you're lucky) and just goes up from there for a 380g jar. Sometimes I see it on special for $5.99...ooooh big savings!! haha ,,,It was my clever mother who put the idea in my head to just start making it myself...love you mum!

So to put it into perspective, last night I bought a 400g bag of peanuts for $3.99 (roasted, but not salted...these are in the baking section, I'm not talking about the not so healthy bags of roasted snacking peanuts from the snackfood isle).  You can just buy raw ones and roast them yourself if you want to, but I wanted a quick fix of peanut butter and couldnt bear to wait a whole 15 minutes to let them get all roasty!!! (which is by the way how long you'd need to roast em up if you were doing it yourself.)
Try to find "Hi oleic peanuts"* if you can, I found some from the Tasti brand.
And a 500ml bottle of peanut oil for $4.99 (in case you were wondering, that works out to 14c per Tbsp) ...you only need one Tbsp of peanut oil per batch so this will make you heaps and heaps and heaps of peanut butter (33.814 batches if you wanna get exact!)

So for the bag of peanuts and the Tbsp of oil, it will cost you $4.13 for about 400g (mine didnt make this much cause I kept eating it....my bad lol) of peanut butter ! And even less if you get the peanuts on special or from the bulk bins.
You can of course add a touch of salt or honey if you want to adjust the mix more to your taste.

So I threw that bag of peanuts into a hot fry pan for literally a minute, stirring gently the whole time...we don't want them to burn, we just want them to warm through a wee bit to get their natural oils going.
When warmed, throw them all in the food processor on high speed.
Now...have patience...I learnt this the hard way and ended up making 2 batches because the first one I did wrong.
The peanuts will turn into crumbs...and appear to stay that way, not doing anything else for *what felt like* ages. Push through the temptation to add the peanut oil at this stage and just wait a couple more minutes...you will see the consistency start to change and hear the thump thump noise the processor starts to make when a thick ball starts to form. That's when you need to add the oil to thin it down a bit. Now you can actually leave it without the oil and you get this very thick, very smooth, glossy peanut "paste" I would be inclined to call it. would be epic in some kind of clean eating peanut butter cheesecake!
Or if you want it more spreadable throw in that oil and let it thin down a wee bit.

The voila, you have delicious home made natural peanut butter with no nasty additives! 

And aside from that, its a pretty novel feeling when you have people staying, and in the morning you can whip out the jar and be all, home made peanut butter on your toast??
(totally trying home made hazelnut spread next!!) Think I'll leave the marmite and honey to the experts though.

Jam is a whole different ball game, if you want a healthy alternative to jam and you like Chia seeds, try this baby out

http://www.losebabyweight.com.au/chia-berry-jam-recipe/

*Hi oleic peanuts have a fatty acid combination similar to olive oil, ie with more monounsaturated fatty acid. This composition allows for a longer shelf life as well as providing health benefits for consumers because of their amazing nutritional benefits such as:

• Healthy fats 

• Antioxidants, e.g. Vitamins and Minerals 

• Good protein source 

• Phytochemicals 

• Beta-sitosterol 

• Low Glycaemic Index 

• Low in Sodium 

• Fibre 

• Cholesterol free 

• Resveratrol 

Peanut research has identified eating 5 or more servings (25 grams) a week can: 

• Prevent Type II Diabetes 

• Decrease the risk of Cardiovascular disease 

• Assist in lowering Cholesterol 

• Assist in weight loss, via hunger suppression 

• Protection against Alzheimer disease 

• Lower Total and LDL Cholesterol 

This info is from the 100% Nutz website...so if you're going to buy the natural peanut butter from the supermarket, I would personally recommend you buy this brand.

 http://www.100percentnutz.com/what-is-a-hi-oleic-peanut-anyway/

*phew* that post only took about 10 thousand attempts, in between nappy changes, feeds (baby and miss bobcut...ok ok sorry I know, I said I'd stop going on about the hair!) and finding things to entertain Alia with! I'm Exhausted, can't wait for hubster to get home!
So for now, get au naturel and stay beautiful! x