Minted – Audrey's 74

Cookie Tasting Party with Minted

Giulia Doyle — Wed, 09 Dec 2015 14:37:27 +0000

Have you kicked off the holiday season with a party yet? It looks like everyone is booked, attending cocktails, dinners or cookie exchanges. Since we like to gather friends, we decided to host something we were calling a ‘cookie tasting’ party. A fun and sweet way to get together, have everyone bring their cookies, allowing us to try a bunch of new treats.

As you know, I’m a big fan of Minted and have used their services even before I started blogging. Over the years, they’ve expanded their offerings and their party supplies are some of my favourites. This time I used the Rose Colored Glass suite – I loved the gold combined with the soft rose colour, with hints of the winter season seen in the evergreen visual. My favourites are banners which make any event a little more special, tent cards to label all the cookies and stickers which I used to upgrade store-bought cups and take-away boxes. Just some little touches to make the party come together.This time I also tried the new Minted online invitations, which they launched a couple of weeks back. I love the variety of the invites designed by independent artists, how much nicer they are than other online invites I’ve seen and how you can manage your guest list in one spot.

I could have ordered the online invite to match my party supplies, but I decided on a more specific cookie theme to illustrate the party – again, the pale pink pulled it all together. Online invites are still free during their beta phase and the one thing to note is that company firewalls could be an issue for the invite. I noticed that people receiving the invite on their private email didn’t have an issue receiving it, but people receiving it at work did have it end up in their spam folders at times. This was a great way for us to kick-off the season, mingle with friends and end up with a serious sugar overload. I’m always happy to put in the effort for people to get together, it really is nice to slow down, chat, have a drink and not think of our long to-do list. Happy holidays to you and enjoy the photo overload!Photo of Online Invite by Minted. Photo of sugar cookies with red sprinkles, macarons and Mexican hot chocolate cookies by Colin Rowe. Party supplies provided by Minted. Opinions are my own.

Holiday Cards – do you send them?

Giulia Doyle — Thu, 05 Nov 2015 19:06:29 +0000

So, we just put away our Halloween decor and it’s early November. We also just received our order form from school for the school Christmas cards, which is a cute fundraiser in which the kids create their own Christmas cards. Naturally we have to order those cards, and though I love those cards, I do often miss being able to order personalized photo cards.

You know I am a big fan of Minted and I’ve used their services for party invites, party supplies, as well as personalized tags for my Christmas gifts and the most amazing wrapping paper. When they contacted me to see if I wanted to order holiday cards, I was going to decline, because I already have my supply of Christmas cards.

But then I remembered that I help my grand-parents every year with their Christmas cards and that I’ve ordered from Minted many times already! My grandparents have been sending personalized cards for 65+ years – I remember creating collages with them and bringing them to the copy shop to create their one-of-a-kind holiday card.

We just completed the card for this year and it’s ready to be sent off to Minted, but here I’m sharing some cards I love, some with photos, others without. The choices are great, varied and what I love most is the quality of the cards, the convenience and that Minted works with artists worldwide. And every year they come up with more great stuff, which just makes me want to come back. Do you send holiday cards?
All opinions are my own. Minted supplied this year’s holiday cards. Images taken from Minted website.

Midsummer Night Party with Minted

Giulia Doyle — Mon, 22 Jun 2015 13:15:36 +0000

The end of the school year was busy, one special event after another and summer sports activities starting. Despite our busy schedule, I wanted to gather a group of friends, colleagues and neighbors to ring in the summer and celebrate Midsummer. It turned out to be a beautiful night and with the help of Minted I was was able to bring it up a notch with their beautiful party decorations and fabric selection.

We celebrated summer and the longest day of the year with a buffet, everyone dressed in white and games on the front lawn. The weather cooperated, which was a big relief. I served my quinoa salad, a simple pasta salad with cherry tomatoes, mozzarella and basil, roasted tomatoes on arugula with some feta, pea dip, gazpacho, sausages, my brownies, raspberry cream cake, a sharlotka made with nectarines, lemon cupcakes and red velvet cake with mascarpone cream and berries served in a cup.

It was nice to come together, relax and see the kids play well as a group. It was a late night for everyone, but that’s what this time of the year is about – we’ll be longing for long summer nights soon enough, grubby fingers, sticky faces and all.

Minted provided me with party decorations and fabric I used for the backdrop and tablerunner. I used the soft floral fabric, ginkgo party supplies and 60 feet of Lotka banners.

Red Pepper Jelly, Cheesy Shortbread and a Minted Giveaway

Giulia Doyle — Mon, 18 Nov 2013 11:00:17 +0000

I’ve been a fan of Minted for many years now. I’ve ordered holiday cards, gift tags and even my sister’s wedding invitations from there. I love their selection created by independent artists, their customer service and the paper quality is amazing. This year they’ve expanded their offering to include ornament cards that I mentioned a couple of weeks ago and then I discovered personalized gift wrap! Again, I posted about it the other week. Minted saw my posts and asked if I wanted to try out their wrapping paper and tags? Of course! Wrapping paper with photos of my kids sounded perfect to add a special touch to our gifts.I’m still waiting for my paper to arrive – all of this happened rather quickly – but the personalization was really easy and allowed me to crop and adjust my photos to fit the paper design perfectly. I chose two types of paper and some gift tags. The tags arrived within days and the quality is great! I can’t wait to wrap my gifts in the paper once it arrives.

Win $50.- to spend anyway you want at Minted!

This give-away is now closed – congratulations Laura D on being the lucky winner!

Would you like to have some personalized wrapping paper or maybe some holiday cards? Or do you need some art or stickers? Just comment below by Monday,November 25th and you could win US$ 50.- towards anything you’d like at Minted.

Winner will be chosen at random and will be contacted by email. Open worldwide, except Quebec residents – see why here.

Good luck and now on to the recipes!With much of my family living abroad and friends scattered across the country, my holiday planning starts early. This year I decided to create a little something from my kitchen and decided on sweet pepper jelly and a batch of cheesy shortbread to go with it. I love the sweet/sharp taste of the pepper jelly with shortbread and even a piece of sharp cheese – it’s perfect to put out when you have guests over. I’m sure they’ll vanish quickly.

Red Pepper Jelly from Canadian Family

Serving Size: 6 cups

Ingredients

4 Cups seeded and roughly chopped red peppers (about 4)
5 1/2 Cups granulated sugar
1 Cup white vinegar
1/3 Cups fresh lemon juice
1 pouch liquid pectin

Instructions

Place red peppers in a food processor and purée.
Combine puréed peppers, sugar and vinegar in a large stainless-steel pot. Bring to a boil, stirring constantly to avoid scorching.
Remove pot from heat and cool for 15 minutes. This allows the peppers to cook slowly in the residual heat and prevents them from floating on the surface.
Add lemon juice and pectin, and return pot to stove. Simmer over medium heat for at least 20 minutes or until thickened, stirring occasionally. Skim any foam from the surface.

Notes

I doubled the recipe and it took about 1 hour and 15 minutes for the jelly to thicken. I almost gave up.

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Cheesy Shortbread from Martha Stewart

Yield: 45 pieces

Ingredients

2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 cup (2 sticks) salted butter, chilled and cut into small pieces
2 cups grated sharp cheddar cheese
1/2 cup milk
1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce

Instructions

To the bowl of a food processor, add flour and cayenne pepper; pulse to combine. Add butter, and pulse until the mixture resembles coarse meal, 8 to 10 seconds.
Add cheese to the food processor; pulse until combined. Transfer the mixture to a large bowl.
Using a fork, stir in milk and Worcestershire sauce until well combined. Have ready several pieces of parchment paper.
Form mixture into two 1-inch-diameter logs, and wrap in parchment. Transfer the logs to the refrigerator, and chill until very firm, at least 1 hour.
Heat oven to 350 degrees. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper. Remove logs from refrigerator, and cut each one into 1/4-inch-thick rounds. Place the rounds on prepared baking sheets, spaced 1 inch apart.
Bake the shortbread until golden, about 12 minutes, rotating baking sheets between shelves halfway through baking.
Transfer shortbread to wire racks to cool. Bake remaining dough.

Notes

Next time I would cut mine thicker and bake them a little longer. They are very delicate and probably would not survive a trip in the mail.

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Minted generously supplied the wrapping paper and gift tags in exchange for a review. All opinions are my own. I was not paid to write the post.