Archive for March, 2016

How to make your farm party a grand success?

March 17th, 2016

Celebrating a special day or moment in your life is very important. But, making sure that the celebration doesn’t become boring and common is also important. Everyone has a party at home and everyone serves food in great chinaware. How can you make your party exciting and unique? Plan a farm party and your celebration will be remembered and talked about for years to come.

People are fed up with the hustle bustle of city life. Everyone wants to escape into nature and spend time in a serene place. Farms are the best places to stay connected with the plants and animals. If you are having a party this summer, host it at your farm, and you are sure to have some old fashioned fun.

Hosting a farm party can be tricky, but you plan right, you are in for a great time. Here are a few tips on hosting a successful farm party –

  • Finding a good location is very important. If you own a farm, then half the job is done. If you do not own a farm, you can always ask a friend if you could host a small party in their farm. I bet no true friend is going to say no to some enjoyment.
  • After finding the farm, plan where you are going to seat your friends, where you will serve the food and where you are going to have the games and other fun activities. You can seat your friends under shady trees and have the buffet in the barn. Just make sure you clean all the places before hand to avoid last minute panic.
  • Do not forget to order a farm themed cake and give the exact address for the cake delivery guy to arrive on time.
  • If possible have a barbeque set up in your farm. It is going to take your party into another level.
  • To decorate the place, use farm items and keep the concept as rustic as possible. Avoid using colour papers, balloons and cardboards. Use table clothes, wooden crates and fresh flowers to decorate the place. Keep the decoration minimum to make it look realistic.
  • Use berry picking baskets as serving trays, wire baskets to keep the breads and milk tins to serve drinks. These small details will make your party a grand success.
  • Let the food be rustic too. Serve fresh milk, fresh fruit juice and wine. Chicken chops, lamb chops, fresh cream with strawberries, fruits handpicked from the farm, all these can make a wonderful spread. You can have cotton candies for the children. It will be super exciting. As a memento, you can order little farm animals shaped cakes gifts for every guest.
  • Make sure you have tied up or locked all the farm animals as they can cause mishaps when your guests arrive

Farms are the perfect venue to host children’s birthday parties, success parties and get-togethers. You can have a slight escape from the busy schedule that you live in the city. Farms can be refreshing and your guests will have the time of their life.

Tips to Make Your Fruits Stay Fresh

March 17th, 2016

Including fruits in the diet is a healthy habit. However, you face the real test when you have to store them. Have a look at your fruit baskets. Do you think that you can preserve all those fruits by merely placing it in a refrigerator? Here under, we detail you a few preservative techniques for different fruits.

Apple: It is highly recommended to refrigerate this fruit. The cut slices of apples undergo oxidation and turn brown. To prevent this, try sprinkling salt over the pieces. Immersing them in lime juice can also prevent this action. It is advisable to consume apples within a day or two after purchasing.

Pears: Similar to that of apples, these fruits also tend to get oxidized when exposed to air. Use the same techniques (as of apples) to preserve these fruits. Pears go stale in a quick time and it is suggested to get only required amount of fruits.

Grapes: As you get the fruits home, wash them thoroughly and give enough time for them to get dried up before refrigerating it. Make sure that you don’t pluck the fruits out of stem to refrigerate. While eating, pluck a handful of grapes and get rid of the dirt by washing thoroughly.

Water melon: If you are all alone, it’s almost impossible for you to eat an entire watermelon at one go. Wrap the left over fruit with a plastic food wrap before refrigerating. The cut slices should be consumed in less than 30 minutes. Confine only to one or two of these fruits when you order for fruit basket delivery UK.

Strawberries: Preserving of strawberries is a hectic job. Any presence of moisture can result in fungus formation. Ensure that it is not stored in damp conditions. Before storing these fruits, detach the leaves and clean the fruits. After allowing them to dry up, store them in an air tight container.

Pomegranate: In comparison to other fruits mentioned above, pomegranates can stay fresh for a longer time. Deseed the fruit and store in an air tight container. You can store this fruits for about a week when refrigerated.

Mangoes: Preserving cut slices of mangoes isn’t a good idea! Consume this fruit as soon as possible. If you have to preserve the slices, sprinkle some salt on top of it before refrigerating. The best way to store mangoes is to extract the pulp and place it in a freezer. Consume this pulp in less than 3 weeks.

Pineapples: You can’t consume this whole fruit for sure. The best way to store it is to de-skin it, remove the stem and then refrigerate it. Sprinkle lime juice on the fruit slices. Consume the fruit within a couple of days.

Kiwi: Unlike other fruits storing slices of this fruits isn’t recommended. Being volatile, the cut slices lose all their moisture. Always refrigerate the whole fruit.

Bananas: You can find bananas either in yellow or yellow with brown flecks. If you find them green, wrap them with a paper bag until they are ripen. Unlike other fruits, avoid refrigerating the bananas.

Understand that storage procedures are not same for every fruit. Your worries in this context start when you get the fruits in bulk. Make sure to get rid of wax coating for the fruits which are consumed with their skin.

Chocolates you must try before you die

March 16th, 2016

Who doesn’t like chocolates? For some it is an indulgence, while for others it is an addiction. These days, chocolate is not just eaten as a bar. It is mixed with ice creams, added into milkshakes and blended with hot milk.  Chocolate is also used in making cakes, pastries and other similar desserts. The availability of chocolate is also one reason it has grown so popular among everyone especially kids. You can buy a box of chocolate in the small shop on your lane or just order online to get the chocolates by post.

If you are bored of eating the regular chocolates, here are some crazy new chocolates that you must try before you die

  • Chocolate covered insects – Dare to be adventurous? Then try out these quirky chocolates. Insects like grasshoppers, ants, scorpions and crickets are dipped in hot chocolate and cooled. You can now eat the insects that are coated with your favourite chocolate. You can either make these on your own or order them online.
  • Lavender truffles – You have had lavenders in your vase. You have worn the lavender fragrance on your body. You have had the fragrance in your living room as a room freshener. But what if I say that you can actually add it into your chocolate? A slight amount of lavender added to chocolate can make a tasty and pleasantly smelling chocolate. Lavender truffles can be perfect chocolate gifts.
  • Camel’s milk chocolate – No prizes for guessing the ingredients. Created by the Dubai ruler named Sheik Mohammad bin Rashid and a company named Al Nassma, camel chocolate is made out of camel’s milk. Camel’s milk is considered very nutrient than cow’s milk as it contains more vitamin C than the cow’s milk and also that it contains almost half of the fat that’s present in cow’s milk. As the availability of camel’s milk is very low, the chocolate can cost you a bit more than your regular bars.
  • Paan chocolate – Paan is an Indian delicacy made out of beetle leaves. They are eaten after a heavy meal to help in easy digestion. Along with beetle leaf other ingredients such as beetle nuts, sugar, coconut flakes, cherries, candied fruits rose petals cardamom, etc are added to a pan. Chocolate Paan is made using chocolate chips or chocolate syrup along with all the other ingredients. Surely it can be a very exotic dessert after a great meal.
  • Chai chocolate – ‘Chai’ in Hindi language means tea. A tinge of Indian tea flavour is added to milk chocolate along with a dash of ginger making it lip smashingly delicious.
  • Kaffir lime chocolate – This heavenly chocolate is made of dark chocolate and kaffir lime leaves. The chocolate bar has a soft centre filled with caramel and flavour of kaffir lime.
  • Spicy chocolate – For all those who do not have a sweet tooth, here is a spicy chocolate you can try. Made out of garlic, chilli and chocolate, this chocolate is really going to tickle your taste buds.

Regular chocolates are boring. Try these weird ones and you will be asking for more.

Unfold the History of Chocolates

March 16th, 2016

A popular gifting item for all occasion is the chocolates. Whether one receives it directly or one gets chocolates by post, there is a special kind of happiness on receiving this utter delicacy. In fact, all ages enjoy chocolates alike. It is found to have a sense of satisfaction along with a feel good factor. In fact, many studies have also pointed out that chocolate bar are a great source of energy. Many studies have claimed that dark chocolates are good for health, heart and skin. Overall, one can find something or the other good about chocolates. But do you know that the chocolates that we know of today are quite different from the ones that actually originated. Let’s take a tour on the same.

Early version of chocolate

Chocolate originally was considered to be very bitter in taste. It was prepared from cocoa beans, which were formulated to form some sort of liquid.  The earlier version of chocolate was also referred to as the cocoa drink or the bitter drink. Slowly, people tried to reduce the bitterness of the drink by adding a little milk to it and that is how the concept of white and milk chocolate came into existence. For a long time, the trend continued. After some time, a Swedish Scientist, mixed a little sugar to the concoction and formulated the frozen form of chocolate that we know of them today. It is hence, that many people consider the Sweden made chocolates to be the original form of chocolates.

Revolution of chocolates

With the changing trends, the trends of chocolates also changed. It started taking up different forms. The bar shape was the original one, however, round, oval and chocolates in the shape of different cartoons started gaining popularity. In fact, the flavours also started expanding. The pure chocolate with a larger concentration of cocoa beans was categorized in the dark chocolate segment. Then there came a white chocolate, which was a mix of chocolate and milk products. A pure milk chocolate was formulated solely from milk ingredients. Eventually a lot of other ingredients came into existence along with the chocolates. There was wafers, nuts, almonds and caramels, which were embedded to elevate the flavour and taste of chocolates. Undoubtedly, chocolate has come a long way since then.

Myriad uses of chocolates

Chocolates find its usage in different forms. Chocolates in the raw form are a delicacy. However, the same is used as a flavoured form for cakes, shakes and ice-creams. Chocolate flavour is considered to be one of the yummiest flavours and its form like chocolate chips are used in almost all kinds of desserts.

Chocolate gift has gained a lot of popularity in the current times. It forms an ideal gift for birthdays, anniversaries and other occasions such as Valentine’ Day, Eid, Christmas, New Year Eve, etc. Assorted chocolates can form a really amazing goody bag especially for the kids. Today life without this sweet delicacy cannot be imagined. However, still today it is the dark chocolate, which is known for its health benefits and is considered to the best form of chocolate.

3 popular gifting ideas for every occasion

March 11th, 2016

Whether it is birthday, anniversary, New Year or Christmas, the one thing that comes to one mind is gift. These occasions earmark a special event of the year, and hence, the gift also needs to be special enough. Usually, one spends a lot of time and thought to select the perfect gift for our near and dear ones. After all, gifts are the best way to express one’s emotion and make the other one feel special.

  • Gift baskets– A very popular form of gifting, which is quite in trend these days is the gift baskets. Baskets can include an assortment of items including fruits, chocolates, dry fruits and other consumables. Gift baskets ooze out a sense of elegance and also give a regal appeal with the assorted items.  Fruits baskets are one of the popular options as they come under the category of healthy gifts. It can include the usual fruits- like apples, bananas, and oranges or can have exotic fruit collection like kiwi, dragon fruit and plums. Gift baskets can also include chocolates of different kinds like the dark chocolates, white chocolates, milk chocolates, chocolates with caramel, nuts and wafers- the option are plenty. Baskets can be populated with either a single genre or can be mixed and matched to create an appealing assortment.
  • Personalized gifts– Another popular gifting genre, which is quickly gaining popularity is the personalized gifts. Gifts with a personal touch convey the deeper level of emotions, which is manifold in the form of customized items. Plethora of options are available in the market today like cups, key chains, pillow covers, purses, laptop and mobile skins. In fact, wall clocks or pen stands can also be customized by adding the photo’s to it to get that perfect appeal. Many offline and online portals are available in the market today from wherein the personalization can be done. In fact, some online vendors also aid in home delivery so one can get the gifting items delivered at a particular area sitting at the comfort of home.
  • Flowers and cake– The traditional gifting item, which still today holds its charm is the combination of flowers and cake. It was considered tradition to celebrate any special event by cutting the cake and then gifting bunch of flowers as a mark of greeting. In the present scenario too, gifting flowers and cake is considered to be very pious. With the revolutionizing technologies- myriad flavours of cake like blueberry, mixed fruit, chocolate truffle or vanilla can be ordered as per one’s choice. Flower bouquet can be also made appealing by adding in orchids, chrysanthemum, lilies, roses and tulips. So, choose your pick and create your perfect combination.

With the world going global today, sending gifts from one place to other has also become easier. So whether it is fruit basket delivery or the home delivery of personalized items like key chains, with the help of few clicks, one can get it done easily sitting at the comfort of their home. So, buy these amazing gifts and bring a smile on the face of your loved ones.