Makeup By ReRe: Blogmas

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Sometimes it can be quite difficult to know what to get someone and we don't all have the money to spend on something that were not quite sure someone would like. That's when I think homemade gifts are such a great idea. If you know someone has a sweet tooth you can make fudge, truffles or even shortbread, package them up nicely and gift them. If your great at knitting and you know someone that likes to be cosy, knitting them some socks, a scarf or a hat would be perfect. Using your talent to make something homemade or personalised for someone else will mean a lot more than being gifted something that they might not even use. If you don't feel you have a talent that you could make a gift from, then your wrong! One of the easiest gifts you can give someone, that shows time and effort is putting together a photo frame full of the best memories you've shared together.

My talent is baking, last year I made shortbread and previous years I've made truffles. This year I'm making fudge. I made fudge for my best friends wedding and everyone loved it so much! I decided after it had gone down so well at the wedding I would make a big batch, get some really nice jars and fill them with fudge for Christmas. I'm not giving fudge to everyone, but I wanted to make up some jars so I could show some certain people that I appreciate them.

The ingredients you need are very simple for fudge and don't really cost a lot. But it's very time consuming as you have to constantly stir the mixture until it reaches the required temperature and so it doesn't burn. You can make lots of different flavoured fudge, but I thought I would go for the classic Vanilla flavour.

The ingredients you need are :

410ml Evaporated milk
500g Golden Caster sugar
100g Butter
2 Tsp Vanilla Extract

Method:

Add all the ingredients apart from the flavouring, to a heavy based pan.
Heat gently until the sugar is dissolved
Increase heat, boil and stir consistently for around 20 mins
After around 20mins the mixture should start to go thick and golden brown, but should be glossy.
It needs to reach soft ball stage, which you can test by using a candy thermometer or by dropping a small amount of the mixture into a cold glass of water. If its reach soft ball stage, you should be able to pick the mixture out of the glass and be able to roll it between your fingers into a soft pliable ball.
Once its reach soft ball stage, remove from the heat and leave to cool for 5 minutes.
Then using an electric mixer, whisk so the glossy mixture goes slights gritty looking.
Add the flavouring and whisk in.
Pour into your prepared tin and flatten with a spatula.
Cool for 2-3 hours before cutting into squares.

I always double this recipe, so that it fills a deep 8 inch square tin. It means when I come to cut the fudge, its in big chunky squares that look better presented in a glass jar than smaller pieces do. It also means I only need to make one batch and it fills 6 medium sized jars.

As long as you continuously stir this recipe and ensure its reached the soft ball stage, then this recipe cant go wrong and every time you will end up with perfect creamy fudge.

To present the fudge I bought some £1 jars from Asda, put a bit of baking paper in the bottom and filled the jar with as much fudge that I could fit in. I cant wait to gift these to people, I know they are going to love them. Of course I also managed to keep a few pieces back for myself too.

Have you made any homemade gifts? If so, what did you make?

ReRe

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