sour cherry and grapefruit pops with rosemary

Here's my promised recipe for pops of my own invention.  The recipe is based pretty heavily on this compote recipe, which is amazing, by the way Grapefruit Compote.  I did add a few twists of flavor, and adapted it to work for pops.  Here's what you need:

1/2c sugar

3T honey

1/2c water

3 sprigs rosemary

1c grapefruit juice

1 grapefruit

~12oz canned sour cherries in light syrup (refrigerate)

yield 7 large pops

1. In a saucepan stir together sugar, honey, water, and rosemary.  Bring to a boil, and boil on low for 5 min, stirring occasionally.

2. Fish out the rosemary and discard (or taste some of the mixture on the rosemary, delicious!)

3. In a small bowl, section the grapefruit catching the juices.  Try to discard as much of the skin as possible, pieces should be pretty small.  Add juice.

4. Stir syrup mixture and grapefruit mixture together.  This is your first layer.

5. Pour half of the mixture into the molds (these can be anything, as long as the open end is larger than the closed end.  You have to be able to pull them out.  I used washed out single serving yogurt containers.)

6. Put these into the freezer and freeze for at least 2 hours, or until hard.  (more is always better in this stage)

7. Take the cherries out of the freezer and distribute into molds.  Feel free to use as much or as little as you choose.  I added ~6 cherries for each cup.  Also pour in syrup.  (you may want to try sweet cherries, I personally like the tartness of morello cherries)

8. Freeze for ~1:30 hours until partially hardened, push sticks into this layer

9. Freeze for another hour or more until layer is hardened

10. Pour in remaining grapefruit mixture, freeze for ~4 hours

That's it!

I love the mixture of sweet and tart in these pops, and the pretty peach mixed with red.  Beautiful!

Note that this recipe is still a work in progress, so feel free to experiment, and I'll come back and make changes as needed.  Let me know if you have any suggestions or alterations.

Enjoy!

Peanut Butter Jelly Time

I made my first popsicle out of the book pops!  This one is peanut butter and jelly, and it really does taste like a peanut butter and jelly sandwich!  It's made of peanut butter, yogurt, honey, juice and fruits.  I made some with grape and some with raspberry.

Hopefully when I get the time I'll make some banana, which is what my roommate and boyfriend are excited about.  I saved some of the peanut butter mixture, so hopefully it'll be a little more painless next time. 
Although this is my first out of the book, I've made a few of my own creation: a berry mint, and coco coconut.

I'm going to keep experimenting, and when I come up with a good one I'll post the recipe here.  Next I'm thinking grapefruit, rosemary.  Sounds weird I know, but the flavors are surprisingly good together!

So it's your Birthday and Easter too?

Last year my mom sent me a card that said, "so it's your birthday and Easter too."  Can you believe that there are enough people to make that card profitable?  Anyway, this year was a little closer, as my birthday was Easter weekend, which was good since it gave me an opportunity to go home (and collect all my booty!)

I really did get some incredible things this year, which shows how well my family and friends know me.  Two really great things come to mind,

First is the book "Pops!: Icy Treats for Everyone" from my roommate.  AMAZING!  I can't wait to get started, and you should expect some photos of my creations, with a few adjustments from the recipes, since I have never been known to leave well enough alone!

The other awesome present, that is also a little silly is the tomato planter that I KNOW you've seen on TV.  I saw the commercial, and it got me with the loads of tomatoes.  I don't know how well it actually works, but as I have been known to tell people, "the tomato is my favorite socially constructed vegetable." (i.e. it's a fruit, but I like other fruits better) So their advertising got me, and my parents were kind enough to give me this silly little present.  I'm starting my plants from seed, and transplanting them into the topsy turvy.

Stay tuned, and I'll let you know how it works.