Octo-Knitting

Meet Gregory the Octopus! He was originally meant to be a surprise 18th birthday present for my friend Cormac, however after knitting all 8 legs I managed to get distracted from ever finishing him. 

Cormac hounded me for the next few years to find out what I had been making for him, but I insisted it was still a surprise in the pipelines. After years of frustrated guessing for Cormac, the disembodied octopus legs finally emerged from underneath my bed, and I finished him off in time for his 21st birthday.

Brid originally knitted the hat as a present for our friend Stefan, however accidentally followed a pattern for a baby's hat. After she threw the tiny hat aside in craft-rage, I realised it fitted this little guy's head perfectly!

Gregory even tried to make friends with Cormac's perpetually grumpy cat Rosa!

She was not impressed.

The pattern was really easy to follow, and came from a book of toy patterns by Jean Greenhowe. Here's a link to the book on her website: http://www.jeangreenhowe.com/toy.html

She also hosts some free patterns on there, some of them are really adorable. Well worth a look!

Clare

Skinny, Minty, Yummy Thin Mints

Thin Mints are a particularly delectable type of chocolatey, minty cookie that I found myself hooked on last summer while I was in New York.  They’re also remarkably easy to make at home and were a nice little way to stave off the late summer boredom I’ve been experiencing in my unemployed state.

190g flour

95g cocoa powder

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 tsp baking soda

200g butter

3 tbsp milk

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1 1/2 tsps mint extract (rather than essence)

• Mix together the flour, cocoa, salt and baking soda.  In a separate bowl, cream the butter. Add the sugar to the butter and beat together.  
• Add the milk, vanilla, and mint and mix together.  
• Slowly add the contents of the dry ingredients bowl while beating continuously.  
• Resist the urge to eat the chocolatey, minty mess you’ve created - oh, go on then, have a taste.
• Once all the ingredients are well combined, you can use your hands to roll the dough into a ball and then roll into a log shape.  
• Wrap the dough in baking paper and put in the fridge for two hours. This gives you a couple of hours to read up on the news, do some knitting, wait patiently for your friends to finish work, or, if you happen to be as bored as I was this particular day, whip up a batch of regular chocolate chip cookies.

                            

• Once the dough’s been chilled, take it out and slice it into biscuits. 

                            

• Place them on a baking tray, taking care to leave enough space between each biscuit (they puff up quite a bit) and bake for 10-15 minutes at 170 degrees (C). 

                            

• Once they’ve cooled you can top them off with some melted mint chocolate for a little extra gluttonous goodness.

                            

Happy baking!

Emma x

Let's Chalk About it

So I have a good bit of chalk left over from a recent project, and on my first day off in awhile last week I took some of it for a walk. I've read about people collecting favourite quotes and chalking them around the place, so that's another option, but I preferred to go for more colloquial/conversational bits, just whatever occurred to me as I went. I think the lovely thing about chalk on pavements is that it will be seen by some passersby and then be washed away by the next heavy shower (and Dublin has had a lot of them recently), so you can go back and write something different the next time. Sketches would be nice too!

Joan

Guerrilla Knitting in Ranelagh

The streets of Dublin can be pretty grey and drab. Time to add a splash of colour!

Materials: 

The biggest needles stocked in your local craft shop

Several obnoxiously large & colourful balls of wool

The last time a knitting project dwarfed me this much, I was 5 years old. Learning to wield the giant needles was a struggle in itself. Anyone sitting next to me risked being on the receiving end of jabs from rogue needles. 

That said, the monster needles ensured the piece knitted up stupidly quickly- I'd say the whole thing only took me a couple of hours.

Joan and I headed out in the cover of darkness to sew the piece onto the bike rack. This is probably something that you could do in the daytime, but sneaking out in the middle of the night definitely added a measure of excitement. Also probably minimised the amount of strange looks we got.

It was so great coming down to see it in the daylight. It's immensely satisfying to watch on anonymously as people stop to look at the splash of colour. 

I thought for sure the thunderstorm that hit Dublin last week would have disintegrated it, but last I checked it's still going strong. Also quite heartening that no rowdy drunks have wrecked it yet! Definitely didn't expect it to last this long.

Such an easy and rewarding project- could not recommend it more.

Butter. But Better

Hello readers,

Here at Crafty Students we have our eye on a new food business in Dublin. We reckon it's going to be the next BIG thing. Let us introduce you to IMPROPER BUTTER. "Improper?" I hear you ask. "Improperly good" we shout!

SO WHAT'S THE DEAL?
We all love a bit of butter slathered on mash, thrown around a pan with some fresh, crisp veggies or plain and simple on a thick slice of toast. Elaine Lavery and Hannah O'Reilly of Improper Butter have been whipping up a storm with their new range of FLAVOURED butters. Think fillet steak with roast garlic, lemon and thyme butter, grilled salmon with moroccan spice butter or French toast with cinnamon and honey butter. Enough said really. Salivating yet? We are...

PROPER FOOD
Improper Butter are committed to using fresh, real, Irish ingredients.We chatted to Elaine from Improper Butter who described her product as "a range of improperly delicious Irish flavoured butters that inspire you to be creative at meal times. Creative. Convenient. Customised."

WE HEART THIS 
A REAL food concept delivered by two young Irish entrepreneurs, who have pledged 10% of their profits to providing a leg up for other university / young entrepreneur start-ups. They're clearly good guys. Help Improper Butter get where it deserves to go by voting for the concept here!

GET ME TO THE BUTTER!
You can pick up Improper Butter on Saturdays 9.30am - 4pm in the Honest2Goodness Market in Glasnevin. A 120g slab of heavenly dinner potential costs just 3 Euro.

I'VE GOT MY BUTTER, NOW WHAT?
Improper Butter have a range of recipes to spark your creativity, check one out below!

Enjoy! Natalie Voorheis :-)

Knitted Kitteh

Awww! Look at the little kitteh! It's rather adorable isn't it? I knitted this little fellow for my friend Beth. It is an incredibly easy pattern both to knit and to sew up. I made the entire thing in less than two hours. Awesome eh?  

Here's a link to the pattern if you would like to try it out! It's so very quick and easy that I would strongly recommend it. I used googley eyes and a little heart button for the nose but there are other ways of doing his face as you can see here. It's a very versatile pattern and you could quickly and easily make a whole family of kittehz. Oh yes.

This pattern is perfect for beginners. Aside from a little bit of shaping for the head, it's just straight up knitting. It's great if you're new to knitting and want to graduate beyond the scarf. Take the leap I say, knit a cat!

                                         

                                     

I hope you're all having a lovely week so far and enjoying the summer sunshine!

B x

Fool's Macaroons

These coconut macaroons are so simple, any fool with a bowl and an oven could make them. Sweet and light, they're the perfect thing to have after a meal with a cup of tea. Or to bring to a party, or to have for breakfast....whatever you're into. I've forgotten where I found this recipe, but I've been making them for years, and thought it was one worth sharing!

                                                For about 16 macaroons you will need

                                                                   4 egg whites
                                                                200g castor sugar
                                                           320g dessicated coconut

Pre-heat the oven to 180 degrees (C)

Whisk or stir everything until the three ingredients come lightly together.

With wet hands, scoop up half a handful of the mixture and roll it into a ball in your two hands.

Continue making the balls, placing them on a baking tray as you go.

Bake for 15 minutes, until the macaroons are just starting to go a bit brown. If you take them out at this stage there will still be nice and soft inside.

Cool. Store. Eat. Repeat!

Tips:

These are quite sweet, but you can adjust the recipe to your own taste, i.e. using more or less coconut.

In Dublin I like to buy dessicated coconut in asian food shops, as you can usually get pretty big bags of the stuff there (500g, 1000g) for under a fiver.

Enjoy!

Joan