Chocolate and Roses

This evening I got home a bit later than usual.  Why?  Well, it involved chocolate and roses and not in the way you think.

At work they will periodically offer classes to employees that are not related to work.  Tonight's class was on using chocolate modeling clay.

Chocolate modeling clay?  Yep.  You read that right.

Apparently someone somewhere decided to see what happens when you melt chocolate and then add some vegetable oil to it.  You then let it sit at room temperature for a couple of hours and you then have edible modeling clay.  Obviously it's hard to dye it if you use brown chocolate.  But if you use white chocolate, dye away.

You can use the clay to make most anything you want, similar to how you use fondant.  The teacher said ultimately it doesn't get as hard as fondant, making it easier to eat. 

Here are the results of my class.  I think I've got them in the order that I made them.  If not, sue me.

 

I'd like to thing I got better as I went along.

It was fun and I may try my hand at other projects.

Papillon

Tea and Roses

Today one of the local nurseries (Osuna Nursery for the curious) partnered with a local tea room (St James Tearoom) to put on an event combining tea and roses. 

I decided to brave the high winds and airborne dust that are so prevalent in Albuquerque in April and see what was to be seen.

As to be expected, there were lots of lovely roses - such as

And then there was

The tea was as yummy as the roses.  They served tea (of course) and a number of food items.  Two that I tasted were cucumber sandwiches and lavender shortbread.  I LOVED the lavender shortbread.  It was not only yummy but fun as well.

After having tea and admiring the roses, I wandered through the rest of the nursery since I love to see all the blooming plants.

I have long been a fan of dahlias.  Here's a pretty yellow one.

And I loved the color of this little pansy.

I'm glad I didn't let the weather deter me from having a fun and colorful time this afternoon.

Papillon