Jell-O Fruit

First off: Comment responses!

Thank you to Erin Rice and Sarah for leaving us encouraging comments! We hope that you check back frequently. And maybe craft with us sometime? Yes, yes. Come craft.

To Amy:
I did a little research on what you can do with empty cans. I have not tried any of these things yet, and most likely will not try them, but here are a few ideas:

• Tin Can Alley over at StichyMcYarnPants.com Here are several kitchsy ideas on how to combine knitting and trash...
• Tweleve Days of TADA Check out #11
• Or, if you have a LOT of cans (about 40,000) you could try your hand at the Beer Can House

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Oh, look! It's our first real post about our domestic feats!

Candice and I were feeling particularly crafty on Saturday night. We had worked on our new knitting projects all afternoon, and while I was trying to figure out how to use my new circular knitting needles, I came across a project that I have wanted to try for years: Jell-O Fruit.

Our pals Joey and Steve came over for ice cream, and after Joey kindly drove us to Myles Dairy Queen (God bless Chip Myles!) he took us to the grocery. Candice and I were very excited to pick out oranges to use as our Earth-friendly Jell-O cups. Joey and Steve were very patient with us, and followed us around the produce area. We also picked up some milk so that us girls could enjoy some cereal in the morning. I tried to juggle two of the oranges and dropped them three times before giving up on a great juggling career.

Back at Frazee 14 Candice and I carefully removed the fruit from the peels with Joey's help. There were two fruit removal injuries: I cut through the peel and cut my finger (Steve bandaged me up) and Joey got some citrus juice in his eye. The citrus fruits really can get you! I found that the best way to get the fruit out was to carefully cut around it with a knife, and then slowly pull the fruit out from the bottom with a spoon. Be careful not to cut through the skin, because you could cut yourself, and the Jell-O will drain as it settles.

After gutting our fruit, we whipped up some Jell-O. We followed the regular Jell-O instructions instead of the Gigglers recipe that are both offered on the back of the box. I did not take exact measurements, however I did not put in the full two cups of water, in hopes that the gelatin would keep its shape better. This worked well. We used a muffin pan as our try, and each peel got its own peel. We carefully filled each peel, and then set the tray into the top rack of the fridge.

Since it was around 1AM when we finished up, we left them in the refrigerator overnight.

After a yummy meal from Chipotle, Candice and I decided to try the fruits of our labor (get it?!) for desert. We called Joey over to enjoy a little Jell-O fruit before work. We turned the fruit Jell-O side down and carefully cut through the peel with a serrated knife. Next time I will use one that is not serrated, so that there are not cut marks in the Jell-O.

The fruits came out very nicely. We did not really stick to the traditional colors of the fruit (because we only had one orange-colored pack of Jell-O and found that each packet fills 2.5 orange halves.) We used peach, cherry, and black cherry, and came out with a nice looking array of our fake fruit. We also used one lemon to see how it would work. The lemon fruit was very easy to work with, and the color of the peel held up nicely, even after being refrigerated overnight.

photo by joey catullo