Peanut Butter DIY project and what you can do with it.

I love peanut butter but have been resisting eating it since most store bought ones have a lot more salt and other additives. Thanks to Food For Tots, I finally got the recipe to make my very own peanut butter. It's just so simple.
I follow her recipe exactly except that I omitted the sugar and put lesser Extra Virgin Olive Oil (EVOO).
I have some leftover peanuts which I used to make soup. I used them anyway.

Peanut Butter

Recipe adapted from Food for Tots

Here's the Recipe:-

Ingredients:

• 1½ cups raw peanut
• 1 to 1.5 tbsp peanut oil or any vegetable oil (I used EVOO)
• ½ tsp salt 

Procedure:-

1. Rinse peanuts and pat dry with paper towels and leave to air dry. 
2. Heat up the frying pan with low heat and dry fry (ie fry without oil) until fragrant and skin turns to a darker brown. This takes about 15 minutes for me. Allow the nuts to cool.
3. Peel the skin away.
4. Blend the nuts. If you have a powerful blender, you can blend all of them together. I did mine in 3 batches
5. Scrape the side as and when needed.
6. Add in salt and EVOO bit by bit when the nuts become sticky. Continue to process till it become smooth. Taste the peanut butter and adjust seasoning to your liking.
7. Pour into a container. If you are not using immediately, you may store in the fridge.

Air drying

Dry frying peanuts at the back. The ready nuts are cooling down in the bowl .

My little one helping to peel the nuts

We had fun asking little one to pick the nuts from the heap of peanut skin.

Changes of the nuts during the blending process. Add the  seasoning at point 4.

My completed peanut butter!

Peanut butter can be an ingredient for other recipes, such as to make peanut filling for Tang yuan (a chinese dessert), make a cake, some biscuits or even some ice cream.
I used some of my newly made peanut butter for the making of Tang yuan with peanut fillings. Also, to compliment my freshly made plain pancakes the next morning. I probably will blog again on peanut butter recipe.

Are you aware that peanut butter has other uses? Below are other uses of peanut butter which I have yet to try. I have tabulated off from the web.

Gummy Hair

You can massage a generous dollop of peanut butter into the gummy mess. Allow the peanut butter to remain in the hair for about five minutes, then wipe off the mess from the hair with a paper towel. Wash your hair to remove the peanut butter smell. The same technique can also be used to remove gum from rugs and carpets.

Sticky Labels

Most children love stickers. Chances that stickers are being pasted all over the house. How to get rid of the sticker residue (which can be unsightly) after you tried peeling them away? The remedy is to apply peanut butter on the affected area and leave for about 5 minutes. Wipe the peanut butter away.

If you are trying to remove the sticker goo from your children's clothing which you have accidentally washed their clothes without realising the stickers are on.them. Not to worry, apply laundry detergent on the residue, then apply peanut butter for a few hours and brush off the residue. This is followed by normal laundry. Repeat as necessary until adhesive is removed. I was stuck in this situation before, I hadn't have any peanut butter as mention I don't buy them. I apply olive oil instead. But note some delicate / sensitive fabric may become stain after these mentioned application.

Fishy Smell

Eliminate the fishy smell from your home next time you fry fish. Add a dollop of peanut butter to the pan as soon as you remove the fried fish. Allow it to fry for a minute or two. The peanut butter will absorb the fishy smell.

Mouse Trap

Bait mouse traps with peanut butter. Mice will be attracted by the sweet scent, and they won't be able to abscond with the peanut butter without setting off the trap. 

Pet Medications

Hide your pet's pill in a dab of peanut butter. Dogs and cats love the taste of peanut butter, so they'll never notice the pill buried inside. I wonder though whether they will choke on the peanut butter instead? :P

Butter Substitute

Use peanut butter for baked goods or sauce recipes that call for butter. The peanut butter will add a subtle nutty flavor.

Edible Playdough

Mix up a batch of edible playdough for young artists. Combine a cup of peanut butter with two cups of powdered sugar and half a cup of honey. Store the playdough in a zip seal bag or an airtight container when it isn't in use. However, come to think of it, I think I won't want to waste my PB, especially my homemade ones on making dough, I prefer to spread them on my bread. :) We have cheaper alternative of making edible playdough.

Shaving

You can shave using creamy peanut butter as a substitute for shaving cream. It contains oil and help lubricate your skin. Hmmm... I wonder whether it works the same way for sensory play? :P I assume it would clog up your razor and leave the skin pretty oily. Now, I worry about pimples.

Scratched DVDs & CDs

Apply a little of the creamy peanut butter onto the scratched disk and wipe away with dry cloth

Glue removal

Rub some peanut butter and wipe away with paper towel.

Now that I have shared my peanut butter DIY project, do you have any peanut butter recipe to share with me?

Note :For people with a peanut allergy, peanut butter can cause reactions, including anaphylactic shock, 

Indoor activity:- Playing with water beads

If you do not intend to go out on weekend, what would you like to do with your kids?
How about playing with some waterbeads? We bought a bag of water beads from Daiso.

There's loads of ideas in the net on how to have fun with water beads. Below are some tried and tested ideas.

We poured into tray and feel it in our hands.We tried to do some simple counting, 1 to 10, did some sorting but after a while, my girl resumed to picking them up and throwing into the tray. Then put her hands on them and move them around the tray. This help keep her entertained for 1 hour

She stepped on them and squashed them to bits!

This is what happen when she drops the beads

We did waterbeads painting. Put a piece of paper in the tray, ( You could use a recycle empty metal container for this purpose.) Add some colours and then drop in the waterbeads. Start shaking the tray. Initially, the painting was quite nice. But soon the beads gets stuck together and it becomes a smudge of paints.

What I suggest is if you have a bigger tray and if your kids doesn't mind dirtying their hands, you could actually ask them to throw the beads covered with paints one by one onto the paper. The bouncing beads will create prints on the paper when it bounces off the paper. It would be quite messy to do this way. So, be prepared to clean up.

Attached below the art pieces made by these water beads.
Note: As waterbeads itself contains water, you do not need to add water to the paint and don't be surprise if it makes a hole on the painting as it did to the 3rd art piece,

We did exploration on the expansion and contraction of water beads.
She was quite amazed at how fast the beads expand in water.

after 1 hrs. PS: This pack of beads is from Cold Storage.

after 3 hrs

after 4 hrs

after 5 hrs

after 7 hrs

As for the contraction, she didn't see it fast enough as it takes a couple of days even after I lay them out to dry on paper towels.


We froze water beads for ice play too and watch the process of melting. Once I kept the beads for a couple of days and totally forgot about them, the beads became brittle after all the freezing.

Melting...

Observe melting process

We tried to make a sensory waterplay using the mini styrofoam box, throwing in all the 3 colours beads. We had a wonderful time trying to look for the transparent beads which simply disappear into the water.

Notice the brittled blue beads?

I am still keeping the brittled beads and wondering whether I should use them in sensory bags or maybe a messy goo... :P

If you have tried water beads, what activities would you do?

Delightful Sunday - thanks to Mermaid Theatre of Nova Scotia

When I saw Mermaid Theatre of Nova Scotia is coming to town to perform the puppet show A Brown Bear, a Moon, and a Caterpiller: Treasured Stories by Eric Carle, I was all excited. Reason being I fell in love Eric Carle's books ever since I saw a finger puppet book of The Very Hungry Caterpillar! Since my little girl's term book is The Very Hungry Caterpillar, we finally decided to get our tickets on the 27th July. * I know this is late blogging about the performance since the last show was last Sunday,  29th July. We didn't get the tickets early as we had programmes on the first few weekends when they started performing*

So, I brought the girl to watch it on the last day of performance. The play was held at Genexis Theatre (Fusionopolis). Just to share, this theatre is not stroller friendly, the lifts only stop at level 3 while the theatre is located at level 6. Therefore, it is better not to bring any stroller / prams when you are bringing your little ones to any shows.

We arrived on the dot, the show was starting! We hurried to our seats. It started with introducing the 3 main characters, The Caterpillar, the Brown Bear and the Moon.  This is a 'no-shushing' show! Excited children were chatting, parents were talking to their kids, of course.  I was very captivated by the way the puppeteer moved the caterpillar, it was very animated. I thought it looks cute! 

The experience was not exactly the same as the Playtime performance at Esplanade (A series designed for audiences aged two to four that seeks to nurture their interest in performing arts) when I brought little one to watch The Noisy Zoo. 

This is because 

1. we have a fixed sitting arrangement. Unlike in Playtime whereby we can move around as there is no fixed sitting arrangement. We were all sitting on the floor then and children could actually stand up and interact with the puppeteers if they wanted to.  
2. we can't see the puppeteers in A Brown Bear, a Moon, and a Caterpillar. They wore black clothes, completed with black masks. With the clever usage of black lights, all the items in black could not be easily seen. This ensures that we focus and watch the characters of the play instead of the puppeteers. The Playtime performance, however, we get to see the puppeteers moving with their puppets. 
3. the puppets are much bigger in size. Definitely! Otherwise, how to incorporate small puppets for show meant for a theatre of people?
4. Lots and lots more props!

The performance followed exactly the story of the 3 books:-

The Very Hungry Caterpillar, Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What do you See?, and Papa, Please Get the Moon for Me.

The very Hungry Caterpillar

This is the book most parents are familiar with, I would say. Throughout the story, I can heard parents (including me) whispering to their kids, How many...(fruits)? What's that?. 

I love how this little caterpillar moves, how it flicks the fruits away after eating, how it become sick after eating too much junky food.

However some facts about caterpillar are not correct. Oops, I am looking at scientific point of view.

1. Caterpillar doesn't just crawl out from the egg like a chicken. Most caterpillars actually eats its shell. My guess is the caterpillar actually eats its way out. Probably, Mermaid Theatre could improvise and make the caterpillar flick away the egg shell after eating just like how it did for the first 5 fruits.
2. When the caterpillar change into chrysalis.(Cocoon/ pupa) The split begins from the bottom near the "head" and, within minutes, the dead larval skin will worked upwards. Not the other way round. I hadn't thought of a solution yet on how to make this possible for the performance. 

Anyway, it's not really that important. We are introducing basic concepts to children. Don't make it too complicated.

Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What do you see?

This series of puppets were the latest collection in Mermaid Theatre. The book itself introduces different animals and colours. So , parents started asking, what's that (animal)? What colour... ?

Actually when I read the book, I felt it's quite a boring book. Throughout the story, it's repetitive phrases "..., what do you see?"  " I see ... looking at me". Repetition is good for toddlers who just started to converse. They pick up fast with repetition. I couldn't think of any good activities to do besides matching words to colours, counting animals. As this is a 3D play, everything is animated just like the real animals. The horse gallops. The frog jumps. Dog chases cat. So I start asking my girl to watch their movement and what they are doing? I think this is something you can't do with a 2D puppet.

Papa, Please Get the Moon for Me

This story was totally new to us. We only got the library book just yesterday and I think a lot of parents seemed to be not familiar with this either. Most of the parents were watching silently to the story. And this story is the one I enjoyed most because the moon really disappears after 3 flips! How to do that with only 1 board in sight?!? I wondered. 

_____________________

Well, I'm glad there's Talkback (QnA) Session. The puppeteers explained how they could remain 'invisible' while handling their puppets. And children were encouraged to ask question about the performance or to request for their favourite animal to be shown again. We were allowed only 3 questions. 

Children requested for the Brown Bear to be display again. The puppeteer showed how she moved it.

And it does look heavy.

The second request was how did the moon disappear? Yeah! Exactly what I wanted to know and the secret is flipping and the use of an additional black prop! I think it's brilliant ! 

The last question was how to make the cocoon appear? This involves rolling up the painting of the cocoon which was attached to a tree prop and rolling it down slowing and swinging the caterpillar at the same time. 

I'm glad my girl enjoyed the show. She was laughing at parts of the performance. Particularly the first 2 stories. And my girl's favourite character? It's the Green Frog from Brown Bear.

Next to watch is the Magic Ocean ( 1st Aug to 5th Aug) by Esplanade's Playtime if I could get the tickets, that is.