Personalised glass bottles for cleaning and bath products

I’m slightly obsessed with watching ‘clean with me’ vlogs at the moment. Does anyone else do that? A lot of these types of videos on ‘You Tube’ show recipes on how to make cleaning products. Now I’m not really (well yet) that into making cleaning products as I do like a good strong bleach, which I know isn’t great for you.

However, I am into the personalised bottles that you can decant your favourite cleaners into. I’ve also discovered the highly concentrated cleaners that you add water to to make up large batches at a much lower cost that buying over and over again. I do also like the idea of having pretty glass bottles on display and not constantly throwing plastic bottles away (into the recycling but you know what I mean).

So I started with some glass bottles I already had (old amaretto and gin bottles) and replaced the caps with some nice corks I had from my elderflower wine and beer making crafts (https://modernmrsbeeton.blog/2017/03/09/elderflower-champagne/). I also had a really cheap hand cleanser that I peeled off the label from.

Next I’ went to eBay and ordered some personalised labels which were very cheap for use now and in future projects.

The labels arrived and I stuck them on my lovely recyclable glass bottles.

I filled with what I had already such as hand cleanser and bubble bath.

I have on ordered now some classic bottles to make up with some Fabulosa cleanser for both glass and around the house. When they arrive, I’ll do another update.

See links to my Amazon products below if you are interested in doing the same:

Glass Bottles

https://amzn.to/3RQaCzz

Labels

https://amzn.to/3MuE8d8

Cleaning Products

https://amzn.to/3yvZL6L

Homemade Cat Treats (Tuna & Catnip)

We spend a lot of money on treats for our lovely cat Molly moo.

Picture for you:

Homemade cat treats

She’s a gorgeous short haired tortoiseshell.

I’m not overly precious about what I eat but I do care what she eats as it’s not like she can decide she doesn’t like or is allergic to things to and tell me!

Therefore, the recipe challenge for this week was to find a recipe where I could make and entirely control what she was eating. I figured it’s probably best to start slowly as cat food itself I presume is designed to give cat’s a balanced diet (or that’s what the vet said anyway).

I found a lot of recipes but equally I didn’t want to try something I know she’s never eaten before just in case.

So this is a combination of a few recipes I found and trusted:

Ingredients:

• 200g of oat flour
• 100g cornmeal
• 1 large tin of drained tuna
• 1 tbsp of olive oil
• 1 tbsp of cat nip

Method:

1. The best way to make oat flour if you can’t find it is to grind down using a food processor some porridge oats
2. Mix everything else in with the ground oats and keep blending until reach a relatively dry and non-sticky mixture
3. I tried two methods of shaping which is rolling into little balls and pressing into a baking tin and cut into small squares
4. Bake for 15 minutes at 190 degrees c but make sure they are completely cooked so they will store nicely dried out

It was a good sign that Molly was walking up and down in front of the oven like she does when we have a chicken in the oven.

Initial thoughts are that she loves them but I think maybe they won’t last that long in the jar as they are made of fish. I’ll keep them for the next couple of weeks and feedback on how we get on.

Here’s a lovely jar you can buy to store them in:

https://amzn.to/3yzZb8q

Jam jar labels:

https://amzn.to/3Ti9OV0

Some Cat Nip:

https://amzn.to/3rQZjMS

100 Blog Posts!

Super excited today as I’ve finally celebrated my 100th Blog Post on ‘The Modern Mrs Beeton’. It has been a complete joy to share all of the recipes; crafts and reviews I’ve been sent over the past few and a massive thank you to all of you who have contributed and fed back to me. I really appreciate it.

I also want to thank Mrs Beeton herself who inspired this.

Excerpt from the introduction of her book:

Thanks again, from ‘The Modern Mrs Beeton’.

Looking forward to the next 12 months…

Posh dogs

Absolutely not a recipe but just sharing something we absolutely love at the moment. In this lovely BBQ weather at the moment the best thing to do is get the BBQ on or even just get your griddle pan and make some summery food.

The best tip we’ve discovered recently are these “Posh Dogs” from Marks and Spencer. Not sure what makes them posh but they are the perfect texture with good quality meat; nice snap on the outside and cook evenly. They also sell perfectly proportioned buns to go with them.

My BBQ summer tip!

Potato print wrapping paper

Is it just me or do you hate spending money of wrapping paper? I mean it’s lovely stuff but bearing in mind most people just tear it and throw it straight in the bin it seems really wasteful. I’m not the most eco-conscious person in the world but even I feel bad about this even if you do recycle it.

So what I tend to do is buy a really big roll of brown wrapping paper (https://amzn.to/3VmW39n). You can leave it there if you like! Just a add a pretty bow or a ribbon and it looks simple and classy. If you want to jazz it up feel free to add stickers for kids or do what I do and add some really retro potato prints decorations.

Simply grab a fairly fresh potato and slide in half. Go to cupboard and pull out whatever cutters you happen to have. I had some nice stars that I use at Christmas for mince pies. You can also (carefully) grab a knife and carve whatever design you like. Dry off the potato and pour some paint into a dish so it creates a shallow dipping area.

Layout the paper on a big table or even to a wall if you paint isn’t very drippy. Secure with tape so it doesn’t roll up. Then taking a small dip of paint press the potato on the paint and then the paper. I recommend testing on some normal scrap paper or newspaper if you have it first to learn how much paint gives you the best looking impression you like.

Freeze ahead breakfast sandwiches

Breakfasts are my favorite meal. I wake up super hungry and get progressively less hungry as the day goes on. In contrast my husband is exactly the opposite and will happily not eat all day but will love a big dinner at night.

I also love hot food in the morning but don’t necessarily have time to make it. This led on a recipe hunt for easy heat up breakfast foods that didn’t require me to go to a fast food place or eat cold cereal.

What I found was a complete array of lovely make ahead sandwiches and egg casserole dishes so I’ve combined a couple of recipes to make this one.

Ingredients (Makes 4 sandwiches):

• 5 large eggs
• Salt and pepper
• Cooking spray
• Sausage meat (sausages or patties it doesn’t matter)
• 4 english muffins (although next time I’m going to try it with croissants)
• 4 slices of cheese

Recipe:

1. Crack the eggs into a large square shallow dish. Be sure to spray it first so they don’t stick
2. Add the seasoning and mix up
3. Cook off your sausages or meat and crumble up
4. Add the sausages to egg mix and bake for around 25 minutes until brown at 200 degrees c
5. Toast your muffins and lay on a piece of cheese on each one
6. When the egg/sausage mixture comes out cut into 4 squares and lay on the muffins
7. Wrap each sandwich in foil and freeze
8. When you want to re-heat (as tested this morning) REMOVE THE FOIL and wrap in a piece of kitchen/paper towel
9. Zap in the microwave for 1 min and 30 seconds

I couldn’t find my exact Jamie Oliver dish i used to make my eggs but I’ve linked a similar one below:

https://amzn.to/3eohQgv

Update on making your wedding confetti

I just wanted to update you on how the wedding confetti turned out.

The petals kept didn’t rot or brown and kept their shape in their little lace cups. We bought a wooden box to put them in that we now eat to keep.

And ultimately they were a complete pleasure to walk under…

Creation post..

https://modernmrsbeeton.blog/2018/10/02/update-on-wedding-confetti/

If you want the doilies, you can get them cheaply at:

https://amzn.to/3Vmp1X7

Wedding Favours honey rum and matches for sparklers

For our wedding I wanted some personalized favours but really didn’t want to pay lots of money for them. We also wanted to tailor them to our family and this particular brand of honey rum is special to us.

For the rum favours I bought a set of miniature bottles from eBay and some personalized stickers. On our last trip to Gran Canaria we brought back some of our beloved rum and using a funnel I filled each bottle and sealed them up.

We were also having sparklers in the evening so I bought a multipack of matches and used some of the leftover stickers to really make them special.

Amazon link to the bottles I bought:
https://amzn.to/3g65Z6Y

And if you’d like our honey rum:
https://amzn.to/3CpEyNf

Healthy lunch boxes

After quite a lot of rich food I’ve been trying to eat a bit healthier at work so have been making an effort to put together some simple lunch boxes.

These boxes are from Amazon and are perfect because they gave just the right amount of little compartments.

https://amzn.to/3EBLXLX

Today whilst I was making dinner I browned off some chicken breasts in the oven and cut them into small chunks. In the other compartments I made a little salad with red onions and tomatoes. I have some tiny bottles of olive oil so I keep that on my desk to make a little side dressing.

For dessert I added some watermelon chunks and some strawberries.

Wimpy Nottingham

This is going to be a bit of a strange review and probably 25 years too late but I wanted to make you aware if you weren’t already that there is still the most perfectly retro Wimpy restaurant available for you to go and try in the UK.

On a random day out in Nottingham we were exploring this lovely little city and after finding a videogame bar and even a videogame museum (go to the Toast Bar inside if you ever head that way too!) we fell across a Wimpy.

The decor; the tables including having your burger on a plate are incredibly retro but most importantly the burgers are still as perfect as they were in the 1980s. The buns are floury and the meat is cooked well.

We now go back whenever we can and hope it gets to stay around as long as it can.

Please go and enjoy it or let me know if there’s another one we need to go and visit.