Learn how to (and how not to) make strawberry wine worthy of the Woodland Realm with Kili!
STRAWBERRY WINE (1 gallon)
Ingredients:
3-4 lbs of fresh, ripe strawberries
2.5 lbs of sugar
1 gallon of pre-boiled water
2 tsp citric acid
1 tsp yeast nutrient
1 tsp yeast
Instructions:
Mash the strawberries. Add mashed berries and sugar to a crock pot. Add 2 tsb citric acid. Pour the boiled water over the mixture and dissolve the sugar as much as possible.
Once the mixture cools, add yeast nutrient and yeast. Stir.
Let the mixture sit for a week, stirring every day.
After one week, strain the strawberries and squeeze out the juice into a sanitized glass carboy. Good luck. If needed, sterilize more water by boiling. Allow it to cool then add it to your wine. Attach an airlock and let sit for 4 weeks.
After a month, rack your wine (siphon it into another sanitized carboy).
When Fili decides to bake a surprise to celebrate the release of Kili’s latest book, her sister catches wind and tries to spy while wearing a certain hoodie…
Kili’s (K.M. Rice) books can be found here, and check out LOTH Hoodies here! Recipe below.
SARUMAN’S SECRET SURPRISE CAKE
For the cake:
1 1/2 sticks (12 tablespoons) unsalted butter (plus more to grease with pans with or you can use a baking spray!)
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder, plus more for the pans
1 cup of milk
1 3/4 cups granulated sugar
2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
3 large eggs
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract (or a little more!)
For the frosting:
8 ounces white chocolate, chopped, plus shaved chocolate for topping
3 sticks unsalted butter, at room temperature
Pinch of salt
2 1/2 cups confectioners’ sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
A small amount of cocoa powder for dusting!
Make the cake:
1. Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F.
2. Butter two 8-inch-round cake pans and dust with cocoa powder, tapping out the excess.
3. Combine the butter, milk and 1/2 cup water in a saucepan and bring to a simmer.
4. Transfer to a large bowl, add the cocoa powder and granulated sugar and whisk until smooth. Let cool slightly, about 5 minutes.
5. Whisk the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a medium bowl; set aside.
6. Whisk the eggs and vanilla into the cocoa mixture then stir in the flour mixture until just combined (it’s ok if there are a few small lumps in this Saruman pool!).
7. Divide the batter between the prepared pans.
8. Bake until a toothpick inserted into the centers comes out with a few moist crumbs, about 35 minutes.
9. Let cool 10 or more minutes in the pans then run a knife around the edges and invert onto a rack to cool completely.
Make the frosting:
1. Put the white chocolate in a microwave-safe bowl and microwave in 30-second intervals, stirring, until smooth; let cool.
2. Beat the butter and salt in a large bowl with a mixer on medium speed until fluffy, about 3 minutes.
3. Beat in the melted white chocolate until combined. Gradually beat in the confectioners’ sugar until smooth and fluffy; beat in the vanilla. (If the frosting is too soft to spread, chill 15 minutes or more! This makes a LOT of frosting so you may not end up using it all!)
4. Place one cake layer on a platter and spread with one-third of the frosting. Top with the second cake layer; cover the whole cake with the remaining frosting.
5. Top with dust of cocoa powder and enjoy a bit of Saruman’s surprise!
Join Kili and Mike the Guide for a tour of several Lord of the Rings filming locations, including Isengard, Anduin, and Rivendell!
Book your own Middle-earth adventure with Mike the Guide, recommended by not only Kili but Ian Brodie, author of the official locations guidebook, himself! Click here to learn more.
Enjoy the photos below and remember to check out our Happy Hobbit YouTube channel for many more videos from New Zealand and the California shire! A great place to start is this playlist:
Where the hobbits tumbled down the hillside in their “shortcut t mushrooms!”
Hiding from the Nazgul… and my fellow tourists! (The tree in the film was fake)
Being Frodo resting and smoking in he and Sam’s camp.
Frodo’s view of the canopy.
Where Sam and the cookfire should be!
Buckland?
Where the Ringwraith appeared in slow-mo in FOTR.
One of the Anduin locations
By the river Anduin
Trying to make a wizard’s beard in Isengard.
We bumped into Jack Machiela, the head of the Wellington Tolkien Society!
Mike the Guide and I pose as Gandalf and Saruman. “Your love of the halfling’s leaf has dulled your mind.”
“Rip them out. All of them.” Isengard.
The two trees in the distance are where Gandalf rode when he arrived at Isengard in FOTR.
Where Brego awakens Aragorn after his “tumble over a cliff” in TTT.
If only Brego really were there!
Where Faramir’s vision of his dead brother was filmed for TTT:EE.
Elven carvings.
An Elvish welcome in Rivendell!
Because some of our Elvish is rusty…
Mike the Guide and a not-so-accurate height chart in Rivendell.
Sauron’s eyes?! Just… no.
Posing like Legolas where he did some classic photos.
As some of you may have noticed, my March madness really was spent in Middle-earth! In the month I spent in New Zealand, I had the immense pleasure of visiting the Hobbiton Movie Set in Matamata. Journey with me now to the Shire to experience your own adventure in Hobbiton!
And please feel free to peruse the photos below!
Matamata!
The entrance
A quaint little home
Which way to go?
A vegetable garden
Hobbit scarecrow!
Barefoot in Hobbiton!
A very happy hobbit!
Lovely abode
So pretty!
Bag End!
The tree atop the hill
The door is cracked… Bilbo must be in! Or is it Frodo?
Hmm, definitely Bilbo, since we know Frodo is out reading his book
Kili and Dodo Brushwater, a shady hobbit from Frogmorton, want some donuts but neither know how to make the delicious treats. How will they convince Fili to make them… or will they?
Dodo’s Donuts Recipe:
Ingredients:
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1 extra-large egg, lightly beaten
1 1/4 cups milk (preferably whole but can be any)
2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
For the sugar coating:
1/4-1/2 a stick of unsalted butter (can use up to a stick but just eyeball it)
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon (Can adjust the amounts of sugar and cinnamon to taste or color!)
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Spray 2 doughnut pans well.
In a large bowl, sift together the flour, sugar, baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg, and salt.
In a small bowl, stir together the egg, milk, melted butter, and vanilla. (Stirring with a spatula or large spoon works best!) Stir the wet mixture into the dry ingredients until just combined.
Spoon the batter into the baking pans, filling each one a little more than three-quarters full. Bake for 17 minutes, until a toothpick comes out clean. Allow to cool for 5 minutes, then tap the doughnuts out onto a sheet pan. You may need to carefully cut around their edges to get them out!
For the topping, melt the butter in the microwave then combine the sugar and cinnamon in a small bowl. Dip each doughnut first in the butter, (if you’re using a wide enough bowl, or else paint the butter on with a brush), and then in the cinnamon sugar, either on one side or both sides.
