Fortune Cookie 101

What a week, one full of lots of emotions and luckily really, really busy. I love a good project to keep my mind and hands busy.

This week the project was finding subs for Nursery, Primary, Sharing Time and Music so that we could have our teacher appreciation meeting during church today. Sometimes it is hard to find one sub, so finding a whole new Primary staff proved to be quite a feat. One that was eventually accomplished by 3 of us stalking everyone in the entire congregation all week long, and then scrambling around to get subs for our subs when some of them called in sick this morning. But we made it...phew! And thanks to all those who filled in.

Then I had to get to work on my part of the meeting. I always take the fun part and do teacher appreciation gifts, because I am greedy and that is that part I love best.

Recently, my friend Katelin posted about some gifts she made for the Young Women she serves. She used Chinese take out cartons and attached a fortune cookie and a message that said, "we are fortunate to be your teachers", or something like that. I was already planning to use take-out containers because I think they are the cutest little trend around right now. When I saw her brilliant idea to add that cute little saying, and cookies, I knew I had to copy it. Of course I can't do anything unless I put a little bit of my own spin on it, so I decided to make the fortune cookies myself so that I could put the message inside the cookie.

So. Much. Fun.

They take all day long but they are a blast and my new favorite trick. I can promise you that my kids' school teachers will be getting a very similar gift at the end of the school year.

Thanks for a fabulous idea Katelin!

Here's how it all came together.

I used the mini take-out boxes because they are smaller and therefore easier to fill, and cheaper.

I recruited a little candy stealing helper.

I learned lots of fun tricks through trial and error. Most fortune cookie recipes said to fold the cookies and put them in muffin tins to hold their shape. I found that egg cartons worked better because the cookies were packed in tighter. In the muffin cups they started to open up a little bit. BUT...I discovered something even cooler. My "perfect brownie" pan, which I almost threw away because I know how to cut brownies...turned out to be, well, perfect. I am now calling it my fortune cookie pan. After the cookies were done I also put them back in the oven in my fortune cookie pan and turned off the oven and let them dry out as the oven cooled. Otherwise, homemade fortune cookies are softer than store bought ones and I wanted them to snap open, not bend open. It worked perfectly, thank goodness, so that I didn't have to start all over.

I don't have step by steps of the cookie making process because you have to be finger burningly quick or the cookies will crack, or refuse to fold altogether. Here is a look at what the fortune looked like. Of course I carelessly photographed a cracked one. Oops!

And here are all my little babies, completed.

A close-up.

Give it a try. You'll love it.

I had issues with most recipes I tried, so I took the one that worked the best and modified it until it worked for me.

I also learned lots of tricks along the way, through trial and error, and now that I am getting the hang of it I will be putting these in school lunches. My kids have been asking for them all day. I will be using them to hide clues for treasure hunts. I will be making them over and over and over until everyone is sick of looking at them.