{ The Fault In Our Stars Cookies }

If I've ever had a hipster moment in my life, it's this:

I liked John Green before he was cool.

Ok, lie. John Green has ALWAYS been cool (unless you ask him about his school days). John has rocketed to fame after publishing The Fault in Our Stars in 2012, and even more so now that the movie hits theaters in only 3 days. I, however, have been a fan of John Green's (and his brother Hank) since 2007, when they started a little YouTube series called Vlogbrothers. When I subscribed to their channel in July of that year they had, I believe, around 4,000 subscribers. As I write this, the vlogbrothers now have 2,103,154 subscribers.

Upon watching the first video I found (Accio Deathly Hallows), I then went back to the start and watched all of them. I loved these quirky guys. They were just too much fun. I did what I always do, and I googled. I found out John was an award winning author and I ran right out and bought the two books he had published at the time (Looking for Alaska & An Abundance of Katherines). Since then he has published Paper Towns, and Co-authored Will Grayson, Will Grayson, and Let It Snow. Also, obviously, The Fault in Our Stars. (See all about John's books here). You can read much more about the Brothers Green in my prior post about them which I wrote after meeting John at a signing in 2012: {That Time I Met John Green & JScribble Cookies}.

Back to the cookies, eh? As I mentioned, the movie comes out in 3 days. I'm quite excited, as you can imagine. TFiOS is a beautiful, quirky, heart-wrenching book, and I love it. In the book, the main characters, Hazel and Augustus, banter back and forth over the word "Okay", and that simple word eventually becomes full of meaning. That's where these cookies come in. The front cover of TFiOS features two clouds.

One cloud is actually black and the other white, but I don't find black icing all that appetizing, so I went with TFiOS blue.

These are simple sugar cookies with royal icing. I decorated with the flood and fill method. I'm not great at it, but I think these look ok :) I couldn't find a cloud cookie cutter (what?!), so I made a template from cardstock and cut around it.

Yes, those are ALL my copies of TFiOS. What?!

Are you a John Green fan? Are you going to see the TFiOS movie? Are you a Nerdfighter? Do you know about the vlogbrothers?

If so, leave me a note in comments!

And as they say in my hometown... Don't Forget To Be Awesome!

Tina





This recipe uses:

Rolled Sugar Cookies
Royal Icing
Flood and Fill method
and... Awesome

{ Cookies for Katniss }

So, I am a nerd.

If you've been reading this blog for any amount of time, you'll realize this. Currently, I'm totally about to geek out over the upcoming Hunger Games movie.

photo from The Hunger Games Wiki 

I held off on reading the books for so long because of the subject matter. Kids killing kids?

Yeah, not my cuppa.

But it was.

It is totally disturbing, but it's also awesome.

And that trailer? Amazing on a plate? YES.

Katniss is from District 12, the poorest of the 12 Districts. 

Katniss photo from The Hunger Games Wiki 

She's from The Seam, which is like the poor area of the poor.

She hunts for most of their food, but still the pickins' are slim.

After the Reaping, Katniss has visitors come and see her before she is shipped off to The Capitol.

One of the visitors is Mr. Mellark. Mr. Mellark owns a bakery in the town square. 

Peeta photo from The Hunger Games Wiki 

His son, Peeta is the other Tribute from District 12. Mr. Mellark comes in & wishes Katniss luck, says he'll keep an eye on her little sister, Prim, and hands her a white package full of cookies.

Katniss has never eaten cookies in her life. She's taken aback by the gesture, but, in true Katniss fashion, throws the cookies out the train window.

Knowing what she was about to go through, she was wary of a kind Peeta. Well, she's wary of everyone. And wouldn't you be too if everyone's goal was to kill you? Yeah.

While Peeta didn't grow up really wanting for much, he didn't have the best childhood. His mother, was anything but kind, and he worked hard in the bakery every day. However, he was considered upper class in the District.

While only the upper class of District 12 would be able to purchase cookies at all, I still imagine that they would be made of basic ingredients. The "rich" of District 12 are anything but rich. No fancy schmancy expensive chocolates or high shelf ingredients.  I didn't want this to be a truly oatmeal cookie though either. I imagine that the wheat flour (which you may easily substitute for all white flour if you wish) and the oats are inexpensive fillers, since white flour costs more. 

Whole wheat flour, oats, white flour, eggs, vanilla, soda, sugars, salt, and butter.

That's it.

Nutty, buttery, and oaty.

Still yummy, but rustic.

This is what I imagine Mr. Mellark gave Katniss.

I made my own Mellark Bakery bag as well. 

Should you like to use it, I've linked it here.

Right click>Save as 

for the full resolution file.

The file is only 203KB

Fold in on the dotted lines, then fold them in once more, fold in half, and you'll have a bag.

Tape the sides with scotch tape.

I started to use staples, then wondered if they'd have staples in District 12.

Then I wondered if they'd have scotch tape in District 12.

Well, that's just silliness. How could you go with out scotch tape, apocalypse or not?!

I cannot wait for this movie on Friday!

And very looking forward to the production of Catching Fire & Mockingjay.

Wanna read the books? Check them out here:

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins

Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins

And may the odds be ever in your favor.

Tina

Cookies for Katniss

by Tina @ Sugar Bean Bakers

1 stick butter (1/2 cup), melted
1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1 egg yolk

2 teaspoons vanilla extract 
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup wheat flour
1/2 cup oats
1 cup white flour

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F

Beat the sugars into the melted butter, add in the eggs, salt, soda, and vanilla. When well blended, pour in the flour & oats a little at a time.

I used my large Pampered Chef cookie scoop, this makes about 3 inch cookies. I got 18 from this recipe.

I recommend using parchment, but otherwise, grease your cookie sheets.

Bake for about 13 minutes or until edges are slightly browned. 

Allow to cool a few minutes, then move to a cooling rack.

shared at
Oopsey Daisy 
Creations by Kara 
Six Sisters' Stuff

{ Zombie Corn }

Funnily, enough, this is the name of a short story** by one of my favorite authors, John Green*. 

Well, technically, it's Zombicorn. But....

Anyway, for those of you who read my rant on Candy Corn in my Candy Corn Cupcakes post, you will know why this amuses me.

Zombie Candy Corn shirt currently available at Woot Shirt.

Candy Corn, it's definitely a love it or hate it candy.

Which are you? Lover or hater?

Tina- hater. period.

*by the way, if there are any other nerdfighters out there reading this... gimme a sign, or.. you know, a reply!

**you can download Zombicorns, if you, um... like zombie stuff, for free, but John asks that you not let it cloud your opinion of him as a writer, as he wrote very quickly for charity (The HPA). Watch John read the beginning here.

***yeah, ONLY read/watch if you like zombie things. I realize a lot of people DO NOT like zombies.. so.. don't read.. or watch. 

****making footnotes is fun.