Wine Label Removal

First off, I'd like to take a moment to say I'm so very sorry! I did that last post (Wine Label Anniversary Project) and had no clue so many people would be so interested! Since I didn't expect it to be so gosh darn popular, it didn't occur to me to explain how to properly remove wine labels so they remain pretty and intact.

Heat your oven to 175 degrees.

Yes, you heard me right. We're not soaking, or using fancy "removers." We're using good old fashioned heat.

Once it's heated (which should take all of a minute and a half), put the empty, corkless wine bottle in the oven for 10-12 minutes.

Remove with a pot holder, and begin to peel slowly from one corner, being very careful not to go too fast or it will rip. Once you've got it removed, the sticky side will actually still be sticky, and you can now stick it to a piece of plain white computer paper. These collect really easily and you can keep them in a file until you're ready to cut them out and Mod Podge them to something fun!

The reason this works is because the heat melts the glue that adheres the label to the bottle. Based on my experience - and you can see that I have a LOT of experience - this method will work for about 90% of wine bottles from US-based winemakers. It gets a little trickier when we go country hopping. Old world wine countries (Italy, France, etc) sometimes tend to use more of a cement than a glue. For these, I've got nothin'. Sorry! But other countries with newer production methods (Australia, Chile) tend to lean toward the glue, which works great for this method.

If you're doing something similar with beer bottles, same rules apply.

Good luck! If you do something using wine labels, I'd love to see pics!

Happy Anniversary!

Today is my anniversary with my wonderful husband. I can't believe another year has flown by! The reason I'm bringing this up on the blog though is because my anniversary gift to him last year was the straw that broke the camel's back; it was the first project I used Mod Podge to make since high school. It's also the first project that got me into the blogging world. As you can see, it's been a slippery slope!

One year ago....

Chris and I had been saving all of our wine labels in a book from that first year of marriage, and about a month before our anniversary, I got the bright idea to decoupage them into a piece of wall art to hang above our couch. I knew he'd love it because, 1) he LOVES wine, and 2) he didn't like the picture frames we had above our couch and was looking for a bigger piece of art to hang up there anyway.

So I ordered a plain canvas online, a 30"x30" canvas. It arrived, and I started to cut the wine labels out of the book, and you know what? It takes a TON of wine labels to cover a 30"x30" canvas! WAY more than we had. I think we had something like 25 or 30 labels... that hardly covered a corner of the thing. Needless to say, I couldn't finish this alone. So I called in the Moms. I begged them to please please please save all their wine labels from every bottle they consumed, and start mailing them to me so I could do this thing!

Well, because of my poor planning, I was only able to tell my husband about his gift, I had nothing to show him yet. And since I was getting help from family sending me wine labels, I decided to let them know the progress of the project by starting a little blog for them to follow along. I go back and look at it now, and still can't believe I wasn't able to finish the darn thing until October! But in the end, I am so proud of it; it really is one of my favorite Mod Podge projects I have ever done.





I then very clearly caught the crafting and blogging bug, because the Food, Wine, & Mod Podge blog you know and love today was started the very next month after I finished this project. And look how far we've come!

If you're interested in seeing the step-by-step for the wine label project, I do go through the whole process in the old blog. Hope you enjoy!

http://winelabelproject.blogspot.com/


**Note: For how to remove wine labels easily, go to my post on Wine Label Removal

A-MA-ZING Shrimp Dish

Let me start by saying this:

Oh. My. Goodness.

So you know the magazine cookbook I made in the last post? Well, the very first page holds a recipe from Real Simple for a shrimp dish. And since we spent all that time cutting out all the recipes, this past weekend we decided we couldn't resist how amazing this looked:



But like all recipes, I never can quite follow them exactly... But let's start with the original recipe and we'll go from there.

Camarones Enchiladas


Ingredients

* 2 tablespoons olive oil
* 1 medium onion, chopped
* 1 red bell pepper, chopped
* 2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
* 2 teaspoons paprika, preferably smoked
* 1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon crushed red pepper
* kosher salt
* 3/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro, plus more for serving
* 1/2 cup dry red wine
* 1 tablespoon capers, chopped
* 1 14.5-ounce can whole tomatoes, drained
* 1 1/4 pounds peeled and deveined medium shrimp
* 1 tablespoon fresh lime juice, plus lime wedges for serving
* 8 small whole-wheat tortillas, warmed
* Sliced avocado, chipotle-flavored hot sauce, and crumbled queso fresco (fresh white Mexican cheese, available in many supermarkets) or Feta, for serving

Directions

1. Heat the oil in a Dutch oven or large saucepan over medium-high heat. Add the onion and bell pepper and cook, stirring occasionally, until they begin to soften, 3 to 5 minutes. Add the garlic, paprika, crushed red pepper, and ½ teaspoon salt and cook, stirring, until fragrant, 1 to 2 minutes.
2. Add the cilantro, wine, capers, and tomatoes, crushing them with your hands as you add them. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer, stirring occasionally, until the liquid is slightly thickened, 15 to 20 minutes.
3. Add the shrimp and lime juice to the tomato mixture and cook until the shrimp are opaque throughout, 3 to 5 minutes. Serve with the tortillas, avocado, hot sauce, queso fresco, cilantro, and lime wedges, if desired.


So here's where we strayed... Tomatoes, bell peppers, red pepper flakes, red wine... absolutely no Mexican/Spanish flavors at all! Except for the very end where you put them in tortillas and add an avocado, everything else screams more Italian to me than anything else. So we followed the recipe exactly, except for the serving method. Instead of tortillas, we grabbed an Italian baguette to sop up the amazing sauce. And let me tell you, it was absolutely amazing. We ate up every morsel. The sauce was divine, the bell peppers tender, and shrimp perfectly cooked. We will absolutely be making this again soon!

(Ok, that's not the only area where we strayed...we added a TON more garlic, but who doesn't love more garlic?!)

Recipe Book Makeover

We love to cook, so needless to say, we get a lot of cooking magazines. Food & Wine, Saveur, Bon Appetit, Real Simple… They’re all great, we get so excited when they come in the mail. The problem though is that they start to pile up, everywhere. Getting 4 a month is a little nuts, and we don’t have the heart to throw them out because of all the wonderful culinary treasures hidden inside.

In an effort to clear out the magazine clutter, we recently started slowly going through the magazines and cutting out each recipe we remotely thought we would want to make sometime. We then taped them to some 3-hole-punched paper and stuck them in a plain black 3 ring binder we had laying around from our college days. This was very functional, and we’re glad we’ve started this cataloguing of magazine meals. However, the plain black notebook just wasn’t doing it for me, so like all boring and plain things in my life, I felt it needed a little Mod Podge!

Recipe Book Makeover

For this project, I ran down to Paper Source for some inspiration. Luckily, I found it! I stumbled upon this awesome paper. It’s bright red with light blue ladles, pots and pans, and French scrawled words all over it. It was so colorful and delightful!



I then found a coordinating plain blue paper, and a wonderful Bon Appetit stamp. Originally I was looking for a stamp that said something along the lines of “Recipes,” but when I saw this I knew it was perfect because I should be able to use the Bon Appetit stamp for more than just a recipe book. I’m thinking dinner party invitations are in my future!

I then got my items home, and grabbed a bright red ink pad and my roller.



I started by stamping the Bon Appetit stamp on the blue paper.





So flat and boring, I think we should emboss it! If you missed my tutorial on embossing, you can check it out here.

Sprinkle some embossing powder on…



Shake it off, and use the embossing tool to finish. I then took the opportunity to paint a coat of Mod Podge directly on the blue paper. Set aside to dry.

Now you can turn your attention to the actual book.

Grab the paper, and start cutting out pieces to fit on the front, back, and spine. The key is to measure so that there is just a hint of border peeking out behind the paper. Since a 3 ring binder is kind of funny shaped on the edges with the heat sealed plastic, and the edges of the spine are bumpy, it’s just asking for trouble to attempt to cover the whole thing in its entirety. You’re better off working around the difficult spots intentionally.



Paint a coat of Mod Podge (matte) onto your notebook.



Then place the paper where you want it, and roll from one edge moving out to remove all air bubbles. If you don’t have a roller, you can use your hands, but it’s hard to make sure all bubbles are accounted for. If you Mod Podge often, or really want a perfect end result, I recommend picking up a roller. The one I’m using is actually a pizza dough/pastry roller, which I think I bought online for a whopping $5.





Continue to Mod Podge the paper to all sides, and stand up to dry. Leave at least 1-2 hours before putting a top coat on.



Once you’ve let it dry, paint the top coat on. I chose to use a wide foam brush because I could get more coverage than a smaller paint brush.



Again, stand up to dry.



While you’re waiting, go grab your stamped-and-Mod-Podged blue paper. Cut it to a size that you would like to go on the front of the book as a sort of label.



Then cut another piece of paper to go behind the blue piece, as sort of a frame to separate it from the background. I chose to use the red paper I used for the background, and flipped it over so I had just a plain red to go with.

Mod Podge the red piece to the book, wait an hour, and to a topcoat of Mod Podge. Then Mod Podge the blue stamped-and-already-Mod-Podged to the red piece. I chose not to then do a topcoat because I had already used Mod Podge on the top.



Let it all dry, and you’re done!



Now my magazine recipe book looks so much cuter in my kitchen!