If you want to send a gift to your mother, grandmother, sister, aunt or other favorite mom, today’s the last day you can order with standard five-day delivery. Tomorrow is possible, but it gets iffy to guarantee delivery by Saturday. (Mother’s Day is Sunday, May 8th.)

We’d like to recommend these exquisite, hand-crafted balls of sugar from Chambre de Sucre.

They are stunning with coffee or tea. Even if Mom doesn’t use sugar herself, guests will long remember being treated to them.

This Sucre Rond (round sugar) is available in 36-piece and 42-piece boxes; square-shaped sugars are available as well.

Use candied rose petals (shown above) or
freeze-dried rose petals as an easy cake
decoration. Photo courtesy Valerie
Confections | Los Angeles.

Just use fresh, candied or freeze-dried rose petals to decorate the sides of the cake. It will be stunning. (Crystallized rose petals are small and crunchy, and not appropriate for this type of decoration.)

You’ll need 2-4 cups of rose petals, depending on the size of the cake (don’t tamp down the petals when measuring them or they’ll bruise).

The only caveat is that you need to use organic rose petals. Flowers sprayed with pesticides should not be eaten.

1. Separate 3 eggs; reserve yolks for another purpose.*
2. Whisk the egg whites in small bowl until white and foamy.
3. Brush egg whites on both size of rose petals with a pastry brush. Sprinkle with superfine sugar.
4. Dry on a nonstick rack overnight.

For more of a rose effect, add a teaspoon of rosewater to the cake batter or frosting.

More rose petal recipe ideas.

*Things To Do With 3 Egg Yolks: Pastry cream—used for éclairs—is delicious with fresh fruit; French custard ice cream; baked custard; crème brûlée; from-scratch chocolate pudding. For savory uses, make Béchamel, Bearnaise or Hollandaise sauces; mayonnaise; thicken soups and/or make Greek avgolemono soup.

Grandma Hoerner’s Big Slice Applesauce
is the chunkiest you’ll find. Photo by
River Soma | THE NIBBLE.

Grandma Hoerner’s makes a specialty applesauce called Big Slice, because the applesauce is mostly large slices of apples, just like in a pie—but stewed to softness instead of baked.

Grandma Hoerner was raised on an apple orchard in Kansas, and began making applesauce in the late 1880s. Her grandson, Duane McCoy, began bottling and selling Grandma’s recipe in 1986. And we really like it.

The applesauce is made from all-natural, slow cooked apples. No sugar is added; the products are sweetened with fruit juice. In addition to the original All Natural Big Slice, Grandma Hoerner’s makes several varieties with added fruits or spices:

We loved Apricot and Strawberry, and look forward to trying the rest of the line. And at $5.50 for a 26-ounce jar, they’re a good value.

The products are available at GrandmaHoerners.com. They can be enjoyed as a side or dessert. Packaged in attractive Mason jars, they make inexpensive small gifts and stocking stuffers.

Thanks, Grandma Hoerner.

With all due respect to other quality products, these are the best ice cream bars we’ve had.

The company doesn’t use the term “bar,” but calls Magnum “handheld ice cream”—ice cream or ice on a stick, cones, etc.

Novelties are single-serving frozen treats that include ice cream bars, ice pops and ice cream sandwiches, among other products (remember push-up pops?). Novelties originated in the 1920s, with the creation of Eskimo Pies, Dixie Cups.

See the different types of ice cream products in our Ice Cream Glossary, as well as the history of ice cream.

The super-premium ice cream in chocolate or vanilla is excellent, and the thick coat of Belgian chocolate can’t be beat.

 
Each of the flavors is delicious, and we are equal-opportunity consumers of all six. However, three deserve a shout out for their extra layers of flavor.

 
Magnum is a brand of Unilever, which has an portfolio that includes Ben & Jerry’s, Breyers, Good Humor, Popsicle and noteworthy non-ice cream brands such as Bertolli, Hellmann’s, Knorr and Skippy. There’s also Slim-Fast, in case you can’t stop eating the Magnum bars.

Magnum ice cream is available in grocery retailers nationwide, including Kroger, Safeway, Target and Walmart. Three-count multipacks have a suggested retail price of $3.99; individual bars, a suggested retail price of $2.59.

Go for the boxes! There’s a store locator on the website. Head to the nearest store and indulge!

FOOD TRIVIA: The ice cream bar was invented in 1920 by Harry Burt of Youngstown, Ohio, who went on to found Good Humor.