Last week I was invited to see a movie with some Magnum Five Kisses ice cream treats & the one I got was filled with red fruits and meringue bits. I really liked it, so I decided to kind of make my own version of the “Loving Kiss” Magnum. This is a bit of a catch to this recipe though, because it feels very light and breezy, but there are quite some calories to this one. But you only live once, right? Let’s make fresh strawberries with strawberry whipped cream and meringue!

You’ll need:
♥ Fresh Strawberries
♥ One bottle of Crème Fraiche
♥ 2 tablespoons of Sugar
♥ Three eggs
♥ 215 grams of sugar
♥ A pinch of cream of tartar

Let’s get started with making the meringues. A lot of people think this is hard, but it’s SO easy! You just need to have good control over the temperature of your oven and your timing. And make sure the gear your using is very, very clean. The smallest drop of water in the bowl you’re mixing your eggs in will cause this recipe to fail completely. Now onto the recipe!

♥ First, separate three eggs and start whipping up the three egg whites along with the pinch of cream of tartar with your food processor or stand mixer.
♥ When it starts getting foamy and showing peaks (not any sooner!!), start adding the 215 grams of sugar to the mixture slowly, but consistently.
♥ When all of the sugar is incorporated, leave the processor to mix for another five to ten minutes. This is where you need to pay some attention: you need the mixture to become strong and have high peaks.
♥ You need to taste it as well: it’s done when the sugar is incorporated, so when the mixture is not grainy anymore.
♥ Now start heating your oven to 150 degrees Celcius.
In the meanwhile, line two baking trays with non-stick baking paper.
♥Make freeform shapes on the baking tray, however small or big you want them. I made some smaller ones using a piping bag, but also make bigger ones that were basically two tablespoons big. These are the ones you usually buy in bakeries. So yum!
♥Then, when the oven has heated to 150 degrees Celcius, place the two trays in the oven and immediately turn the heat down to 130 degrees Celcius. This drop of heat will make sure the outside will be well crispy, while the inside has some time to get all chewy.
♥For smaller meringues, 20 to 30 minutes should be enough. For bigger ones, you’ll need between 40 and 60 minutes. Check a test meringue to see how chewy they are on the inside, this should be to your liking.
♥Open the oven & leave the meringues in the oven to cool off (if you have the time for it)

Now onto the strawberry whipped cream! Again, make sure your equipment is very clean and if possible, use a cold bowl to mix in.

♥ Take your double cream or crème fraiche and pour it into the (cold) bowl.
♥ To your liking, add one or two tablespoons of sugar.
♥ Now let the stand alone mixer to its job! Whip it!
♥ After three to four minutes, your whipped cream should be done. Don’t overbeat the mixture as it’ll become buttery and icky.
♥ Take some strawberries and quickly chop them up in a food processor. Don’t overdo it, there should still be some visible pieces in there.
♥ Now fold the strawberries under the whipped cream, but do it carefully. You don’t want to lose the volume of the whipped cream we just created.

Now to finalize the dish, chop up some more strawberries and serve them alongside a generous portion of the strawberry whipped cream. Then, add some meringues on top. I promise you, this is HEAVEN on a dessert plate! You can keep the meringues for about two weeks in an airtight container, and the whipped cream for two to three days in the fridge.

Now that we got past the empties post, let’s move on to new and exciting things I want to tell you about! A month or two ago I was browsing my local (huge) pharmacy as usual, when I discovered they had added a new brand to their range: Apivita. As you know I’m a huge sucker for packaging, so I was kinda sold from the beginning. The packaging is very pharmaceutical, but think old school brown glass jar pharmaceutical. I love it. No white generic uglies! I first bought some facial masks which come in handy little sachets, but gave in to my first full size products a few weeks ago when I knew I needed to drastically change my cleansing ritual in order to tackle my disobedient skin.

I bought the Cleansing Gel with Propolis & Citrus for Oily/Combination skin. I’ve had a rough time dealing with (new) adult acne the last few months, and this has been my answer when it came to cleaning & calming my skin. When I was younger I used to use pure propolis whenever I had a throat ache, so I’m already well aware of how soothing this miracle stuff is. It’s antiseptic and antioxidant, but still very mild and gentle for your skin. The citrus will tone & refreshen your skin, and it will immediately brighten your day as it’s responsible for the amazing scent! There’s also lemon & tea tree oil in this cleanser, which is used especially to target oily skins and will regulate oil secretion and mattify. And last but not least.. Instead of water, Apivita uses green tea infusion to crank up those antioxidant levels.

Even though there is no SLS in this cleanser, it foams up quite well and thoroughly but gently cleanses my face. It smells AMAZING and never fails to boost my mood, which is a welcome advantage during those early ugh-i-want-to-stay-in-bed mornings. I bought this mainly for the calming nature and I must say that I’ve been very pleased with this addition to my skin care routine. Before using this I wet my face with luke warm water, and then I warm up one pump of product between my hands and gentle massage it onto my face. After it has foamed up well, I rinse it off gently with luke warm water and pat (not rub) my face dry with a soft towel. It’s very important not to aggravate your skin when it’s all broken out as this ‘ll only worsen the condition: you really want to be super gentle.

Ingredients: Aqua**, Aqua, Cocamidopropyl Betaine, Sodium Cocopolyglucose Tartrate, Sodium Lauroyl Sarcosinate, PEG-150 Distearate, Sorbitol, Polysorbate 20, Bisabolol, Ammonium Glycyrrhizate, Glycerin, Propolis, Citrus Aurantifolia Fruit Extract, Panthenol, Capryloyl Glycine, Allantoin, Camelia Sinensis Leaf* , Citrus Medica Limonum Peel Oil*, Melaleuca Alternifolia Oil*, Juniperus Communis Oil, Butylene Glycol, Parfum, Citric Acid, Dehydroacetic Acid, Sodium Phytate, Sodium Hydroxide, Benzyl Alcohol, Alcohol, Limonene, Hexyl Cinnamal, Linalool (** = Camelia Sinensis* Leaf Aqueous Infusion = Green tea water, * = Certified organic cultivations)

This lovely cleanser comes in one size of 200ml & is sold in selected pharmacies for €15.30. There’s also a webshop here.

I’ve been wanting to do an empties post for a while, but I just hate photographing bulk products that are empty and look awful from being in the shower cabin for more than a month. But I really love watching vlogs and blogs on empties, I think it’s a great way to showcase some products that perhaps didn’t make it in a full article, but still deserve a mention. Or maybe you were wondering about something and it’s here in the list.. I’m not really up for the whole vlog thing, so let me just write it down. I added some special effects to the pictures to make it more bearable, whaddyathink? You’ll find a list of emptied products & how I feel about them and if I would repurchase below & in between the pictures. Keep in mind that this is quite a few months worth of products.. I had these piling up in a big shopping bag in my laundry room.. Oops! I won’t wait this long to do another empties post again.. So be ready for a long post!

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Remember when I told you that this year would be the year of the Chubby? Well, I’m totes right. The Chubby Stick Shadow Tint for Eyes have just launched in Belgium in eight colours. I got Mighty Moss to try out and love the versatility of this Chubby: if you want a light wash of colour you can just apply one or two layers and blend out with your finger, but if you’re looking for some full one colour you can build it up really well and combine with an eyeshadow to define. The texture is quite creamy, but not as creamy as a paint pot or shadow paint. It feels like something in between cream & powder, and I don’t own any products I can really compare it with.

As you can see on the swatch the product starts of as a very, very sheer colour when you just swipe once. When you layer four or five times, you get a gorgeous deep colour that doesn’t look all caked up. I found the shape of the Chubby to be quite easy when it comes to applying it directly on the eyelid, although I did use a small synthetic flat eyeshadow brush to really pack on colour where I needed the pigmentation to be really dense. I can imagine that these would be great  to use as a thick liner as well, as a daily look to bring out the colour in your eyes and for a general pop of colour!

Here I applied the Chubby Stick Shadow Tint for Eyes in Mighty Moss on the whole eyelid & on the inner half of my lower lash line, combined with a MAC eyeshadow in Cognac from the Fabulousness palette for warm eyes blended out in the crease & on the outer half of my lower lash line. These colors combine like heaven, don’t you think? The lasting powder of this combo was great & there was no creasing at all. And more importantly, this look was done in under a minute and with just two brushes!

I’m again smitten with this Chubby product. Available now in eight shades on the webshop or at Clinique counters for €19.45 suggested retail price. 

Tell me Clinique, when are the Chubby Blush Sticks For Cheeks launching? ;)

A little note for my Flemish/Dutch readers.. And all other readers in fact! Considering an e-mail I got from a Flemish reader, I’ve just installed a translating function in my sidebar. It allows you to pick your language & translates the whole blog for you. Of course the translations won’t be perfect, but I’ll do my very best to manually enter the translations in Dutch. And of course you can always send me an e-mail in Dutch of French, no worries! :)

Een klein berichtje voor mijn Vlaamse/Nederlandse lezers.. Na een vraag van een Vlaamse lezer heb ik net een vertaalfunctie geïnstalleerd in m’n zijbalk. Zo kun je gewoon je eigen taal kiezen & wordt de volledige blog vertaald. Het zal niet altijd even mooi vertaald zijn, maar ik doe m’n best om zo vaak mogelijk de Nederlandse vertaling manueel in te geven. Hopelijk vinden jullie deze oplossing fijn & kunnen jullie zo de blog ook in het Nederlands volgen. En natuurlijk kan iedereen me gewoon in ‘t Nederlands mailen!

Two weeks ago I discovered the Sweet Recipe collection by Etude House, an Asian cosmetics brand that always does the cutest packaging you can think of. The Sweet Recipe collection is inspired by all sorts of sweet things: chocolate bars, cupcakes, candies, .. I couldn’t resist and bought the ice cream cone shaped nail varnish in Mintchoco Chip. Because how could I not buy this cutie?

I had no other option but to buy these on Ebay, so I wasn’t sure if or when they’d arrive. To my surprise, shipping to just a little longer than a week and the varnish arrived very well packaged with even an extra skin care sample! You can visit the seller here. I paid $6.99 for this one, which is just a little bit more expensive than they should be. But since this one was already kind of hard to get hold of, I gladly paid the extra two dollars. Also, shipping is usually free with these kind of Ebay sellers! Onto the polish now: the first layer was quite streaky, so you’ll surely need a second one. The second layer was wearable, but I had the best effect with three coats (as pictured). I love how these look and they really pop out! My nails are mostly quite brittle, so I can’t comment on how long they wear. And I just got this yesterday, but I really wanted to show it off already! The glitter details in the polish are really stunning and make for such an interesting effect! And I can’t help it.. But I really find these Etude House varnishes to look so much like Illamasqua’s Imperfection collection, but at just a fraction of the price. And with way cuter packaging, right? :)

I’ve been working on photographing a new header this weekend and after a bunch of concepts I decided to go for a picture of three jars against a white wall - one filled with raisins, one with pecan nuts & one with perfume and skin care samples and a bar of Malin + Goetz soap. I’m really planning to do a lot more food posts in the nearby future, so there you go. And pecans are my favorite nuts, and even yummier when combined with raisins :) In the meanwhile I also changed the layout of the sidebar, so if you have the time do check out the complete new layout on the blog itself. New regular blogpost to follow tomorrow! 

I’ve been working on a new layout (well, new header & colours), so I haven’t really prepared a lengthy post for today. However I do want to share a super budget tip with you, since I went on a petite shopping trip in France last Friday. French skin care brands are almost 40% cheaper there; so whenever you get the chance: do make some time to explore a French pharmacie and save some precious euro’s. Since Belgium is really small, it’s not that hard to live close to France. As much as I love my pharmacy around the corner (and I suspect they love me too), once a year when we go on a little shopping trip across the border, I like to splurge on some French skin care. 

La Roche-Posay & Bioderma retail between 20% & 40% cheaper in France, depending on the pharmacy you visit. Also, did you know that Bioderma Sensibio H20 is exactly the same as Bioderma Créaline H20? Now next time you’re in France you won’t have to wonder about the name! If you never visit France, or you happen to live on that one side of Belgium where France is kinda far away.. I’d suggest to look out for a Lloyds Pharma pharmacy in your neighborhood as they always offer really good coupon reductions & have a huge range of brands, or visit the New Pharma webshop as they also have a wide variety of French skin care brands at very competitive prices.

Summer is kicking in and that means.. A bunch of new fragrances to indulge in! I’m quite the sucker for ‘eau fraiche’ versions of perfumes; such as Chanel’s Chance Eau Fraiche which I even find much lovelier than the original. A while ago I got introduced to Fendi’s Fan Di Fendi when the Extreme version of the perfume got launched, a very sensual scent that’ll make you feel super feminine on a night out. But now Fendi released a new version of their iconic Fan Di Fendi perfume: the Fan Di Fendi Eau Fraiche. My first glimpse at the playful green bottle made me very cheerful: I knew it was going to smell like summer.

The result of this interpretation of Fan di Fendi is a super fresh scent with bergamot, Calabrian lemon and cardamom from Guatemala in the top notes, a heart of white flowers and green tea leaves, and as base notes sensual woods & leather. 

In my own words: this is a super fresh summery scent that makes me think of cold green iced tea with loads of citrus slices - super refreshing and a welcome treat. It sounds very sweet: but it’s not. It’s the perfect mix between sweet, fresh and lemony sour. Have been wearing this on days that I’ve really been craving better weather & warm, sunny days. Only downside is that you do need to carry this one around with you as the scent does not stay on you for the whole day.. You might need to re-apply a couple of times as desired. 

Available since mid April, retailing at €65.50 for 50ml & €80.50 for 75ml. 

What’s up, CC? The CC cream I was anxiously waited for is finally landing in Belgium: pleased to meet you, Clinique Superdefense CC Cream SPF 30! After all those BB’s, you might be wondering what CC stands for.. Well, these creams are Color Correcting/Controlling, meaning they’ll take care of whatever issues your skin tone might be having and turn your skin radiant and beautiful. So you might think that this is exactly the same as a BB cream.. But they’re not quite. The biggest difference is the amount of coverage: CC creams offer better coverage. I like fuller coverage, so this is a huge plus for me. The second huge difference is the improved skin care benefits that these CC’s offer, focusing mainly on more SPF, loads of antioxidants and extra moisturizing benefits. It’s like a BB with super powers!

Clinique is launching their CC cream in 3 shades in Belgium: Light, Light/Medium and Medium/Deep. The formula is designed to “correct, hydrate & protect”. Advanced color correcting technology ensures that optical effects neutralize the skin tone to make you look healthy & natural. Dull complexions will look clearer, while pale complexions will get a healthy peachy glow. Red spots are neutralized. Hyaluronic acid, Trehalose and Sorbitol take care of an immediate moisture injection and keep your skin hydrated the whole day through. The SPF30 in the formula protects against UVA & UVB rays, while the powerful anti-oxidants vitamin E, rosemary, nordihydroguaiaretic acid and ascorbyl tocopheryl maleate protect the skin from external agressors.

Exact list of ingredients: Octinoxate 7.5% Octisalate 5.0% Titanium Dioxide 5.2% Zinc Oxide 3.2% Water\Aqua\Eau, Squalane, Octyldodecyl Neopentanoate, Butylene Glycol, Propanediol, Glyceryl Stearate, Behenyl Alcohol, PEG-40 Stearate, Polyglyceryl-10 Pentastearate, Aloe Barbadensis Leaf Water, Thermus Thermophillus Ferment, Trehalose, Caffeine, Glycerin, Linoleic Acid, Lecithin, Stearic Acid, Hydrogenated Lecithin, Sorbitol, Polyglyceryl-6 Polyricinoleate, Tocopheryl Acetate, Ammonium Acryloyldimethyltaurate/Vp Copolymer, Sodium Stearoyl Lactylate, Sodium Hyaluronate, Tetrahexyldecyl Ascorbate, Pentaerythrityl Tetra-Di-T-Butyl Hydroxyhydrocinnamate, Isopropyl Titanium Triisostearate, Synthetic Fluorphlogopite, Xanthan Gum, Silica, Alumina, Sodium Dehydroacetate, Tin Oxide, Disodium Edta, Phenoxyethanol, [+/- Mica, Titanium Dioxide (Ci 77891), Iron Oxides (Ci 77492), Iron Oxides (Ci 77491), Iron Oxides (Ci 7799)] [Iln39833]

Here are swatches of the three locally available colors in natural day light. ‘Light’ is just a tad too dark for my skin as you can see, but I wore it anyway today to see how it performs. The formula is really lovely: it’s semi thick, but blends into your skin wonderfully when applied. It melts away and covers very evenly, and sets to a glowing finish. I used my fingers to apply this one, which worked really well, although application with a stippling brush would work as good in my opinion. This one covered my spots really well and neutralized most redness, resulting in a natural look. If you want full coverage on certain blemishes, an extra concealer might be needed or you can double up this CC cream as it seems quite buildable. Concealer for under the eyes is definitely needed, I added an illuminating liquid concealer to brighten the under-eye area. I did powder off a bit since I like matte looks, I tend to shine a lot in the afternoon.. So that’s just my precaution. Can be worn with or without a day cream, but I always prefer to use my own day cream beforehand anyway. 

Three more colors are available in the UK & the US (and perhaps also other parts of the world, check your local website for more info on this), of which the lightest color Very Light looks to be a good match for me. I will be testing this one too, so stay tuned for an update on that one with some product pictures as well.

Clinique Superdefense CC Cream SPF 30 Colour Correcting Skin Protector is available in Belgium from mid May on (that’s not too long anymore!) in all Clinique counters and will retail for €30.30. This product is available now overseas at £28 in the UK & $35 in the US.