Ahoy mateys! Arr ya ready fer some free grub?

On Saturday, Sept. 19, Krispy Kreme is offering free one dozen glazed doughnuts to patrons who visit a participating store dressed in a pirate costume. Or, one free glazed doughnut to those who speak like a pirate. This offer is available at participating Australia, US and Canadian locations.   

According to the Krispy Kreme website, your costume must include 3 or more items from the list below to qualify as a pirate costume:     

• Eye Patch
• Pirate Hat
• Pirate Flag
• Bandanna
• Peg Leg
• Parrot on Shoulder
• Pirate Shirt / Loose white shirt
• Knickers
• Leather belt
• Silver and gold necklaces and earrings
• Pirate Hook
• Pointy black boots or ragged brown sand

Click here for more details from the Krispy Kreme website.

To help you to prepare for this fun day, we are sharing below a printable pirate hat, and pirate eye patches from snapfish.com (Note: we give no guarantees that Krispy Kreme will count these as part of your costume).

To print the pirate hat and eye patches:
1) Click on the file
2) Download and save onto your computer
3) Print with a colored printer on white card stock
4) Follow the instructions to complete     
 

Also, we are sharing some basic Pirate lingo  below as seen at the talklikeapirate.com website to get you started. For more details and advanced pirate lingo, click here  
This link will take you to the talklikeapirate website.
                               
                   How To Talk Like a Pirate

According to the website: 

"Pirate lingo is rich and complicated, sort of like a good stew. There are several other sites that offer glossaries that are pretty good, and you can find some of them on our links page.

But if you just want a quick fix, a surface gloss, a "pirate patina," if you will, here are the five basic words that you cannot live without. Master them, and you can face Talk Like a Pirate Day with a smile on your face and a parrot on your shoulder, if that's your thing.

Ahoy! - "Hello!"

Avast! - Stop and give attention. It can be used in a sense of surprise, "Whoa! Get a load of that!" which today makes it more of a "Check it out" or "No way!" or "Get off!"

Aye! - "Why yes, I agree most heartily with everything you just said or did."

Aye aye! - "I'll get right on that sir, as soon as my break is over."

Arrr! - This one is often confused with arrrgh, which is of course the sound you make when you sit on a belaying pin. "Arrr!" can mean, variously, "yes," "I agree," "I'm happy," "I'm enjoying this beer," "My team is going to win it all," "I saw that television show, it sucked!" and "That was a clever remark you or I just made." And those are just a few of the myriad possibilities "

Have fun!

The Super bowl game will be played on Feb. 7, 2016 at the Levi's Stadium in Santa Clara. And so the countdown begins, starting today, with several celebration events and activities lined up in the Bay Area for the next five months.

Did you know that The first Super Bowl was held in California? Our state is "just the perfect place to celebrate a Super Bowl of this significance - this golden moment right here in the Golden State" (sfbaysuperbowl.com)

The NFL is kicking off today's celebration with a free concert at Justin Herman Plaza in San Francisco featuring multi-platinum singer-songwriter, Ellie Goulding and San Francisco's own Grammy Award-winning band, Train starting at 2:30 pm today. This concert will part of the pregame show on NBC and NFL Network which will feature the Patriots versus Steelers to kick off the 2015 NFL season. 

"Today is an historic day for a number of reasons,” Super Bowl 50 Host Committee CEO Keith Bruce said. “First of all, we are 150 days away from super bowl 50.”

The Bowl 50 Host Committee describes in their website...

"Super Bowl 50. The biggest Super Bowl the NFL has ever celebrated."

"And one that will be uniquely Bay Area."

They promise...


"Planning a Super Bowl experience that will not only set the bar for next 50 Super Bowls, but will celebrate our communities and our people like no other event has done before.

Wow!  Isn't this exciting for us who live in the Bay Area? To know more about the upcoming events click here.

In anticipation of the many party celebrations that will be hosted all through this season, here are some football-inspired dessert recipes that you may want to include in your menu:

1) Football Rice Crispy Treats
Click here for the recipe

3 ) Chocolate Strawberry Football
Click here for recipe

Hello Everyone, Sept. 4th is Force Friday. Today celebrates the market release of the STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS toys, collectibles and gadgets at many participating stores. There are also lots of events and activities lined up. For those interested, click here for the most updated event guide from the starwars.com website.

 To join in the fun, we are sharing below some Star Wars-inspired recipes that we have collected. These are: Princess Leia cupcakes, Blue Milk (along with a downloadable mason jar decorative cut-out), Yoda Green Tea Oreos, and Darth  Vader Lightsaber Sugar cookies. 
 
May the Force (Friday) be with you!

                                  Princess Leia cupcakes

What You Will Need:
Your favorite cupcake
Cream Cheese Frosting
black icing
heart sprinkles
Oreos

How To Make It:
Spread a flat layer of cream cheese frosting on the cupcake.

With a #4 tip and black icing, start one side of the hair first, from the center down. (We are going for a middle part, here.) Add the other side of the hair and then add the eyes.

Place a little heart sprinkle for the lips.

For the hair buns, use icing to stick Oreos to the sides of the cupcake liner. To get rid of the ‘white line’ i.e. creamy center, simply run a thin layer of black frosting down the center of each Oreo.
Recipe courtesy of justjennrecipes.com

                                                Blue milk

What You Will need:
1 cup milk
½ teaspoon unsweetened blue fruit punch mix
1 teaspoon sugar

How to Make it:
Pour the milk into a tall glass and gently stir in the blue fruit punch mix. The drink should be lightly tinted blue. Adjust the amount of mix to get the color that you like. Add sugar to taste.
Recipe courtesy of Lucasfilm, Starwars.com

                                            Mason Jar Cut-out

Serve the Blue milk in these cute, decorated mason jars. Here is how to make it. 

Click on the file below to download and print the design pattern. Then cut out the pieces following the dotted lines. Finally, wrap around a mason jar and secure with tape. 
Courtesy of potterybarnkids.com

                                     YODA GREEN TEA OREOS

What You Will Need:
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
pinch of salt
1 Tablespoon matcha (green tea powder)
2 teaspoons of lemon zest
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
1 cup sugar
1 egg

Filling Ingredients:
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
2 cups powdered sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla extract

How to Make it:
Matcha is a fine, concetrated green tea powder. You can find it in asian markets, the asian section of your grocery store or online.

In a medium bowl whisk together the flour, baking powder, salt, matcha and lemon zest. To me, the lemon just adds a little something, almost undetectable, yet adds so much flavor. Set aside.

In the bowl of an electric mixer beat the butter and sugar until combined. Add the egg.

Slowly add in the flour until it is incorporated. The dough will form quickly, and when it starts to pull away from the bowl, it’s done!

Split the dough into two and wrap in plastic wrap. Chill until you are ready to use.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Prep baking sheets with liners.

Start rolling out the dough. I use powdered sugar instead of flour so it doesn’t get that dough-y taste and the sugar adds a slight sweetness. Roll the dough to about 1/4 inch thick.

Use your cutter to cut out the shapes and transfer onto the lined baking sheet.

Bake for 8-10 minutes depending on your oven.

Let cool on a wire rack. While the cookies are cooling, start the filling.

In the bowl of an electric mixer, beat the butter while carefully adding the powdered sugar. Add the vanilla and beat until creamy.

Using a piping bag or a spatula, place the filling on the (flat) side of one cookie. Use another cookie to press on top and form your ‘sandwich’.

There you have it. The most edible Jedi master in the history of Star Wars. Deliciously cute and full of sweetness!
Recipe courtesy of justjennrecipes.com

You can purchase the Yoda cookie cutter here  

                     Darth Vader Lightsaber Sugar Cookies

What You’ll Need:
Pre-made sugar cookie dough or your favorite sugar cookie recipe
Red, black, white cookie icing
Knife
Flour
Bowl, medium
Rolling pin
Cookie sheet

How To Make It:
1. Put the sugar cookie dough in the freezer for at least 1-2 hours before you're ready to make the cookies. This will get the dough nice and cold and will make it easier to roll out later.


2. Prep a cutting board with some flour; this will help the dough from sticking. Take the dough out of the freezer and set a side in a bowl. Put flour on your hands to help the dough from sticking to your fingers.


3. Put the dough on the cutting board and start to roll it out with a rolling pin. Try and roll it out so the dough is about 1/4 of an inch thick. 


4. Using a knife cut oval, lightsaber like shapes out of the dough. Just remember that pre-made cookie dough usually expands quite a bit so try and make them a bit on the thinner side. 


5. Place the lightsaber cookies on a cookie sheet and bake according to the package directions.


6. When they're done baking, set them aside to cool.


7. In the meantime, heat the cookie icing according to the package directions.


8. Once the cookies are cooled and the icing is heated, start to draw on your lightsabers (as shown in the main image).


9. For the lightsaber buttons, you can use white cookie icing or you can add food coloring to the icing and make it grey before you draw the buttons on..


If you’d rather represent the Rebels, feel free to substitute the red frosting with green, purple or blue for Yoda, Mace Windu and Luke Skywalker’s lightsabers.

Recipe courtesy of family.disney.com

A Facebook team member contacted us for our photo booth service at their Summer Barbecue Party tagged  "Targeting Summer Party 2015".  The event was held last Sunday, August 30th at the Sunnyvale Baylands Park. It was an intimate get-together with co-workers and their families along with lots of food and drink to go around, and a great opportunity to reconnect away from the Menlo Park headquarters.  Besides the photo booth, there was also face painting available for the kids to enjoy. And of course, a Facebook outdoor party cannot be complete without a group shot captured by a drone, how cool is that?