Man, Lapis Lazuli sure has had a bummer go of it. Even though she’s (sort of) a Crystal Gem now, there’s still a lot we don’t know about her. We know she’s pretty powerful and can manipulated water. We know she’s traumatized by everything she’s been through. We know she’s deadpan and sarcastic, and we know she’s apathetic at best about baseball.
In short: we’ve mostly seen Lapis in some of the worst situations of her life, and day-to-day Lapis is only now emerging.
I’m Lapis Lazuli, and you can’t keep me trapped here anymore!
Lapis, Mirror Gem
What we can see immediately is that she’s pretty funny, though in a dry way. She also decides to get along with Peridot long enough to make art with her, though neither of them actually know what art is.
“I’ve been calling it meep morp.”
Lapis on Art
Acknowledging I had limited material to work with, I decided to do something that I think would fit Lapis during less dire times. I chose a water-based dessert (for obvious reasons) and went with a refreshing coconut flavor. This snow cone is almost cooling enough to make me wish it wasn’t chillier outside-…I’m sorry, I lied. Not even the most delicious snow cone can make me want summer back.
I used a butterfly pea flowers to color the syrup. The flowers provide a vivid blue coloring that turns purple when combined with an acid. You may remember my Instagram video demonstrating this awesome property. They also had a nice flavor, albeit a very subtle one. If you can’t get a hold of any butterfly pea flowers or simply don’t feel like it, you can always go with blue food coloring instead.
Lapis Lazuli Coconut Snow Cones
60ml (1/4 cups or 4 tbsp) dried butterfly pea flowers (link below)
500ml (2 cups) boiling water
600g (3 cups) sugar
~10 drops coconut flavoring oil (link below) or 2 tsp coconut extract
250ml (1 cup) coconut cream OR heavy cream
Ice
350g (12 oz) tempered white chocolate or candy melts
Blue powdered or oil-based gel food coloring (not liquid)
Pearl luster dust
Modeling chocolate, marzipan or fondant
Clear extract
1. Stir together the pea flowers and boiling water and allow to steep for 5 minutes, until dark blue. Remove the pea flowers and combine with the sugar in a saucepan. Heat on low heat, stirring as you go, until the mixture boils. Boil for 1 minute, then remove from the heat and allow to cool.
2. Stir the coconut flavoring into the syrup, tasting as you go, until you like the flavor. Remove 120ml (1/2 cup) of the syrup and mix it into the cream. This should leave you with one pale blue and one dark blue syrup. Store in a squeeze bottle in your fridge until ready to use.
3. Cut out a 5″x5″ piece of parchment for every snow cone you intend to make. Melt your white chocolate and color it pale blue using your food coloring. Fill it into a pastry bag with the tip snipped off and pipe freeform wings onto each piece of parchment, making sure they have a thick section at their base as shown below. Set them to harden with the sides curled up (you can balance them on pens or whatever you like) to give them a slight curve. Letting them dry flat is okay too if you can’t find anything!
4. Once the wings have set, dust them carefully with luster dust. Use your marzipan/modeling chocolate/fondant to make little lapis gems: first make balls, then form those into cones, then flatten and round them with your fingers. If you want, use a knife to make little cuts to look like cracks. Mix some blue coloring, luster dust and clear extract into a paste and use it to paint the gems. Allow to dry.
5. Once you’re all ready to make your cones, assemble the following supplies: your paper cones and a holder for them, your syrups, your wings and gems, a chopstick and a small piping bag filled with melted pale blue chocolate/candy melts. If you want to round off the tops of the cones, get a very small bowl do that with.
6. Using a blender/food processor/ice shaver, crush the ice. Make sure it’s crushed quite finely. Scoop a cone of ice full and press it rounded with the bowl if you like. Drizzle on your syrup: 1/2 dark, 1/2 pale blue. Using a chopstick, stab an indention into the top center of your ice. Drizzle a little melted chocolate into this hole and immediately place in the wings. This way the chocolate sets and locks the wings in. Place a jewel at the center and serve!
I’ve added two links for the flower tea below. One is a bit pricier but comes with Prime, and the other is cheaper and comes shipped from Thailand. I got the latter and it took nearly 4 weeks to arrive, so it’s one to order well in advance!
IN THIS ENTRY (affiliate links):
