Birthday Cake!

Last Sunday Little C and I made Daddy his birthday cake.
The pictures are not the best, but you can see that it was a super moist cake.
She had the choice of making cupcakes or a this cake (based on a similar picture).
Who wouldn't choose this one with all the yummy layers and textures!?!
It was GOOD!

We started out with my favorite chocolate cake.
I made a new buttercream frosting (love it!)
We took a few shortcuts, which I would not do again.  I was just trying to avoid a trip to the grocery store for 2 items on a Sunday afternoon.
The filling is the buttercream frosting with chocolate chips in it.  The recipe called for mini chips, and since we had lots of regular chocolate chips, we chopped them up.
The ganache is where I misjudged.  I did not have heavy cream, but still had whole milk from the pistachio gelato, so I used that.  At first I made the mistake of using the full amount - huge mistake, which common sense would tell you, but we had been cooking our special dinner all afternoon, and I wasn't thinking clearly.  So, batch 1 of the ganache went down the drain.  I am kinda glad because it had butter in it as well, and the ganaches I have made before have just been cream and chocolate.  I think the butter would have made it too rich, and this cake was not short on the richness factor at all.  So, I just melted chocolate chips and added a little bit of whole milk, stirred until smooth and drizzled over the cake.  The recipe had more ganache which covered the top and ran over the sides, but this did the job and was delicious!

Chocolate Cake with Buttercream Frosting and Chocolate Ganache

Chocolate Cake with Buttercream Frosting and Chocolate Ganache

Chocolate Cake with Buttercream Frosting and Chocolate Ganache

Whoopie Pies Round 2

Last weekend I attempted to perfect the Whoopie Pie recipe that I tried out in January.
Wow!  They were amazingly rich!   I will have to make them smaller and use less filling next time.  I compared this recipe with one that my mother had used and made a modification in the amount of flour.  The texture was perfect - so moist!  I also added espresso powder and baked a for a little less time than the last ones.  I made the same marshmallow filling, but was going for a darker color.  The filling ended up being a pretty raspberry pink, but was not what I had wanted as far as color.

So, in the next round of whoopie pies I am going to try a different filling recipe and do some food color experimenting.   I may also try the recipe that my mother had used - it uses coffee rather than espresso powder, so they may not be as rich.  There is only one way to find out!

Last night I made Pistachio Gelato!  The difficult part of the recipe was finding pistachio cream/paste.  I found the recipe almost 2 months ago, and last weekend found the pistachio cream at Williams Sonoma.  We had checked at specialty food stores, Central Market, and an Italian market; I was about to order off of Amazon when a quick trip in to WS produced the little green jar of gold.
The recipe was not complicated and the result was delicious!  I did not take a picture for two reasons; 1. I had two people eagerly awaiting their surprise dessert, and 2. it just looked like green ice cream in white bowls.  I will have to think about the photo staging for the next batch.

As we have a birthday coming up in our household, there will be chocolate cake in the near future.
I also have 1 more Chocolate Chip Cookie recipe to try out, along with a few other Test Kitchen Trials.
So many things I want to make, but only so many taste testers!

Whoopie Pie with Marshmallow Filling

Chocolate Hearts

We had our family Valentines Dinner tonight.

The new dessert I tried out was very rich and delicious!
Dark Chocolate-Cherry Ganache Bars.
The first layer is a chocolate shortbread, the second cherry preserves, and the top is a chocolate ganache.  It was much easier to cut the remaining bars in to squares, but I was able to cut out 3 hearts for our dessert.

I made us each personalized Valentine place-mats, sprinkled the table with paper hearts, and had pink roses for Little C.

Happy Valentines Day!

Dark Chocolate-Cherry Ganache Hearts 

Valentine Table

Valentine Project

Valentine fun in the Test Kitchen.

Little C and I made her Valentine Pretzels over the weekend.

We just melted white morsels, dipped the pretzels and decorated with sprinkles.

We had lots of fun with this project and took several pictures for the scrapbook!

Valentine Pretzels

Valentine Pretzels

Quest For The Best Chocolate Chip Cookie - #3

I tried out another CCC recipe - just took them out of the oven.

Based on my quick sample, they are really good, but not quite as good as recipe #2.

I made them the old fashioned way - did not use the Kitchen Aid, but mixed them by hand.

The butter was melted for this recipe, so it was easier to stir by hand.

It was a toss up between Valentine Sugar Cookies and CCC's tonite and I opted for the CCC's.

You can't go wrong with CCC's - they always hit the spot; and I didn't have the time or patience to ice cookies before I made dinner. :)

Update on the Pot Roast - it was incredible!  I made hot roast beef sandwiches with leftovers one night, and I have beef enchiladas in the oven right now.  I did not end up making the new vegetable side recipe on the pot roast night as we already had a ton of food with the pot roast and vegetables, and baked acorn squash.  I made the new side recipe the next night and it was surprisingly good - sauteed zucchini, peas, and tortellini.

Happy Weekend!