Spider-Man Cake

Those of you who have followed my blog for a while know that I usually make a wacky cake for my kids birthdays. My oldest son turned 6 last week. He's very into super heroes right now. This is the cake I made for him. To get the shape of Spider-Man's face, I first made a double batch of the wacky cake batter (recipe found here) in a large rectangular pan. I then traced a Spider-Man shaped head on the cake before cutting it out. I scooped out the sides of the cake (and froze them, I mean to make something out of the cake bits later) and then turned the cake over to the foil lined cutting board. I then froze the cake over night. Freezing the cake makes it much easier to decorate. The rest I did by looking at a picture of Spider-Man. The eyes I made by shaping a couple of white chocolate pieces, laying them down on top of the red icing. I did all the black icing last. I am really happy with the result and it turned out to be one of the easier cakes I've done.

Jamie Oliver's Lasagna

I am very much in love with this cookbook. I have yet to find a bad recipe in the lot. I find with cookbooks you have to like the author's style of cooking or it's of no use to you. I own probably 20-25 cookbooks but use 5 on a regular basis. This is now part of my regular rotation. What I like about it is that it is simple enough for beginning cooks to use, but interesting enough for those of us who are comfortable in a kitchen to enjoy.

Sauce
*the original recipe uses smoked bacon in it (2 slices), I have a pork intolerance so I left it out
2 medium onions
2 cloves of garlic
2 carrots
2 celery stalks
olive oil
2 heaped tsp dried oregano
1 pound ground beef
2 x 14 oz cans of tomatoes
sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
small bunch of fresh basil
2 oz parmesan cheese


For the Lasagna

8 oz dried egg lasagna sheets
2 cups creme fraiche or 2 cups thick sour cream (I used the sour cream)
4 oz parmesan cheese
1 large ripe tomato, sliced

Making the sauce

Peel and chop the veggies.  Use a large casserole type pan on medium to high heat.  Add 2 lugs of olive oil and the oregano.  Add the veggies and stir around the pan until veggies are softened.  Stir in the beef and the canned tomatoes.  Fill one of the empty cans with water and add to the pan.  Stir in a good pinch of salt and pepper.  Pick the basil leaves and place in the fridge for later.  Finely chop the basil stalks and stir into the pan.  Bring to a boil.  Turn the heat down and simmer for 45 minutes, stirring every now and again to stop it catching.

Preheat the oven to 375*.  Remove the sauce from the heat.  Grate the 2 oz of parm into the sauce.  Tear and stir in any larger basil leaves, keeping the smaller ones aside for later.

Make the lasagna

Grate the 4 oz of cheese.  Boil some water in a large pot.  Add all of the lasagna sheets with a drizzle of oil and blanch for about 3-4 minutes.  Drain the sheets in a colander and pat them dry.  Spoon a third of the sauce into the bottom of a lasagna pan.  Follow with a layer of lasagna sheets.  Dollop a third of the sour cream or creme fraiche and smooth it out over the lasagna sheets. Sprinkle with a good pinch of salt and pepper and 1/3 of the grated parm.  Repeat the layers twice more, finishing with the layer of sour cream and cheese.  Top with some slices of tomato and scatter the basil leaves over top.  Drizzle with a little olive oil.  Cover with aluminum foil, place in oven and bake for 20 minutes.  Remove the foil and cook for a further 35 minutes until the lasagna is bubbling and golden.  (Total cooking time 55 minutes).

(You'll notice from my picture that I used dried basil instead of fresh, it still tasted good, but fresh basil would have been even better)

Chicken Burritos

This blog has been seriously neglected for a while.  I have a backlog of pictures of meals that haven't been posted.  I drifted in my files all the way back to April to find where I left off.  These burritos are another way to use that rotisserie chicken meat.    They were pretty easy.
vegetable oil
1 onion - sliced into rings
1 red pepper - sliced lengthwise
1 green pepper - sliced lengthwise
tex-mex seasoning
pulled chicken meat
tortillas
fresh cilantro - finely chopped
shredded cheese
sour cream
salsa

Lightly oil a large frying pan.  Set heat at medium-low.  Add onions and peppers.  Sprinkle with Tex-Mex seasoning to your liking.  Saute until the veggies are softened.  Add the chicken meat, mix and heat through.  Remove from heat and set aside
Take a tortilla, add a scoop of chicken/veggie mixture into the centre.  Add cilantro.   Fold into wraps.  Place wraps into a baking dish (lasagna pan size) and bake at 350* for 15 minutes.  Top with sour cream and salsa as desired.

Volcano!

For my husband's birthday this year we had lunch at the Rainforest Cafe. Some of you may know it. It's a themed out restaurant based on (you guessed it) the Rainforest. You know you are in a certain stage of your life when your birthday lunch choice is really more of a treat for your kids than you. We actually did go out for a nice dinner sans kids the week after for our anniversary. As expected the kids loved all the animatronics and the 'storms' that happened every half hour. The price of the food was incredibly marked up (you are paying for the entertainment value of the restaurant!) On the menu that we didn't order, but saw many of was their signature dessert, the Volcano. This $15 baby (yes $15 for dessert) was always brought our by the servers announcing "Vooolllllcaaaannnnoooo" throughout the restaurant. Talk about showing off. Who was the special person that got such a treatment? And they really were flying out of the kitchen that particular day. We opted not to order a volcano. In my mind I did think that it looked easy enough to make...hmmmm.
So I did.
This is what I did:
1 box brownie mix - follow box directions to make brownies, or make your own from scratch - let cool.
On a large plate, scoop up lots of vanilla ice cream into the centre of the plate. Slice your brownies length-wise and form a pyramid over the ice cream. Spray whipped cream 'lava' down each of the brownie sides. Drizzle more 'lava' in the form of chocolate and caramel sauce (heated if possible). Stick a sparkler in the top, light it and call out "Vooooolllllccaaaannnnoooo!" as you carry it out to the guest of honour. Bring lots of forks, this is a lot of dessert, a must share (and then plenty left over).

BTW - my oldest boy thought this was fabulous and loved making it for his dad. My DH thought it was ingenious.
*I don't know why it looks like there were 2 sparklers in the picture above, there really was just one.


This is me being goofy just outside the Rainforest Cafe. I'm supposed to be looking scared of the big snake in the tree, but it looks like I'm being scared of the silly frog instead.

Easy Cinnamon Buns

I got this recipe from Keeper Worthy Recipes, who got it from Ezrapoundcake.  See a good recipe really travels around well.  What makes these great (besides being delicious) is that there is no yeast involved.   They are start to finish less than an hour to do.


Filling:
1/4 cup brown sugar
2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp nutmeg
Mix together in small bowl and set aside.


Biscuit Dough:
2 1/2 cups flour
2tbsp packed, brown sugar
2 tsp baking powfer
1/2 tsp salt
1 1/2 cups plus 1 tbsp heavy cream (I only used half and half and it worked just fine)

Mix all the dry ingredients with a wooden spoon.  Add 1 1/2 cups of the cream and stir until dough is smooth and forms a ball.  Use your hands (floured) to kneed a few times.
On a floured surface, roll dough out until it forms a 9x13 rectangle.  Brush remaining cream over it.  Sprinkle cinnamon mixture over the dough evenly.  From the long side, roll dough into a cylinder.  Slice into 9 equal rounds.  place the rounds cut side down into a n 8 inch square baking dish or pie plate.  Bake 30 minutes at 400*


Icing:
6 tbsp powdered sugar
6 tsp heavy cream

While biscuits are baking, mix the icing together.  Drizzle over top the buns when they come out of the oven.   

NY Times no-kneed bread

3 C all purpose or bread flour
1/4 tsp instant yeast
1 1/4 tsp salt
cornmeal or wheat bran as needed

In a lg bowl combine flour, yeast and salt.  Add 1 5/8 c water.  Stir until blended.  Dough will be shaggy and sticky.  Cover bowl with plastic wrap.  Let dough rest for 12-18 hours at room temp (70*). 
Dough is ready when its surface is dotted with bubbles.  Lightly flour a work surface and place dough on it.  Sprinkle with a little more flour and fold it over on itself once or twice.  Cover loosely with plastic wrap and let sit 15 minutes.
Using just enough flour to keep dough from sticking to your fingers, gently and quickly shape dough into a ball.  Generously coat a cotton towel (not terry cloth) with flour, cornmeal or wheat bran.  Place dough seam side down onto towel.  Sprinkle with more flour, cornmeal or wheat bran.  Cover with another cotton towel.  Let rise another 2 hours.  Dough will more than double in size and will not readily spring back with poked with a finger.
At least half an hour before the dough is ready, heat oven to 450*.  Put a 6-8 quart heavy covered pot (cast iron, enamel, Pyrex or ceramic) in the oven as it heats. When dough is ready carefully remove pot from oven.  Slide you hand under towel and turn dough over into pot, seam side up.  (it may look a mess, but that's okay).  Shake pan once or twice if dough is unevenly distributed.  Cover with lid and bake 30 minutes.  Remove lid and bake another 15 to 30 minutes (until loaf is browned).  Cool on a rack.

Smell of Christmas Pot Pourri

2 or 3 bay leaves
2 cinnamon sticks
1 tsp allspice
1 tsp caraway seeds
1 tsp whole cloves
4 cups water
Simmer in saucepan, as water evaporates, just add more