if today is lunar new year, then yesterday was dad's birthday

it was D's bday on saturday, so of course that meant happy cooking and baking. spent almost two hours at wegman's trying to figure out what to cook for his birthday and ended up making a decision on the spot with the help of a handy smartphone (what did people do before smartphones??)

these empanadas are really straight forward and delicious (it might help that there are 16 oz of cream cheese and two sticks of butter in the crust!) used the crust recipe from simply recipes but changed the ingredients of the filling. i made myself a samosa-esque emapanad with a combination of chickpeas, sauteed mushrooms and onions and this new sauce i got from wegman's. chef sahikh's curry sauces are tasty and good for you (low in sodium and minimal ingredients). here's a link to the nutrition info for the jar i got (the hot curry sauce is really not that hot at all). 1/4 cup of the sauce is only 50 calories and 110 mg of sodium. the meat eaters got chorizo, sauteed mushrooms and onions. 

Chorizo empanadas

(made about 25-30, lots of filling leftover)

1 large onion, diced

1 large king oyster mushroom, diced

olive oil

1 T minced garlic

salt and pepper

3 chorizo links, chopped in small pieces

pastry recipe from simply recipes

Follow recipe for pastry dough.

Saute onions and mushrooms in olive oil and add garlic and salt and pepper to taste. Mix in the chopped chorizo. Let cool completely.

Chickpea Indian empanadas

1 large onion, diced

1 king oyster mushroom, diced

olive oil

 1 T minced garlic

salt and pepper

1 can (15 oz) chickpeas, rinsed and drained

1/2 c Chef Shaikh's hot curry sauce

Follow the recipe for the pastry dough. Saute onions and mushrooms in olive oil with garlic and salt and pepper. Combine onions, mushrooms, chickpeas and sauce. Follow empanada recipe.

we got lazy and didn't use a 1/4 of the pastry dough from the empanadas, instead we decided to do our usual bake five million desserts and make a apple pie, minus the bottom crust, b/c really, who likes it when the bottom crust gets all soggy? 

roll out the dough and place over chopped peeled apples that are lightly tossed in cinnamon and sugar. the pastry dough with all the butter and cream cheese was absolutely delicious as a pie top.

this is the mother of all desserts- biscoff ice cream cake. and really, it just came down to mixing vanilla ice cream with biscoff. i love that stuff.

i wish you could taste how good this ice cream cake really was

i don't think you can go wrong with biscoff, but this ice cream cake is absolutely delicious, and it's minimal work but so pretty and melt in your mouth yummy.

Biscoff ice cream cake 
(adapted from two peas in a pod, took out the toffee bits to save D's teeth)

Crust:

1 2/3 cups crushed Biscoff cookies

1 T granulated sugar

4 T unsalted butter (1 stick), melted

*I have a feeling the butter amount for the crust can be decreased

Filling:

1.5 quarts vanilla ice cream, softened

1 cup Biscoff spread

1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

Topping:

Biscoff cookies, chopped

1. Preheat the oven to 350 F. Combine the crushed Biscoff cookies, melted butter, and sugar together and press into the bottom and sides of a 10" springform pan. Bake for 12-15 minutes or until firm and set. Let cool completely.

2. Melt the chocolate chips. In a large bowl, mix together the ice cream and Biscoff spread. Swirl in the melted chocolate. Spread the ice cream mixture evenly over the cooled cookie crust. Smooth out the top and sprinkle with chopped Biscoff cookies. Freeze until firm, about 6 hours or overnight.

3. Remove the cake from the freezer and let sit for 5 minutes. Loosen the pan sides and run a knife around the inside. Carefully remove the cake to serve. 

i'm not sure if i mentioned the black bean brownies i had in gmfr in vt, but they were pretty good for being made w/ no butter, flour and with black beans. i finally got around to making it for the family, and i don't know how it happened but this turned out soooo much moister and tastier than i remember it from vt. it's like fudge brownie. maybe it's the banana. i will have to experiment, how terrible :D 

Black bean brownies (9x9)

1 can black beans, rinsed and drained

splash of vanilla extract
1/4 c cocoa powder

~3/4 cup sugar

2 eggs

1/4 tsp baking powder

1/8 to 1/4 cup canola oil

1 1/2-2 bananas, sliced (depends how thick this is sliced)

1/2 cup semi sweet chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350 F. Spray 9x9 pan with canola oil and line w/ sliced banana. Puree all ingredients except the chocolate chips. Mix in the chocolate chips and pour over the bananas. Bake for about 30 minutes or until set.

happy year of the snake!

ba-na-naaaaa!

i loved despicable me for the minions alone. and the fact that they were all in love with fruit, like me, didn't hurt either :D

so of course this is a banana update, if you didn't get that yet :)

first is M's bday cake-

Banana Sheet Cake (9 x 9)

Cake

1 cup all purpose flour

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 cup (1/2 stick) unsalted butter

1/2 cup granulated sugar

2 eggs

1/2 tsp of vanilla extract

2  large mashed bananas

1/4 cup Greek yogurt

Frosting

3 oz whipped cream frosting, room temp

1/4 cup (1/2 stick) unsalted butter, room temp

1/4 cup powdered sugar

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Preheat the oven to 350 F. Grease a 9x9 baking pan. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, cinnamon, and salt. In a larger bowl, beat the butter and sugar. Beat in the eggs one at a time and then add the vanilla and mashed bananas. Mix in half of the flour mixture, then the yogurt, then the other half of the flour mixture. Spread the batter evenly in the baking pan and bake for about 20 minutes or until nicely brown and the surface springs back up when touched. Let cool completely before frosting.

For the frosting, mix all the ingredients together (electric mixer would be the easiest, but by hand is doable). Spread over the cake. Decorate with toasted pecans, optional.

*did half the simplyrecipes recipe but forgot to halve the egg and butter in the frosting, egg might have made the cake denser, and frosting turned out perfectly (not too sweet but a cream cheesy goodness)

second was a new banana bread recipe! who would have thought i would ever branch away from my usual recipe.

Banana Bread

adapted from joy the baker

makes 1 loaf

1 1/4 cup all-purpose flour

1/4 cup granulate sugar

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1 cup uncooked old fashioned oats

3 tsp canola oil

1 large egg, beaten

2 medium egg whites, beaten

3 large ripe bananas

Preheat oven to 350F. Grease and flour a loaf pan. In a large bowl mix all dry ingredients from flour through the oats. In a smaller bowl, mash bananas and then add whole egg and oil until thoroughly mixed.  Add the wet ingredients to the dry and mix well. In a medium sized bowl, with an electric hand mixer, beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form. Fold the egg whites into the batter in three additions. Pour batter into pan and bake until top of loaf is firm to touch about 45 minutes. 

panda, panda, panda!

mini cupcakes everywhere!!!! (although if you look in the back, there's some normal sized cupcakes as well) for noah's 100th day birthday celebration we made pancakes in honor of his half chinese heritage. these come from bakerella with some modifications. i wanted to make the cupcake match the panda so i found some polka dot cupcake liners at michaels and made an oreo cake batter (from the cake doctor).

polka dots on the inside and outside! so cuteeeeeee

the creation of a panda, i think i needed more milk in my frosting to fluff it more (or just add more frosting) b/c the choc chips were having a hard time sticking in (esp the ears)

i would also take bakerella's suggestion and use white confetti pieces and a food pen to make the eyes. i put a dot of frosting and then broke a sprinkle in half to make the eyes...and this ended up the only panda with complete eyes. also, as a side note, the oreo cake tastes better in the cake form with the whipped cream frosting and crushed oreo, but these are super adorable.

look at all their expressions! is it bad that i like the ones that look confused. and someone lost an ear at the top of the board!

quarter of a century

"quarter of a century" just makes me think of that kellis song. which i think is titled the same. but, other than getting off track, it was my birthday at the end of march and lucy, the wonderful girl, surprised me w/ this banana, strawberry layered cream cheese frosting tower of beauty. man was it good. and it's such a cute idea to stack an "individual" cake! although transporting and such is always fun...

cutting straight down and we almost had a falling tower of cake!

also survived my first real wedding cakebite order. haha, clearly this is not what they looked like, but this was our white chocolate poo pile which was just calling for some very artistic sculpturing.

the whole kitchen and family was taken over by cakebites. and they did an awesome job! i'll try and update the other blog w/ tips and tricks.

happy april (what happened to my nice weather?)