THE Cake :: a chocolatey angelic dessert

After years of making fun cut-out cakes, my mother in law ended up making THIS "cake" for my husband's birthday every year. For as long as I can remember, they've just referred to it as "THE cake." His requested favorite. It wasn't made for any of his siblings, just my hubby's own special cake for his own special day.

It's a rich and delicious combination of tastes and textures--the really nice airiness of the angel food cake and creamy scrumptiousness of a dense chocolate mousse. It's nothing short of the perfect dessert!

1 large angel food cake
4 eggs
2 TBSP sugar (I consider this optional)
12 oz. package semi-sweet chocolate chips
1 pint whipping cream
1 cup nuts (optional)

Melt chocolate chips in a double boiler. (I put them in a glass bowl and microwave starting with 1 minute, stir, then heat in increments of 30 sec. + a stir until all is melted.) Add 1 TBSP sugar (optional) and egg yolks. Beat egg whites separately, add 1 TBSP sugar (optional), and fold into the chocolate mixture. Whip cream in separate bowl, then fold into chocolate mixture. Fold, stir, mix until there are no streaks. Break up the cake into small pieces, about 1-inch"ish" cubes. Put 1/2 of the cake into the bottom of a 9 x 13 inch pan. Cover with 1/2 of the chocolate mixture; layer the rest of the cake pieces, then spread the rest of the chocolate mixture to cover all of the cake pieces.

Sprinkle with nuts if desired (we like toasted PEE-can pieces).
Refrigerate overnight, or at least for a few hours.
Slice into squares.

Serve with a kind word and a smile...and a birthday song, if it fits the occasion!

Carrot Cake (3 layers)

I just made this cake for our block party in celebration for all August birthdays. I think it had been a while since our neighbors had a homemade cake...not a crumb was left!

Our sweet neighbor down the street from our old house made this cake and a pot of chicken and dumplings for us a few days after we returned home from the hospital with our newborn twins. Since she is elderly and because we had a very steep driveway, Joe walked down the street to her house to pick up the food and bring it home for us. I remember him coming home with his arms shaking from fatigue because he had to carry the cake in one hand and a hot saucepan in the other. Since the handle cover wasn’t long enough to cover the entire length of the long hot handle, it took tremendous strength to continue holding the heavy pot all the way home without being able to support it underneath with his other hand…carrying the cake. Periodically, he had to just stop, rest it on the ground, and switch hands! What funny things we remember! We never told her about Joe's trouble, but I did get the recipe from her!

1-1/2 cup grated raw carrots
1 cup oil
2 cups sugar
2 cups flour
2 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt
4 whole eggs
2 tsp. vanilla

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Cream together oil and sugar. Add carrots and eggs. Add flour, cinnamon, soda, salt and vanilla. Using 3 – 8 inch cake pans (greased and floured), pour batter evenly into pans and bake for 20-25 minutes until toothpick comes out clean.

Frosting:
1 pkg. (8 oz.) cream cheese, softened
1 lb. box of powdered sugar
1 stick butter
2 tsp. vanilla
1 cup pecans, toasted & chopped (optional, but good)

Cream together butter and cream cheese. Add sugar--and a little milk, if needed. Frost cake and add pecans all along the side.

Note: For the carrots, I took 1/4 cup of the leftover frosting and added 2 drops red and 4 drops of yellow food coloring, mixed it, then threw it in the freezer to harden a bit. I don't have nor would I know how to use fancy cake decorating tools, so I just scooped up wee bits of the frosting and formed them into carrot shapes and positioned them onto the cake. Ideally, I suppose I should have made one carrot for each slice of cake. For the leaves, I used a squirt can of green food coloring I had left over from another cake (I know, classy. Hey, I'm all about function and simplifying life, okay?

P.S. If you're wondering about the birthday banner, I made this cake for our street's 2nd Annual August Birthday Bash celebrating about 10 neighbors' August birthdays (including one of our kids). I used card stock to print up the subtle-colored bunting, printed letters with marker, sewed some craft thread through the card stock, and tied the banner to a set of chopsticks.

Caramel Puffcorn

If you like caramel corn--and don't mind the addictive quality is has in taking over your brain telling you to have just another handful...until it's gone--you'll really like this version made with kernel-less puffed corn. I like that I don't even have to worry about the thought of cracking a tooth on those little buggers when I pop these caramel puffs in my mouth.

My mother in law sent us home with a bag of puffed corn because she knew that my husband could eat this gluten-free snack, which he would have devoured on our 21-hour roadie back home to Texas from Minnesota if I hadn't seen the caramel corn recipe on the back of the package.

I packed them away in the back of our vehicle so none of the 12 hands looking for snacks would find them and eat'em up before I returned home and had the chance to try this recipe! (Yes, this is probably considered abusive--especially when my entire family is physically restrained for 1200 miles.)

Here's everything you'll need:


Yes, I know it's a HUGE box of baking soda. You'll only need 1+ tsp. for this recipe. You really don't want to know why I have this overabundance of baking soda...and four more boxes just like it at my house. I'll just leave you with two words: mummified chicken. 'Nough said, k? Carrying on...

Here's the recipe for

Caramel Puffcorn

3- 3-1/2 oz. pkgs. puffed corn (found in the snack aisle, butter flavored--not cheese flavored!)
1 cup butter (not margarine)
1-1/4 cups brown sugar
2/3 cup light corn syrup
1 tsp. baking soda

Preheat oven to 250 degrees
Combine butter, brown sugar, and light corn syrup in a 2 qt. sauce pan, cook on medium heat until mixture has melted. Once mixture has melted add the baking soda.

Note: This will cause the mixture to foam slightly.
Note 2: You may need to add an additional 1/2 tsp. soda if 1 tsp. doesn't cause it to foam or get slightly cloudyish.

Pour puffed corn into a large roasting pan. Pour caramel mixture over the puffed corn and stir until mixed.

Place in oven at 250 degrees for 45 minutes, stirring at least every 10-15 minutes.

Remove from oven, pour on wax paper or parchment and break apart/separate puffs. Allow to cool and...
ENJOY!

*For a naughtier version: drizzle melted chocolate over the mixture after you
remove it from the oven.

Bring it to your neighbors for a Christmas treat.
Just beware they'll be looking for it again every year.

If you don't continue to deliver, they'll look at you with (as my 7 year old son would say) "angry eyebrows"...and you don't want that, do you? Unless they complain about your yard not looking good enough--then it might be okay to occasionally skip a year of caramel corn for them! :}

For all of you living north in the frozen tundra, you're in Old Dutch country--not Chester Cheetah country. Look for Old Dutch brand corn puffs in your grocer's snack aisle.

Lamb Cake :: Almond Cherry Pound Cake

This is a fun little cake to make in the spring for Easter or 1st Communion celebration. My mother-in-law makes a number of her lamb cakes and gives them to friends for Easter!

I couldn't find her recipe in time to make my daughter's First Communion lamb cake (photo), so I modified a recipe I found online instead. I'll add her recipe in the future.

[Make in a bundt pan, two loaf pans, or halve the recipe to fill one lamb cake mold.]


Ingredients:

½ pound (2 sticks) butter
½ cup vegetable shortening, plus more for pan
3 cups sugar
5 eggs
3 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for pan
1/4 tsp fine salt
½ tsp baking powder
¾ cup half and half or whole milk + ¼ cup maraschino cherry juice
½ tsp. vanilla extract
½ tsp. almond extract
1/8 – ¼ cup finely chopped cherries (get all liquid out)
¼ cup chopped pecans

Finish:
Frost with your favorite white or cream cheese frosting...or simply dust with powdered sugar.

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

With a mixer, cream butter and shortening together. Add sugar, a little at a time. Add eggs, 1 at a time, beating after each addition. Stir dry ingredients together in a bowl and add to mixer alternately with milk, starting with the flour and ending with the flour. Mix in vanilla and almond extract. Fold in the cherries and pecans. Pour into a greased and floured tube pan and bake for 1 to 1-1/2 hours, until a toothpick inserted in the center of the cake comes out clean.

For molded lamb cake:
Pour batter into mold so it's even with the top of the base pan. Place other mold half (the one with a steam hole)on top of filled base mold. Gently poke with the end of a utensil to ensure there are no air pockets.

Place on cookie sheet and bake for 1 hour, checking doneness with toothpick through top steam hole.

Allow to cool for 15 minutes before taking top mold off. Let cool ~5 more minutes before, then gently slide a small knife around edges to ensure good mold release. Turn whole lamb cake out onto a cooling rack to cool completely before frosting or dusting with powdered sugar.

Use white frosting to frost lamb in swirls (like lamb’s wool), add flattened raisins for eyes and sliced cherries or cut fruit roll up pieces shaped for the mouth.

This white frosting recipe is truly excellent! Or, in a pinch, use prefab frosting.

(I use the whole recipe and make one molded lamb cake and one loaf.)

Recipe modified from Paula Dean's Mama's Pound Cake.

Rice Krispie Kisses

Every year for the past four years, the kiddies have looked forward to making these sweet little treats for St. Valentine's Day.


They're just rice krispy treats with tinted melted marshmallow,


...packed into a smallish funnel,


...wrapped in foil (sprayed lightly with non-stick cooking spray)


(with a cute little ribbon--or a strip of paper with a sweet message written on it).


I snip the corners off the foil squares before wrapping the krispy treat. Otherwise, there would be a big wad of foil at the top.


Yum!


Now go give 'em to all the little neighbor kids!

NOTE: I made 2 regular batches of rice krispy treats. Using a funnel that holds about 1 cup of water, I was able to make 16 krispy kisses (8 kisses in each batch). If needed, more can be made using a smaller funnel or just by not filling the funnel up to the top.

For a more authentic chocolatey (and gluten-free!) kiss treat, you can use Cocoa Pebbles. Sadly, krispy rice cereals still contain gluten because of the malt ingredient.

Cashew Clusters

If you're looking for a special treat that is super easy to make and doesn't involve the oven or icing or colored sprinkles, this recipe is for you! This is a winner above many other yummy recipes since it is 1) chocolatey, 2) embarrassingly quick and easy, 3) different than all the other "cookie" exchange items, 4) substantially satisfying to eat!

This is a recipe my mom always made at Christmastime. My Grandma Hardie used to make these, and many of her five children latched onto the recipe and have continued to make these chocolatey morsels for many, many years. My family always used the roasted Spanish peanuts, but I prefer the cashews. My children and I now make these clusters at Christmastime and give them to friends and neighbors in small tins.

Ingredients:

12 oz. white chocolate chips
2-12 oz. packages chocolate chips
2 lbs. whole cashews (or roasted Spanish peanuts)

Directions:

Place chips in a double boiler over medium heat. Stir until chocolate until melted and smooth. Or microwave chocolate to melt by heating on high for 1 minute, stir, then continue to heat for 30 seconds at a time, stirring in between until chocolate can be stirred smooth.

NOTE: depending on the chocolate you use, you may need to temper the chocolate to prevent white streaks from forming after the clusters cool. I use regular bags of chips and I don't bother tempering. Just don't overheat the chocolate while melting.

Remove from heat and add the nuts. Spoon onto waxed or parchment paper to form small clusters. Cool a few hours. Place in a tin separating layers with waxed or parchment paper.

To serve, place one or two...or three of them on one of Grandma Hardie's little Christmas plates and enjoy!

Caramel Morsel Bars (Mike's Favorite)

My grandma used to make these for a Christmas treat along with her many Christmas cookies. She made them especially for my brother, Mike, since they were his favorite. Grandma loved providing family favorites.* I was told she found this recipe in a magazine. After Mike died in 1987, we all realized that these bars were favorites of more of us than Mike alone. When my grandma passed away in 1989, I started making these as my own Christmas treat tradition!

Ingredients:

14-oz. bag KRAFT Caramels
3 TBSP water
5 cups crisp rice cereal or toasted oat cereal (I use crisp rice)
1 cup peanuts, optional
One 6-oz. pkg. (1 cup) semi-sweet chocolate chips
One 6-oz. pkg. (1 cup) butterscotch chips

Directions:

Melt caramels with water in saucepan (or double boiler) over low heat. Stir frequently until sauce is smooth. Pour over cereal and nuts; toss until well coated. With greased fingers, press mixture into greased 9” x 13” pan. Sprinkle morsels on top; place in 200 degree oven for 7 minutes, or until morsels softened. Spread softened morsels until blended to form a frosting. Cool, cut into bars.

* Grandma liked to make people feel special by going out of her way to provide their "favorites". Besides making these bars for Mike, she baked mint surprise cookies (I still need to locate that recipe)--my Uncle Steve's favorites. One year grandma couldn't find her usual chocolate mint wafers for these cookies. I ended up locating something similar at a bake shop in the Twin Cities on Thanksgiving break and bringing them back to DBQ so she could make them for him before Christmas. I also recall Grandma asking me to pick up a loaf of sour dough bread at a bakery on Bluff Street for Grandpa...just because she knew he really liked it. She didn't want me to mention to Grandpa how expensive it was because he, in all his frugality, would not have wanted her to buy it for him. These were Grandma's little touches to make people feel special...and I would have never known about them had I not been running errands for her while she was recovering from a heart attack.

Candy Cane Brownies

You can even use a mix for these little trees!

Today was one of those days when your little child scampers up to you and asks, "So, what treat am I bringing to my Christmas party today?" and hands me a note from his religious education teacher that he received LAST week...about the party TODAY!

Whuh?

As I recall, all the kids said that they didn't need to bring anything to their parties--only a couple of ornaments for the older kids to trade with their classmates. The children were finishing up making homemade cards for all their teachers when Jimmer sprang this one on me. So goes life.

No time for creative thought. My husband had taken the family vehicle to work since it was too rainy and cold to take his open Jeep, so I couldn't get to the store. Hmmm...not much in the pantry, though I had a box of unsweetened chocolate.

I just want to say a big thanks to my neighbor, Julia, who had candy canes that I could use to make these holiday brownies.

Directions:

The easy way to make these brownies is to use a box mix, add 1/2 tsp. peppermint extract (very good, but optional if you don't have it on hand) to the batter and bake as directed in a 9 x 13-inch pan. Using a quart-sized zipper baggie, crush four larger-sized candy canes with a mallet.



When the brownies have about 5 minutes left to bake, take them out of the oven, distribute the crushed candy canes over the top of the brownies, press them gently into the top, and finish baking.

If you're like me and don't have a mix, then make a fudgey version of your favorite brownie. I cut the vanilla extract in half and add 1/2 tsp. of peppermint extract.

Today, instead of just adding the crushed candy canes on top, I sprinkled on some milk chocolate chips five minutes before the brownies were done. After they were done baking, I spread the chocolate over the brownies with a knife, then sprinkled the crushed candy canes over the chocolate.

Allow the brownies to cool completely, then cut them into triangular tree shapes for that little extra Christmassy somethin', flip them all onto a red plastic plate, top it with non-festive, plain old clear cellophane (that is molecularily opposed to bonding with red plastic plates), hand them to your six year old, let him know that you'd like him not to run with them and drop them all before he gets to his party, and send him on his way with his dad...who has now returned just bit late with the family vehicle to run all the children to their parties.

Now close the door, pour some spiked egg nog, and finish wrapping Christmas presents while all the kids are away for that one and only precious hour a week that they are out of the house without you at their side. Ahhhhhh!

If I had the time, the ingredients and the gumption, I may have tried making these yummy looking brownies. The recipe has a few extra steps I just didn't have time for today.

Note: If you looked really closely at the picture of the final brownies, you'd notice a very sparce sprinkling of green sugar. I didn't think it addded anything special, so I stopped and left it with barely noticable greenery.

Cake Ball Christmas Tree

The inspiration for this Christmas tree treat totally came from Bakerella's directions on making cake balls. This Christmas tree is made from red velvet cake mix and cream cheese frosting, and covered in melted candy wafers. The cake balls were then arranged on a foil-covered Styrofoam cone "tree" with toothpicks. A nice centerpiece for a festive holiday party.

If you think this looks festively fun, you really should check out Bakerella's site. She has a perfectionist way of decorating all sorts of cake ball-type goodies and, of course, other scrumptious baked goods.

Using the same method of arranging the little cakes on the Styrofoam tree, I've also created a more decadent chocolate truffle tree. This will be a post for another time.
Basic directions are:

Bake a cake mix in a 9" x 13" pan. Let it cool, then crumble it up in a large bowl. Then take a standard off-the-shelf tub of frosting and mix it in (I used a fork to mix) until it all is crumbly-sticky. Grab a glob of the mix, roll it with your hands and plop it onto a waxed paper-lined cookie sheet. I stuck mine in the freezer to firm up before coating.

Psst.

Don't tell anyone, but I didn't use up the whole can of frosting. The cake held together sufficiently using only a little more than 3/4 of the frosting. I like a little less frosting.

Here's what your hands will look like after making the cake balls!

Follow the directions for the candy coating wafers (you can get in most grocery stores or in the cake decorating section of craft stores), dip the cake balls and get festive or creative or nutty with your designs!
For the green accent, I just melted some green wafers in a glass bowl in the microwave and plopped it into a quart-sized freezer zip bag. I snipped off a tiny bit of a corner then scribbled away on the cake balls. Yep, I just scribbled back and forth. I'm no perfectionist like Bakerella. If you look closely at the tree you can see little crumbs of cake, hanging strings of green scribble, blobs of coating here and there. Nope, no time for being a perfectionist!
I ended up making smaller (and more) balls out of the 9" x 13" cake to fill up the tree proportionately. I made about 70 balls and used 66 starting with 11 on the bottom and reducing by about one each layer. So, let me see...70-66=4 means I had four lucky children who got to pop unused cake balls!

It would even look better if the balls had been smaller--even graded in size to have the larger ones (1-1/4 inch) at the bottom and smaller ones (1 inch) near the top. See how some of those top ones kind of stick out like a sore thumb?
It's just not festive to think about sore thumbs. So, smaller balls at the top equals no sore thumbs!

Voila!


Your very own Red Velvet Cream Cheese Cake Ball Christmas Tree. But instead of saying that mouthful, just fill your mouth with these little crowd pleasers!

Again, for more inspiration check out Bakerella. She's full of cake ball ideas. Go wild and get creative!

Pumpkin Cheesecake Brownies

Ah yes, fall versions of our favorite classics. I'm not sure if I could go through the holidays on just cutely decorated sugar cookies--more specifically, without a hit of chocolate. With Christmas in the air, chocolate seems to fit in nicely with Cashew Clusters, the showy Truffle Tree (stay tuned for that one), and even Caramel Morsel Bars. For Thanskgiving, however, I've usually just offered Pumpkin Ice Cream Pie. There's also the traditional pumpkin and pecan pies. Hey, where's the chocolate?

When I was asked to bring something to the kids' fall violin performance for the reception afterwards, I was most certainly thinking chocolate. Hmmm, basic brownies just might not cut it, I figured. Yes, something chocolate with a fall twist.

Pumpkin cheesecake brownies would fit the bill.

The recipes online that I thought about trying only made a small batch. Also, I wanted the chocolate to stand out more than the pumpkin. If you only need an 8 x 8" pan, check out this recipe. (I still have yet to try it but will soon.) If you need to make a bigger batch (or use a boxed brownie mix), and want to keep it a bit chocolatier, read on.

For the chocolate brownie batter, I doubled my recipe for Double Chocolate Brownies (without the extra chocolate chips), but you can use a boxed version for this as well.

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

Prepare brownie batter, boxed or homemade, or this--as long as it's for a 9 x 13 pan.

Pumpkin cheesecake topping:

1 8 oz. package cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup canned pumpkin
1 egg
1/2 tsp. vanilla
1 TBSP flour
1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp. ground cloves
1/4 tsp. ground ginger
(Instead of using the cinnamon, cloves and ginger seperately, you could just add one teaspoon of pumpkin pie spice if you wish.)

Cream together the cream cheese and sugar; mix in the pumpkin, egg and vanilla. Add the dry ingredients and blend just until all ingredients are incorporated.

Pour 2/3 of chocolate batter into a greased 9" x 13" baking dish. With large spoonfuls, drop cheesecake mixture over the top of the chocolate--leaving some of the chocolate still showing. Add the remaining chocolate batter in large dollops over the top--again so both the chocolate and cheesecake batters can be seen. Take a knife and run it back and forth lengthwise through the dish (touching the bottom) just a few times. If you'd like more blending, run the knife through a few more time in the other direction.

Bake for about 5 minutes longer than the regular brownie recipe/mix calls for (that's about 35 minutes for the Double Chocolate Brownies). They're done when a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Allow brownies to cool before slicing.

Gobble 'em up!

Lemon Bars

These are Kathleen’s new favorite bars. As we were being spoiled in Chelan at Grandpa Terry and Grandma Doogie’s house with way too much good food, Kathleen kept eyeing these bars…and slowly (and slightly mysteriously) they disappeared throughout the course of a day! These are like a buttery-rich short bread made refreshing with the lemony citrus topping. I think the key to this recipe is the powdered sugar in the crust. It seems almost creamy.

Now, Kathleen has been on a mission to make these bars since we've been home! We’ve got the recipe…and we’re sharing the wealth! Here it is…

Preheat oven to 350 degrees

With two knives, have one of your children cut in the following crust ingredients:

1 cup flour
1 stick softened butter
1/4 cup powdered sugar
If you're using salt-free butter, also add 1/8 tsp. salt

Cut the butter into the dry ingredients until it's the size of small peas.

You can also put the ingredients in your processor and just give it a twirl. Or, if you'd like throw pastry caution to the wind, then just beat it up a bit with your electric mixer. I won't tell anybody. I just don't have my kids use these power tools on their own yet.

Dump the crust mixture into an 8" x 8" baking dish.Don't forget to clean up your mess!
Pat down the crust mixture firmly and evenly. (Kathleen had to get up on the counter top to make sure it was even.)
Pop the crust into the oven for 20 minutes. Meanwhile, let your kiddo make a mess of her face while eating all the crust bits off her hand. Letting her do this helped pass the time that the crust was baking. Kids don't like to wait very long!

Now, mix the lemony filling by beating the eggs, then adding the sugar,
(Never mind that Kathleen added the sugar before the eggs then had to pour it back out.) Carry on...add lemon juice (heck, throw in a tablespoon of the rind if you're using fresh lemons), and a pinch of salt.

Fold in the flour and baking powder, then pour the filling into the baking dish over the shortbread crust.

Bake for 18 minutes until the "middle doesn't jiggle" and the top is slightly browned.Remove from the oven and allow to cool completely. (Again, this is where kids don't like to wait. So, please begin your lessons on the virtue of patience, read an Aesop's Fable about the downfalls of instant gratification (there's gotta be one), or let them pre-run off their lemon bar calories by sending them outside to play.

To serve: Cut into squares or triangles (unless cutting things into triangles means the kiss of death like it does in Joe's family. They never cut their sandwiches into triangles. I figured, with the engineers and mathematicians in their family they would have cut their sandwiches, bars and cakes into every conceivable geometric shape...but NO. Remember, it was the kiss of death. Their own words, not mine.) Personally, I like triangles. Am I getting off the subject?

After you ponder your perceived kisses of death, generously sprinkle confectioner's sugar all over the top, then serve. Pure loveliness!

Tip: Depending on how many bars you want to make, either make this single recipe or double the ingredients and use a 9" x 13" baking dish.

Okay, okay, I've fooled you all. This hasn't been Doogie's recipe. Below is the recipe she gave us. I just had to write down everything else so I'd remember how to make them. I need support that way. Otherwise, I often doubt myself.

The actual words on Doogie's recipe card:

Mix:
1 cup flour
½ cup butter
¼ cup powdered sugar
Press into bottom at 8” x 8” pan and bake 15-20 minutes.

Mix:
2 well-beaten eggs
1 cup sugar
3 TBSP lemon juice (Using the bottled stuff is just fine. Doogie gave me permission to say that.)
Dash salt

Fold in 2 TBSP flour and ½ tsp. baking powder. Pour this mixture over crust and bake 15-20 minutes. Cool slowly.

Birthday cake by Dad

Yep, Joe made this one since there was no time on Halloween (the day before Jimmer's birthday) and no time in the morning on his birthday for me to make one. I'm the kids' violin coach and had to take them to lessons.

Jimmer requested a camper cake--reminiscent of our recent Canadian Rockies trip in a 31-foot RV.

I was confident that Joe's structural engineering talents would shine and that he'd be able to pull it off. I just gave him materials suggestions. He didn't even have to use steel or concrete for this structure, although a couple of toothpicks were used for reinforcement. Some extra special touches--green sprinkles for grass, a couple of chimps (Jimmer's faves) and other fun animals, trees, and even (ahem) a dump station. He made me proud--not because of the dump station but because he didn't even use a measuring device OR a level...not even blue prints! (Doing things "Willy-Nilly" like that usually goes against every grain in an engineer's being.)

I'm thinking he did such a fine job, we may just share this job of requested birthday cake creations.

Jimmer really liked his camper cake.

Checking out the front of the camper.
Checking out the ladder in back.
"Aw, Dad, is that the sewer water hose?"

Yep, sure is. (Leave it to Dad to include a dumping station.)

Make a wish...

Camper Cake
Building Supplies:

3 frozen pound cakes, thawed
2 containers white frosting
fruit roll-ups, he used red
mini donuts (not necessary)
Life Savers
licorice whips
couple of toothpicks
plastic animals of choice
green sprinkles

Blue Print/directions:

None available
(Engineer's tip: Just wing it!)

Pumpkin Ice Cream Pie

If the weather here won't cooperate and act like it's fall, I'll just go ahead, get out the pumpkin, and start cooking like it's fall.

I begged this recipe off Joe's sister. Loving her little brother very much and being the kind sister-in-law she is, she gave it to me...and hand wrote the recipe onto a very appropriate orange recipe card. Ellen, have I ever told you how much time it has saved me looking for this recipe? The orange card pops out right away. (She's an accountant. She thinks of things like this to make life easier. I'm not an accountant.)

Here we go...

Pie crust 3 ways:

1. Traditional - Make a 9-inch pie shell (or use a frozen deep-dish pie shell). Prick & bake until very lightly browned (425 oven). Cool.

2. Ginger snap crust -- similar to graham cracker crust

25 cookies (or enough to make 1-1/3 cup crumbs), crushed with a rolling pin in a quart-sized freezer zip bag or swirled in a processor. Leave out about 1 tablespoon of cookie crumbs to sprinkle on top of pie.
1/4 cup melted butter

Mix finely ground cookies in a bowl with melted butter, press firmly into a pie plate. Bake at 350 degrees for 8 minutes. You can also add a tablespoon of sugar to the crust ingredients, if you wish.

3. Ginger cookie crust (our most preferred) :

Make the cookie recipe from the Krusteax Gingerbread/cookie mix. Use 3/4 mix and press into a tart pan. (Make cookies with the rest of the dough...or do as I do and drop little balls of dough into your children's mouths much like a mother bird would feed her little chicks. No raw eggs :: no worries.) Bake as directed (10 minutes). Let cool before layering ice cream and pumpkin topping.

Now for the topping goodness...

In medium bowl put:
1 cup sugar
1 cup canned pumpkin
1 tsp. pumpkin pie spice
½ tsp. salt

In another bowl:
1 cup whipping cream. Beat until stiff. Here's what you'll have so far.

Fold into pumpkin mix until no white streaks are left.

This is not how you want it to look. Remember, streak rhymes with eek!


Ah, this is more like it--no streaks.


Scoop 1 pint softened vanilla ice cream into shell making sure there are no big air pockets between the crust and ice cream. (You'll need all the room you can get for the topping.)

Pour pumpkin mixture over it to make a full pie. Don't forget to save a good spatula full for yourself. A cook can't serve it unless it's tasted.

Sprinkle top with 1 tablespoon of ginger snap crumbs.

Freeze uncovered on a level spot in freezer for 1 hour, then cover with plastic wrap and keep in freezer until ready to serve.

Now, go answer your door and have your little girl's friend see that you still have some pumpkin topping on your face. Give her half the pie and send her home to share it with her family. Then maybe she will forget about your face being covered with pumpkin and won't tell anyone.

When ready to serve, let the pie sit out and soften for about 10 minutes (depending on how cold your freezer is) so it can be cut smoothly.

Forcefully stabbing through the pie and having it shoot across the table onto the floor on Thanksgiving Day would probably cause people to frown at you.

Frowning isn't very festive.