Pro Four Layer Cake
May 13, 2008
Ingredients
- 3/4 cup boiling water
- 1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
- 1 tsp instant-espresso powder
- 1/2 cup milk
- 1 tsp vanilla
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 1/4 teaspoons baking soda
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 cup unsalted butter, softened
- 2 cups packed brown sugar
- 4 eggs
- 500ml of whipping cream
- 1/2 cup soft butter
- 2 cups sifted icing sugar
- 1 egg white 'stiffly beaten' lol
- 2 oz melted unsweetened chocolate
Filling/Icing
Preparation: Preheat oven to 350°F. Butter 2 round 8ish inch pans that are 2ish or more inches deep. Get three bowls to work with. With your main/biggest bowl, mix your butter and brown sugar together with an electro mixer. Use high speed until its 'fluffy'. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Now with one of your other bowls, whisk together water, cocoa and espresso powder until its smooth. Whisk in the milk and the vanilla. In your third bowl sift together your flour, baking soda and salt. Now add your flour mix and cocoa mix into the big butter brown sugar bowl. Start with the flour, then the cocoa, back in forth in batches, aka not all at once. Use a low speed for this, because the flour will go everywhere in the air and such. When its all nicely combined, use a spatula to help pour it into the 2 pans. Make sure they're even, duh. Smooth the top. Ok now pop them in the middle of the oven for like 35 minutes. This is a generic number, use a stick or something to test whether the cake is done. If its down, the cake batter stuff won't have stuck to the stick, it'll be clean and non gooey. After they're cooked, take em out of the oven and let them cool for a while. After they're cool, take them out of the pans. Cut the 2 'cakes' in half, so you get 4 layers. Ok now you need some filling.
Alright, cream your butter with your icing sugar in a bowl. Add in the egg white and the 2oz of melted chocolate and beat it until its smooth. Take your 500ml or so of whipping cream and whip it using an electric mixer, it should take a few minutes. Don't turn it into butter. Now you can contruct the cake. Put down one layer, coat it with the chocolate buttercream icing. Add the second layer. Put a layer of whipped cream on this one. Put the third layer down, coat it with another layer of chocolate buttercream, finishing it. Add the fourth and final layer which is the top. Now all that is left to do is to coat the outside of the cake with your whipped cream. The 500ml should be just enough, if you want lots of cream, you'll probably have to use more than 500ml. Here is what the final result looks like, while coating the side with the whipped cream.
Bacon-wrapped Chicken
May 12, 2008
Ingredients
- X amount 4oz chicken breast
- 1 slice provolone per chicken
- 2 or 3 strips of bacon per chicken
- pinch salt
- little pepper
- other spice
Preparation: Take out your chicken breasts on a cutting board or plate or something. 4oz pieces of chicken are pretty good for this, if your chicken is too big, cut it to be smaller. Now filet the chicken breast cutting a slit horizontally into it. This is where you'll put the provolone slice. Now you want to pound the meat, lol. You don't have to if you don't want to. Ok, now insert your provolone slice and fold the top of the chicken on top. The chicken will be like a hotdog bun, with the cheese inserted like a hotdog. Yea. So take your bacon strips, and warp the chicken relatively tightly with it. Now put whatever spice on that you want, aswell as the salt and pepper (again, optional). Now bake at 350°F for 15 minutes. Turn the heat up to 400°F, and continue baking for a further 25 minutes.
As for the potatoes, simply get a bunch of mini ones and boil them while the chicken is in the primary cooking stage. Drain the water and put them in a dish. Pour a bit of olive oil over the potatoes, not too much, then crush up a couple cloves of garlic and sprinkle that on them. Add some pepper and salt and some rosemary for imp flava flav. Put the dish in the oven which is now at 400, and let them bake until the chicken is done. Take both out at the same time. Rabbit food or maybe some bread would work with it, if you're into that. Here's what the result looks like.
Jam Tarts / GG Pastry
April 18, 2008
Ingredients
- 5 1/2 cups flour
- 2 tsp salt
- 1 lb tenderflake lard
- 1 egg - lightly beaten
- 1 tbsp vinegar
- water
- jam
Preparation:
Mix together flour and salt. Cut in lard until mixture resembles 'coarse oatmeal'. Combine vinegar and egg in a one cup measure, or in something that can measure one cup. Fill the vinegar/egg mixture to an even cup with water. If you don't understand this, you don't deserve tasty treats. Stir liquid into the dry mixture gradually. Add sufficient liquid to make dough stick together. Gather the dough into a ball and divide it into six parts. Place the dough in saran wrap and chill in the fridge for one or two hours. Note: Because this recipe is really meant for pie crusts, you will have a ridiculous amount of pastry. One section out of six makes about 14 tarts. As far as I know, you can freeze the stuff, so you can put the other five sections of pastry away for another time. If you want to make less pastry, divide the ingredients, but good luck working out one sixth of an egg.
After chilled, take the dough out and roll it out on your countertop. Be sure to sprinkle it with flour, and sprinkle your rolling pin with flour frequently. Alternatively, you can roll it between 2 pieces of saran wrap. You must roll the dough out fairly quickly, as when heated up the dough will become very annoying. When about 4mm thick +/- 1mm, use a cookie cutter to extract circles. If you are in fact still making jam tarts, you need a 'mince pie tin', basically very shallow concave dimples. After placing them in, it should look similar to this. Now simply put one teaspoon of jam, whatever kind you want into the pastry. Note: you might think, because I am super ripped, I will put more jam! This is generally a bad idea, as the jam will overflow and burn and make a sticky mess. Ok, now have your oven set to 400°F, and put the pan in the oven for about 10 minutes, or until the pastry turns golden. When you take them out, don't get jam on you, and don't eat them until they've cooled for five minutes. If you try, you will burn.
And here are the results...note the LOL pastry. It doesn't taste too great without jam.
Oatmeal Chocolate-Chip Cookies
April 8, 2008
Ingredients:
- 3/4 cup margarine
- 1 cup brown sugar
- 1/2 cup granulated sugar
- 1 egg
- 2 tbsp water
- 2 tsp vanilla
- 2/3 cup flour
- 3/4 tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- 3 cups oats
- 1 1/2 cups chocolate chips