Hilary makes dessert

Flourless Chocolate Cake (also known as Jane’s Birthday, part 2)

~ Hilary ~ 2 Comments

For those of you who were wondering why Jane was the only one whose birthday cake was chocolate, this post should serve as clarification for your questioning minds.  Jane, who is I swear the sweetest person in the universe, just happens to be allergic to a dear little thing called gluten.  This being said, there is gluten in things that I could never possibly imagine – licorice, Caramilk chocolate bars, etc. etc.  Needless to say, I would die.  Jane, on the other hand, is a super trooper (yes, like the ABBA song) and, since I always feel horrible for making Friday treats she can’t eat, I knew I needed to make her an extra special cake for her birthday.

That’s where this flourless chocolate cake came in.  Meant to serve as a joint birthday/happy last summer orientation day cake, the pressure was on.  I spent countless hours searching the Internet in and out for a gluten-free cake recipe that I thought I could duplicate.  I finally found this awesome blog, Gluten Free Goddess, which then led me to find this recipe.

Since there is (obviously) no flour in this cake, the ingredients were quite unlike what I was used to.  This cake contained a hell of a lot of chocolate – five dark chocolate bars to be exact.  Seeing me carting six chocolate bars through my check out (yes, I bought an extra milk chocolate bar just for me) my overly-curious grocery store cashier kindly asked me if I had just suffered an unfortunate break up.  I couldn’t help but laugh.

This cake also contained EIGHT eggs, the most I have ever used all at one time, including during omelette and breakfast making.  My fridge resources were exhausted.  Another ingredient I was unsure about was the coffee required for this recipe.  In the end, I took a leap of faith, bolted to my local Starbucks and ordered a grande bold to go.  Following what the recipe requires.. always a good choice.

The end result of this cake was a luscious, dense dessert where one could taste just a hint of coffee.   A little less solid and cake-like than what I was used to, it reminded me more of a giant brownie than anything.  Don’t get me wrong, it was still delicious, but I think this whole gluten-free eating thing could take a little getting used to…   Also, made some simple chocolate icing to go on top and added some coloured sprinkles, just for fun!

Happy Birthday Doug (what better way to express birthday wishes than through a cookie pizza?)

~ Hilary ~ 1 Comment

When my co-worker and good friend Kristina approached me a few weeks ago to help her make cookies for her boyfriend Jasen’s dad, I knew this couldn’t just be any normal baking session.  What Kristina proposed was that, since Doug loved cookies, we make him a plethora of different varieties, in hopes of satisfying his apparent sweet tooth.  Of course, I saw this as an opportunity to do something creative and different – the cookie pizza was born!

Now I must admit I cannot take complete credit for this cookie pizza idea.  Ever since I was an 11 and ate cookie dough by the bowlful, I have known about cookies and their remarkable ability to double as pretty awesome birthday cakes.  The idea for this cookie pizza was actually inspired by two sources.  The first was Ariel, one of my beloved, school-year roommates.  Ariel had made a cookie pizza back in March, and could not stop bragging about how good it was (I unfortunately did not get a piece, which makes me extremely upset, considering I heard about it for weeks on end). The second was a search through trusty google images, to find this gorgeous picture and recipe for a dessert pizza.  Drawing a little inspiration from each, Kristina, Elisabeth (my super cool friend from Norway!) and I managed to churn out something which I think is pretty wonderful.  Ridiculous thing that never happens in my kitchen: somehow Kristina does not own dry ingredient measuring cups, so things like flour and brown sugar were measured in a gravy mixer.

Anatomy of the Cookie Pizza:
– Chocolate chip cookie (using mom’s recipe, of course – mom, I know you love it when I give you shout-outs, so here we are)
– Buttercream icing
– Red sprinkles (to make up for the fact that we completely forgot to dye the icing red…)
– Shredded coconut
– Red chocolate moulding wafers
– M&M’s, star sprinkles, baking gums and whatever your heart desires.
– Chocolate glaze piped through a sandwich-size Ziploc bag (try not to make your letters obese like my “H”)

Result: sugary birthday treat, perfect for a grown up sweet tooth.  Hope he liked it!

I realize that reading my blog right now is like looking into a candy store.  As of tomorrow, this sugar-streak will end and I will once again return to my attempts at healthy-almost-including-vegetables meals.  Apologies.

Candy Sushi (and my ultimate demise by sugar coma)

~ Hilary ~ 1 Comment

There is one thing I dislike about my job.  No, it’s not my co-workers, Summer Orientation days or designing parent newsletters.  I positively adore all of the above.  It is something substantially more ridiculous and avoidable: the amount of CANDY in our office, and my extreme effectiveness in eating all of it.  Be it at the front reception desk or in my supervisor’s office drawer, there is no shortage of sugar.  As all my co-workers know, I can often be found shamelessly sneaking into someone’s office to get Riesens, jubjubs, licorice or, most often, all of the above.

This being said, eating candy sushi after a full day of pigging out on office treats was not that enjoyable of an experience.  Making this sushi on Thursday night, I found myself surrounded by a pile of fruit roll-up wrappers, Bulk Barn bags and Rice Krispies squares.  Under normal circumstances, I would have been in heaven.  This night, however, found my stomach lurching into an unpleasant rollarcoaster.  Please do not get me wrong, these were good, but unless you would like to have a major sugar crash, I sincerely recommend you eat them one at a time.

So why in the world did I made this candy sushi?  WELL, since we do everything together, my co-worker’s and I decided to throw a sushi party.  After the great success of Gord and LJ’s sushi making adventures a few weeks ago, we all decided that these Japanese delicacies needed to be replicated in mass quantity.

Never one to conform to basic standards and bring something easy like cucumber or avocado to the night, I decided I needed to make something cool.  This was where the website Mommy Knows (awkward site for a 20-year-old girl) came in.  She posted a fantastic candy sushi recipe on her site, and it contained the best and most simple instructions on how to complete this treat.  Basically, all you needed to make these sushi were fruit roll-ups (to double as seaweed), thinly-made Rice Krispie square sheets and some more sugary candy for the inside filling.  Super easy to make and, I think, super realistic.  Try it at home for your next sushi party!

I put my sushi on a cake, which may not have helped with the sugar overload…

So how did the regular sushi work out?  Well it was just GREAT!  As per usual, I ate way too much, but it was totally worth it.  My personal favourite – avocado, strawberry and banana rolls – can only be described in one word: amazing.

Me, pre-sugar coma, happy as a clam.

White Chocolate Cheesecake with Fruit and Raspberry Coulis (Dinner Party, Part III)

~ Hilary ~ Leave a comment

Random intro line: The commercial for “Eat, Pray, Love” is on – I want to see it SO badly.  Plus the song in the trailer is super catchy.

…

I knew that my dinner party encore had to be decadent and impressive.  With these two requirements in mind, I narrowed my dessert search down to two dishes, this cheesecake, and a Chocolate Brownie Turtle Cake (from my Canadian Living Family Cookbook).  Leaving the latter until another (very soon) occasion, I went forth with preparations for the cheesecake.

Having this be only the second cheesecake I’ve ever made, I was once more concerned about my lack of water-bath for cooking the cake.  I cranked my oven down to a mere 275° F, and cooked the cheesecake for 3/4 of the required time.  Perhaps I should be more modest, but the cake turned out perfectly.  There was not a SINGLE crack, nor bubble in the top of the cheesecake.  I am extremely pleased.  Also, it didn’t taste too much like white chocolate, which pleasantly surprised me, since I’m more of a milk chocolate girl.  With patience on my side for once, I let the cheesecake cool completely before lovingly cutting into the cake to prepare it for pictures.  The results, I think, are quite pretty…

Needless to say, I had cheesecake for three major meals the next day.  Nom, nom, nom, nom!

Ginger Molasses Crinkle Cookies

~ Hilary ~ 2 Comments

No matter what delicious food I make in the future, I am positively sure that cookie dough will remain my favourite snack for the rest of time.  As always, I ate about 1/3 of the prepared cookie dough prior to it being baked, a task which quickly threw my stomach into a state of mass chaos.  Was it worth it?  Of course.

I made these cookies at the request of one of my co-workers, Diandria (shout-out!!).  She is a huge fan of the Starbucks ginger molasses cookies, so I knew I had to try my very best to recreate their treat.  Not having ever made ginger cookies of any kind, I had no idea what recipe to use.  Of course I turned to Canadian Living to fix my problem, and easily found the recipe for their Ginger Molasses Crinkle Cookies.  Not sure where the “crinkle” comes in (since the word kind of reminds me of Christmas wrapping paper), but I’m not complaining.

I haven’t brought in a Friday treat for awhile, since our Fridays have been completely occupied by Summer Orientation sessions.  Since today was our LAST Friday session (I can’t believe it), I decided to make these cookies to celebrate/mourn.  Also, it’s weird, but I’m getting some sort of inner-gut feeling when something is done in the oven.  Maybe that’s a super Foodie Freak thing to say, but it’s happening.  Okay, or it might just be that my paranoia makes me check the oven every minute so things don’t burn.  Either way, I’m learning.

PS: Sorry about the bland pictures.  There is only so much you can do with cookies.