Oreo Ice Cream Cake

This is a great cake - very rich and sweet.  It also looks pretty fancy, but it's actually really easy to make!  The first time I had it was when I went home one weekend during college and my family surprised me with one for my 22nd birthday.  I've made it a total of two times since, both of which took place before I started this blog so no step-by-step pictures this time :(  Also, I didn't take pictures of the cake the second time I did it and I messed up the first a little...  The cake should not be an "interesting" brown color on the outside, but we'll get to that in a bit.

Ingredients:

1/2 cup hot fudge topping, warmed

8 oz. whipped cream, thawed (1 tub)

3.9 oz chocolate instant pudding (1 package)

1 cup chopped Oreos (we used minis to make it easier)

12 vanilla ice cream sandwiches

Directions:

1.  Pour fudge topping into bowl and whisk in half of the whipped cream (the first time, I dumped it all in so I had none left for frosting).  Then add the dry pudding mix.  If the fudge mixture is too thick, add some milk.  Stir in chopped Oreos.

2.  Get out a 24-inch long sheet of foil and arrange 4 ice cream sandwiches on the center of it, side-by-side.  Spread half of the fudge mixture on it.  Repeat and top with final layer of sandwiches.  Frost the top and sides with the other half of the whipped cream.

3.  Bring up foil and double fold top and ends to loosely seal packet.

4.  Freeze 4 hours or until firm.

Verdict: I made this for Joseph's birthday last year and he shared it with his friends later that week.  I then received a phone call from him and the phone got passed around to each of his friends so they could each praise the cake.  They were very impressed with it, but they didn't know that the secret was ice cream sandwiches!  I got a request from his roommate to make this for his birthday so that should be a pretty good indication of how awesome this cake is!


I bet you can guess that it isn't very healthy.  But if you're eating it, you're probably celebrating something or other (at the very least, celebrating that you get to eat cake!) so calories don't count then, right?  In any case, I'll add that information in small font so you can pretend not to see it.


Recipe serves 12.  Calories per serving: 340.

Turkey Chili and Homemade White Bread (with the help of a bread machine)

This was one of the first meals I made this year when I began learning how to cook.  It was a perfect, hearty meal for the winter months.  It still tastes good now, but you'll probably be sweating while eating it - the weather around here's been up in the 90's.  Actually, you'd probably be sweating just sitting around here so go ahead and make it!  These recipes came from a Better Homes and Gardens cookbook and my bread machine book.


Chili - serves 4


Ingredients:
12 ounces lean ground turkey
1 cup chopped onion (1 large)
1/2 cup chopped green sweet pepper
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 15-ounce can dark red kidney beans, drained
1 14.5-ounce can diced tomatoes, undrained
1 8-ounce can tomato sauce
2-3 tsp chili powder
1/2 tsp dried crushed basil
1/4 tsp black pepper


Directions:
1.  In a large saucepan cook ground beef, onion, sweet pepper, and garlic until meat is brown and onion is tender.  Drain fat if needed.  

2.  Stir in kidney beans, undrained tomatoes, tomato sauce, chili powder, basil, and black pepper.  

3.  Bring to boiling; reduce heat.  
4.  Simmer, covered for 20 minutes.


Traditional White Bread - 1.5 pound loaf


Ingredients:
1-1/8 cups water
1 tbs margarine
1-3/4 tsp salt
3 cups flour
1 tbs dry milk
2 tbs sugar
2 3/4 tsp active dry yeast


1)  Add ingredients to bread pan in order.  For the yeast, form a hole with your finger in the dry ingredients and pour yeast into hole.  Yeast should not come into contact with liquid.
2)  Put bread pan into the bread machine and set the machine to break your bread!
This is pretty easy, but the baking will probably take around an hour and a half so plan ahead when making the bread. 

Verdict: I like it!  I've made the chili several times and found that it freezes pretty well so you can make individual-sized dinners for the week.  I've also recently discovered a love of   pickled jalapenos so I throw that in my chili too.  The bread's good, but doesn't last that long. I ended up having to throw some of it out because I don't eat bread that often.


Nutrition: Turkey Chili has around 275 calories per serving.  White bread has around 125 calories per slice if the loaf gets cut into 12 pieces.