The February 2009 challenge is hosted by Wendy of WMPE’s blog and Dharm of Dad ~ Baker & Chef. We have chosen a Chocolate Valentino cake by Chef Wan; a Vanilla Ice Cream recipe from Dharm and a Vanilla Ice Cream recipe from Wendy as the challenge.

Okay, that’s the required text that the DB team uses to see if we completed the challenge. Our challenge was to make a Chocolate Valentino cake (Valentino cakes are traditionally heart shaped) which is a flourless cake. Then we were supposed to pair it with homemade ice cream, yum! Instead of doing vanilla, I made our absolute favorite ice cream recipe by Jaden of Steamy Kitchen. It’s Thai Coffee Ice Cream and I can’t share the exact recipe until her cookbook is out, but it has espresso and cardamom and sweetened condensed milk and is incredibly amazing! I also paired it with a raspberry sauce.

I had a huge blessing when making this challenge that we were staying at Eric’s parents. They have a REALLY nice kitchen and his mother has tons of cooking equipment. It was like Christmas! There was a big gas stove, two ovens, a perfect glass bowl with handle so I didn’t get burned, a food mill and more. It made preparing our Valentine’s Day dinner a breeze. It’s also great for having Eric help me cook, there’s tons of prep space.

For this cake it was very important to pick a chocolate you really like the taste of, so I went with my favorite dark chocolate that I use for everything now. It’s from Trader Joe’s and the bar is over a pound and very affordable. One thing I didn’t think about is it’s not very sweet, so even though I can eat a chunk of it plain, you don’t add sugar to this so it wasn’t sweet on its own. Fortunately that was made up for by the ice cream, raspberry sauce and powdered sugar.

This challenge may have been my most fun so far! The recipe we had to use was only 3 simple ingredients: chocolate, butter and eggs. The creativity was in how you serve it and that was really fun for me. I knew I wanted to do the coffee ice cream, but I didn’t want it to be all brown, so I was inspired once again by my days as a Starbucks Barista (funny how much that’s influenced my cooking lately and I think there’s more to come of it) and the Raspberry Mochas that so many of my customers couldn’t live without. The powdered sugar was because I wanted to make the heart stencil on top, and to add sweetness to the rich dark chocolate. I only did a half recipe which made 8 cupcakes and what you see pictured is just one cupcake cut in half. Oh and didn’t the yolks mixing into the chocolate look so cool?

Chocolate Valentino
makes 16 cupcakes
Preparation Time: 20 minutes

Ingredients
16 ounces (1 pound) of semisweet chocolate, roughly chopped
½ cup (1 stick) plus 2 tablespoons of unsalted butter
5 large eggs separated

Instructions

Put chocolate and butter in a heatproof bowl and set over a pan of simmering water (the bottom of the bowl should not touch the water) and melt, stirring often. While your chocolate butter mixture is cooling, butter your pan and line with a parchment circle then butter the parchment.

Separate the egg yolks from the egg whites and put into two large bowls. Whip the egg whites in a large grease free bowl until stiff peaks are formed (do not over-whip or the cake will be dry). With the same beater beat the egg yolks together.

Add the egg yolks to the cooled chocolate. Fold in 1/3 of the egg whites into the chocolate mixture and follow with remaining 2/3rds. Fold until no white remains without deflating the batter.

Pour batter into prepared pan, the batter should fill the pan 3/4 of the way full, and bake at 375F. Bake for 25 minutes until an instant read thermometer reads 140F. Note – If you do not have an instant read thermometer, the top of the cake will look similar to a brownie and a cake tester will have crumbs.

Cool cake on a rack for 10 minutes then unmold.

Raspberry Syrup

Ingredients
1 cup frozen raspberries
1/2 cup water
1/4 cup sugar

Instructions

Place all ingredients in a sauce pan on medium-high. Stir and bring to a boil. Turn down the heat and simmer 5 minutes. Remove from heat and let cool.

Separate syrup from seeds (If you’re like my mother in law and have one of those handy food mills hand crank things, use it! If not press through a mesh strainer).

This is the only food I’ve made today. For some reason when my stomach is upset I only want pickles and ginger ale and sometimes saltines. As I was able to keep those down I decided to throw some cheese and mustard in the mix, similar to one of my weirdest snacks pickles cheese and mustard sandwiched in a taco shell. Anyway, as I mentioned here, Eric and I have been sick. He fortunately got healthy really quickly, I unfortunately did not. I’d feel better for a day and then worse. Then I noticed a lot of pressure building up in one ear, and some hearing loss. I figured I had an ear infection and yesterday called to set a Doctor appointment for after work today.

Eric ended up having to rush me to the hospital after work. My ear was so painful to the point that I was hysterical and telling him I wanted to die. Yeah, that bad. I don’t really remember it that clearly but I definitely wasn’t myself. 800 mg of Ibuprofen and a heat pack helped and by the time we got to Urgent Care I was feeling better and a little silly. But apparently I was not overreacting, when the doctor looked in my ear she said “Whoa!!!” because it was so red and inflamed. I’d probably had an infection for over a month, as I mentioned to her that when I’d run on a treadmill I’d always be leaning/falling to the left. The nurse said it’s good I came in because if an ear infection gets bad enough and affects the lymph nodes, they’re also connected to the brain and it can be dangerous.

Okay, if you look carefully, you may realize that this curry isn’t actually vegetarian, it has scallops in it. See, wanted something to use up my kale, and thought that a curry would be perfect. But because of Eric’s first reaction to my using kale in a vegetarian meal, I didn’t want to risk that again and thought I’d throw some chopped scallops in. That was fine, but we ended up not even tasting the scallops, they were just some extra chewiness. So, I’m adding this to my list of vegetarian meals because it’s delicious and I’ll definitely make it with just the veggies next time. By the way, Eric loved it and said “the gross green stuff is actually really good in this!” Hooray! Another great way to get some new healthy veggies in our diet. (By the way, don’t toss the pepper tops, kale stems, or other veggie leftovers. Put them in a ziploc bag in your freezer, I’ll tell you why soon!)

photo from importfood.com

Eric and I love curry, and previously I’ve made it from scratch Sri Lankan style using a bunch of different spices, which is really good. Now I save myself a lot of time by using Thai Red Curry Paste. This stuff is so good, I don’t get the 14 oz jar, I got the 2lb tub! (Quite cheap at Cash and Carry) It’s good enough that you can use just it and coconut milk, but I always like to add things, it makes me still feel like a chef I love my citrus so I often add a variety of lime juice, lime zest, or lemongrass (I use the kind from the tube since fresh lemongrass is an hours drive away). I also always add garlic and sometimes some grated ginger. You can use a variety of vegetables and it’s so easy to make. We like ours with steamed rice.

Vegetarian Curry with Kale
serves 4-6

Ingredients

2 TBS olive oil
1 TBS Thai red curry paste
1/2 tsp chopped lemongrass
2 cloves garlic minced
1 red onion chopped
4-5 kale leaves
1 19 oz can of coconut milk
1 yellow bell pepper sliced
juice of 1/2 lime

Instructions

Heat olive oil in a pot and add curry paste, lemongrass and garlic. Mix well sauteing for about a minute. Add chopped red onion and saute another couple minutes until onions begin to caramelize to bring out their sweetness. Meanwhile tear small pieces of kale from the tough stem.

Add the kale to the pot, stirring for a minute, then pour in coconut milk and add pepper slices. Allow to boil slightly for 5 minutes, stirring occaisionally. Add lime juice and test if kale is softened. Once it has you’re ready to serve it over steamed rice.

Chocolate Haupia Pie…Chocolate Haupia Pie…Chocolate Haupia Pie! You just caught me in a typical daydream. See this pie is one of my favorite desserts in the world, and it’s one of the foods that takes me back to Hawaii. In fact, my last day living in Hawaii I bought a chocolate haupia pie by Ted’s Bakery and took it to watch the sun set at (where else?) Sunset Beach! I ate the entire pie, right out of the pan. Needless to say I did not need my airline meal on the flight that night!

This was one of the first Hawaii foods I craved after moving to Washington, and so for almost three years now I’ve been perfecting the recipe. I bring it to potlucks, serve it for dessert when friends are over for dinner, and gladly take any opportunity to work on it. Sometimes I’m lazy and make it in a pre-made graham cracker or shortbread crust. Sometimes I use milk chocolate, sometimes a frozen pie crust. But after much experimentation, I’ve come up with the perfect recipe!

The crust is crunchy and rich with Macadamia Nuts and Quaker Oats. The chocolate haupia layer is absolutely decadent made with quality dark chocolate. Oh, what is haupia you ask? Here’s part of the wikipedia definition:

Haupia is a traditional coconut milk-based Hawaiian dessert often found at luaus in Hawaiʻi and other local gatherings. Since World War II, it has become popular as a topping for white cake, especially at weddings. Although technically considered a pudding, the consistency of haupia closely approximates gelatin dessert and is usually served in blocks like gelatin.

Me, I just say haupia is a dreamy creamy coconut dessert that goes great with chocolate. So if you like chocolate and coconut, you will LOVE this! One very important thing with this crust is to make sure you butter the pie pan, otherwise it’s a pain to try and get the pieces out. If you get a chance to try this, let me know what you think!

Macadamia Nut Crusted Dark Chocolate Haupia Pie
serves 8
Ingredients

crust:
3/4 cup flour
1/8 cup granulated sugar
1/8 cup packed brown sugar
3/4 stick cold butter (6 TBS)
1/2 cup uncooked Quaker Oats
1/4 cup chopped Macadamia Nuts

filling:
6 ounces good quality dark chocolate
1 13.5 oz can coconut milk (or a little over 1.5 cups)
1 cup 2% milk
1 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup cornstarch
1 cup water

whipped cream:
1 cup heavy whipping cream
1/8 cup granulated sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
Instructions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Butter a 9 inch pie pan. Mix flour, granulated sugar and brown sugar in medium bowl; cut in butter with a fork until mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Stir in oats and nuts. Press the mixture into bottom and sides of prepared pie pan. Bake for 15-20 minutes or until golden brown.

While crust is baking, make haupia by whisking coconut milk, milk and sugar together in a saucepan. While bringing coconut mixture to a boil, whisk cornstarch and water together in a separate bowl. Reduce coconut mixture to a simmer and pour in cornstarch mixture. Continue whisking until mixture is thick.

Remove crust from oven when done and put in fridge to cool slightly.

In a medium microwave safe bowl, microwave for 1- 1 1/2 minutes and stir with a fork to melt. Pour half of haupia into the chocolate and mix well. Pour chocolate haupia into pie crust. Pour remaining white haupia in a layer on top of chocolate haupia. Place pie in refrigerator to cool at least 1 hour.

Whip heavy cream, sugar and vanilla until stiff peaks form. Pipe or spread onto pie and top with shaved chocolate. Cool another hour in fridge.

Update: I’ve entered this in 1 Family Friendly Food’s Cake Collection!

Okay, yes that was a cheesy title, but we just watched the musical Oliver, and this Root Veggie Mash looks kinda like gruel so that’s what Eric and I have been calling it. But trust me, those poor hungry orphans would absolutely want more of this gruel, it’s delicious! It was completely an experimental dish, for this week’s superfood challenge.

I have never cooked with turnips before and decided that it was a root veggie, like potatoes so why not try mashing them up? I thought I’d include a carrot too, another root veggie. I really wasn’t sure how it would turn out but was pleasantly surprised. It was kind of like a turnip chowder. Eric really liked it too. By the way, interesting thing, potatoes and carrots sink, turnips float! I served this with some sauteed brussel sprouts and bacon, and a scallop pasta.

Root Veggie Mash
serves 2
Ingredients

1 small red potato chopped
1/2 large turnip peeled and chopped
1 large carrot peeled and chopped
2 cloves garlic minced
1/4 cup cream
1 TBS butter
salt and pepper to taste
rosemary
thyme
oregano

Instructions

Boil the turnip, carrot, potato and garlic in a large pot of water for 20 minutes or until tender. Drain and mash with cream, butter and spices to your taste.