Impromptu Pizza, sort of

While at Trader Joes one day, I picked up some of their fabulous herb pizza dough and pesto among other things. A few days later, I still didn't have a specific plan per say for the pizza, but my mother in-law was over, we were hungry, so I whipped something together.

I didn't have any tomato sauce and didn't want to use ALL pesto for the sauce since I already had the super flavorful herb dough. I did have some cherry tomatoes, probably left-over from the frittata in the post below, and red onions, so I sauteed those up with some olive oil, salt, pepper, dry basil, and garlic powder. When it was saucy and cooked, I stirred in some of the pesto and cooked it for another minute or so. I rolled out the dough, brushed olive oil on the crust, and spread my tomato, onion, and pesto mixture onto the rest. on top of this, I added whatever shredded cheese I had in the fridge. I think it was a mix of Mexican blend, mozzarella, and cheddar. On top of this I put some chopped green bell pepper and a bunch of fresh baby spinach (also, left over from the frittata. . . ). I baked it up and it was REALLY GOOD. I think sometimes the best meals are born when you're not prepared and need to use what you've got!! Mmmmmm.

Anyone for brunch??

Okay, are you still with me? There's yet more catching up to do!

I had some friends over for brunch a few weeks ago and made my first frittata! I'm not a HUGE egg fan, something Jenni and I have in common, but did want to give this a try. It's a Spinach and Potato Frittata that I added cherry tomatoes to. I also used at least double the amount of spinach that this recipe calls for and had to finish it off in the oven because it didn't set on the stove. Oh, and don't forget the salt! It needs it. Scott ate it, like most things, with ketchup, and really liked it.
















For this brunch party (and also for my own brunch birthday party in February!) I made Baked French Toast. Holy holy, this is good stuff. I make it with ONE stick of butter instead of two (OH Paula. . . ) and double the cinnamon in both the casserole as well as in the topping. No syrup needed. Delish!

German Chocolate Cake!!

About a month ago, I made my first German Chocolate Cake and it was delicious!! I mean, chocolate, coconut. . . hello?! Heaven! I topped it with a chocolate ganache just to make it even more chocolaty. Note: the recipe above is the same as the Betty Crocker recipe, so if you know Betty at all, you know it's a winner. Also, the pecan filling is not traditionally used on the sides of the cake. It's very goopy and hard to spread unless you let it cool in the fridge for a little while.

Graduation cake!

In June, I made a graduation cake for one of my students and her cousin. I had a hard time tracking down the plastic graduation caps cake toppers I've used in the past, so I figured out how to make it one (or rather, two!) out of fondant! I found some pictures online of other two-dimensional graduation caps, was able to draw it from the screen onto a piece of paper, cut it out, and then sort used it as my own homemade template and traced it onto the fondant. (I should probably mention here that I used white fondant, colored it with black food/icing color stuff, and just kneaded the color into it). I then cut the fondant out with a sharp knife and made it extra black and shiny by lightly rubbing some water on it with my finger. I also used a tiny bit of water on the back of it to stick it to the cake. I outlined the caps with yellow decorator's frosting and used a very steady hand (three tries for this one!) for the red tassel.

I used an ivory food/frosting color for the diploma, rolled it out, cut it in a rectangle, rolled it up, and tied it with a bow!

I'm baaaaaack (again!)

I love that we have this blog, Jenni (and Michelle. . . hello, Michelle? Are you out there?) and I really do need to get back into contributing to it. It's so much fun so I don't really know why I can't consistently keep up with it! Anyway, let's pick up from where I left off. . . post-Easter.

I made a super cute cake for a little friend of mine who was turning seven. It was my first time making people on a cake, and though I did "borrow" this idea from some pictures I found online, I'm still proud of it and I think it came out nicely! The party theme was a "sleepover party" though none of the kids actually slept over. . . the party was during the day and the kids were all six and seven years old, kind of young. I believe that they wore their pajamas to the party though!