Ultimate Chocolate Cake

Friday was the birthday of both of my room mates, Carla and Helen. I am all about festivities, so I volunteered to make the cake.

Now, I will admit that I made the offer partially out of selfishness. I wanted to be able to eat cake too, which meant secretly making it vegan. Besides, I figured that they would be a game enough crowd to turn into my guinea pigs for a night.

If I hadn't told anyone, not a single soul would have suspected that this cake was not filled with butter and cream--that's how good it was. It was so fast, so easy, and so delicious. Incredibly chocolaty and very reminiscent of a moist brownie. Yum!

This recipe is from aliciak on Instructables.com.

First, combine 1 1/4 cups of flour, 1 cup of sugar, 1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder, 1 tsp baking powder, and 1/2 tsp salt in a baking dish (I used 7x9). Stir everything together with a fork.

Stir together dry ingredients.

Next, add to dry ingredients 1 cup of warm coffee, 1 tsp of vanilla extract, 1/3 cup of vegetable oil, and 1 tsp of distilled white or apple cider vinegar. This part is very important! If your vinegar isn't distilled and is diluted with water the cake will turn out to be a gooey brick. That would be a waste of perfectly good chocolaty awesomeness, so be careful. Mix everything thoroughly.

Cake batter after the wet ingredients are mixed in.

Next, bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes or until a knife comes out clean. Mine actually took only 25 minutes, so keep an eye on it and adjust for the size of the pan you are using. Let cool completely.

Fresh out of the oven.

Lastly, pour the icing mix on top (see recipe below). It will cool very, very quickly so spread it fast. Let cool one hour.

The icing is almost more like a ganache.

Finally, decorate and serve! I hope you enjoy this as much as we did--I think that every single one of us went for seconds!

So delicious!

For the frosting, combine 1/2 cup sugar, 4 tbsp margarine, 2 tbsp almond milk, and 2 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder in a small pot. Bring to a boil, turn down the heat, and then simmer for 2 minutes while stirring constantly. Remove from heat and stir for an addition 5 minutes. At this point the icing should go from gloopy and bubbly to smooth, silky, and glassy. Stir in 2 tsp of vanilla extract and ice cake immediately.

So shiny you can see your reflection in it...

I will be playing with this recipe for sure in the future. I made it exactly the way the instructions said this time, but I'd like to experiment with whole wheat flour, apple sauce, and some sort of unprocessed sugar. Stay tuned!

Black Mushroom Cantonese Stir-Fry

I had completely different ideas about what this dish would be like--it actually turned out to be like a vegetable chow mein. It reminded me of the blue can of La Choy chow mein my mom used to buy when we were kids.

Black Mushroom Cantonese Stir-Fry

Start off by sauteing for 5 minutes a container of sliced shikate mushrooms, half a yellow onion, 3 hot small dried red chili peppers, 3 cloves of garlic, a small can of bamboo shoots, and a handful of sugar snap peas. I couldn't find these peppers at Kroger and I didn't have time to run to the Asian market, so I got some different dried peppers. They were useless and imparted no flavor. Next time I'll add a some red pepper flakes instead, which will be less hassle anyways.

Sauteing veggies.

Next mix up 1 tablespoon of cornstarch and about a cup of water (I will probably use vegetable stock next time for extra flavor). Dump over the stir-fried vegetables and start adding soy sauce, probably around half a cup. While I usually use low-sodium only, this is one occasion where regular would be appropriate. Either that or season with salt. Don't forget pepper as well.

Once the sauce is added...

Serve over rice with scallions and sesame seeds, if desired, and season with extra soy sauce as is necessary. The key to this one is really the soy sauce, so don't be afraid to be liberal with it.

Enjoy!

Singapore Noodles

While picking up large rice noodles for the Hakka Noodles at Kroger, I noticed a package of really thin mei fun rice noodles. One of my favorite Chinese-American fast food dishes is Singapore Noodles, so I decided to hang the meal plan and make these for lunch one day.

Singapore Noodles

These noodles are incredibly simple to make. Soak some rice noodles in hot tap water for 10 minutes and then rinse with cold water and drain. In the meantime, saute some garlic, ginger, and and vegetables you'd like. I used snow peas, onion, and scallions. I bet carrots, sprouts, and cabbage would be wonderful as well. You will want a little bit of oil, just a tablespoon or two, one you put the noodles in just so that they don't stick. Fry the noodles for a minute or two, tossing with tongs throughout. Then start adding in soy sauce and curry powder. There really isn't any right amount--whatever looks (and more importantly tastes) right. Next time I may add a little bit of vegetable stock towards the end just to get a bit more moisture, but these noodles are supposed to be dry rather than saucy.

Kind of like Filipino pancit, this is the kind of dish that you can throw whatever leftovers you've got in the fridge in, including meat if you aren't following a vegan diet. Fast, easy, cheap, and incredibly flavorful. What else could you ask for?

Hakka Noodles

These noodles had the potential to be amazing, but they need a little bit of tinkering with first. I will be experimenting with this dish in the future for sure.

Hakka Noodles

This recipe had a ton of ingredients originally. I pared it down and decided to use just what I had on hand. I used:

• al dente fettuccine-size rice noodles
• crushed red pepper
• carrots
• napa cabbage
• onion
• garlic
• ginger
• snow peas
• bell pepper
• fresh cilantro

In a separate bowl mix up some ketchup, apple cider vinegar, and soy sauce. This is the part I've got to play with still. Too much ketchup makes the noodles way too rich and overpowering. Dump this on the stir-fried vegetables and mix them up and they are ready to eat.

I'll let you guys know what progress I make on these--they have a lot of potential.

Jamaican Stir-fry

What a crazy and wonderful dish. So many new flavors! I cannot wait to make this again.

Jamaican Stir-fry

The first step to this recipe is to get bell pepper, onion, garlic, ginger, plantain, and fresh jalapeno sauteing in a pan. The less brown the plantain is, the less sweet it is--which is a good thing for a savory stir-fry. The original recipe called for half of a habanero. That is not something that I would be able to handle or enjoy, so instead I used a quarter of a jalapeno and it was just right.

Once everything is browned, the recipe says to add fresh thyme, allspice, and curry powder. I have never felt like such an imbecile in the kitchen before--as I've got this stir-fry half finished cooking I realize that I forgot the curry powder and the allspice (which are basically the two main flavors in this dish). Instead I improvised and dumped some of basically every spice in my cupboard into the pan. I ended up using: cinnamon, nutmeg, ground clove, turmeric, cumin, chili powder, and coriander. I felt certain that I had ruined it beyond palatability, but the aroma coming off of it was actually quite nice...

The last step is to pour in some almond milk and stir so that you end up with a sort of curry sauce. After I plated it and sat down at the table, I probably stared at it for about 5 minutes (between the plantain and the circus of spices going on in there it didn't seem very approachable). Turns out that it was fantastic. I was dying to have more of that precious, wonderful sauce with every bite. The plantains were extremely odd though--it was a flavor and texture I've never had before, and it was a little bewildering. Next time I make this I am going to dice the plantain instead and use a lot more other vegetables with it. I'll probably double the amount of spices and almond milk too, because the resulting curry sauce was pretty much to die for. Yum!

Chipotle Black Bean Burger

This recipe has gotten pushed back several times, and so I decided today it was finally time to explore the vegan realm of burgers.

Chipotle Black Bean Burger

Unfortunately, this one didn't quite turn out so well. This was a little bit of a pain to make simply because there were a lot of odd ingredients and the beans had to be mashed and whatnot. Once I added the oatmeal and panko to the wet black bean mash, the dough had to set for a few minutes.

Black bean and bread crumb "dough".

After that I formed the dough into patties and dropped them in a hot pan to brown on both sides. The first burger immediately burnt and then I accidentally dropped it on the floor. No good. I was much more careful with the second burger, and it seemed to be perfectly seared. It even smelled amazing!

Frying the burger was harder than I thought it would be--it burnt quickly.
This is the second one I made; you can tell because it's not completely black.

The taste really wasn't too bad, but the texture was completely off. The outside was good, but the center was mush, kind of like the consistency of raw hamburger meat. I ate most of it, but only because I was hungry. I was thinking that maybe a sliced tomato on top would make it a little more palatable, but I found my tomato to be frozen completely solid in the back of the fridge. So much for that.

One thing that did turn out pretty good earlier today however was the roasted sweet potato with breakfast.

Roast Sweet Potato

Salt, pepper, and a tiny bit of Pam spray is all these babies needed. Well, that and maple syrup for dipping, of course. I'm thinking I'll have to do some savory garlic and herb ones next time for dinner or a snack. Yum!

Day 17

The menu for the day is:

Breakfast:
Berries and Rosemary Oatmeal (recipe)
Roasted, chopped sweet potatoes drizzled with maple syrup

Lunch:
Chipotle Black Bean Burger (recipe)
Chips and hummus

Dinner:
Jamaican Stir-Fry (recipe)
Bananas in Berry Artesia (recipe)

I'm feeling a little nervous about that stir-fry. We'll see how it goes!