stout chocolate cake

I've got a major case of the Tuesdays today. Summer's over compounded by my boy problems. The cure? Chocolate cake.

I don't like chocolate cake.
But I make the best chocolate cake.

My sister loves chocolate cake.

She loves it so much that she made me one on my birthday! From.a.box. Lucky for her, we don't pick sisters. And luckier for her, she's stuck with me! So on her birthday, I made her the best chocolate cake.

This recipe is based loosely on Nigella Lawson's Chocolate Guiness recipe (that looks like a Guiness!).

I used an Oatmeal Stout instead of Guiness, because I don't like Guiness because they filter the beer with fish scales (vom.com). I don't like fish in my cake. I don't like fish period.

For the cake, you will need:

1 cup Oatmeal Stout

2 sticks unsalted butter

6 ounces of good semisweet chocolate chips
2 tablespoons cocoa powder

2 cups flour

2 cups sugar

1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda

3/4 teaspoon salt

2 eggs

2/3 sour cream

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Spray your pan. Melt stout, butter and chocolate chips in a saucepan. Drink the rest of the stout so you don't go crazy while waiting for everything to melt. Whisk in cocoa powder. Let cool slightly.

In a large bowl, whisk together the dry ingredients. Beat the eggs and sour cream in another bowl. Beat the cooled beer/butter/chocolate mixture into egg thingy. Slowly add flour mixture and continue the beating! Pour batter into pan and bake for about 30 minutes.

For frosting, you will need:

1 brick of delicious cream cheese

1 1/2 cup powdered sugar

2/3 cup heavy cream, WHIPPED 

Whip heavy cream. I'm talking semi-stiff peaks people. In a separate bowl, beat cream cheese with beaters until smooth. Whip in powdered sugar to cream cheese. (Is it just me or does this cake take a real beating?! hahahaaaaa, yeah ok no.) Fold in whipped cream. Frost cake when cake is cooled because runny frosting is not cute.

This frosting is amazing. Light, cream cheese-y and not too sweet. We had a little extra and couldn't let it go to waste...

THE MOST IMPORTANT STEP. 

Refrigerate cake overnight (or at least a couple of hours). We've eaten this cake fresh, and while it tastes good as far as fresh baked cake goes, it's not as good as the brownie density you get after some intense refrigeration.

For actual birthday celebration, you will need:

As many candles you need to dot your i's.

Is it Wednesday yet?

carrot cake

i hate carrot cake.
maybe it's because I used to hate carrots. but now I love them (esp with peanut butter!!!!!)
but alas, my sister loves it. and it was her birthday (well last month it was!). and the birthday girl should always gets what she wants (even though she bought me a carrot cake on my birthday... i guess we weren't all meant to bake, but that's a different story).
So on July 30th, I made her a carrot cake from scratch. Like "hand-grated 3 cups worth of carrots"-scratch. And my arm was sore for a straight week! But ya'll, that's the secret. If you don't grate the carrots by hand, you don't get the finely grated carrot that melts into the batter with the nuts and the (golden) raisins, instead, you get those coarse cuts of carrots that stay stiff in the batter and do the opposite of melting in your mouth. and the last thing that I want to taste in my cake is a piece of raw carrot. Which is why this carrot cake worked for my taste buds. Maple cream cheese frosting didn't hurt either!

Recipe loosely based on this smitten kitchen recipe. And when I say loosely, I mean I made a rectangle cake and not cupcakes. :)

I forget if my pan took longer or shorter to cook but I used the trusty toothpick test and checked the cake incessantly after the 15-minute mark!

happy birthday christine!

HAPPY HAPPY BIRTHDAY CHRISTINE!!!!

do you have a sister?
mine pinches my cheeks and squishes my face when she adores me.
she also sits on me and strongly grabs my limbs leaving her fingerprints when she's mad.

we like to sing together. for example, she'll sing the rap part of Nicki Minaj's "Super Bass" and I'll sing the chorus.
(maybe we'll show you one day in a youtube video..!!)

so.. yes we have a weird yet unbreakable sisterly bond, to say the least.
she's moving up to NYC next month to pursue her cobbler aspirations.
canNOT.wait

<3

Conversation with my Sister

Picture: Post-Thanksgiving meal. Christine and I are sitting on the couch. We are feeling stuffed and "watching" my brother, uncle and dad watch football.

Me: is there a football game every Thanksgiving?

Sister: Jennifer, there is Sunday night football and Monday night football.

Me: it's Thursday.

Sister: oh, um....

cannot wait to visit Dallas for Christmas!!

photos from our 2009 white christmas