Saturday Night Cooking w/ 1hundo

Hello everyone! So I guess 1hundo and I have gotten into a little routine of cooking dinner together on Saturday nights when he's off work... Here's a little shot of the finished product from this past weekend! I have to admit, this week, Patrick did most of the cooking, and whipped up some mean burgers. I could barely fit those bad boys in my mouth! Makin' me proud, that boy is.

For the wonderfully written up recipe (yes, he even did that too this week), and beautiful shots of our meal (as always), check out:

http://1hundo.ca

I am such a lucky girl!

xoxo

Mariel

My Favorite Chocolate Cake

Hello everyone! It's time that I share with you all the most incredible chocolate cake recipe that you've ever tasted...

It's no surprise that one of my favorite cake recipes of all time comes from one of my favorite culinary ladies of all time - Ina Garten! This recipe, my friends, is one of those tried and true-keep for your entire life-everyone asks for it everytime you make it recipes. 

This particular cake was made for no real "special" occasion, but it had been long over-due since it was made last. The making of this delicious piece of chocolate heaven actually came about because Patrick needed something to shoot for his photography class, hence the gorgeous pictures we all get to gawk at to go along with this gorgeous recipe. Thanks Patrick! Your pictures are always, always welcome on this blog...

Anyways, I guess I better give you the recipe after all that hype, hey?

Beatty's Chocolate Cake

Recipe from Ina Garten's Barefoot Contessa at Home

butter for greasing the pans
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for the pans
2 cups sugar
3/4 cup good cocoa powder
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1 cup buttermilk, shaken
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 extra-large eggs, at room temp
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 cup freshly brewed hot coffee

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
Butter two 8 inch round cake pans.
Line with parchment paper, then butter, and then flour the pans.
Sift the flour, sugar, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder, and salt into the bowl of an eletric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment and mix on low speed until combined.
In another bowl, combine the butter milk, oil, eggs, and vanilla.
With the mixer on low speed, slowly add the wet ingredients to the dry.
With the mixer still on low, add the coffee and stir just to combine, scraping the bottom of the bowl with a rubber spatula.
Pour the batter into the prepared pans and bake for 35-40 minutes, until toothpick comes out clean. 

Cool in the pans for 30 minutes, then turn them out onto a cooling rack and cool completely.
Place one layer, flat side up on a flat plate or cake pedestal.
With a knife or offset spatula, spread the top with frosting.
Place the second layer on top, rounded side up, and spread the frosting evenly on the top and sides of the cake.

Chocolate Frosting

Recipe from Ina Garten's Barefoot Contessa at Home

6 ounces good semisweet chocolate
1/2 pound unsalted butter, at room temp
1 extra large egg yolk, at room temp
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 1/4 cup sifted confectioners sugar
1 tablespoon instant coffee powder

Chop the chocolate and place it in a heat proof bowl set over a pan of simmering water. 

Stir until just melted and set aside until cooled to room temp.
In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with paddle attachment, beat the butter on medium high speed until light yellow and fluffy, about 3 minutes. 

Add the egg yolk and vanilla and continue beating for 3 minutes. 

Turn the mixer to low speed, gradually add the confectioners sugar, then beat at medium speed, scraping the bowl as neccesary, until smooth and creamy. 

Dissolve the coffee powder in 2 tablespoons of the hottest tap water. 

On low speed, add the chocolate and coffee to the butter mixture and mix until blended. 

Don't whip! 

Spread immediately onto cooled cake.

And there you go! If you're worried about the copious amounts of coffee in this cake - don't worry! You can barely taste it, and the coffee is just in there to enhance the flavor of the chocolate and make the cake really moist. And boy does it ever...

The cake - and the photos - turned out beautiful!

Thanks to the master photographer and wonderful helper.

Patrick has a bunch more photos of the baking extravaganza on his blog - 1hundo. - so definitely check those out! I hope you all enjoy this cake as much as we did (and always do)!

xoxo

Mariel

Jerk Chicken n' Red Stripe

Hello loves! Okay, okay...so I've also realized that I've kind of been on a chicken kick lately...but everything chicken I've eaten has just been so good! Last night I (finally) headed out to the Monthly Reggae Night at Redstar with Patrick (who I stole these photo's from...it was so dark in there I'm sure my camera wouldn't have sufficed)! 

I have been dying to try the jerk chicken, rice and peas (the "peas" are actually beans) and cornbread (I have a major weakness for cornbread) for ages (and of course sip on the red stripe specials), but since this event falls on the first wednesday of every month, something school-wise always came up!

But I finally have gone, and am pleased to tell you - the food was everything I dreamed it would be. The chicken was the perfect heat (spicy, but not burn-your-mouth-off spicy), and so moist and juicy, the rice and peas were delicious and homey and the corn bread was perfect. The red stripe's were icy cold and the people there - incredible! I have a feeling this won't be my last journey out to Redstar for these nights...

xoxo

Mariel

Mariel's Noms X 1hundo

Hello everyone! So here is that good Noms X 1hundo collaboration post that I promised to make up for the lacking past couple of posts! Friday night Patrick and I whipped up a little dinner, and he of course took the pictures! Here's the results:

We ended up making a beautiful, simple pasta bursting with fresh flavour. It turned out soo yummy.

We started off by making our own meat balls, we kind of just threw the ingredients all together, but I'll give you the approximate amounts of everything we used.

1 pound ground beef

1 egg

1/2 cup bread crumbs

1 tablespoon garlic powder

1 tablespoon dried oregano

2 teaspoons italian seasoning

salt and pepper

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Mix all the ingredients together (yes, use your hands)

Form into whatever sized balls you'd like!

Bake until brown and cut with a fork to check the insides!

Super easy.

They turned out pretty tasty, too!

After the meatballs were all formed up and in the oven we started on the sauce and boiling up the water for the pasta. We started with the basics, cuttin' up half an onion and chopping up two cloves of garlic.

Patrick practically deep fried the garlic in olive oil before caramelizing the onions, which was bizarre, but absolutely delish...

Then we tossed a whole can of whole San Marzano tomatoes and their juice into the mix and broke those puppies down with a wooden spoon, and let em' stew for a bit.

Later on, Patrick added a bit of tomato paste to thicken up the sauce, and a hefty dose of salt and pep.

Then towards the end of this sauce's stay in the saucepan, we threw in a good handful chopped fresh basil, frozen peas (we tried to do the whole fresh pea thing, but upon opening up the sugar snap peas we realized there really weren't any peas inside...) and the meatballs.

We used a bizarre little pasta. I'm not quite sure what it was called...but it cooked up super quick and was done in about five minutes!

When the pasta was cooked, we loaded up our bowls and spooned the sauce and meatballs over top, finishing them off with a bit more peppery, delicious basil.

So there you go! A tasty, quick little pasta recipe that is great when you are starving, AND great on the wallet too...

I found myself staring at the cutest little thing (Molly) all dinner! She wanted some pasta too...

Love her!

Such gorgeous pictures of a gorgeous little meal! I am thinking that you should be able to look forward to more collaboration posts in the future! I sure hope that there are more...I love these pictures!

xoxo

Mariel