Birthday Cake Fun

I wanted to do something different for Adam’s birthday cake this year but was really struggling to come up with some ideas.  Last year he asked for a white cake with buttercream frosting which is easy enough but it just seemed too boring.

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I remembered some bright colored cakes in a jar that I saw on Pinterest and thought … hmmm… I wonder if I could do that with a regular cake so I searched for some inspiration online.   I found a few recipes and then got started!

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This was super easy cake to make.  Just a few steps…

1.) Identify the birthday boy’s (or, girl’s) favorite colors.

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2.) Make your standard white cake batter (use a box or make from scratch… your choice).

3.) Separate the cake mix into bowls (one bowl for each color).  I wanted 6 colors so I used six bowls.  Try to put an equal amount of cake batter into each bowl.

4.) Add your food coloring.  Using gel coloring will make the cake colors more vibrant.  You might also check your colors to see if they’ll produce the desired results.  I wish that my red had been more of a fire engine red instead of a pale red.  Oh well!

 

5.) Pour one color at a time into a greased cake pan.   Make sure that the bottom / base color is spread throughout the entire pan.  The next color should go in a circle on the top and will actually push your bottom color out a bit.

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After pouring three colors into the pan, your batter should looking something like this.

 

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I decided to put three colors in each pan.  012

6.) Bake the cake as you normally would.  I baked mine at 350 degrees for just about 300 minutes.

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I really loved how bright the colors were when it came out of the oven…

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7.) Let it cool and then frost in whatever manner you would like.  Because this is actually a white/vanilla cake you could use any frosting that you think would taste great with that flavor.

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This cake was so much fun to make and I just wish that I had pictures of Adam’s face as he cut into it and realized that it wasn’t just another plain old cake.

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The colors actually were much brighter than they appear in these pictures … this is the perfect cake to have fun with!

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And, it tasted pretty good too! It didn’t take too long to get to a point where there was only this much left!

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Sautéed Eggplant & Cherry Tomatoes

I think the pollen is really starting to get to me.  My eyes were red, itchy and watery all day yesterday.  I ended up leaving work a few minutes early because I was so uncomfortable and needed to get my contacts OUT.

The first order of business after removing my contacts was watering the grass seed that we put down over the weekend.  It is SO dry out we are trying to water at least 2-3 times a day.  Typically I think we are close to over watering but this year – wow I really hope it rains soon!

After I finished the watering, I went inside to get dinner started.  We decided to have sautéed eggplant and cherry tomatoes on noodles.  I quickly cut up an egg plant, sliced the cherry tomatoes in half and diced a few cloves of garlic to be sautéed.  This had to be the simplest meal ever – literally – 4 ingredients!  I started cooking about 10 minutes before Adam was due home.

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I have really been into the colors of my food recently.  I don’t know what it is but I loved the red of the tomatoes against the eggplant.
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The eggplant and tomatoes were then served over a large volume of noodles because we were both starving.

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We had intended upon splitting this into 2 nights worth of meals… but ended up eating the whole thing last night!  Guess I am going to have to make a few modifications to our meals for the week.

For anyone interested, the recipe is below.

Ingredients:

- Olive oil (1-2 tablespoons)

- 1 Eggplant cut into bite size chunks

- 1 pint of cherry tomatoes halved

- 3 cloves of garlic minced

- Noodles (4-5 servings depending upon your taste)

The cooking of the eggplant and tomatoes takes about 15 minutes so time your noodles accordingly.

Sauté the eggplant in the olive oil until brown.  After the eggplant is brown (about 8-10 minutes), add in the cherry tomatoes and garlic and cook for another 3- 5 minutes.

That is it.  You can add parmesan or romano cheese, if you like but I didn’t find it necessary as I preferred the flavors of the eggplant and tomato.  This recipe is a definite keeper for us.  So simple yet really good and healthy!

 

Leftovers and The First Step

Wow – I seriously just love this quinoa chili.  Last night was leftover night and we finished up the chili.

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I am definitely going to need to make this again soon.  I absolutely love how many veggies are packed into this one bowl!

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A few people are asked for the recipe that we actually used as I did make a few modifications so here you go:

 

2 red peppers

2 banana peppers (any chili pepper will do)

1 jalapeno

1 green pepper

3 zucchini

2 medium onions

4 garlic cloves

Cooking spray

1 tablespoon chili powder

1 teaspoon ground cumin

1/2 cup water

1/3 cup of uncooked quinoa

1/4 teaspoon salt

14.5 ounce can of diced tomatoes (spicy, if you can find it)

15 ounce can of kidney beans

1 cup of V8 juice (low sodium and spicy, if you can find it)

 

To prepare:

1. Chop the red peppers, banana pepper, jalapeno, and green pepper.  Set them to the side.

2. Chop the onion and zucchini and mince your 4 cloves of garlic.  Add all of this to a pan and sauté then for a few minutes.  I just used cooking on the pan rather than sautéing in oil, but use what you feel most comfortable with.

3. In a dutch oven, add all of the above ingredients (onion, zucchini, garlic, peppers, and chilis).  Add in your spices, the water, quinoa, salt, diced tomatoes, kidney beans, and juice.  Let all of this come to a boil and then simmer until the quinoa becomes tender.  We let ours simmer for about 40 minutes.

That is literally it!  How much simpler could it get???

Moving on… I ended up doing pretty well last night.  I definitely went to bed a bit late; however, I didn’t end up munching away on anything.  I was on the phone and working on some projects.  I guess part of the key is to keep myself busy!  As a result of a good night sleep, I was able to get a good workout in this morning and I am feeling much much better today!

Yesterday was my first step towards breaking the crazy rut that I’ve been in, I am going to continue focusing on this so that I can officially break the rut and feel better everyday!

Today’s workout was 90 minutes of cardio followed by 30 minutes of strength training and a sprint up the stairs to get dressed for work!  I was pretty pleased that I was able to keep my heart rate up for so much of the workout. Yay!

April 6 workout

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