Well, I think I've sufficiently celebrated turing 25! The least healthy thing I had before the weekend commenced was this simple but delicious salad along with a side of spicy guacamole on Friday night when I met my friend Susan for dinner.
The rest of the weekend was filled with pizza, wine and cake!
For the cake I made a carmel cake following a recipe I found from Martha Stewart. Huge lesson learned during this baking experience, read the comment section. The recipe for the carmel sauce was poorly written and I was only suppose to use 1 cup of water not 2. As a result my first batch was too thin and I had to give it a second go.
Also, the cake itself was a bit small to me so I doubled that batch...again you have to do the same for the icing recipe. The frosting is pretty sweet but goes well with the light cake. It was made even better by my use of a fresh vanilla bean...after using the bean I might not be able to return to vanilla extract!
Finished cake :)
The cake was for my birthday dinner which my friend Ryan was kind of enough to throw.
The menu was middle eastern inspired and was so yummy that I forgot to snap photos until after we ate but included a risotto made with Israeli couscous, a quinoa vegetable salad, and homemade hummus. 
Dessert, another look at my carmel cake:
I also picked up a chocolate angel food cake for a lighter alternative:
With homemade whipped cream for a topping:
Whipped cream brought to you by Matt!
Ciao-Nicole
please send some of the carmel cake to Birmingham. yum. :)
ReplyDeleteagree. happy belated 25th -- glad you had good friends and food to celebrate with!!
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