Daily Archives: March 5, 2010

Chocolate Strawberry Ice Cream Cake

Chocolate strawberry ice cream loaf Last year the church youth group put on a banquet for the entire church – and had so much fun that they wanted to do it again.

This year we wanted to experiment a little with dessert – and came up with this strawberry chocolate delight.

You may recognize it as being very similar the Chocolate Ice Cream Cake I shared last summer. We just changed out the ice cream and modified the filling a bit.

(And yes – the modified filling was what we were experimenting with during the infamous Double Fail Brownie incident!)

It was a huge hit!

And it was so easy to assemble that high school boys did it! We made an assembly line in the church kitchen and things went pretty fast.

We did use three different brands of strawberry ice cream – since we were buying in bulk and none of our small town stores had enough of one kind.  It was interesting to note that each brand had a different pink coloring.  Blue Bunny was my personal favorite – both for coloring and flavoring!

Chocolate Strawberry Ice Cream Cake

1 bag (1 – 1/2 cups) crushed Oreo cookies
1/4 cup melted butter
6 cups strawberry ice cream (divided) – about one carton
3 ounces softened cream cheese
3/4 cup powdered sugar
4 ounces Cool Whip

Carefully line a bread pan with aluminum foil.

Mix together the crushed Oreo’s and melted butter.  Press half of the mixture into the bottom of the foil lined bread pan. Freeze for 15 minutes.

Open the carton of ice cream on the side and cut it in half with a sharp knife.

Cut one half of the ice cream into thirds and lay them side by side on top of the Oreo crust. smooth the top, filling in the cracks. Freeze until solid – about 1 hour. (Put the other half of ice cream back in the freezer.)

Whip the cream cheese and powdered sugar until it is creamy. Fold in the Cool Whip. Spread on top of the ice cream layer and freeze one hour.

Take the remaining half carton of ice cream and cut it into thirds and lay them side by side on top of the cream cheese layer. (This may look like it won’t fit – squeeze what you can in, and eat the rest with a spoon!) Freeze one hour.

Spread the remaining Oreo Cookie crumbs on the top and freeze.

To serve, flip the pan on to a serving platter and remove the pan.  Carefully pull back the foil and slice with a serrated knife into 8-10 slices.

Enjoy!


Homemade Lasagna

When I was growing up, a church potluck was not complete unless Miss Shirley brought a lasagna.

It was fabulous and disappeared quickly. As kids we would jockey for position in line to get a piece before it was gone.

Lasagna was a delicacy for us. It just didn’t ever show up on our table at home. We were Dutch – German and my dad was a meat and potatoes kind of guy.

When my oldest sister had a baby, one of her friends brought over a lasagna. She was kind enough to share the recipe and a family classic was born.

Soon after my husband and I were engaged, he leaned over at a family meal and whispered, “Do you think you could get your sister’s lasagna recipe?”

I’ve teased him ever since that he married me for the recipe! :)

Lasagna

1 pound hamburger
1 clove garlic, minced
1 Tablespoon basil
1-1/2 teaspoon salt
1 -lb can tomato sauce (2 cups)
2 – 6 oz. can tomato paste
10 oz. lasagna noodles (10 noodles)
3 cups cottage cheese (1 large container)
2 Tablespoons parsley flakes
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon pepper
1/2 cup Parmesan cheese
2 cups shredded mozzarella cheese

Brown meat slowly, drain. Add next garlic, basil, salt, tomato sauce and tomato paste. Simmer uncovered 30 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Cook noodles in a large amount of salted water, drain, rinse.

Combine cottage cheese, parsley flakes, Parmesan cheese, salt and pepper in a small bowl.

Place 1/3 noodles in greased 9 x 13 pan. Spread with 1/3 cottage cheese filling, add 1/3 mozzarella cheese and 1/3 meat sauce. Repeat layers.

Bake 375 degrees for 30 minutes.

This can be made ahead and refrigerated or frozen. Just thaw before baking and allow at least 15 minutes more to the baking time.

Enjoy!

I’ve linked this post up with Design by Gullum’s Foodie Friday