Peanut Butter Cup Ice Cream Cake

August 2, 2011

Peanut Butter CakeEvery year before Dagmar’s birthday – she pours over cookbooks and websites to find the perfect ice cream cake.

Her only requirements are chocolate and of course – peanut butter.

This year’s concoction was no exception.

It was a veritable feast of peanut butter – chocolate goodness with creamy peanut butter ice cream and crushed up peanut butter cups.

Warning – this is NOT low calorie. Sure is good though!

Peanut Butter Cup Ice Cream Cake

Original recipe from Kittencal

1 quart chocolate ice cream
16 ounces peanut butter
6 Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, chopped and frozen
2/3 cup chopped salted peanuts

Crust

1-1/2 cups Oreo cookie crumbs
1/4 cup sugar
6 tablespoons melted butter

Combine all the crust ingredients in a a bowl and then press into the bottom of a 9 inch springform pan. Bake at 375 degrees for 8-10 minutes. Cool. Put in the freezer until ready to fill.

in a large bowl combine the softened ice cream with peanut butter until well combined. Then mix in 4 of the chopped peanut butter cups and 1/3 cup of chopped peanuts. Spread in the frozen crust.

Sprinkle with the remaining peanut butter cups and chopped peanuts.

Freeze until firm.

Enjoy!

This post linked up with Tempt my Tummy Tuesday at Blessed with Grace and Tasty Tuesday at Balancing Beauty and Bedlam.

By Country Gal | Posted in Cakes, Chocolate, Desserts | Tagged , , | Comments (4)

Chocolate Chip Cheesecake

June 25, 2010

chocolate chip cheesecake It’s birthday season again.

Angel Girl begins our round of summer birthdays. It’s been a year of changes for her.

I’m not sure when exactly it happened, but I slowly realized that she never played with the Polly Pockets anymore – and the doll house was sitting idle.

I knew she was growing up when she asked for a cheesecake instead of the traditional birthday cake.

No worries – we all love cheesecake. But there was still a hint of sadness that my little girl is growing up.

No more castle cakes, or flower cakes, or Candy Land cakes (my personal favorite!).

She’s  slowly moving into the world of adults.

She picked a chocolate chip cheesecake, and I used two different recipes to create this one.  Since I didn’t have any vanilla wafers, I substitutes graham crackers crumbs in the crust. It tasted great – and since we all know that the crust is just the conduit to hold the cream cheese filling together to get it to your mouth – it was perfect! :)
Chocolate Chip Cheesecake

2 cups vanilla wafer crumbs
1/2 cup finely chopped walnuts
1/4 cup sugar
3 Tablespoons baking cocoa
1/3 cup butter or margarine, melted

Filling:

3 packages (8 oz. each) cream cheese, softened
1 cup sugar
2 tablespoons flour
3 eggs
2 tablespoons heavy whipping cream
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1-1/2 cups miniature semisweet chocolate  chips

In a bowl, combine the first five ingredients; stir in butter. Press onto the bottom and 1 inch up the sides of a 9-in. springform pan. Refrigerate for 15 minutes.

In a mixing bowl, beat cream cheese until smooth. Combine sugar and flour; beat into cream cheese.

Add eggs; beat on low speed just until combined. Add the cream, vanilla and chocolate chips.

Pour into prepared crust. Place pan on a baking sheet. Bake at 350 degrees for 60-65 minutes. Carefully run a knife around edge of pan to loosen; cool 1 hour longer. (Cheesecake top may crack.)

Refrigerate overnight. Remove sides of pan. Garnish the cheesecake with mini chocolate chips. Refrigerate leftovers. Yield: 12-14 servings.

Enjoy!

I’ve linked this post up with Lisa over at Stop and Smell the Chocolates and at Foodie Friday at Designs by Gollum.

By Country Gal | Posted in Chocolate, Cooking and Food, Desserts | Tagged , , | Comments (3)

Chocolate Fudge Birthday Cake

December 1, 2009

Feathery Chocolate Fudge CakeI can’t believe it is Buddy’s 9th birthday already! When did my baby turn nine? It seems like yesterday I was watching him take his first steps and now he’s reading Redwall books, writing in cursive and begging to drive the 4 wheeler by himself.

At least he is still young enough to enjoy a traditional birthday cake – chocolate cake with Cool Whip frosting and decorated with M & M’s and his own Lego creations.

This year I tried a new chocolate cake recipe – Feathery Chocolate Fudge Cake – from the Better Homes and Garden Cookbook.

Although it had great flavor, it didn’t quite live up to it’s “feathery” name. It seemed a little dense and heavy to me – but Buddy didn’t seem to mind – he loved it as did the rest of the birthday party guests!

Feathery Fudge Cake

2/3 cup soft butter of margarine
1 3/4 cup sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 1/2 1-ounce squares unsweetened chocolate (melted and cooled)
2 1/2 cups sifted cake flour
1 1/4 teaspoons soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 1/4 cup cold water

Cream together butter, sugar, eggs, and vanilla till fluffy (beat 5 minutes at high speed on mixer, scraping bowl occasionally to guide batter into beaters, or beat 5 minutes by hand).

Blend in chocolate.

Sift flour with soda, and salt; add to creamed mixture alternately with cold water; beat after each addition.

Bake in 2 paper-lined  9 X1-1/2 inch round pans in moderate oven (350 degrees) 30 to 35 minutes or till done. (We used a 9 x 13 pan, would have made a difference in the texture of the cake.)

Cool on wire rack for 10 minutes. Remove from pans and cool completely. Frost with your favorite frosting. (I use extra creamy Cool Whip – it’s fast, easy, and no-fail!)

Enjoy!

By Country Gal | Posted in Cakes, Chocolate, Cooking and Food, Memories | Tagged , , , | Comments (0)

Dagmar’s Ice Cream Birthday Cake

August 20, 2009

Ice Cream Cake Having four summer birthdays  has forced me to be creative when it comes to birthday cakes.

All year I’m on the look-out for amazing – but easy – ice cream cake recipes. My criteria is simply – something I don’t have to bake but the kids will love.

Pedro has been quite happy with his ice cream sandwich cake for several years now – but Dagmar has yet to find the perfect cake.

This year I discovered a recipe I had torn out of an old issue of Family Circle magazine. I don’t even know the year or the month of the issue!

Using ice cream sandwiches cut and stacked around the edge and filled with ice cream, the recipe was fancy enough to be pretty, but super easy!  Dagmar loved it!

Layered Ice Cream Cake

15 oreo cookies
1 tablespoon milk
8-9 ice cream sandwiches
3 pints ice cream (we used all chocolate mint – but you could do layers of whatever flavors you wish – such as vanilla and strawberry)
1 – 8 ounce container of Cool Whip

Spray the bottom and sides of a 9 inch springform pan with cooking spray and line the edges with waxed paper.

Finely crush 12 of the Oreo cookies ina food processor. Add the milk and pulse again. Set aside.

Unwrap the ice cream sandwiches and cut into quarters. Stack strips of sandwiches on end around the edge of the springform pan.  (It is helpful to have someone helping you on this step – the ice cream gets soft fast. I unwrapped and Dagmar cut and placed.) This creates the cool strips around the edge of the cake!

Spoon the cookie crumbs into the bottom of the pan and press firmly over the bottom. Freeze on hour.

Remove the ice cream from the freezer and let it soften for 15 minutes. Carefully spread the ice cream in the crust – using layers if you choose. We just filled the crust with chocolate mint ice cream.

Frost the entire cake with thawed Cool Whip

The recipe called for crushing the remaining 3 Oreos and sprinkling them on top of the Cool Whip – but we wanted more of topping, so we crushed the remaining 3 Oreos with a large Butterfinger bar and sprinkled it over the top.

Return to the freezer – overnight if possible.

Before serving, carefully remove the side of the pan and pull off the waxed paper. Cut into wedges to serve.

Then just sit back and bask in the compliments!

Enjoy!

By Country Gal | Posted in Cakes, Chocolate, Cooking and Food | Tagged , , , | Comments off

Birthday on a Budget Part 2

July 16, 2008

birthday cakeTraditions.

When you need to do birthdays on a budget, especially multiple birthdays, the secret is to start some inexpensive traditions.

Remember that the object here is to honor the birthday child, have fun and make some memories!

Take the birthday cake for example. you really don’t need to visit the bakery and spend a lot of money on a beautifully decorated cake. Be creative!

My oldest sister always made a chocolate cake (from a box) and cut it into the first letter of the birthday child’s name. Then she frosted it with chocolate frosting (from a can) and decorated it with a bag of M & M’s. Cheap, child friendly, and a memory that her kids will remember for a long time.

When they were younger my children wanted special cakes, like a forest fire cake, a butterfly cake or a race track cake. I found the easiest thing to do was to bake a 9 x 13 cake and frost it. This creates your canvas. Then we used plastic toys, legos, duplos, matchbox cars, etc… with M & M’s, colored sugar, sprinkles, and marshmallows to create a masterpiece.

The best part was that we created it together. We didn’t just make a cake, we made a memory! And…since the birthday child helped, they thought it was the most amazing cake ever!

Remember that creating memories doesn’t have to mean spending lots of money!

By Country Gal | Posted in Holidays | Tagged , , | Comments (0)