Cookies and Cream Ice Cream

Mmmm.... the first ice cream of the summer, and it's homemade!

I modified this recipe from the one that came with my ice cream machine. Strangely enough the one that came with the machine made too much batter to actually fit in the bowl... so I've modified it so it doesn't overflow the mixer anymore.

Start with the base, which is an amazing Vanilla Ice Cream

2 cups half and half (creamo, light cream, whatever you want to call it)
6 eggs yolks
1 cup sugar
2 cups whipping cream
4 tsp vanilla

Then add
1 1/2 cups add ins... for this recipe I used crushed Oreos and made Cookies and Cream

Heat half and half over medium heat in a mid-sized saucepan until it is very hot, but not boiling. Meanwhile in another bowl, whip together egg yolks and sugar until well blended, and slightly thickened. Pour in the heated half and half and mix until well blended.

Return mixture to the saucepan and heat until it is steaming and small bubbles form around the edges but not boiling. Stir constantly as it heats.

Pour into a bowl (with a spout), then stir in whipping cream and vanilla. (Use really good vanilla if you can, I use my favourite stuff from Mexico). When the mixture is well blended chill for at least 8 hours.

Then follow the instructions on your ice cream maker to finish!

UCM Grad Cake #2

Last year I made a grad cake for my friends at my church group. This year, I insisted on making the grad cake again, even though I was one of the grads and so I wasn't supposed to do any work for the grad party. I had fun making this cake, even though life was insane and I didn't really have time to do it. But two of my friends came over and we worked on it together and had a lot of fun.

Birthday Cake for the World

This was a cake I made this past weekend for a huge birthday party celebrating anyone from our church group who had a birthday in February, March or August. So I decided to make a cake trying to incorporate all of the inside jokes from our group of friends.
My mother saw the final product and commented "that cake looks a little schizophrenic".
I had a lot of fun with this cake, because of the variety of stuff to put on it, all the laughter about all the jokes that went into it, and because for the first time, I had someone else working on the cake with me!
Also, I think this is the best cake reaction I've ever had, considering everyone spent about 10 minutes discussing the cake, and trying to pick out which piece related to them the most.

One of the challenges with this cake was all the colours we used to make it. And running out of icing tips and icing couplers.
Also, some stuff was too complicated and really hard to illustrate. Like the "Be A Man" song from Mulan.
Overall, though I think this was probably my favourite cake to decorate. :)

Valentines Chocolate Cheesecake

So, I finally found a heart shaped springform pan, so I made a chocolate cheesecake for my family for Valentines.

Chocolate Fudge Cheesecake

Crust:
1 1/2 cups vanilla wafer crumbs
1/2 cup icing sugar
1/2 cup cocoa powder
1/3 cup butter

Cheesecake:
2 cups chocolate chips
3 bricks (250 g) cream cheese
1 can sweetened condensed milk
4 eggs
2 tsp vanilla

Preheat oven to 300. Mix together crust ingredients and press into a springform pan. Melt chocolate in double boiler or microwave (I find microwave is easier and works just fine with chocolate chips). Beat cream cheese until light and fluffy. Add in sweetened condensed milk and beat in until smooth. Add in chocolate, eggs and vanilla and beat until well blended. Pour into pan and bake for 55 minutes.

Shamu Cake

This is a cake I made for a friend's birthday the other day. She's one of those people I just love making cakes for because there are so many ideas for her, and also because of how much she loves whatever design I decide on. Last year, I made her a Jedi-Mickey Mouse cake. This year I considered going Disney again, but then I decided to go for Shamu instead. She has a Shamu lunchbox, and so I decided to base the design off of that.

I had another friend secretly take a picture of her lunchbox, so I was able to try and copy it.
Isn't he a happy Shamu?

Starbucks Cake

This was probably one of my favourite cakes to make. It was a fairly basic buttercream transfer, that just turned out really well. Plus I had the great fun of surprising the friend I made it for. :)

Gingerbread AT-AT

This year, I decided to go a little non-traditional with my gingerbread creation, so instead of a house, or a barn, or a church, I bring you a gingerbread AT-AT.

This idea was first posted on my Facebook wall a few weeks before Christmas, with a picture of an AT-AT made by a professional bakery in the States. I decided that this would be a fun challenge to try and make my own.

We started with my brother designing a pattern for all of the pieces and then I baked them in gingerbread and laid them all out.

Then we started building.
We had some difficulties when the head didn't want to stay on to the body. There was originally a neck as well, but we got rid of that when we realized it wouldn't hold the weight of the head.
I was very nervous when we balanced the body on the legs, but it was surprisingly stable.

Then we started decorating.We added lights along the sides of our Christmas AT-AT.Also plenty of pretzel cannons and a viewscreen.
And also, we have a snowspeeder, crashed with its tow rope around the AT-AT's legs.
We also have the rebel defense army.

And then we have a warning triangle on the back...

Merry Christmas from Hoth!

My gingerbread and icing recipes can be found with last year's gingerbread blog post.