Breaking the Silence

WOW that was a long time of no communication, and for that, I really must apologize. I can only speak for myself here, I totally  got absorbed in the craziness of last semester, and then decided to be lazy during Christmas break. And then continued being lazy about the blog, so I’m really sorry. That’s the last time I will apologize, however, because my next story will make you wonder how I got this far in school, let alone in making desserts. I’m breaking the silence with a K-Shaming post.

In my internship, my unit was responsible for hosting a potluck this month and I chose to do dessert! Mainly because I force myself to do something from scratch, desserts are easier than making lasagna (my other option), and- honestly?- I thought I might be able to convince my hubby to make it for me. No go on that last one though, so I asked for suggestions  and chose Famous Wafer Dessert. It’s so delightfully delicious, as well as low in ingredients so it was a perfect solution.

Here’s the recipe quick, so you can understand my mistake later:

Famous Wafer Dessert:

-Two boxes Famous Wafers (a chocolatey wafer)

-One Quart of Heavy Whipping Cream

– Your choice of fruit as a garnish (I recommend berries of any kind, blueberries, strawberries, raspberries)

That’s it.

Whip the heavy cream in the blender until it turns to whipped cream, and then one by one using a knife, gently spread about a quarter inch of the whip on the wafers.  Put them together on a platter so they are standing up, perpendicular to the platter. The way I prefer to do it is in a circular shape around the edge of a round plate, and then I serve the fruit in the middle of the dessert. Don’t use all the whipped cream for this! Once you’ve got all the cookies ‘glued’ together by the whipped cream, use what’s left to do a final coat all over the wafers, completely covering them. Once you’ve done this, cover it with Saran Wrap (use toothpicks to hold up the Saran Wrap and protect the frosting) and let it set in the fridge for a minimum of two hours, adding the fruit right before you serve it. The way it works is the hard wafer absorbs some of the moisture in the whipped cream and expands into a cake-like texture by the time it’s ready to serve, and just melts in your mouth. It’s light, fresh, and a huuuuuge crowd pleaser.

My problem happened when I realized I had no toothpicks to stick in the cake to keep the saran wrap off the whipped cream- I searched high and low and found none, even though I swear we had a whole jar in the cabinet. Since I was sure I had some somewhere, I decided not to go to the store because, well, that’s just silly! I knew I’d find them as soon as I get home from the store anyways, so I decided to use uncooked spaghetti instead. Genius! Who needs toothpicks when you have uncooked spaghetti? Perfect. Let’s do that.

In the morning, when I got up (late, I might add), I went to put my dessert in the car only to discover that the moisture in the cake had also done its work on the spaghetti. Every piece was totally limp and the saran wrap was resting nicely over every inch of my gorgeous cake.

Curtis got a kick out of my muttering while I started yanking out the spaghetti thinking I’d just have to re-frost the top of the cake before serving. But that was before the spaghetti broke apart in my hands, leaving pieces of noodle in the stupid cake. By this point, I was hyperventilating with frustration, and started cutting the cake into slices to try and neatly dig out each individual noodle left in it.

After ten minutes, I was pretty sure I had it spaghetti-free, but it was no longer my pretty masterpiece….nevertheless I brought it to the potluck, and decided to be grateful that it was an Italian themed potluck. That way, if anyone found spaghetti in their dessert they’d assume that it somehow found its way from another plate, not that the baker had spent twenty minutes playing ‘Operation’ that morning.
And…….everyone loved it! Thank goodness. It was not the relaxing potluck I thought it would be, as I was peering at everyone’s plate hoping to not see a noodle sticking out.
Success….?
Maybe, maybe not. But I bought some toothpicks and started blogging again, so maybe it wasn’t all bad 🙂
-K

Walking!

I’m a winter person. In general, I do not like summer- I prefer being cold to the oppressive heat of the Central Valley. However, I must admit that once summer gets here, it’s never as bad as I make it out to be. Curtis and I have been walking at night once it’s cooled down, which I must say we never do in the winter. It is nice too, to have some time away from TV, internet, laundry, and cleaning to chitchat about our day and relax. It was lovely.

Before our walk I made dinner. This morning before work I had halfway planned ahead by letting some ground beef thaw for spaghetti and assumed I’d have the rest of the necessary items the recipe requires. I get to the point where the ground beef is browned and ready only to realize that not only do I not have spaghetti sauce, but I also do not have spaghetti noodles. Awesome.

Then Curtis saves the day and gives up his boxed Velveeta Mac n’ Cheese noodles. My hero! The sauce problem I solved by finding deep in the back corner of my pantry a can of seasoned diced tomatoes. So I threw that in with the meat, along with some garlic, onions, dried basil, oregano, salt, pepper, and a teensy bit of whine I mean WINE….and voila! It smelled like pizza. Tasted pretty good too!

It really did smell like pizza…

So after this somewhat heavy meal Curtis reminded me that I had wanted to go for a walk (bless him, I know he was tired) and he pulled me out the door. 🙂 Cuz I was all ready for a bowl of ice cream (is it still National Dairy Month?) and some Restaurant Impossible. Hehe, I am so easily distracted, I’m telling you. And distracted may not be the correct word…more along the lines of ‘ready to just relax.’

🙂

-K