The Best Ice Cream Cake You’ve Ever Had

What’s the best part of an ice cream cake? If you ask a bunch of people many of them would say that they like those chocolate crunchies that come in the middle of the cake. But there are so few chocolate crunchies in a normal ice cream cake. Enter the best ice cream cake ever!

This is a cake that my family has made as long as I can remember. We make it for almost every birthday… no matter whether it’s aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents… everyone gets this cake because they love it!

Ingredients

-3 flavors of ice cream (usually a vanilla-base, chocolate-base, and strawberry, but you can use whatever you want… I used cookie dough, chocolate, and strawberry), softened

-3/4 cup butter, melted

-3 boxes Famous Chocolate Wafers

-1 container chocolate sprinkles

While the ice cream softens, melt the butter.

Using a food processor, pulse the cookies into a coarse powder.

Mix the cookie powder into the butter.

You get an almost doughy consistency. Grease a spring form pan with an angel food cake center. Press the cookie mixture into the bottom and outsides of the pan (but not the inside sides). Make sure not to make the corners too thick… unless you want to have a really thick crust. Don’t use all the cookies… leave about 2-3 cups for in between the ice cream layers.

Then spoon the first type of ice cream into the pan. I use the vanilla-based ice cream (cookie dough) first.

Make sure it is level and goes all the way to the sides of the pan. Cover with some of the cookie mixture and 1/3 of the sprinkles.

Then layer on the next type of ice cream. I like to use strawberry for the center layer because it provides a nice break between the chocolate and vanilla layers (and looks pretty when you cut it).

Top with more cookie mixture and another third of the sprinkles. Finish up the ice cream layers with the chocolate ice cream.

Cover the chocolate layer with the rest of the cookies and sprinkles.

This is actually the bottom of the cake. Put the cake in the freezer to allow the ice cream to harden. I put it in overnight, but I think about an hour should do the trick. When you’re ready to eat the cake, run a knife around the edges and flip it onto a dinner plate.

Undo the spring form pan and take out the center portion. Ta-da!

I promise this will be the best ice cream cake you ever had! I brought it to school and shared it with my students (it is on the lab table in the above picture). They were raving about it!!! Look how great the cake looks when cut:

My mouth is watering. I hope my sister wants one for her birthday!

-Carolyn

P.S. Many of the pictures in this post were taken using the CameraBag app for the iPhone! Great filters and lots of fun.

Low Carb Margaritas!!!

Woot woot! In celebration of… well Tuesday, I whipped up some delish low carb margaritas. I was somewhat nervous about this concoction, but it came out tasting very refreshing! I used a modified version of this recipe (no orange extract, lemon juice instead of lime juice… but only because I didn’t have lime. I’m sure lime is better). I made two, one for me and one for mi madre!

Low Carb Margaritas

• 1 jigger (1.5 oz) tequila (3 Tbsp)
• 2 Tablespoons (1 oz) lime juice – bottled more convenient, fresh tastes a lot better
• 1/4 cup (4 Tablespoons) water
• 1 Tablespoon’s worth artificial sweetener (2 splenda packets)
• Ice – small handful

Get a handful of ice for each drink. If your refrigerator makes crushed ice, you’re in luck! Use that. Otherwise do what I did. Start with ice that looks like this…

Then use a meat tenderizer (or what Alton Brown would call a multi use tool) and smash it up… a great way to take out aggression if you need to! You’ll end up with ice that looks like this…

Fill the glasses about as high with ice as you plan to fill them with margs (the ice melts pretty quickly).

Pour in the margarita and enjoy!

If you’re fancier than me you could even garnish with a slice of lime. I totally feel like Bethenny Frankel! And I have to say that a margarita totally beats a cup of tea.

Cheers!

-Carolyn

…Chinese Pepper Steak Wraps

After a too long, three week hiatus, I’m back! This recipe is too delicious not too share. I must include that you have to like spicy foods in order to like this. Only 5 points!

• 10 oz beef top round
• 1 red pepper, thinly sliced
• 1 yellow pepper, thinly sliced
• 1 onion, thinly sliced
• 2 tbsp. canola oil
• 2 tsp. cornstarch
• 3 tbsp. chile paste
• 4 fat free flour tortillas

1. Slice the beef so it is paper thin. Marinate it for one hour in a ziplock bag with the oil, cornstarch, and 1 tbsp. of the chile paste.

2. Cook the beef in a skillet over medium high heat until cooked through, about 2 minutes on each side.

3. Transfer the beef to a plate. Add in the peppers, onions, and remaining chile paste and cook until soft, about 8 minutes.

4. Add the beef back in and heat through. Wrap in tortillas and eat!

My head was sweating when I ate this. I loved it!

-Carolyn

…Egg Noodles with Chicken

I absolutely love egg noodles. They are so delicious and go well with lots of different foods. I grew up eating a lot of German food when I went to my dad’s parents house. My favorite foods all include sauerkraut, so that tells you how much I like it! Maybe that is why I like egg noodles so much because you do find them in lots of different German foods. Here is a delicious chicken recipe that includes egg noodles!

• 1 lb boneless, skinless chicken breast
• 1/2 cup flour
• pinch of salt
• pinch of pepper
• 6 oz egg noodles
• 1/2 cup white wine

1. Portion the chicken breasts into 4 equal size pieces. Pound them out between two sheets of wax paper with a mallet or frying pan. Combine the flour, salt and pepper. Dredge the chicken in the flour mixture.

2. Cook the egg noodles according to the package. Drain and set aside.

3. Heat a large skillet over medium heat. Cook the chicken in it until browned, about 5 minutes on each side. Add the wine and simmer, about 3 minutes.

4. Add in the egg noodles and cook until heated through.

5. Serve and enjoy!

Hope you enjoy the chicken, but I already know you’ll love the egg noodles!

-Carolyn

 

…Buffalo Chicken Dip

I realized today that I haven’t blogged in quite a while. I actually haven’t cooked much this week because my parents have been away. I did cook on Sunday (portobello and goat cheese sandwiches) and Monday (goat cheese and tomato coulis pizza) but neglected to document my efforts. So this post is a little bit of a flashback to the night of the Superbowl when I made buffalo chicken dip. It is so delicious and definitely easy enough to make any time of year. The best thing about this dip is that it is actually better with celery than with chips!

• 1 can cooked chicken
• 1 cup hot sauce (Franks Red Hot or similar type)
• 2 8 oz packages of fat free cream cheese, softened
• 1 cup fat free ranch dressing

1. Heat the chicken in a large non-stick skillet over medium high heat until heated through (about 3 min).

2. Add the hot sauce until it boils. Turn down the heat and let simmer for about 5 minutes.

3. Add in the cream cheese. Stir until melted. Add in the ranch dressing. Stir dip until there are no lumps.

4. Transfer the dip into a serving dish (I used a 9 inch square baking dish).

Eat it with celery (or chips if you prefer, but I’m telling you… celery is way better)!

And I’m off to drink some delicious chai tea and relax before the work week starts again.

-Carolyn

…Turkey Boo-rgers

Fabio got kicked off Top Chef last week. I think he is (by far) the best person on the show ever (Sam from season 2 takes a close second). Best quote: “This is Top Chef. Its not Top Scallops.” He made a burger… or what he calls a boo-rger… and it tasted like meatloaf. In honor of Fabio getting kicked off of Top Chef on the last episode, I decided to make turkey burgers. And no they did not taste like meatloaf. They are actually quite delicious. So here goes the turkey burger recipe.

• 1 lb ground turkey
• 3 Tbsp low sodium soy sauce
• 1 tsp minced garlic
• 1 onion, finely chopped

1. Combine all the ingredients in a mixing bowl.

2. Heat a skillet over medium high heat. Section the meat off into 4 parts. Make each into a patty. Cook the patties in the skillet until cooked through, about 5 minutes on each side.

3. Serve with a toasted light bun. Only 7 points for a burger with the bun!

This burger is so flavorful that you don’t even really need ketchup! It is absolutely delicious and I think my new favorite dinner.

Yum!

-Carolyn

…Chicken and Eggplant Recipe

So I had a bunch of leftovers and needed to make something to get rid of them. Nothing was cooked yet… It was extra stuff from other recipes I had made. So I made up my own chicken recipe and it turned out really well! Here is the recipe:

• Cooking spray
• 2 cloves minced garlic
• 2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cut into two inch cubes
• 1 small eggplant, minced
• 1 28 oz can of diced tomatoes
• ~2 Tbsp crushed red pepper
• ~2 tsp italian seasoning
• 1/2 box fettucini, cooked

1. Spray a nonstick skillet with cooking spray. Add in the garlic and cook until it is soft (or until heated if you use the jarred stuff like me… I seriously can not live without it in my kitchen). Add the chicken and cook through, about 5 minutes.

2. Add the eggplant, Italian seasoning, and crushed red pepper. Let some of the liquid from the eggplant cook off, about 3 minutes.

3. Add in the diced tomatoes. Allow the mixture to boil and then turn down the heat. Let simmer. (Note: the eggplant slowly turned the mixture dark as I let it simmer. Don’t worry… it still tastes great!)

4. Mix the sauce with the cooked fettucini. Eat and enjoy!

This recipe is Weight Watchers friendly.. only 8 points!

Well, I’m off to drink some Apricot Tea. Yum.

-Carolyn

…Cold Weather and Meatloaf

It is freezing out today! Below freezing actually. This morning on the news they said you could get frostbite in ten to fifteen minutes. So we cancelled the youth group sledding trip. It would have been fun, but I am NOT getting frostbite!

Instead I made grilled cheese and soup for lunch. I had Progresso 99% fat free New England clam chowder. It was actually quite good. I couldn’t tell that it was fat free- It was still really creamy with big chunks of potatoes. For dinner I made Spicy Meatloaf from the New Complete Weight Watchers Cookbook. I really like the cookbook because it has healthy versions of all different kinds of foods, from Mexican to Chinese to good ol’ comfort food. And most of the stuff is so easy to make! (The only annoying thing is that it is written in the old points system so I have to convert everything to the new points values online.) Even if you don’t do Weight Watchers, it is still useful to find healthy versions of your favorite recipes.

First finely chop and saute the vegetables. The loaf has a carrot, celery stalk, onion, and a package of sliced mushrooms.

Once the veggies are sauteed, mix them with the meat, 1/2 cup of oats, an egg, tomato paste, worcestershire sauce, and hot sauce.

Mold the mixture into a loaf in a 9×9 inch pan (sprayed with cooking spray).

Bake for 30 minutes, spread tomato sauce on the top, and bake for another 30-45 minutes.

The loaf didn’t really stay together when sliced, but it was still delicious. Two slices are 7 points. It was so filling that I only ate one slice (and had one of the non fat muffins from Friday).  I paired it with steamed broccoli and cauliflower (from one of those frozen bags). The meatloaf was really good and much healthier than regular meatloaf.

Off to drink some Irish Breakfast tea… Yum!

-Carolyn