Back With a Bang

Good morning!! So I took an extended blog-vacation last week.....we went on a family trip!!! I don't have any pictures of that yet, but when I do, I'll definitely post some! We went to a city just an hour and a half away, but it was completely different from Recife and just a really nice change of pace! We got to visit with some friends who moved there, hung out at the beach, and just relaxed. Then, we've been home most of the weekend....Dad's had some different ministry-related things to do, but the rest of us have been at home. What did you do this weekend?


Saturday, my sister and I checked one of my items to bake in 2012 off the list: homemade eclairs (we made them completely from scratch)! We made little 2-in eclairs....cute and yummy!

Eclairs

Ingredients:

Pastry Cream:

• 1/2- 3/4 cup milk (start with 1/2 cup, add if while cooking the cream thickens too much, gradually add the rest  by tablespoons)
• 2 egg yolk 
• 2 T sugar
• 1 1/2 T flour
• 1 teaspoon cornstarch
• dash salt
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Pate a Choux

• 1/2 cup water
• 1/4 cup butter
• 1/2 teaspoon sugar
• 1/8 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup flour
• 2 eggs

Chocolate Glaze

• 1.5 oz chocolate (we used milk)
• 1 teaspoon corn syrup
• 1 T butter

Instructions:

1. First, prepare the pastry cream. Heat the milk in a saucepan until it begins to steam. Meanwhile, beat the egg yolks with the sugar until very thick and yellow. Combine flour, cornstarch and salt, add to the eggs. 
2. Very slowly, pour the hot milk into the egg mixture, beating continuously. Rinse out the saucepan and pour the entire mixture into it.
3. Heat over medium heat, stirring, and bring the mixture to a boil. Let boil for two minutes. Because the mixture will thicken a lot, you'll have to stop stirring every once in a while to check and see if it is actually boiling. 
4. Remove from heat, add vanilla extract. Store in a shallow bowl, with plastic wrap touching the surface of the cream. Refrigerate for at least 2 hours before using.
5. While the cream is chilling, begin preparing the pate a choux. Heat water, butter, sugar and salt in a saucepan until boiling. Add the flour to the boiling mixture all at once. Stir, over medium heat, until the mixture forms a ball and begins to pull away from the pot. Cook, stirring, for another two minutes. 
6. Transfer paste to a bowl, beat the mixture, either by hand or with an electric mixer, for a few minutes to cool it off. Add the eggs one at a time, and beat until a smooth, shiny paste forms. 
7. Divide the pate a choux into 8 pieces, and spoon each onto a prepared baking sheet. With damp fingers, shape the eclairs into smooth rectangles, making sure that there are no seams on each section. 
8. Bake for 10 minutes at 400, reduce heat and bake at 350 for 25 minutes. The eclairs should puff up a lot and be a deep, golden color. With a toothpick, poke a small hole into each eclair. Let cool completely before filling. 
9. While the eclairs are cooling, make you glaze. Microwave the chocolate and the corn syrup until the chocolate melts, stirring constantly to prevent burning. Once the chocolate has melted, add the tablespoon of butter. Set aside. 
10. Once the pastries are cool, either pipe the cream into them, or cut in half carefully and spoon some filling into each one. Drizzle the glaze on top of each eclair. Let sit for about 20 minutes for the glaze to set. 
11. Eat! :D 

These were seriously delicious!!!! :D 

Before I go, I just want to talk about something that I really had to deal with over our vacation. I'm the type of person who does pretty much the same thing every day and has a routine to follow. Going on a trip right in the middle of the week was definitely not in my regular schedule. I wouldn't be eating things that I was used to eating, wouldn't have the opportunity to exercise like I usually do, and would just be living in a completely different environment for a few days. This was really stressful at first because the eating disordered/OCD side of me was panicking at the thought of not having a plan for what I was going to be doing for that many days. However, I do believe that the experience really helped me a lot in overcoming some of my difficulties, as well as give me some time away from my typical environment to relax a little. 

I did end up exercising some, but not as much as usual and mostly just to de-stress and not to get a kick-butt workout in. I was also sick (just a cold) during the vacation and it was nice to realize that it is OK if one week I don't workout like I usually would. All in all, I really enjoyed our family trip and believe that God used it to help me grow. 

That's about it for today....see ya'll later!

What is your favorite dessert? 

My dad's all-time favorite pastries are actually eclairs. A couple of nights ago I went through my to-bake list with my family and asked them what sounded good. My dad immediately said that he was most excited about the eclairs! 

Are you a routine person? If so, what do you do to avoid getting stuck doing the same thing every day? 

Sometimes Ugly Food is the Best Food.

Good morning! How is everyone doing? Our weekend has been pretty rainy and ugly outside, but we had some good family time and visited a different church yesterday. What did you do this weekend? 


For school, this semester I am taking a course called Life Management Skills. Basically, it is supposed to teach high school students how to prepare themselves for college life and living a little more independently of their parents. This semester, we are covering cooking and preparing meals that are quick and easy to make. The funny thing is, I've been cooking for a while now, so some of the recipes in our class cookbook (which happens to have been designed for kids just learning to cook) are either things that I already knew how to make or just very simple. Either way, over this quarter, I will be making at least one thing from each section. Each week will tackle a different section of the cookbook: breakfast, lunch, dinner, snacks and dessert. Last week, we did breakfast. I read the recipes out to my family and asked them to choose one. The recipe that seemed most interesting was a hashbrown and scrambled egg pizza. Since we don't exactly get frozen hashbrowns here, I made some from scratch and modified the whole recipe a little bit to fit with what we have available here.

Breakfast Pizza
4 servings

(seriously crappy picture....eggs are not photogenic)

Ingredients:

• 1 frozen pizza crust (a small sized crust is what we used...we just cut it into quarters and served it....no leftovers!)
• 1 medium sized potato, cubed
• Onion and green bell pepper (optional....can use as much or as little as you want)
• 1/2-2/3 cup cheese, shredded
• 4 eggs
• 1/4-1/3 cup milk
• 2 T butter, divided
• salt and pepper to taste
• bacon (optional)

Directions:

1. Prepare the pizza crust according to package directions. Set aside.
2. In a medium sized skillet, combine 1 T butter,  the potato, onion and bell pepper. Saute until the potatoes are tender. Season with salt and pepper. 
3. In a bowl, beat eggs, milk, salt and pepper. In a large skillet, melt the other tablespoon of butter, cook the eggs until they are cooked through but still a little glossy. 
4. If using bacon, fry up however much you want, crumble, and add to the potatoes. 
5. Sprinkle half of the cheese on the crust. Pour the eggs, potatoes, and bacon on the cheese. Top with the remaining shredded cheese and bake at 375 for 8-10 minutes or until all the cheese is melted and the crust is cooked to your preference. 

This was actually pretty good!!! We had toast with homemade jelly (strawberry!) and fruit salad on the side. The bacon was definitely a good addition to the pizza, and we all liked how the dish took typical breakfast foods and served them in a non-traditional way. Personally, I think that it would be pretty awesome with some pepper jack cheese on it, but we don't have any here.....oh well.... :P

Oh and by the way, the above plate was my dad's. He arranged it and offered to let me take a picture of it for the blog!  Do you have any favorite non-traditional breakfast recipes?

That's about it for today....see ya'll later!

Gnocchi and Cookies

Happy Friday, everyone!!!! How have ya'll's weeks been???? What do ya'll have going on this weekend? I've had a pretty good week.....like I said Wednesday, mostly school. As for the weekend, as far as I know, we don't have much going on, which will be good for us all!

Besides school, I've been up to some ktitchen experiments this week!!! Wednesday, I made homemade gnocchi (so that is one more thing to check off my list!) and yesterday, I made some super easy peanut butter cookies (mainly just because I wanted some cookies and they required little effort....15 minutes to fresh cookies!). Here are the recipes for ya:

Homemade Gnocchi (based off of this recipe) 

 

(not my picture)

Ingredients:

• 2 lb potatoes 
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• dash of pepper
• dash of oregano
• 1 egg yolk
• 1 cup flour (more if needed) 

Directions:

1. Wash potatoes, pierce with a fork, and either bake at 400 for about 45 minutes, or microwave for about 15, flipping them after about 7 minutes. Once the potatoes are tender, let cool until they are easier to handle, about 15 minutes.
2. Scoop the insides of the potatoes out of the skins and push through a potato ricer. Gather the potatoes into a mound on a well-floured counter, sprinkle with salt, pepper and oregano and let sit about 15 more minutes to cool off some more. 
3. Pour the egg yolk on top of the potatoes and then sprinkle the cup of flour on top of it. Gently incorporate the yolk and flour into the potatoes, being careful not to overwork the dough. The gnocchi dough should be sticky, but if it is too sticky to handle, add more flour 1 tablespoon at a time. Pat out into a disc about 1 1/2 in thick and cut into 4 pieces. 
4. Roll one piece out to make a 2 foot long "snake". Cut into pieces about 1/2-3/4 in in size. Repeat with the rest of the dough. 
5. Bring a large pot of water to a gentle boil. Drop about 1/4 of the gnocchi into it. When the gnocchi floats, they are done. Remove with a slotted spoon and repeat with the rest of the dough. 

These were really yummy! I didn't saute them, but served them with a garlic cream sauce! So, so good! :D 

Nooow, for the cookies (most of you have probably already seen this recipe before...:D): 

Quick Peanut Butter Cookies (flourless)

Ingredients:

• 1 cup of sugar
• 1 cup of peanut butter
• 1 egg
• 1/4 tsp vanilla (optional)

Directions:

1. Combine all ingredients in a medium sized bowl. 
2. Drop by teaspoonfulls onto a baking sheet, flattening each cookie a little bit after you drop it. The dough doesn't spread very much while baking, so you can put the cookies close together. 
3. Sprinkle each cookie with some sugar and bake at 350 for about 10 minutes. R
4. Remove from oven and let cookies cool for about 5 minutes or until they firm up a little. 

Easy, no? I bet these would be great with dark chocolate dreams or nutella or something! 

Well, that's about it for today...I'm off to study for some tests! 

See ya'll later!

Yet Another Circuit Workout

Wow....I'm really not that great at post titles, huh?

So what has everyone been up to this week??? For me, it's been mostly school so far. Oh, I did want to talk about that zinc experiment from a couple of weeks ago. I started watching my zinc intake a while back to see if it would help my massive salt cravings. A few weeks later and I would definitely say that my salt problem is a lot better! Of course, I still do have days where I crave salt, but that's pretty normal, and it is definitely not as bad as it used to be. For anyone who didn't see my original zinc post, zinc deficiency and salt cravings are related because the zinc deficiency can lead to a loss of appetite, which can cause electrolyte imbalances, creating massive salt cravings.

Anyway, a couple of days ago I made up a new circuit workout (my favorite kind :D) for the gym! There's cardio and strength in there, though this particular circuit has a little bit more cardio than usual. The whole thing took me about an hour to complete.

A couple of moves that killed me were the boxer, triangle arm raises and the plie jump squats!!!! Also, this workout can definitely be modified by cutting out one of the cardio sections, doing each strength set twice, etc. If anyone tries this out, let me know what you think!

Please forgive the absolute randomness of today's post....I'm not very good at transitioning between the n topics. :D
When I was really in the middle of my eating disorder, I would spend hours online looking at recipes that I ended up never making. Well, I've decided that over this year, I'm going to try to make as many of them as possible, as well as try to come up with my very own dishes or treats! So, here's just a quick list of some of the things that I would love to make in 2012!!! If any of ya'll have a recipe that you love, please share it!!!! :D I'd looove to try out some of ya'll's favorite recipes, too!

• Doughnuts
• Crullers
• Homemade Gnocchi 
• Tater tots
• Red Velvet Cake
• Chicken and Dumplings (my grandmother's recipe!)
• My aunt's famous rolls 
• Croissants
• Bloomin' Onion (made this week!)
• Biscotti
• Cream horns (w/ homemade puff pastry) 

These are just some of the things that I would love to attempt this year! There are definitely more, but for now, these are on top of my list! :D

Well, that's about it for today...see ya'll later!

Cappuccino Muffins

Good morning!!! My weekend pretty much flew by! The concert on Friday was lots of fun, we just basically hung out on Saturday, and went to church + some more hanging out yesterday. What did your weekend look like?  Oh! and before I  forget, I made these on Saturday, and can I just say that they're awesome? Kind of a strange recipe, but so worth it! :D

Another thing I've made recently? Cappuccino muffins. They're pretty awesome, what with the whole cappuccino flavor going on plus melty chocolate chips, and a drizzle of glaze. We used a basic plain glaze, but I bet that making a cappuccino glaze would be awesome as well! Anyway, here's the recipe for ya:


Cappuccino Muffins 
(makes 6....I actually halved my typical muffin recipe just in case these didn't turn out)

Ingredients:

• 1 cup flour
• 1/4 plus 2 T sugar 
• 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1 1/4 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup milk
• 1 T instant cappuccino mix (or you can just use instant coffee+some cocoa powder)
• 1/4 cup oil
• 1/2 egg (crack an egg, beat it, and pour about half of the liquid into the batter)\
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/4 + 2 T chocolate chips (I used semi sweet)

Directions:

1. In a medium sized bowl, combine flour, sugar, cinnamon, baking powder and salt. 
2. In another, small bowl, combine the milk and the cappuccino mix until it has dissolved. Add the oil, egg and vanilla. Add the wet ingredients to the dry, stirring until combined. 
3. Fold the chocolate chips into the muffin batter
4. Spoon into 6 greased muffin tins. This will fill them almost completely up, but the muffins rise really well. Bake at 375 for 17-20 minutes or until the muffins test done. 

Anyway, these were really yummy and a great way to start off the week! 

Well, that's about it for today.....I do have some school stuff to do! 

Do you like coffee/cappuccino flavored baked goods? 

Olive Garden Breadsticks and Fun Friday

Hey! SO glad today is Friday! :D My week went pretty well, especially for the first week back at school, but I'm definitely glad that it is almost the weekend. How was your week? 


So, I have a couple of things to share with ya'll today.....first up: a copycat recipe for Olive Garden Breadsticks!!! I originally saw the idea on Pinterest, but tweaked the recipe a little bit based on what we had here at home! They turned out really well, especially since we don't have an Olive Garden here! Personally, I think that these breadsticks would be awesome with some herbs in the dough, which would make them slightly different from the original version. Anyway, here ya go:

Olive Garden Breadsticks (based on this recipe)

(definitely not my picture..hahaha :D)

Ingredients:

• 4 1/4 cups flour
• 2 tablespoons butter, melted
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• 1 tablespoon salt
• 1 1/2 cups warm water
• 1 package active dry or instant yeast (I used instant because that's what we have here)

Garlic Topping (brush half on about 7 minutes into baking, and the other half after the breadsticks are done)

• 1/4 cup butter, melted (I used some garlic butter that we already had, but regular is fine, too!)
• 1/4 cup oil
• 2-3 cloves garlic, crushed (or more or less, it really depends on personal preference)
• 1 1/2 teaspoons salt

Instructions:

1. If using active dry yeast: Dissolve sugar and yeast in warm water and let sit for 10 minutes. The mixture should look frothy. 
2. In a large bowl, combine flour and salt. Add either the proofed yeast mixture (for active dry yeast) or just the yeast, water and sugar (for instant yeast) to the flour. Add the melted butter. Mix with a wooden spoon just until fully combined. 
3. Knead dough just until smooth. Overworking the dough will cause the breadsticks not to turn out well, so be careful!
4. Grease a cookie sheet. Separate the dough into 10-12 pieces. Roll into breadsticks. Cover and let rise in a warm place for 45 minutes to an hour. 
5. Bake breadsticks at 400 degrees for 12-15 minutes. About halfway through baking, take the breadsticks out and brush with half of the garlic/butter/oil mixture. Place them back in the oven and bake until done to your preference. As soon as you take out the finished breadsticks, top with the rest of the garlic/oil/butter mixture.  Enjoy! :D

These were really delicious!!! And very close to the real deal! 

So I'm really excited about today! For the very first time, an American Christian singer, Michael W. Smith, is coming here to Recife!!!!!! My whole family, plus some of our friends, is going!!!! When we first heard that he was coming here, we all thought that it would be fun to go, but never actually considered going. Then, a few days later, some friends of ours mentioned it, and we all decided to go as a group! Fun stuff, huh? :D

What are you doing this weekend? Other than the concert, I don't think that we have a whole lot going on!

Bootcamp Workout and Awesome Tuesday

Good morning to ya'll! It is already Wednesday! What have you been up to so far this week?


The other day, I was working out here at home and decided to combine a couple of different bootcamp-style workouts to create my own! It turned out to be a pretty decent workout, though not the hardest thing I've ever done, so I thought that I'd share it with you guys!

Also, if you want, you can always do 5-10 minutes of cardio between the two circuits. And don't forget to cool down and stretch! Without any additional cardio, the circuits took me about 20 minutes to complete, which is great if you're pressed for time!

So yesterday we all went up into the community to have our first event with the ladies of 2012!!! Last year we did some sort of craft every Tuesday for a couple of months, and are continuing a version of the Tuesday meetings this year. Yesterday's activity, for example, was a maze that the ladies (split into two different teams) had to cross. Basically it was a sheet with 30 squares on it, and you had to figure out which squares made up the pathway to the other side. Every time a mistake is made, that person has to exit the maze and let the next member of their group attempt to figure it out! It was so much fun!!!! Truly a great start to the 2012 activities and meetings!!!!

On to another random subject! :D As some of you may know, Julie from Peanut Butter Fingers has a monthly book club in which readers of her blog help choose a book that is then read during that month. At the beginning of the next month, Julie then posts a review of the book. I've been following the book club for a little while now, and am really excited about this month's book "The Night Circus"! I'm going to try to see if I can get it here and read it!!! Anyone else reading the book this month?


Well, that's about it for today....see ya'll again soon! :D

Buttermilk Doughnuts and the First Day of School

Mondays are, and have always been, my least favorite weekdays. Because really, who wants to go back to work/school after the two short, fun weekend days? But my least favorite Mondays have to be the ones that come right after vacation time. Which, is what today is for me. My very first day of school after a really fun break, and a really fun weekend. Blegh. :P hahaha

Anyway, like I said, this past weekend was pretty great! Some major family time occurred, and we all got to rest a  little bit! Also, I'm pretty sure that any weekend that includes homemade doughnuts is bound to be awesome. The best part about these is that there's no yeast in the recipe, so no waiting forever for the dough to rise!!!
Buttermilk Doughnuts (from this recipe)

Ingredients:

• 3 1/2 cups flour
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 2 eggs
• 3/4 cup buttermilk
• 1/4 cup sour cream (we don't actually get sour cream here, so I had to make some by adding vinegar to heavy cream...it really works!)
• 1/4 cup butter, melted, browned, and cooled
• Oil for frying

Glaze (this is just a guesstimate...I sort of made it up as I went along.....it turned out crackly though, sort of like a store-bought doughnut)

• 3/4 cup sugar
• 3 T milk
• 2 T water
• 1 t vanilla extract
• 1/2 t oil (this will make the glaze shiny)

Combine glaze ingredients in a saucepan, heat until sugar has melted. Dip doughnuts into glaze after they've been fried.

Directions: 

1. Whisk together the flour, sugar, baking soda, baking powder, salt and cinnamon in a large bowl. Set aside. 
2. In a medium sized bowl, combine the eggs, buttermilk and sour cream until combined. Stir in the browned butter (can be only slightly browned or completely browned, depending on the flavor you want).
3. Make a well in the flour mixture, pour the wet ingredients into it. Stir gently until a sticky dough has formed. 
4. Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface, sprinkle some flour on the top of the dough, and pat out to about 1/2 in. thick. Get two different sized cookie cutters. Dip the largest in some flour, and cut out a doughnut. Cut out the doughnut hole by dipping the smaller cookie cutter in flour and cutting out the center of the doughnut. Continue until all the dough has been used up. I got about 10 doughnuts. Place in the fridge until ready to fry.
5. In a deep skillet, heat a 1 - 1 1/2 in layer of oil until it reaches 365-370 degrees. When the oil is ready, take 2-3 doughnuts at a time and place them in the oil, turning after one side is browned. Each side should cook for about 2 minutes. Remove doughnuts, dip in glaze or cinnamon sugar. Enjoy! :D 

You know that I am having one of these today for a first-day-of-school snack! :D 

Speaking of school, I should probably start studying......look who will be helping me out today:

See ya'll later! 

What's your favorite kind of doughnut?

Holidays are Almost Over

Hey everyone!! :D How are ya'll this week? What's been going on? Not much here.....we did go out and get a couple of things for my room, and some friends came over on Monday, but that's about it.

So last night, I made dinner!!! :D We had breakfast for dinner with omelets and breakfast potatoes. Yum! :D Here's how I made the potatoes:
5 cups diced potatoes
Chopped onion and bell pepper
2-3 tablespoons oil
Salt, pepper and oregano

I combined everything in a skillet, covered it, and cooked on medium low for about 30 minutes, stirring occasionally to prevent sticking. They were pretty tasty!

What's your favorite thing to have for breakfast for dinner? We usually like omelets or pancakes!

So I start back school on Monday. I really can't believe how fast the holidays have flown by! The worst part is, my sister doesn't go back to school until February...which makes it even tougher for me to concentrate, knowing that we could be hanging out or something! hahaha When do ya'll go back to school/work? 


Another thing that I wanted to talk about, that I haven't for a while, is my weight. At my very lowest, I weighed about 96 pounds, and the most I've ever weighed (before the eating disorder) was 128. I've never been fat, but due to the way I hold weight, I didn't feel comfortable at 128. I'm really only 5'3 and have a small frame anyway. Over the past year and a half or so, I've been trying to gain weight and hit around 115. I'm definitely in better shape right now that I was at either my highest or lowest weights. I'm really learning not to worry as much about the number on the scale but to go by how I feel. Right now, I hover anywhere from about 111 to 113, which is pretty close to my goal weight. I wouldn't say that I'm completely recovered from my ED......there are definitely still days when it is hard and I really have to fight, but all in all, I'm in a much healthier place right now than I was a year ago. My family and friends have been awesome and I thank God for putting all of them in my path! :D I want to thank ya'll as well for reading this ol' blog and for being so supportive!

That's about it for today....see ya'll later!

It's 2012!

Good morning, everyone!! Who else thinks that 2011 flew by? We didn't do too much this weekend....mostly just hung out! Last night we had black eyed peas, baked potatoes, baked italian chicken (recipe to come soon!), rice, copycat olive garden breadsticks (so, so good....if anyone wants to see this recipe as well, let me know!) and corn for dinner with a big glass of sweet tea!!! Yum! :D Not extremely traditional, except for the black eyed peas, but delicious nonetheless! What did ya'll have for New Year's dinner? 


Well, I did promise a chocolate recipe on my last post, so here it is! I had this for my birthday last Wednesday! Basically its like a combination of a mousse with a cake. Tastes like the mousse, but bakes like a cake! :D Also, anything that has both melted chocolate and cocoa powder in it is bound to be awesome!

Chocolate Decadence (original recipe found here)

(not my picture)

Ingredients:

• 7 oz chocolate, finely chopped (we used a dark chocolate, but I think any kind would work, depending on how rich you want the cake to be) 
• 1/3 cup cocoa powder
• 2 T flour
• 2/3 plus 1/4 cup sugar, divided 
• Dash of salt
• 1 cup milk (we used whole, and it worked just fine)
• 2 egg yolks
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 3 egg whites
• 1/8 tsp cream of tartar

Directions:

1. Place chocolate and cocoa powder in a large bowl.
2. Combine flour, 2/3 cup sugar and salt in a small heavy saucepan. Whisk in just enough of the milk to form a smooth paste. Mix in the remaining milk. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon to prevent burning (especially around the sides and bottom edges of the pot), until the mixture begins to bubble. Boil gently, stirring constantly, for 2 to 2 1/2 minutes (the mixture will get very thick and then you may notice that it thins ever so slightly as the starch cooks). Scrape the hot mixture immediately over the chocolate and cocoa. Stir until the chocolate is completely melted and smooth. The batter will be very thick. Stir in egg yolks and vanilla.
3. Beat egg whites and cream of tartar in a mixing bowl with an electric mixer on medium speed until soft peaks form. Gradually sprinkle in the remaining 1/4 cup sugar, beating on high speed until the egg whites are stiff but not dry.
4. Gently fold about one-fourth of the egg whites into the chocolate batter to lighten it. Gently fold in the remaining egg whites until no white streaks remain. Scrape the batter into the cake pan, smoothing the top.
5. Set the cake pan in a larger baking pan and place on the oven rack. Pour enough boiling water into the baking pan to come a third to halfway up the side of the cake pan. Bake at 350 until the surface of the cake is slightly crusted and springs back when gently pressed, 20 to 25 minutes. (The cake will still be quite gooey inside.)
6. Once the cake is done baking, let it cool completely before serving. Mine was still a little gooey after 2 hours, but tasted delicious. The cake is even better after being refrigerated overnight. 

This is definitely my new favorite birthday treat!!! :D Have any of ya'll tried a cake like this before?

Well, my big project for the week is re-organizing my room. Fun stuff, right? I've been spending most of the weekend some time on Pinterest looking for some fun room decor ideas. There is a lot to work with on that site.....I love it!!!! I think I'm going to try to make this  because it is just so cute!!!! First though, I really need to find a way to get my fat cat out of my closet! It's really hard to organize in there when he just jumps right in when I'm done.....and gets black and white cat fur all over everything. Downside of having a black and white cat: None of your clothes are safe from fur! Anyway, that's the big thing for the week......it'll definitely be nice to have a project to work on! What are ya'll's holiday projects? Another thing I want to do? Flip-flop redesigning! 

Well, that's about it for today.....see ya'll later!!!