jen

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the wall.

Jen Driesbach

yeah, that's the wall this week.thanks to d + k and my efforts to be more disciplined, I now have an obsessive nature towards post-it notes.but I do like seeing my to-do's in a row on a wall...it makes me feel like it's do-able.like it's not this giant insurmountable plethora of stuff. (yeah, check out my smart words barrett girls) :)I'm not gonna be all cheery for the sake of being cheery today.it was a hard day.the kind of day where you could look at the wall and simply cry because you feel like you're slopping through mud with 20lb. weights attached to your ankles.BUT.I still got to make it to italy tonight.  and I needed to go to italy tonight.I know what you're thinking.  "she's lost it.  there's no way she went to italy tonight."oh, but I did.you see tuesday nights are our one night a week family dinner night.  one of my goals this year is to be a better cook, and the only way to do that is challenge myself.  so each tuesday we go to a different, far-off place...places that we'd all like to go someday...a couple weeks ago it was china...last week was hawaii with shish-kabobs and fruit pizza's.well, this week was italy.  oh, I had great plans for italy...it's somewhere I seriously would like to go to someday!  italian sausages, caprese salads, garlic everything...oh, yes...it was going to be amazing.since you already know what kind of a day I had, you know it didn't turn out quite that way...let's just say it takes a lot, and I mean A LOT of talent to burn a boiling pot of water with pasta in it.  :|but the calzone's still made it - stuffed with fresh basil and italian cheeses, smooth riccotta and real pepperoni slices...and no one was put off by paradise bakery's perfect pasta salad (it's my favorite anyways.)AND my cake turned out...my super rich mafioso italian chocolate cake turned out perfectly.and THAT cake, I suppose being a girl :)  made everything better. :)

now, as I lace up my tennis shoes to go work off the guilt :)  I'll share my perfect chocolate cake recipe.trust me...it's worth the extra effort...and has the power to make the wall seem like just a post-it note.

Mafioso Italian Chocolate Cake

  • 1/2 cup Hershey's Special Dark cocoa
  • 3/4 cup boiling coffee
  • 1 cup sour cream
  • 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
  • 2 cups sifted cake flour (do it.  trust me, it's better that way)
  • 1/2 cup butter
  • 2 cups C&H Baker's Sugar
  • 3 egg whites
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
  • 6 tablespoons butter, softened
  • 3/4 cup Dutch process cocoa powder
  • 2 2/3 cups confectioners' sugar
  • 1/2 cup milk
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions

  1. In a small bowl, mix together 1/2 cup cocoa and 3/4 cup boiling water; set aside.
  2. In another small bowl, dissolve baking soda in the sour cream by stirring them together.
  3. In a large bowl, cream the 1/2 cup butter and 2 cups sugar. To the butter and sugar mixture, alternately add the sifted flour and the cocoa mixture with the sour cream mixture. Beat until fluffy. Beat the egg whites until stiff and fold in the egg whites and 1 1/2 teaspoons of vanilla.
  4. Grease a 9x13 inch pan and pour the batter into it. Bake at 300 degrees F (150 degrees C) for 50 minutes. Frost with La Famiglia Chocolate Frosting (below).
  5. To Make La Famiglia Chocolate Frosting: Cream 6 tablespoons butter or margarine in a small bowl. Add 3/4 cup cocoa and confectioner's sugar alternately with milk; beat until spreading consistency. More or less milk can be used depending on the texture you want. Blend in the vanilla. This yields about 2 cups of frosting.

tune in next week as we head to Alabama - in honor of my most favorite movie :)