Biscuit Cake

My commander recently got married, and to celebrate we threw her a little surprise party at the beginning of last week. I was told to make a cheesecake and planned to make a white chocolate cheesecake and some brownies with a cheese topping (for another post!). Well, the cheesecake flopped, so I was back to the drawing board. I flipped through ALL my cookbooks and finally decided to make this biscuit cake. The original recipe comes from Carine Goren's Sweet Secrets but is heavily adapted and doesnt resemble the original in anyway. I basically made the cream and layered it with vanilla and chocolate biscuits and topped with some mocha sauce I had laying around. The result was so delicious and for some reason, nostalgic. It reminded one of my friends of a cake her mother made growing up and it brought me back to one of my first baking experiences ever- making a no-bake biscuit cake in my sixth grade baking group. This cake is not only super easy to make but is lick-the-bowl-clean delicious. Make sure to freeze this cake so it's firm and sliceable. It's kind of messy to eat no matter what, but that makes it even better, I think. Putting this one in the drawer for Shavuot!

Black Bottom Pie

Alright- time to catch up on my pies! I made this one a while ago for dessert for Shabbat lunch and it's another from Haedrich's Pie! This pie is messy to eat but I can assure you it's worth all of the napkins it'll take to clean the cream from your chin! We start with a biscuit or graham cracker crust and then pile in a ganache, which is your black bottom. On top of that goes a whipped cream lightened pastry cream with a flavor that brings me back to my childhood Swiss Miss days. (I must say I love making these pudding/custard/cream pies, especially since the work can so easily be divided over a couple of days!) A nice fudge sauce would be nice but I opted out. To make the ganache parve, I used coconut milk instead of cream. My cream turned out sort of soft, (hence the mess!) so I would add a bit of gelatin next time to stabilize it. All in all, another successful pie. Pi(e) day, here I come!

Peanut Butter Pie

Things have getting busy in my army life (in the best way!) and that's why posting has not been happening. I have somewhat of a day off and one of my goals is to get this post posted! A couple of weeks ago, more like a month ago, I was invited out for Friday night dinner and was asked to bring dessert. Her criteria were gooey, cinnamoney and fruity. Well, I took gooey and ran with it! I did some research and came across this recipe for Peanut Butter Pie in Patty Pinner's Sweety Pies. After confirming that no one was allergic to peanuts and that peanut butter was an acceptable choice, I made my shopping list. This pie comes together really easily, you just stir a bunch of things together. I decided to add some chocolate to the bottom to cut the sweetness. Next time, I need to use chocolate chips or chop the chocolate because the blocks didnt melt. I must say, this pie is GOOEY. And decadent and delicious. Cut small wedges to prevent from sugar-shock. Whipped cream is also necessary to cut the sweetness a bit. I didn't flavor it at all. As far as the gooey factor, I guess I must not have baked it long enough. Be sure to bake for the full length of time- covering with foil as necessary to prevent over browning.