Tuesday, May 28, 2013

Chocolate and Wine [May 4, 2013]

at 9:10 PM

Today I learned...

...ceramic bowls crack in the microwave. (I already knew that burnt chocolate smells up the whole kitchen...)

...turning the electric mixer on to 4 right away means that your kitchen will be covered in brown sugar.

...how to make whipped cream out of cheese.

...red wine and chocolate make a very deep purple when it spurts everywhere.

Yup. It's my mom's annual Wine and Chocolate party.





[On May 4th my mom had her annual Wine and Chocolate Party. I started a post so I wouldn't forget key points, but haven't had time to finish updating it. So, without further ado... the long awaited Wine and Chocolate Post!]

Wine Jello Shots
 
First I made wine jello shots...

 I first got the idea from a pin to the Martha Stewart website, but upon further investigation I decided the recipe was too complicated.

After another search on Pinterest, I found this recipe, which I followed to a T - complete with the wine glasses and fruit.

 Well, it didn't quite set up enough for me to cut it into cubes, but scooping chunks of it into a wine glass worked just as well.


 The ingredients

The finished product! 

Red Wine and Chocolate Cake
 
Then I made a red wine and chocolate cake. 
 
I found this recipe and also followed it completely. 
 
Ingredients!
 

As you probably assumed from above, I had a few issues. For starters, it said to melt the bittersweet bakers chocolate. So I picked out of my mom's mixing bowls, and put the chocolate in for less than a minute. I knew I'd had to take it out and stir, because chocolate melts funny, but I did not know that ceramic bowls aren't microwavable. 

I took it out to stir, and had to use the oven mitts to take it out. That, apparently, is clue number one. If you microwave a bowl/plate and it's WAY too hot, it's probably not microwaveable. I've noticed this with my plastic Target plates, too. 

I put the bowl back in for about 30 seconds. I walk away. And CRACK! I hear the loudest noise ever, followed by the sound of the microwave turn-table turning incorrectly. I go to the microwave and stop it. I open it to find a nice quarter of the bowl broke off. Unfortunately, I did not get a picture, though I wish I had. It broke cleanly, with melted chocolate everywhere. 

At this point in the day, my mom had gone out to the grocery store for some other missing ingredients for the party. I called her up. 

"...I messed up. Everything is ok, and I'll clean up the mess, but I goofed, bad. I broke your bowl..." 

Lucky for me, my mom enjoys "laughing as she watches me learn" - her words. And she didn't much care for the bowl in question. Of course, as I'm on the phone with my mom, my dad's car pulls into the garage. 

"I gotta go - Dad just got home and I have to clean the microwave before he notices!" My dad tends to be slightly more concerned about messes in the kitchen. 

I'm sponging chocolate out of the microwave when he enters the house. "I goofed, but Mom knows, and I'm cleaning it!" I rush through an explanation before he can ask questions. 

"How did you goof?" "...I exploded a bowl in the microwave..." "Mom knows?" "Yup." "You didn't blow up my microwave?" "Nope." "K..." and he went upstairs. 

...which turned out to be a very good thing. Because while he was upstairs was when I started playing with the mixer. Now, my mom has one of those awesome, pretty, wonderful KitchenAid mixers. It comes with this lovely plastic bowl shield to keep things from spilling out. I didn't know this. 

Well, I kind of did. But I thought it was for liquids and frosting. So when I go to [attempt to] mix the brown sugar and room temperature butter, I didn't put the shield on. And brown sugar went ... (you guessed it!) everywhere. Take two. 

I managed to mix the brown sugar and butter together, without thinking about the shield. I continued on in the recipe, getting to the "add red wine" part... which also got everywhere.

I've decided that I cook the way I sew. Haphazardly. [If you need clarification on that, see this post]

But it turned out well in the end and everyone loved it! 
 
 

I also made this lovely homemade whipped cream. When I read the recipe I thought it was frosting, but after making it, it appeared to be whipped cream. I made two kinds! The main one listed on the website with the recipe, and another one that was almost the same. The only difference was that instead of mascarpone cheese, I used the Philadelphia brand chocolate delight whipped cream. 
 
 
 
Delish! No, seriously, they were heavenly.

Plop your whipped cream on top of the cake as it's served. Yum!

White Wine Chicken Recipe
 
This recipe was wonderful! 

My mom fried up the chicken for me, because I don't touch raw chicken. (I'm weird. It's a thing.) 



And I made the sauce! We also boiled the pasta, as you can see in the picture above.



The only change I would make, it sauteing the garlic with the chicken, because it was still raw and sharp tasting in the pasta. While I love garlic, roasted is a different taste than raw, and I prefer it.

 My favorite recipe of the night was...

Grilled Brie Sandwhich

I got the idea here, but you really don't need a recipe. 

I used some sliced french bread, spread margarine on it like you would for any grilled cheese. I used dark chocolate candy bars, from the candy section not the baking section. Slicing the brie without the rind was the hardest part. I sauteed the strawberries a bit, to make them all gooey, after thin slicing them.

Then, pile it all on and grill!



Everyone was wary about trying them at first, but after a taste, people started asking me for the recipe! I think they'd make a perfect breakfast/brunch. Mmm!


Other people brought other recipes. There were cupcakes, and fondue, and I forget all what else. But Gabs and Shelly brought these delights!

Pre-made chocoalte shots! (love them! you can find different flavors at any liquor store!)



 And these aMAZing chocolate bars.



 The bacon tastes exactly like you'd think it would. The spicy chile one was a style my familia much enjoys and has had before. I fell in love with the potato chip one. The salty sweetness, and the potato chip CRUNCH was a delight! But the poprock one - by FAR - rocked our socks off the most. Not only do you get the pop-pop-pow of poprocks in your mouth (a feeling every one in my generation remembers fondly, I think) but it's followed up by a crazy aftertaste of BURNING chipotle! Which we did not know, and did not believe, until we checked the ingredients after a drunken argument about whether or not it was the spicy chile flavor burning my mouth.

All in all, I think this was a very awesome party. Maybe it was just because I was sloshed... lol. But the food was great, and the people are always awesome. So I call it a win!



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