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Raspberry Cream Cake

May 21, 2010 by Shanna Hatfield

Raspberry Cream Cake

I made this deliciously easy cake the other day and Most Wonderful Hubby declared it was the “best cake you’ve ever made!”

That pleased me quite a bit, I have to tell you. Not only because compliments from MWH are like a happy tonic for me, but also because he is a tough cookie to please when it comes to sweets. His favorite cake in the world is carrot cake and he literally would eat it rather than any other dessert. So to hear that comment from him nearly sent me over the moon.

This cake is so simple and starts out with a basic cake mix.  Enjoy!

The Ingredients. I forgot to include Cream Cheese Frosting, which you will need.

Bake the cake according to package directions. Cool. Then frost layers with cream cheese frosting.

While cake is cooling, rinse raspberries, then sprinkle with sugar.

Once the berries have soaked up the sugar, pat dry, along with mint leaves.

Place raspberry filling on top of frosted first layer.

Place frosted second layer frosting side down on the filling. This way you have a frosting and filling sandwich.

Generously cover cake with whipped cream.

Completely cover cake in luscious mounds of whipped cream.

Yum!

Raspberry Cream Cake

1 box Duncan Hines French Vanilla Cake Mix (18 ounce)

3 eggs

1/2 cup oil

1 1/3 cup water

1 cup of fresh raspberries

1 tbsp.  granulated sugar

1 can of raspberry pie filling (21 oz)

1/3 cup powdered sugar

2 tsp. vanilla extract

1 carton of heavy whipping cream (16 oz)

1/2 cup prepared cream cheese frosting

Mint leaves for garnish (optional)

Mix cake mix with eggs, oil and water and bake according to package directions. For this cake, I used two square pans and then cut the two layers in half.  I did this crazy thing because I needed two desserts for two separate small meetings and splitting the cake in half just saved me time. You can use two 9-inch round pans or three 8-inch rounds. Your choice.

Once the cake is baked, let it cool completely.

While it is cooling, wash the raspberries and drain.  In a small bowl, sprinkle 1 tbsp. sugar over the berries and let it soak in. Set aside.

Mix up your whipping cream. Beat it on high until it starts to get thick then add in powdered sugar and vanilla. Finish beating until peaks form and it is a good thick consistency. Stick this in the fridge until you are ready to frost the cake.

By now the sugar should have soaked into the berries. Remove them from the bowl and place on a couple of paper  towels to absorb any extra liquid or juice. If you are garnishing with mint, rinse it off and pat dry while you are doing the berries.

Place your first cake layer on your plate or platter. Using the cream cheese frosting, spread on both the top of this layer and the bottom of the second layer. I did a thin layer, but you can put it on as thick as you like.

Next, spread on about half the can of raspberry pie filling. If you are making a three layer cake, you will use all the filling. If you are making a two layer cake, you will have leftovers. I scooped my leftovers into a Ziploc and tossed in the freezer to use for something tasty in the future.

Place the next cake layer on the filling, frosting side down. The frosting acts like glue to hold the layers together. I learned that the hard way when I made three layers of this cake with just the filling and the layers started sliding every which direction when we attempted to cut it. It wasn’t pretty and I don’t recommend trying it just to see if it will happen. It will.

Now that the top layer is in place, get the whipping cream out of the fridge and liberally spread all over the cake. Feel free to be generous with the whipping cream.

Top off the cake by scattering fresh raspberries across the top. You can garnish with mint leaves if you so desire. I desired because it just looks so pretty!

Put the cake into the fridge until you are ready to serve and when you do, be prepared to enjoy the compliments!

Happy Entertaining!

Shanna

Posted in Desserts, Easy Recipes | Tagged , , , | Leave a Comment »

It is NOT Chocolate

May 20, 2010 by Shanna Hatfield

When I was 11, my mother decided to bring my world crashing down around my ears and declared I had an allergy to chocolate. Since I was plagued by a variety of food allergies I didn’t question the decision. I wasn’t able to in my traumatized state.

The problem was that I was genetically programmed to crave chocolate. Several members of my dad’s side of the family have the same affliction. We crave chocolate. We love chocolate. We are chocolate addicts. We need chocolate. Chocolate is a key ingredient in our happy existence. This goes beyond the normal really liking chocolate. I mean we honest-to-goodness need chocolate.

So with much crying and whining, I spent the next 12 years without chocolate. Trying to make it up to me, my mother attempted multiple times to convince me that carob was just as good, if not even better than chocolate. She was so wrong.

A great definition I found of carob is this:

“Carob is a tropical pod that contains a sweet, edible pulp and inedible seeds. After drying, the pulp is roasted and ground into a powder that resembles cocoa powder, but does not have the same flavor and texture of chocolate.”

Okay, so you read that part about it not having the same flavor or texture of chocolate. That is putting it mildly! Carob, in my opinion, has a similar flavor and texture to that of cardboard being finely shredded  and then dusted with a generic brand of cocoa powder.  It is NOT a substitute for chocolate.

My mother got creative with her attempts at helping me find peace with carob. There were carob-chip cookies (blech!), carob-covered peanuts (double blech!), and carob cake (I won’t even try to describe that one). She finally gave up. I was forever grateful and accepted my chocolate-less existence.

Then I met and married Most Wonderful Hubby. One day he casually asked why I was allergic to chocolate. I didn’t know. My mother said it was so, and so it was. He gave me half of his chocolate candy bar and I ate it. Then we both waited for me to break out in hives, collapse in a heap and in general do something that required a trip to the emergency room. When nothing happened, I think I heard a chorus singing hallelujah.

Suddenly the world was a happy place again, one filled with chocolate. Do you know how many new kinds of chocolate things are developed in a 12-year period? A lot! And I’m pretty sure I tasted every single one of them. I’m still on a quest to make sure no chocolate is left untasted. After all, I’ve got the rest of my life to make up for those 12 lost years.

Posted in entertain, Musings | Tagged , | 11 Comments »

Cooking School Fun

May 19, 2010 by Shanna Hatfield

Last week I had the opportunity to have a booth at a Taste of Home Cooking School. Because these events are so much fun and offer attendees a wealth of information as well as a great evening, they are the focus of my Wednesday Shout-Out.

Attendees get to come early, sample great food, receive discount coupons, interact with vendors and then enjoy a couple of hours of exciting recipes and on-stage cooking demonstrations. Did I mention the prizes? There are a lot of great prizes that are given away throughout the evening as well.

If you have the opportunity to attend a Taste of Home Cooking School, I highly recommend it. If nothing else, you’ll come home with some great new recipes to try!


Here is my booth in all it’s lime green and hot pink glory.

The cooking school crowd, enthralled with the presentation.

To find out more about Taste of Home Cooking Schools in your area, click here.

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Limes and Flowers Make Centerpiece Magic

May 18, 2010 by Shanna Hatfield

If you are looking for a centerpiece that brings a “Wow” factor to your table, think about combining unusual elements together.

One combination that I love is a vase filled with sliced limes topped with a bouquet of flowers. Not only is it a striking visual element on your table the smell of the limes mixing with the florals creates an appealing scent.

This centerpiece doesn’t take that long to put together, but really makes a statement.

To create it you will need:

6-8 limes (depending on size)

a hurricane vase

a plain glass  florist vase

6-8 stems of a “drapey” flower

6-8 stems of a “stalk” flower

10-12 stems of a “blooming” flower

To assemble, start by slicing your limes. I make the slices pretty thin.

When you are finished with that, put the plain florist vase inside the hurricane. It is okay if the florist vase sticks up a bit because the top will be hidden anyway.

Once the vase is in place, start layering in the limes until you’ve got them going up to the top of the hurricane. Fill both the hurricane and the plain vase with water.

Start arranging the flower stems inside the plain vase. I use the “drapey” flowers around the outside edge of the vase in particular,to hide the edges. The “stalk flowers” create some texture and height appeal while the “blooming” flowers add bright pops of color and texture.For this arrangement I used cuttings from a snowball bush that had not yet bloomed for my “drapey” flowers, lavender stems for my “stalk” flowers and peonies for the “blooming” flowers.

Have fun with this, be creative and remember there aren’t any rules set in stone about how this has to look. You could also substitute lemon or orange slices and you could use any combination of flowers and greenery. If you want dramatic height, you could even throw in a few tree branches.

Happy Entertaining!

Shanna

Posted in Centerpieces, Entertaining at Home, Entertaining Ideas, Quick and Easy | Tagged , , , , | 3 Comments »

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