Colorful Birthday Surprises!

***WARNING: This post is riddled with pictures!***

Consider yourself warned. A few weeks ago, Laura and I traveled to her home to surprise her dad for his birthday. We had a blast planning out the menu and executing, as we were both officially DONE with school. Summer is in! So we celebrated by spending all day in the kitchen. It was heaven to me! Plus, Laura and I have learned to be a pretty bang-up kitchen team. She's the cook, I'm the baker. It works out nicely.

EDad really likes spaghetti. It's standard fare for most American households, and he's happy as a lark when spaghetti is served. We wanted to give the spaghetti a nudge of excitement, as this was a party we were throwing! Our spaghetti came with homemade tomato sauce, sauteed veggies, and turkey meatballs. And everyone seemed to enjoy it! Sometimes ground turkey can turn out dry, but our meatballs were really good, if I do say so myself.

We also made another one of EDad's favs - Frozen Pea Salad. We omitted the step about warming the bacon bits, but apparently it was a crucial step that allowed the flavors to meld together Whoops! We'll know for next time.

Finally, the cake of all colorful cakes was made for dessert. EDad's favorite of all favorites is M&Ms, so we, naturally, HAD to incorporate them. Laura found a great little recipe for M&M cake, and it turned out quite nicely. The batter was more of a pound cake consistency, and M&Ms were baked right in, so a layer of candy-coated chocolate formed on the bottom. There was a simple lemon-y glaze that went over the cake and created the glue for more M&M decorations. It was pretty tasty if I do say so myself!

We had a great time! Thanks to Laura's family for allowing us free-range in the kitchen! I love birthdays!

I leave you now with just a little bit of ambiance (haha!) and a recipe.

Christmas M & M Cake or...Anytime CakeCAKE:

1 cup butter -- softened

1 cup sugar

1/2 cup light brown sugar

3 eggs

1 cup milk

1 teaspoon vanilla

2 1/2 cups flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/8 teaspoon salt

1-16 oz. pkg. red and green M&M's (Any Color Will Do)

FROSTING:

1 cup powdered sugar

juice of 1 lemon

2 teaspoons water

1. Cream together butter and sugars until light. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition.

2. Stir together milk and vanilla.

3. Mix together flour, baking powder, and salt. Alternately add flour and milk to creamed mixture.

4. Reserve 1/4 cup M&M's for topping. Stir remaining M&M's into batter. Pour into greased and floured 12-cup bundt or tube pan.

5. Bake at 350 for 40-50 minutes. Cool 15 minutes before removing from pan.

6. Mix together frosting ingredients to make glaze. Drizzle over top and decorate with reserved 1/4 cup M&M's.

NOTE: The chocolate from the M&M's melts and goes to the bottom of the pan (top when turned out of pan) and the red an green M&M's leave colorful trails throughout the cake.

Tummy Tea

Sometimes you just don't feel good. It's not exactly a sickness of any particular sort but you just feel crummy, whether is due to stress or lack of sleep. Laura came back with my new favorite home remedy for tummy aches and general crummy-ness - Ginger Tea. It's really all quite simple, but she made this concoction several times for me in the last few weeks of school during the late night study sessions (hence the picture below of my messy desk.) And now I'm sharing it with you!

Ginger Tea

1 T. grated ginger root
1 pinch of black pepper
1 1/2 c. hot water
1 T. honey
1 t. lemon juice

1) Heat the water in the microwave
2) Bundle ginger and pepper in a tea steeper (or a small sac made of paper towel and dental floss like Laura did)
3) Let the ginger steep for several minutes
4) Stir in honey and lemon juice
5) Enjoy!

Strawberry Dancing

If you haven't taken advantage of the bounties of the season, I suggest you head to your local farmers market and scoop up all the goodies you can! Spring is fraught with fresh, yummy produce just aching to be eaten. From asparagus and artichokes to rhubarb and strawberries. It's really incredible how spring brings forth beautiful, edible wealth! I went to the farmer's market last Saturday and stocked up on asparagus, carrots, cabbage, and more. It was wonderful!

But I digress... this post is specifically about strawberries and before I got off the bloggers deep end babbling on about how I love spring foods (and trust me, I could babble), I will get back to the point. I have a not-so-secret obsession with strawberry picking. Aside from desperately wanting to have my own garden/farm of wonderful foods to tend to and appreciate and EAT, which I'm pretty sure is just an excuse for me to play in the dirt no matter what age I am, I satisfy my craving for digging in the dirt by picking seasonal foods from You-Pick farms. This spring (well really just in the past month) I have picked strawberries 4 different times. Twice near my home, once near school, and once in my current town. Each time I have thoroughly enjoyed the direct farm-to-table bounty, and knowing that I am supporting local agriculture and taking responsibility for my food chain make me feel good. There is just something about talking to the farmers that makes you feel secure about the food you consume. (Instead of some of the produce in the grocery store that has to travel all around the world to get to you.)

But I digress yet again... Phil and Laura accompanied me on this particular strawberry picking trip. We had a blast surveying the rows and rows of berries and finding 3 beautiful baskets of plump, juicy ones. Most of them were consumed as is, but Laura did make a strawberry cake, and I made some strawberry bread with another bunch I picked near home.

I think I might freeze a bunch so I can have more throughout the summer! Yum!