Strawberry Bars Forever

I often get asked how my husband and I stay in such great shape what with all the baking I regularly do. My secret is that much like a shark, I never stop moving. "But Kate, you're sitting down to blog right now," you say? I'm tapping my foot at about a 50 mile an hour rate. Like a bumblebee on crack, I fidget. I assume fidgeting, along with intense workouts and dogs that will riot if not walked, helps me stay in shape. I enjoy really rich desserts, but every once in a while, I just want something light and low-cal. But usually when I hear the words "healthy dessert," I either assume it's actually cardboard or that whoever is trying to pitch it lives in a magical fairy-tale land full of whimsy and is completely insane. But as it turns out, that magical fairy-tale land happened to look quite a bit like my own kitchen this week. And while I may be heavy on the crazy, I've been told I'm not certifiably insane, so just go with me on this. What if I told you that you could eat a warm, sweet, glazed dessert for under 250 calories, AND I promise it isn't cardboard? No gimmicks! I'm starting to feel a lot like a used car salesman though, so let me wrap up the pitch and show you the damn dessert already. The low-cal dessert of your sweet-tooth-loving dreams has arrived:

I'll take five.

Dripping, yes, dripping with vanilla glaze, these strawberry oat bars are next-level goodness. Very rarely does a person get to eat a delicious dessert and not hate themselves immediately following (this can't just be me, but I am crazy, so who knows). Upon consumption, you have to remind yourself that feeling like a worthless sack of empty calories with lost Olympiad dreams simply isn't necessary! What I also love in a dessert is when it can double as breakfast (I am but a simple human). I've shared the merits of breakfast pie and breakfast cake before, but this is actually an acceptable breakfast because it has oatmeal in it. Although I will always argue the line between pie and turnover is thin and should be crossed, oatmeal is pretty damn normal where breakfast is concerned. Think of this as fully-constructed overnight oats. Baked for your taste buds' pleasure.

I have so much leftover oatmeal. I guess I could eat it for breakfast...but bacon exists, so yeah...

If you're not totally sold on the idea of a healthy dessert that's actually delicious, one, you're really hard to please and I feel sorry for the people that love you, and two, what if I told you that you already have everything you need to make these in your kitchen? Because I did. And I go through strawberries like, well, someone who really likes strawberries. A lot. So give your pantry a peruse and gather up:

• 1 cup Quaker Old Fashioned Oats (not the mushy quick-cook kind)
• 3/4 cup All Purpose flour
• 1/3 cup dark brown sugar
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp ground ginger
• 6-7 tablespoons melted butter
• 1 teaspoon cornstarch
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 16 strawberries, diced into quarters

Start by preheating the oven to 375 and line an 8x8 round or square pan with Parchment paper and spray with cooking spray. In a large bowl, mix the oats, flour, brown sugar, salt, and ginger together. Once combined, add in the melted butter and mix until all ingredients are damp. In a small, separate bowl, mix together the cornstarch, lemon juice, and sugar and set aside.

Press half of the crumb mixture into your prepared pan.

Top with the chopped strawberries. Then take the bowl of lemony sugar and pour over all the berries.

And finish off by sprinkling the rest of the crumb mix on top.

Bake for 40 minutes, until the top layer is golden brown and your house smells like brown sugar heaven. I was nearly drooling by the time these were done...Pavlov would've had a field day with me. Let cool on a rack for 10-20 minutes before placing (while still in the pan) into the fridge or freezer to fully cool and set. I placed into the freezer for a half an hour.

Which was really hard because, loooook at how yummy and golden.

I mean really, now you're just showing off, oat bars. You're not allowed to look as delicious and drool worthy as a cake.

Carefully, very, very carefully, remove your fully cooled strawberry oat bars from the pan (if you care about presentation). Clearly, I do because ugly photos means no likes on Facebook, and that makes me a sad panda. I found it best to take a sharp knife around the edge of the pan to separate any sticky areas, and then used the knife to lift out one corner so I could grab on to the Parchment paper and just slide it out on to a plate. It sounds complicated because it is. There was a lot of  low, hushed cursing at this point and prayers to several deities, but the dessert made it in one piece since it was a little frozen. Had I not needed presentation photos for some greedy jerks that read my blog...have I told you thanks for reading lately? My heart, much like my strawberry bars, is slightly frozen, so I'm not great with the gratitude.

Because without glaze, this is just breakfast food.

Glaze. There are few things in life that glaze can't make better. Bad day? Put some glaze on your pie. Put some glaze on your carrots. Put some glaze on your rolls. I'd put glaze on top of frosting if I wasn't positive it would give me diabetes. Simply gather up a small bowl, half a cup of powdered sugar, one teaspoon of vanilla extract, and one tablespoon of milk. Mix your ingredients together and get ready to drizzle, baby.

Pretty sure this is the definition of food porn.

At this point, you're ready to eat. Sliced into 8 larger bars, that's only 230 calories per bar. I know. Seems too good to be true. Certainly you're about to eat some cardboard with glaze on top of it. But on a scale of one to Ryan Lochte, I'm not even lying a little, not even lying a Lochte. Heat up your bar in the microwave so things are ooey gooey warm, and you will not be disappointed. The strawberry is a very versatile fruit. So versatile, in fact, you forget you're basically eating oatmeal for dessert because paired with the berries, glaze, and wonderful brown sugar, you've got guilt-free sweets for days! Or for a few days if you have to share...which is unfortunate. Because I promise you once you get a bite of these bars with their tart crunch and silky vanilla glaze, you're gonna want to keep these gems hidden. But I find if you tell people it's a low-cal, healthy dessert, they really do look at you like you're crazy and reach for the ice cream over your magical fantasy treat that only exists in fairy-tale land. They don't have to know it's real, but I can guarantee you one look at these bars and the only thing they won't believe is that they actually have redeeming nutritional value. But I'm okay with people thinking I'm insane if it means I get more dessert to myself. 'Til next time, my fellow eaters!

It's...berry...delicious. Second blog in a row ended on a terrible pun. How oat-terly terrible.

Orange You Glad I Bake?

When I was a wee child, I played soccer. I didn't so much play as I did sign up to get free orange slices at halftime. I mean, clearly I didn't join because I have a natural inclination for the sport. I have the coordination of a baby giraffe and a drunk toddler all wrapped up in one wobbly package. But damn if I didn't love those orange slices. I've always been a fan of fruit, seeing as it is the natural dessert of the food world. Bless the person who came up with fruit and dessert fondue. I remember in my youth my mom used to melt chocolate Symphony bars and dip strawberries in them to get us to eat anything other than McDonald's apple pies for dessert. Although, looking back, she probably also made this dessert because children drive you crazy, and every once in awhile you need to indulge in some really good chocolate to cope. She has also always been a fan of chocolate and orange combined together. I was introduced to the orange Milano cookie by my mother. I don't care who you are, when you bite into an orange Milano you get the distinct impression of what it must have felt like to be Italian nobility: "Servant--tell chef I require a dessert that has both chocolate and cream, but I must be able to eat it with my fingers without making any mess at all."  Talk about the good life. I'm still a huge fan of any flavor Milano cookie, but the orange will always reign supreme. I decided I needed to take this love to the next level, so naturally that means baking it into cake form. Say ciao! to the orange chocolate Milano cake, named as such for its shockingly identical taste...

Brown and orange, not just for the five remaining Cleveland Browns fans.

Like most of you, I've spent the last week and half living and breathing all things Olympics. I wonder how long synchronized swimming routines take to master and what it must feel like to be able to get your entire body perfectly inline with someone else's. I've yet to even master synchronized walking with my own two legs, so things like diving, swimming, and gymnastics leave me feeling relatively underwhelmed by my existence and generally concerned I may well step off a curb wrong and simply fall over dead one day. I was not blessed with a streamlined physique and proclivity for athletics. I was blessed with the ability to bake my ass off though, and I feel like this is worthy of a medal of some sort. Or at least a hearty thumbs up. And I can guarantee you that if you make this orange chocolate Milano cake, people will want to laud you with medals, well wishes, and for two seconds forget people with superhuman abilities exist (looking at you, Ledecky. There's only room for one Katy in this blog).

This is what a medal podium looks like in the baking world.

I searched high and low for the perfect orange chocolate cake recipe, and I was relatively shocked that Pinterest offered me nary a recipe up to my standards. It's like one of those moments when you Google something relatively simple and yield no results. I managed to quell the confusion and decided to go full Martha on this cake and just do it my damned self. Insider trading aside, she's a pretty big baking inspiration. To make my orange chocolate Milano cake, you'll need:

• 1 cup sugar
• 3/4 cup flour, plus 2 TBS
• 4 TBS Hershey's unsweetened cocoa powder
• 2 TBS Hershey's unsweetened dark cocoa powder
• 3/4 tsp baking soda
• 3/4 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 large egg at room temp
• 1/2 cup of milk at room temp
• 1/4 cup veggie or canola oil
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 TBS pure orange extract
• 1/2 cup nearly boiling water

While it's a lot of ingredients, everything falls together with nice ease. You can use a 9x9 or 8x8 circular or square pan for this recipe. Just be sure to grease the hell out of the pan. I even put down Parchment paper first and greased that since this is a very dense cake.

Preheat the oven to 350. I only have one giant mixing bowl in our what I call "somewhat" furnished condo (seriously, what furnished kitchen doesn't come with a pasta strainer), so make do with what ya got. Dump all the dry ingredients together and whisk until well incorporated. Then add in the egg, milk, veggie oil, and extracts and blend well. Finish off by adding in the hot water (carefully) and mixing.

So smooth. So dreamy. Like the Ryan Lochte of cakes.

Pour into your prepared baking pan. This cake will rise a bit, but it will not spill out of an 8x8 pan, I promise. It took my cake 30 minutes to finish baking throughout, but if you use a 9x9 pan, it will probably take less, so start checking for doneness (spell check doesn't believe this is a word) around 25-28 minutes. Let cool in the pan for 10 minutes before using an angled spatula to ensure your edges are not sticking to the pan before removing to a cooling rack to finish cooling.

I am also sans cooling rack, so this went on my cake round and directly into the freezer for 45 minutes. I do recommend freezing before crumb coating.

When we finally get to Florida and I can unpack my entire kitchen, you'll hear my sobs of happiness from a ten mile radius...especially when I'm reunited with my stand mixer. I apologize profusely to any of you who have tried to make my buttercream frosting with a bowl and hand mixer; it is not for the faint of heart.

But you're gonna have to do it again..

This makes a large enough amount of frosting that you could get fancy and torte your cake and fill the layers with frosting. I thought about it, but since I'm trying to have some semblance of healthy desserts in my life, I opted to skip the inch-thick additional layer of frosting in the middle of the cake. Trust me, it is still delicious enough without it. So to make enough frosting for the cake and for you to shamelessly shovel several spoonfuls into your mouth for taste testing purposes, you need:

• 1/2 cup of softened butter (1 stick)
• 1/4 cup of Hershey's Cocoa Powder
• 1/4 cup of Hershey's Special Dark Cocoa Powder (if you want an even lighter chocolate flavor, omit this and use 1/2 cup of the regular powder instead, but trust me when I say you want the dark cocoa powder)
• 1 tsp vanilla extract 
• 1 tsp pure orange extract
• 4 cups of powdered sugar
• 5 tablespoons of milk 

Cream the butter until fluffy, then add in the cocoa powders, extracts, two cups of powdered sugar, and two tablespoons of milk. Blend well, make a huge mess with your hand mixer, curse the life you took for granted that had a stand mixer in it, scrape the bowl, add in the remaining two cups of sugar and three tablespoons of milk, and realize cake baking can get pretty emotionally draining outside your normal kitchen.

Also realize you've been tricked into a crappy photo montage.

Crumb coat your cake once it is fully cooled; once again, I do recommend freezing this cake because it is extremely moist, so even frosting a crumb coat might be tricky. Slather a nice layer of crumb coat on your cake, throw back into the freezer for thirty minutes, and longingly gaze upon the bowl of frosting.

Or you could be more productive, gathering an orange, zester, knife, and fitting a piping bag with a 1M tip. Zest a bit of the orange before cutting it for garnish. Let the zest sit out to air dry for easier handling later.

Messy, rustic, chic, all the same.

You can smooth this frosting using the Viva paper towel trick, but I wanted to make it swirly since it was so nice and creamy. I applied my second layer of frosting over the entire cake with a small angled spatula and then came back over every inch of cake with it while swirling the spatula in wavy S patterns. I then took my remaining frosting and loaded it into the piping bag. I simply topped the cake with large, mounded stars, but you could do large shells or rosettes as well. Any of them would be pretty!

But much like me in high heels, these large, mounded stars make this single-layer cake look even taller.

I finished up my decorating by dusting the top of the cake with orange zest and a couple small slices of oranges. You could get really fancy and candy orange slices to top the cake with, but that takes two hours, and I was busy wondering what the actual rules for Olympic men's field hockey were and why everyone that plays this sport is ridiculously attractive, so I already had a full day.

This. cake. Orange my God (surprisingly kept the orange puns to a minimum in this blog. What a navel  novel idea). It is rich. It is moist. It tastes exactly like an orange Milano cookie. So to answer the question, yes, it is possible to make an orange Milano even better because you can turn it into cake. You could even garnish this cake with orange Milanos to have some sort of cake-cookie inception situation happening. This yields 10 slices of cake with each slice ringing in at just under 450 calories. I know, not light or healthy by any means, but I really did feel like an Italian noble while I ate it, so my waistline is just going to have to deal with it. After feeling so inferior while watching the Olympics, I deserved five minutes of feeling better than everyone who doesn't eat cake. I may not know the sweet taste of athletic victory, but I do know exactly how good it feels to devour chocolate orange Milano cake, so in your face, coordinated people of the world. If competitive cake eating ever becomes a thing, I'm bringing home the gold. 'Til next time, my fellow eaters!

Not trying this cake would be a pith-y. Get it? What an a-peeling pun. Okay, I'm done, I swear.

Dessert and Brunch Are Essentially the Same Thing Anyway.

So it's been awhile. Ever since Bakefest 2016 at the beginning of July, we had to play the "we're moving, so everything in the pantry must GO" game and I had nothing to bake. I've literally never had so much ramen in so many different ways before in my life. I cringe every time I hear a crinkle wrapper opening. Too soon. But now that we've settled into our long-term temporary abode (this is not an oxymoron if you're in the military) in the actual Land of Enchantment portion of New Mexico, I finally had the chance to go grocery shopping and NOT at a Walmart. You know you've been outside of civilization for too long when entering a real grocery store makes you so happy you almost cry. I've gone from no Targets to THREE. I've gone from no Chickfila to one that is two minutes away. I've gone from cow poo smell and desolate wasteland (think Mad Max) to mid afternoon rain and mountains. I'm, dare I say, happy. Aside from the soul-crushing fact that Blue Bell ice cream is absent from Albuquerque. Call me Icarus, thinking I could fly that close to the sun and have it all. Well, I may not be able to have Blue Bell until November, but dammit, I can still bake.

Where there's an oven, there's a Kate.

These little beauties are blueberry crumble bars. Not to be confused with blueberry cobbler because blueberry crumble bars are a handheld item. This is really one of the only differences, I suppose. But I've always wondered if there was any way to have cobbler like everywhere and anywhere I go, so I've solved a longstanding personal problem with this recipe. These can work excellently for brunch or as a dessert. You can top them with ice cream to make them absolutely divine, but people might judge you if you starting eating ice cream at 10:30 a.m. ...and yet they're perfectly okay with you getting loaded on champagne. It's a fickle world we live in, people.

New kitchen, same crappy photos!

It takes longer for these bars to bake than it does to pretty much quite literally throw them together. I actually had to go out and buy most of my ingredients since we showed up to our townhouse with a box full of cereal and pretty much nothing else in the way of food, but you've probably got most of what you need. Gather up:

• 3 cups of flour
• 1 1/2 cups of sugar, divided
• 1 tsp of baking powder
• 1/2 tsp of salt
• 1 cup of butter (COLD)
• 1 egg
• Fresh blueberries (I used 1 lb, feel free to use 2 for extra goodness)
• 1 heaping tablespoon of cornstarch
• 3 tablespoons of lemon juice

Start by greasing an 8x11 or 9x13 pan and preheating the oven to 375. Fun fact! Our new place has a gas oven/stove, and I forgot that it always smells like the house might explode when you cook with them. Good times.

It kind of looks like cornbread at this point.

 In one bowl, mix the flour, 1 cup of sugar, baking powder, and salt together. Cut the butter into small pieces and then use two forks to incorporate the butter. This is a really obnoxious process, but our furnished place didn't come with a pastry cutter (I know, right? Don't they know who I am?). Add in the egg and blend...things will be very thick and kinda crumbly...hence the name "crumble" bar. 

You missed my smartassery.

Press half the batter into the bottom of your greased dish. I used an 8x11 dish (because it was all our house came with. Recurring themes...). But this yields really thick bars, and I like more dessert for the punch. If you use a 9x13 pan, you'll probably need to use 3/4 of the batter but the bars will be thinner.

If you eat enough blueberries, will your skin turn blue? These are my deep thoughts.

Take your remaining half a cup of sugar, the cornstarch, and the lemon juice and whip into a thick paste. Fold in the blueberries and really make sure they all get coated.

But like, how many blueberries would it actually take to turn your skin blue?

Dump your blueberry mix on top of the batter mix. Use a spoon to even out the blueberries. You're gonna want an even distribution of crust to berry. Trust me. I'm a professional. Or something.

Can you get blueberry poisoning? Because that would probably happen before your skin turned blue.

Take the remaining batter mix and press it on top of the blueberry layer. I honestly had a handful or two leftover. You want enough to cover the berries but not so thick a layer that it won't brown up on top without burning the bottom crust layer.

Because daaaamn it looks good all nice and browned.

Baking time will vary depending on the size of the pan you use. With the 8x11, I baked for 45 minutes and broiled for 5 to brown the top crust. You'd probably need to reduce baking time 5-10 minutes in a 9x13, but still broil to get the crust golden. Now, the hard part: put in the fridge for several hours to cool. I wanted dessert and fast after going for so long without baked goods, so this went into the freezer for two hours to set.

Totally worth it.

Now, here's the shocking part: one of these little bars will ring in at only 300 calories. Not terrible in the realm of dessert, especially since I know ways of making one slice of cake run you nearly 900. Gluttony, thy name is Kate. But with Florida really looming on our horizon now, I must unfortunately actually reel in the old sweet tooth. The great thing about these bars is that they are nice and sweet while not breaking the old calorie bank. Until you "Kate them up" and add ice cream, anyway. The first night we had these, we decided that for future consumption to warm them up in the microwave for 30 seconds to make them ooey gooey in the middle, which was a total win. But then we also decided a scoop of homemade vanilla from Blue Bell would make these taste absolutely heavenly. Subsequently, I spent the following day running around every store I could think of frantically searching for Blue Bell. I got really twitchy. And then really sad when the cashier at the commissary told me Blue Bell isn't sold out here anymore. I died a little when I placed a carton of Breyers in my cart. It made do, and I was reminded with each scrumptious bite that complaining about ice cream is a problem I'll gladly take after living for over five years in an area that sanctimoniously crushed souls and enjoyed it. Now excuse me while I go enjoy that mountain view some more while bopping up and down like an overeager toddler on sugar because I've earned it. 'Til next time my fellow eaters!

Ultimately, still delicious. But you better believe we're trying this recipe again when we return to the promised land with Blue Bell. Why yes, I am so Texan it hurts. How did you know?

A Cake United...

Between my husband's birthday, Shark Week, and the holiday weekend, it's been a pretty banner couple of days for us. Those of you that know me well know my absolute obsession with Shark Week. A misunderstood creature that looks mean and likes food, like, a lot? This speaks to me on so many levels. Plus, truly nothing feels more American to me than a one-ton eating machine springing from the ocean to devour its food. Perhaps the only way it could get any more American is if the scientists recording these beasts shot off a flare every time a shark jumped out of the water at impressive speed and height. The only downside to Fourth of July weekend is that one of our dogs, Hank, is insanely terrified of fireworks. For about two-three weeks around this time of year, neighbors are shooting off fireworks and poor Hank is hiding under the bed, certain the world is coming to an end and I'm doing nothing to stop it. Since we had a party to attend yesterday evening, we decided to dose him with melatonin to ease his anxiety. Because nothing says, "I care," quite like sedating your loved ones. My only other problem with the Fourth of July weekend is coming up with a dessert that screams 'True American Patriot.' I outdid myself the very first year I got into baking, so it was an inevitable slow decline in effort on my part in the year following. I decided to bake something this year so full of red, white, and blue it looks like an American flag threw up. That's right, I made a red, white, and blue tie-dye berry American flag cake. Because there are three things that are truly important to me: Freedom. 'Merica. And cake.

So much freedom.

I showed up at this party with an insanely American dessert and an equally insanely American husband. He loves this country, and he has amassed a wardrobe that shows it. From American flag bandana, tank top, sunglasses, board shorts, and USA face shield, the only thing he was missing was red, white, and blue flip flops...next year. But I'm pretty sure all of the Founding Fathers were impressed with his outfit, as were the party goers. On a scale of one to America, my husband really loves his freedom. I'll admit it was a great conversation starter (the outfit, not the cake), and being the wife of the most American to ever America did fill me with a lot of pride. It may look difficult to assemble, but I had this bad boy ready to go in under two hours (the cake, not my husband). Minus wait time for the cake to cool, this was so insanely quick to assemble. I recommend bringing this to all your celebratory barbecues tonight and tomorrow if you're in need of a dessert. If he could, Ben Franklin would totally high five you for making a dessert this patriotic, and you know it.

This is, once again, a part of the "We're moving soon" collection.

You probably don't randomly have half a strawberry cake mix and half a white cake mix in your pantry. I do because this is a problem only a lazy baker could have. If by some strange coincidence, you're in my boat, just be sure to half the ingredients needed for each cake and keep the strawberry cake totally separate from the white cake (dye the strawberry cake red, split the white cake in half and dye one half blue). If you're a normal human being, you need:

• 1 white cake mix
• 4 room temp egg whites
• 2/3 cup of room temp butter
• 1 1/4 cups of room temp milk
• Red and blue gel dye
• 1-2 lbs fresh strawberries 
• 1 cup fresh blueberries

Grease a 9x13 pan (mine was disposable, so when baking, I placed it on a cookie sheet) and preheat your oven to 350. Dump all ingredients except the dyes and fruits into your stand mixer and blend on medium-high for two minutes. Divide up the cake batter into three bowls:

Leave one bowl white and dye the other two red and blue.

Then gather up three spoons and plop a spoonful of each color into the pan in random order.

Do this until you've run out of colors. Doesn't need to be pretty, it will look awesome after it has baked.

Don't swirl the batter, just tap your pan on the counter to even things out. Bake as directed for about 25-30 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. Let rest on a cooling rack for 10 minutes before removing from the pan (unless you're using a disposable pan, then leave that sucker in there). If you want to speed things up, place in the freezer for a half hour.

It looks even better on the inside! Promise. Got a drab camouflage happening here.

What, no vodka?

 Full disclosure, the party we went to was with members of a different squadron...so, people not indoctrinated to my need to add booze to every dessert I make. I decided to make this cake sans alcohol and went with my standard buttercream recipe:

• 1 cup of room temp butter
• 1 TBS clear vanilla extract
• 1/2 tsp almond extract
• 6 cups powdered sugar
• 4-5 TBS milk or heavy cream

Cream the butter until fluffy, then add in the extracts, three cups of sugar, and two tablespoons of milk. Blend well, scrape the bowl, and add in the remaining three cups of sugar and two tablespoons of milk. If frosting is still too thick, add in one more tablespoon of milk.

Remove your cooled cake from the freezer or wherever you've stashed it and give it a solid crumb coat. Banish it back to the depths of the freezer for 15-30 minutes until completely crusted.

While this is taking place, go ahead and cut a bunch of strawberries in half. I ended up using 3/4 of a 2 lb container.

Add a final coat of frosting to the cake; you should have a generous amount of frosting leftover in the bowl to pipe stripes later. Don't freeze! Arrange your fruit into a flag shape while the frosting is still soft to help adhere the fruit in place.

Like so. I eventually moved and added more blueberries because I had a ton of them leftover.

Then fit a piping bag with a 1M tip and pipe large shells in between each row of strawberries to create a nice, polished finishing look.

Here it is with the additional blueberries. Much prettier.

And it did look super vibrant once we cut into it! The tie-dye pattern varies with each slice which is really a cool touch.

 As far as cakes go, I never think to add fruit on top of them. Make cake healthy? What? You can do that? But strawberries on top of my almond buttercream...perfection. I'm not ashamed to say I wanted to sit down in a corner and just eat three or four slices of cake. It's my right as an American, after all. I definitely play by the "go big or go home" adage of America, and this cake was no exception. I think it would look really cool if you did take a knife to the batter and swirl an 'S' shape into it...then it would be a really trippy tie-dye. I may try that in the future with other cakes. As far as eating the first cake in months not made from a handle of rum or vodka goes, it was actually quite refreshing. I love being the boozy baker, but going back to basics is nice sometimes. Plus, there were booze-soaked cherries at the party, so I got my fix. I love the right to bare boozy foods, what can I say. I hope you all have a fantastic Independence Day. Blow stuff up, eat meat in tube form, drink cheap, watery beer, and gorge on dessert. Be as American as possible (preferably while clad in every article of American flag clothing you own)! Just make sure your pets are safely in hiding and you don't set yourself on fire or lose a toe to a rogue roman candle. No amount of cake in the world can fix that. 'Til next time, my fellow eaters!

I like to celebrate my freedom with a side of frosting and a boatload of calories.

Dirty 30: Part Deux

So today we continue what has been termed "Derekpalooza" at our house. But today also marks the actual birthday of my husband, so it carries extra importance. The week-long celebration of Derekpalooza started last Saturday with the big 3-0 birthday cake, and will end on 4th of July weekend...which is fitting because my husband is real-life Captain America. If you don't believe me, just wait until the Instagram pics get posted from the 4th of July BBQ we'll be at Saturday to see what he's got planned. Tonight we're going out to a nice dinner with friends, so I knew we'd be too full for cake. I decided to do cake and presents last night, mostly because I could no longer contain the excitement over the gift I purchased him. When my husband opened up his thirtieth birthday present from me to find it was a Super-freakin-Nintendo, I think the last time I saw him that blissfully overjoyed with happiness was the day we were married (little did he know...I kid). A few weeks ago after I had hunted one down, he casually mentioned in conversation about needing to find a Super Nintendo. In my head, the voice was screaming "PANIC MODE, ENGAGE!," but outside I maintained composure and responded as only a wife can with steely poker face, "But we already have a Nintendo 64 you never play." I should probably be a politician. While the N64 has been neglected as of late, we're a bit busy trying to sell our stupid house. I mean, trying to sell our luxurious three-bedroom/two-bathroom home that you should totally tell your friends about. So that and getting ready to move has taken total control of our lives. But I knew we needed a break, and no matter what birthday a man is celebrating, cake and video games are an excellent way to relax. I wanted a birthday cake that went along with the Nintendo theme. I know my husband's favorite old school Nintendo game, and I was still trying desperately to clear out our bar before the move, so what came to fruition was this, the Svedka strawberry lemonade, 8-bit Legend of Zelda cake:

I will always believe the original Nintendo has the most bitchin' graphics.

I never played Zelda. I know. I had to do a little research before making this...Zelda is the princess, but the main character is Link? To me, this makes as much sense as calling Super Mario World "Princess Peach World," but no one asked me. And besides, my husband loved it, so all's well that ends well. And sweet baby Jesus was this cake delicious. Svedka strawberry lemonade vodka, from what I remember, always made the best summer cocktails. This translated perfectly into the best summer cake. It is oh-so-fluffy, sweet, and has a hint of lemon, which goes great with a base strawberry cake. And the frosting. Oh the frosting. I'm telling you, the only way I ever want to consume vodka again is via buttercream frosting. This has such a nice zing, but without the burning sensation usually accompanied by drinking the stuff. And it's honestly probably got the same calorie count as a vodka punch, but without the awful headache. Small miracles.

Even the bottle is pretty.

Once again, going the lazy baker route. I don't have a homemade strawberry cake recipe...yet. I promise that one day I will, but until then, if it ain't broke...

• One box strawberry cake mix
• One cup of room temp butter
• Four room temp eggs
• 3/4 cup of room temp strawberry lemonade vodka (I swear by Svedka, best cheap vodka out there, and I would know)
• 1/4 cup room temp milk

I know, I upped the ante with the amount of booze in this recipe. I think I may go full scale for my next recipe because this turned out amazing. All you need to do is grease a 9x13 pan, preheat the oven according to box directions, and dump everything in your stand mixer and blend on medium-high for two minutes. Pour the batter into the pan and bake...watch carefully for time. I think the amount of alcohol in the cake and how it bakes out in the oven causes the cake to bake faster. A typical 9x13 cake is done in the 30-35 minute window. This finished at 22 minutes. So it's either that or my oven is getting ready to break, which would make perfect sense since we're trying to sell our house. Someone knock on some wood for me.

Pictured: Supreme 90s kid candies

 I won't lie to you. While your cake cools on a cooling rack, you're gonna spend about three hours chopping candies to make an 8-bit cake of any variety: Mario, Zelda, Donkey Kong, you name it. You will be so sick of Starbursts that you swear you'll never eat one again, only to realize you still have half a bag and no choice. The things we do for the people we love. But here's the exact amount of candies you need to create Link, the dude from Zelda who was robbed of getting a game named after him.

• 8 yellow Starbursts (I'm told people hate these; they are my favorite. This tells you everything you need to know about me.)
• 2 packages of watermelon Airheads (I bought 4 and only used half)
• 6 pink Starbursts (I was going to use pink lemonade Airheads, but they were pink pink)
• 4 Tootsie Rolls

Throw in a few extra for taste tests.

Couple of tips:

• Work with one color at a time.
• Heat for about 8 seconds in the microwave to make more malleable.
• Roll out each candy with a sturdy glass (rolling pins are too large).
• Use a very sharp knife, and clean candy residue off after each candy.
• Assemble a mock up on a sheet of foil or Parchment paper before you even think about assembling on a cake. I redid my candies quite a bit.

Once rolled out, trim edges of each piece into a nice square.

And cut each candy into quarters.

Slowly but surely, things will come along!

I didn't need to roll out my Airheads, so I heated and cut them up in the manner you see here.

Like the world's tastiest cross stitch pattern.

I also recommend using tweezers to help you assemble things. Starbursts are ridiculously sticky.

I did the Tootsie Rolls last because I simply believe they are an inferior chocolate and deserve to be treated as such. If I could've found a way to use Godiva for this, I would have.

I placed my Link rendering into the fridge while I worked on making my frosting and crumb coating my cake. I wondered to myself what the hell he was holding, but every 8-bit Link Google image search showed it, so I figured the internet wasn't playing a cruel trick on me for once.

This frosting will change you.

Three simple ingredients to make the best frosting I've ever had in my life. Well, tied with Baileys frosting. Nothing could ever be better than Baileys frosting. That's just crazy talk. You need:

• 1 cup of room temp butter
• 6 cups of powdered sugar
• 4-5 tablespoons of Svedka strawberry lemonade vodka

Cream the butter until fluffy then add in three cups of sugar and two tablespoons of vodka. Mix until well incorporated. Dump in the remaining three cups of sugar and two tablespoons of vodka. Blend well. If too stiff, use the extra tablespoon of vodka. The icing will smell like a stiff drink, but it tastes divine and not like a shot of vodka, I promise. This recipe will give you enough frosting for a crumb coat, final coat, and piped border.

I got out my Link rendering to make sure he would fit on my cake. I needed to make him just a bit shorter, so I took off a row of whatever that yellow thing is. Someone help me, I know nothing about Zelda. But I cold spend six hours telling you the merits of playing as Luigi in Mario World. Crumb coat your cake and stick in the freezer for 15-30 minutes.

Then add the final layer of frosting. Doesn't have to be too pretty, we'll smooth it out later. Place back in the freezer for 15-30 minutes.

Then you can use the Viva paper towel trick to get things smoothed out.

Then I used my tweezers to transfer Link on to the actual cake. He looks relatively surprised by this turn of events.

I actually had 3/4 of a piping bag full of green frosting leftover from Derek's first 30th birthday cake last Saturday, so I used that to pipe a star border around the entire cake using a #21 tip. I wrote out the birthday message with a #3 tip. I had enough of the new frosting leftover to make a border though, so no worries if you aren't like me and don't have random stockpiles of frosting in your freezer. But lucky me, I just got to sit down and eat some by itself. It's like strawberry lemon heaven. Sweet, packs a zing, and just leaves you wanting a whole glass. Or in this case, spoon.

Then I added in some very festive and sparkly candles because every dessert should have sparkle.

 As excited as I was for Derek to open his birthday present, I was absolutely dying for him to see the cake. Clearly my baking is the best present I can give anyone since it requires so much time, patience, and effort to create something tailored specifically to one person. But a Super Nintendo is a very close second. I am proud to report he loved it. He thought it was insanely cool and had to take several pictures on his own phone (this is how I know it was a winner). I can't say enough about how light and fluffy vodka makes a cake...it's crazy, especially since it has the exact opposite effect on most people. Try making a flavored vodka cake, you will be impressed. All in all, baking, frosting, and piping border on to the cake took barely any time which helps make up for the tedium of chopping tiny 8-bit squares. No matter how much time it takes, this is a really clever way to decorate a cake, and I'm totally saving this for more ideas later. And anything that makes my husband happy is worth the time and effort. Now that you're ready to gag and/or barf, I'll take my leave. 'Til next time, my fellow eaters!

I promise to make you only the raddest of cakes from now until the time I have really terrible arthritis from cake decorating. Happy Birthday, Derek! I am so happy we get to celebrate you! Derekpalooza!!!