Tasty Tuesday: Chocolate Eclairs

The BF's birthday was yesterday and I made two desserts.  He's special enough that he got two.  Dark chocolate fudge cake and chocolate eclair cake.  And they can't be any more different from each other.

The BF has a love affair of sorts with this chocolate eclair recipe.  He's mentioned that it's his favorite dessert ever.  And I will have to admit, it is pretty darn good.  Graham crackers.  Mmm.  French vanilla pudding and Cool Whip.  Yes.  Chocolate.  Can't go wrong that.  All put together to create a marvelous no bake dessert. 

This is the recipe that his mom has always used and I have no idea where she got it from.  The last time I made this, the store didn't have french vanilla pudding (seriously?) and regular vanilla was used instead.  Still tasted good, but not the same.... 

Chocolate Eclairs
1 box honey graham crackers
2 boxes instant French vanilla pudding
3 c milk
1 tub Cool Whip

-Cover the bottom of a 9x13 inch pan with graham crackers.
-Mix the pudding mixes with the milk. Whip until it thickens. Then fold in the Cool Whip.
-Place half of the pudding mixture over the graham crackers in the pan. Then cover that layer of pudding with more graham crackers. Pour the rest of the pudding mix on top of that. Cover with a last layer of graham crackers.

2 squares unsweetened chocolate
2 tbsp butter
1 tsp vanilla
2 tbsp corn syrup
1 1/2 c powdered sugar
3 tbsp milk

-Melt together the chocolate and butter. Add the vanilla, corn syrup, powdered sugar, and milk. Pour over the graham crackers and refrigerate for a couple of hours.

Seriously, the hardest part of this is waiting for the cake to set in the fridge.

The Cake from the Birthday

It's amazing how fast a week can go.

The BF's birthday came and went. We went to the movies and ate Mexican food. And as I promised, here's a picture of the cake. The BF is into video games, and recently, he's been really into this game called Skyrim. Well anyway, I wanted to incorporate that into his cake. I made a homemade chocolate cake and used whipped vanilla frosting.

I made an outline of the dragon that's on the cover. I melted semi-sweet chocolate and poured it onto a wax paper that I placed on top of the outline I drew. I then put the dragon in the fridge to harden. After I frosted and topped with the dragon, I made the edges. I melted some more chocolate and smudged it on some tin foil that I cut to size to fit the edge of the cake. I put the tin foil with chocolate on the sides and put it in the fridge to harden. A couple of hours later, I took the tin foil off and the chocolate wall stayed on. The BF was impressed...and it didn't last very long.

In other news, the weather has been up and down here. It's warm one day and freezing the rest. I'm from the south and I'm just not used to this. The BF is from Michigan, so he's used to 8 month winters. Anyway, the day before his birthday, the sun was out and it was in the 50's (in February). We enjoyed the day by going for a walk/run. And we wanted to capture the fact that he's wearing shorts and a tshirt.  He doesn't recall having that many birthdays without snow.

Stay classy my friends,

Heidi

Happy Birthday!!

Today is the BF's 27th birthday.  We're keeping it low key.  All he really wants to do is go to Baja Fresh and go to the movies to see Chronicle.  So far, he's spent the day plaing video games.  Whatever he wants, it's his day. 

Him playing video games and being out of the kitchen has given me an opportunity to work on his cake.  I've kind of started this little tradition where I suprise him with a cake.  One of his favorite foods are tacos, so last year I made...a taco cake!  It took a little bit of creativity, but I got it done.


I mixed cookie crumbs into the white fondant to give the brown spots that are normally in flour tortillas.



I used half the chocolate batter for a round cake and the rest for cupcakes. I cut the round cake in half, frosted with chocolate icing and put them into the fondant "tortillas." I crumbled the cupcakes to resemble the ground beef and covered the rest of the round cake inside. 

The toppings were made out of fruit rollups and starbursts.

And the "taco sauce" was red icing.

As awesome as it looked, it didn't have the greatest taste.  I wasn't a fan of the sugary fondant. 

So this year, I'm leaning towards a better flavor with a simpler design.  It's a chocolate cake with vanilla frosting....with a suprise!



Stay classy my friends,
Heidi