Ice-cream Cake with Chocolate Ganache

It was my MIL's 75th birthday. We had lunch at the restaurant (I was a little lazy to cook up a storm; anteeksi äiti!) but I 'assembled' an ice-cream cake for her. It was a 'short cut cake' as I have used store-bought sponge layered cake and ice-cream. Nothing made from scratch except for the ganache. But nevertheless, it was good and all of us were happy.

Fresh strawberries for decor

A good peek of the cake 

Ingredients

1 tub of 2-litre vanilla ice-cream
30g of crushed almond cookies (something I got from the store here but you can always replace with chocolate flakes, sprinkles, nuts or anything that you can think of)
1 store-bought pack of 3 layers chocolate sponge cake 
Fresh strawberries (for decoration)
50 ml of whipped cream (for crumb coating)
A tsp of icing sugar

Chocolate Ganache
180ml of whipped cream
20g butter
200g of dark chocolate

Method

1. Line your pan with cling wrap (with extra for wrapping the cake later) and put in the first layer of sponge cake.
2. Mix the vanilla ice-cream and crushed almond cookies well and scoop half of the mixture into the pan. 
3. Level the ice-cream well.
4. Put another layer of the sponge cake and press it down firmly and put in the remaining mixture.
5. Top up with the last layer of sponge cake.
6. Wrap it up with the cling wrap and store in the freezer for 5 hours or overnight. (I usually leave it overnight)
7. Whip up the cream till peak first and then take out the cake. Do a thin layer of crumb coat and store in the freezer again for 2 hours. 
8. Then take it out and do a second layer of crumb coat, make sure that the whole cake is covered and store in the freezer again.
9. Crush the chocolate in a heat-proof bowl. Heat up butter and whipped cream in a pot and as it starts to boil, take the pot away from the heat.
10. Gently, pour the mixture into the chocolate and use a spoon to stir well-make sure all the chocolate is melted and the mixture is well-combined. (Try to be gentle as you do not want to have air bubbles trapped in the mixture)
11. Take out the ice-cream cake and place it on a wire rack. 
12. Pour out the chocolate ganache (starting from the middle) and work very quickly with a spoon/spatula and let the ganache spread all over the cake. 
13. Let the ganache settle in for a few minutes and store the cake in the freezer again.
14. Decorate with fresh strawberries and sprinkle some icing sugar just before serving.
15. Enjoy!

Note: You can refer to my oreo ice-cream cake for the setting up of the pan. :)

Baked Honey Ribs with Mashed Potatoes

A simple dinner for my little boy's birthday celebration. He loves mashed potatoes and tender ribs. My fussy princess was also chomping down those yummy ribs. My, oh my.. I'm so pleased. :) Our dessert for the day is Oreo ice-cream birthday cake.  Yippeee!

Ingredients

Honey Ribs

700g pork ribs

5 tbsps honey

5 tbsps soya sauce

2 tsps salt

Mashed Potatoes

10 medium-sized potatoes

Slabs of butter 

Milk

Salt to taste

Vegetables of your choice

Method

1. Marinate the ribs with honey, soy sauce and salt for at least 4 hours or overnight.
2. Bake the ribs at preheated oven (200 deg) for 40mins. Do check after 30mins if they brown too fast. 
3. In the meanwhile, boil potatoes and mash them with butter and milk (to taste) till smooth and combined. Season with a little salt to taste.
4. Blanch your choice of vegetables.
5. Serve warm.

Juicy + Yummy

Dessert of the day

p.s. The marshmallows are only for decoration purposes. Somehow, none of us in the family likes them. Do you like it? 

Oreo Ice-Cream Cake

An ice-cream cake for a special occasion, birthday or party? A pretty easy cake to make. All you need is to do it 1 or 2 days before. A few store-bought ingredients will make this cake presentable and hopefully, a 'wow' factor. You can choose your fillings as what you like. Mix and match is the key here. I find it a little too sweet as I have added the dark chocolate chips. If I make this combination again, I would not use the chips. AND Twix. But the caramel is so goooood. Okay, perhaps half of it. ;)  

Vanilla ice-cream, OREO and Twix 

Store-bought chocolate sponge cake -cut into desired size

Ice-cream, OREO, Twix and chocolate chips-beaten till combined

Ready to be frozen

Top layer-chocolate sponge cake

Frost with whipped cream

Melted dark chocolate as decor

Final Product

A slice of the yummy ice-cream cake

Ingredients

2 litres of vanilla ice-cream

1 pack of 150g of OREO cookies

1 pack of Twix

2 layers of chocolate sponge cake (I have used ICA's brand)

50g of dark chocolate chips (optional)

3 dl of whipped cream

1 pack of baking dark chocolate

some cocoa powder

Method

1. Line your baking pan with clingwrap. This makes it easy for removal later. 
2. Remove the cream from Oreo cookies, place these cookies and Twix in a ziplock bag and crush them with a rolling pin. You can have a variety of sizes (small bits and powderish). Keep some 'powderish' Oreo for decoration.
3. Cream ice-cream, crushed cookies and dark chocolate chips till combined. Use low speed.
4. Put 1 layer of chocolate sponge cake in the baking pan as the bottom layer. 
5. Scoop the ice-cream mixture into the pan and level it. 
6. Put the 2nd layer of chocolate sponge cake on top. Cover the cake with the cling wrap and freeze it overnight.
7. Transfer the cake to a plate or a cake holder. Beat 3dl of whipped cream and use it to frost the cake. You can use a spatula or a spoon. Work quickly to avoid melting. 
8. Sprinkle some 'powderish' Oreo at the sides of the cake and freeze it for 30 mins. 
9. In the meanwhile, melt dark chocolate in the microwave or over a pot of boiling water. 
10. Line a pan with a piece of parchment/baking paper and sprinkle some cocoa powder.
11. Next, use a spoon and drizzle the melted chocolate all over a baking/parchment paper. You can create your own design. I did the 'scribbling' method. 
12. Sift some cocoa powder on the melted chocolate and let them set in the fridge for 30 mins.
13. Sprinkle the rest of the Oreo on the cake and layer the chocolate on top. You can break them into desired sizes.
14. Pipe some whipped cream as decor and top with Oreo cookies.
15. Serve it as soon as the decoration is done.