Tuesday, May 5, 2009

Cake Bites

What you'll need:

Cake mix (I used Devil's Food)

Eggs

Vegetable oil

Frosting- I prefer the Whipped Chocolate

Melting Chocolate- I prefer Guittard milk chocolate wafers

Toothpicks- the plastic ones with the spears on the end work great!

Wax paper

Plastic Spoon


Directions:
-Start by baking the cake according to the directions on the box. Make sure you grease and flour the pan so the cake is easy to remove.
-Once the cake is baked, pull it out of the oven and let it cool for about 20-30 minutes.
-Dump the cake into a large mixing bowl and add 2 spoon fulls of frosting and begin mashing the frosting into the cake with your hands.
-Once all of the frosting is mixed into the cake and it is moist you can begin rolling the mixture into balls with the palms of your hands.
-Place the ball onto a baking sheet or plate lined with wax paper. (You'll be needing to put it into your freezer so whatever will fit is what you should place it on.)
-I prefer to flatten the bottom of the ball and shape the ball into more of a cylinder shape (as shown below).
-Once you have filled the baking sheet or plate with the cake bites place it in the freezer and let it sit for 30-40 minutes until the cake bites have hardened.
-When you are ready to coat the cake bites with chocolate I suggest only taking out 5 or 6 at a time so the rest can keep hard in the freezer.
-You'll need to create a double broiler by placing a metal mixing bowl on top of a saucepan that has water in it. Set it on low-medium heat.
-Then place your Melting chocolates in the bowl and begin melting them.
-Using the toothpicks with the spear on the end, poke the toothpick into the bottom of the cake bite and up through it almost to the top.
-Then stir it around in the melted chocolate until it is completely coated

-Remove the excess chocolate off by tapping the toothpick on the side of the bowl- gently.
-Then carefully scrape the cake bite off of the toothpick and onto a plastic spoon, then slide it off the spoon and back onto the wax paper. This will help reduce the amount of chocolate that will puddle around the bottom of the cake bite.
-Place the tray of coated cake bites in a cool area to harden.
-Repeat until you are finish with all the cake bites from the freezer.
-Wait about 2-3 hours after coating the cake bites before eating.

Here is the finished product.

Ham & Mozzarella Rolls

What you'll need:

Rhodes White Dinner Rolls

Thin Sliced Ham

Shredded Mozzarella Cheese

Melted Butter


Finely Shredded Parmesan Cheese




Italian Seasoning

-Take the rolls out of the freezer and let them soften a little bit, you don't want them to start rising.
-Preheat the oven to 350˚
-Once the rolls are soft enough flatten them with your hands and stretch them a little to give you some surface area for the ham and cheese.
-Take a piece of ham and bunch it up so it will fit in the middle of the dough.
-Take a pinch or mozzarella cheese and place it on top of the ham.
-Then take the edges of the dough and pinch them up around the ham and cheese, enclosing them inside the middle.
-Pinch the ends of the dough together so it seals the end of the dough. You now have a little ball.
-Place the rolls on a baking sheet with the pinched end on the bottom.
-Spread some melted butter on the top of the roll then sprinkle it with the finely shredded Parmesan cheese and Italian seasoning.
-Bake in the oven until the tops start to turn a golden brown.

This is how they should look when finished.