Jeanette - Off The Cuff

My Photo
My name is Jeanette, and I was born in Sweden, but unlike the famous Muppet, I am not a professional Swedish Chef. I actually went to school for art, design, and photography. Beyond that, I worked as a freelance indie-rock critic for several magazines in the late 90s and early 2000s. I even took a crack at running a PR company for a while. However, cooking has always been in my DNA--my dad's brother was a chef and culinary arts instructor, my dad's father was a pastry chef, and my mom's mother was a caterer, and at the age of 92, she published a cookbook of traditional Finnish breads and pastries. Everyone else in my family loves to cook, too, and we're not afraid to experiment. Usually I end up inventing dishes (with or without outside inspiration) with whatever I have on hand, hence "Off the Cuff." I might make very Scandinavian dishes (meatballs, and salmon with dill-potatoes) or ethnic like Thai, Japanese, Mexican, Italian or Spanish. By the way, you can put bell peppers in almost all cuisine! (Drop me a line, at o f f t h e c u f f c o o k i n g "at" g m a i l followed by the dot-com. :)

Monday, August 6, 2012

Fudge and Peppermint Ice-Cream Cake


Many, many moons ago, in 1984, which was the first year my family moved from Sweden to the US, we stayed a night or two with some acquaintances during a road-trip, and they served up this amazing ice-cream cake.  I dutifully hand-wrote the recipe down from their index card, making sure to spell everything correctly, since I was still learning English, and for the last 28 years, this has been one of our favorite desserts.   I just spent a half hour scouring Google for an identical recipe and did not find one.   Even the official Nabisco website does not have this recipe. Alas, I cannot credit an original source other than the Crandall family in Iowa.  If anyone out there knows the source, please message me, and I will gladly put a link in. 

Last week for my birthday, my mom asked what I wanted for dessert, and of course, I said "Oreo Mint cake".  Since she was the one who prepared it, I only have just the one photo of it sitting there on the fancy plate.  I do have the recipe, still hand-written in the back of my old childhood cookbook, so I will type it up for you, despite the lack of prep-photos.

Please make this.  It's so good. And, oh yeah... it has TWO sticks of buttah in there... Please consult your doctor if you have any sort of heart-disease history. 



INGREDIENTS:

Crust:
1 package of "chocolate sandwich" Cookies (that kind that rhymes with "floorio")
1 stick butter

Filling:
1 carton of mint-chocolate chip ice cream

Topping:
1 cup chocolate chips
1 tsp vanilla
2 cups powdered sugar
1 large can evaporated milk (NOT sweetened condensed milk)
1 stick butter

DIRECTIONS:

Crush chocolate cookies either with a food processor, a mallet & zippered plastic bag, or a rolling pin between sheets of foil, or whatever method seems convenient to you.  Melt the first stick of butter, and mix it thoroughly with the cookie crumbs.  Line a  9"x13" pan with waxed paper, and press the crumb-mixture into the bottom until it makes an even crust.  Reserve 1/2 cup of crushed cookies for the topping.

Allow mint-chocolate chip ice cream to soften until you can easily spread it over the cookie-crust in the pan, and set this in the freezer to chill.

Meanwhile, make the sauce, by melting the chocolate chips, evaporated milk and butter in a sauce pan, and then stirring in the powdered sugar and vanilla.  Bring to a low boil, stirring constantly until thick.  Let cool for a while before spreading it over the top of the ice cream layer, and then sprinkle on the remaining crushed cookies. Cover tightly with seran wrap and/or foil, and freeze until a half hour before serving.


Posted by at

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)