Food Frenzy

Last Saturday was really terrible weather, so I spent the whole day indoors, cooking. I had started making tangerine sorbet earlier in the week, but the tangerines were way too dry, so I had to get more. The sorbet turned out very well- the tangerines were at just the right stage of ripeness to give the sorbet a very bright flavor.

While I was out getting the tangerines, I thought I’d do dinner with friends that night, so I picked up a pork shoulder to roast and ingredients for my most guilt inducing dessert- Italian Rum Cake. Italian Rum Cake is not guilt inducing just because it’s bad for you (though it hardly qualifies as health food), but because it’s made entirely with packaged ingredients, including Jello pudding. It is, on the other hand, very Italian in that it uses cookies as the base for the dessert (think tiramisu with its espresso-soaked ladyfingers). Yous start by lining a lasagna pan with anisette toast, cut side down. Each piece of toast is moistened with milk.

The next step is to make Jello vanilla pudding (the cooked kind, not the instant). As soon as you take the pudding off of the stove, add 1 Tblsp. rum. Mix thoroughly and pour over the toast.



Now make a package of Jello chocolate pudding. When it comes off of the stove, mix in 1 Tblsp. Grand Marnier and pour that over the toast. Put the whole affair in the fridge and let it chill several hours.



Jut before serving, whip a carton of heavy cream. As the cream begins to thicken, add a teaspoon or so of sugar and 1 Tblsp. Crème de Cacao (I was jokingly calling this Italian Three-booze Cake). Spread the whipped cream over the top of the cake, dust with cocoa powder and serve.



While I was making the pudding and cooking the roast I decided to make some more cheese- something I haven’t been able to do for weeks. I tired a cheddar this time, a completely new type for me. It was an interesting process, I’ll try to blog about it in more detail soon. Alas, it will be a minimum of 2 months before I can try it. I love cheddar, so I have high hopes.



In the evening we had our neighbors (and travelling companions) Michael and John over for dinner. The menu:

Tangerine Sorbet
Roast Pork Shoulder with roast red potatoes and parsley root
Green Beans from last summer’s garden
Italian Rum Cake

Sunday the weather was stunning and we went out to the Fen. The hepaticas are in bloom.