Strawberry Shortcake Cake

For my mom's birthday earlier this month, I offered to bring dessert when we came over for dinner. She requested these strawberry cupcakes, but I had just seen this recipe for Strawberry Shortcake Cake on Pioneer Woman that had similar elements... I showed my mom the recipe and she said it looked delicious!

This cake was relatively easy to put together, but did require a few steps. I actually baked the cake, prepped the filling and made the frosting the night before and just assembled it right before we went over for dinner. I think this worked great, the cake got a little soggy from the strawberry juice, but just the right amount. Overnight would have been too much.

The pound cake was delicious.... it would be good with just a plain fruit topping and whipped cream, for sure!


I was pretty impressed with my ability to actually cut this in half evenly

Black Bean and Quinoa Chili

I saw this great recipe on Closet Cooking for Black Bean and Quinoa Chili and I knew it would be a winner! Healthy and packed with ingredients that both Ben and I love.

There was more chopping involved than I wanted, but it was worth it in the end :) This was a tasty and filling chili that provided us food for one dinner and 2-3 lunches each! Definitely much better with a little sour cream and cheese added in, as usual :)

That's one looooong bike ride!

Ben did the MS150 bike ride this weekend (75 miles each day, from Duluth to the Twin Cities - actually, specifically a lovely town called Nowthen) and he actually finished without looking too worse for wear! This was a major feat considering that the longest he'd ever ridden before was maybe 30 miles at one time...

He rode with Rett and his company team - Team Clockwork, and it seemed like they had a great time overall! Luckily the weather was beautiful... I'm sure it would have been a different story if it was cold and rainy like it was last weekend!

Becky, Adelaide and I went to greet the boys at the finish line! They seemed pretty happy to be done :)

Yay, a little smile :)


Super cool baby


Way to go Rett and Ben!


A few members of Team Clockwork

Rainbow Cake

Ever since I saw this post on the kitchn, I knew that someday I would make a rainbow cake. I didn't really care how it tasted, just that it looked cool :) This post on Omnomicon was super helpful with directions, but I didn't want a diet cake, because... gross. So I searched my google reader, and found another version on Loves to Eat's blog. I used her white cake recipe, and the easy vanilla buttercream from Annie's Eats.

This was easily the most visually impressive thing that I have ever baked, hands down. I was very excited to make this for Steve and Laura's birthdays - I told Becca that I would make a cake, and didn't tell her what kind - she told me Steve hates chocolate, so thus I picked rainbow. It was great to cut into it and have everyone be all excited :) Also, people thought it was from a mix, so it was even better when they found out I made it from scratch :)

Behold, the Rainbow Cake.

This was not even CLOSE to enough food coloring. I kept putting it in until it seemed borderline obscene, but at least the cake looked bright at the end!










Sure wish I had a dishwasher!


They looked only so-so from the top...




Kate did the writing - good thing she was coming over, because if I had to do it, wow, it would have sucked :)


Birthday kids!


Sweet success!




Ben sure liked it :)

PedalPub!!

Many MSP-ers may have seen the PedalPub rolling around the streets of Minneapolis and St. Paul in the summertime. While it looked interesting, it was certainly never appealing to me - it looked like a whole lot of work just to get between a few bars! Alas, I was persuaded to go on this contraption not once but twice over the past few weeks.

On the Saturday of Memorial Day weekend, we went on the PedalPub with a bunch of Ben's friends from high school - many of them have May and June birthdays, so Jake reserved the PedalPub about 6 months ago and we planned to do the NordEast route.

The weather was gorgeous on that Saturday! We met at Jake and Allison's for a little BBQ-ing and then set out to meet the PedalPub in Northeast Minneapolis at about 4:15pm - we had reserved it from 4:30-7:30pm, and we brought along a small keg to have while pedaling (ridiculous that this is legal).

I was actually pleasantly surprised by how fun the PedalPub was, mostly because I didn't have to pedal at all :) There are 4 non-pedaling seats, and I snagged one of them right away! My sister and I spent most of our time on the back, which I think were the best seats in the house :)

I have to say that the whole PedalPub experience was just absurd, but in a fun way :) First, you can have a keg or other beer/wine (no liquor) on the pub itself while you are pedaling. You go to bars, and spend about 15-30 minutes there, which really lends itself to either doing a shot or downing a drink while you are inside. Kind of a recipe for disaster! I had to drive both times we went, so I very much enjoyed watching everyone get crazy :)

First bar stop - Tony Jaro's for Greenies


Liz and I on the back :)


Our driver, Melissa. I felt for her - she had to reprimand us several times - 1st because Ben insisted on high fiving all passing motorists, 2nd because people were screaming in residential areas, and 3rd she had to listen to us all singing "Africa" by Toto at the top of our lungs. Wow.


Same as the one Ben saw in Amsterdam! These are made in the Netherlands and then shipped here.


Next stop, Dusty's. I didn't go inside, but I hear there was tequila involved.


Then, 1029. Ben sat outside talking to Newman the whole time.


Had to go up a slight incline. Looked pretty difficult for the pedalers. Too bad for them!


I think this was in Shaw's (where the 3 of us returned after the PedalPub for a delicious Shaw Burger) but I can't be positive


Side view of the Pub


Then, Knight Cap


At Gasthofs, my least favorite bar. Someone insisted that we get a Boot, which was a really great idea after 2.5 hours on the Pub........ it was finished in 7 minutes.


Ben's favorite activity at Gasthof's is the "snuff" - tobacco shot up your nose. It's free. He's very thrifty like that.


Last stop, Stasiu's.

All in all, it was a great time, but again, I am very glad I had to drive! I'm thinking many people were a little worse for wear the next day, but I felt glorious :)

The very next weekend, we had another PedalPub to go on with Ben's family for Laura's 21st birthday, and Steve's 23rd birthday. (Laura and Steve are Ben's siblings for the uninformed) I made a beautiful and delicious cake for them that will be featured in a future post. We again did the NordEast route, but this time it was from 8-10pm.

We met at Becca and Joe's house for dinner and prepared ourselves for the Pub. Becca and Amanda had made t-shirts and coozies for the occasion :)

GET IT?? The To-do list is upside down so you can read it. Oh, the cleverness. The iron-ons kind of fell off, so packing tape was needed.




We had a different model for this one.


This isn't ALL Ben's family - there are a few family friends and friends of Laura's here too :)


Again, first stop Tony Jaro's for Greenies...


Maureen, Becca and I took the sweet seats on the back this time


At Gasthof's, again. For the boot. Too bad Becca spilled :)

The last 2 stops were 331 Club and Stasiu's. Since this one was only 2 hours, we didn't have quite as much time to go to all the bars, and plus, seriously that pedaling looked to be pretty tough! Good thing I didn't have to do it :)

Overall, the PedalPub was really fun, but I have to say I would be just fine never going again in my life :) It's a novelty that is fun once, and was still fun twice, but that's enough for me!

Tulips and Lilacs!

Okay, I just have to start out by saying that I am SO GLAD to be done writing those posts about Europe! It was basically my part time job for the last few weeks. So glad to have it all down somewhere now, but wow. Now it's time for me to indulge in some crappy TV and perhaps take advantage of the beautiful Minnesota springtime :)

When we got back from Europe, I was super excited to see that our tulips were still blooming, and that the lilacs in our neighbor's yard were spilling over into ours! I thought for sure we'd miss them altogether but we got lucky :)