Everyone has their favorite family recipes. I have great memories of this chocolate cake from birthdays, anniversaries, and holidays. My Aunt finally shared the recipe with me at my wedding shower. I have put off making this cake for 3 years because I thought it was too hard. I finally decided to try it out today and learned that there are some steps but once you master them this cake is pretty easy. Thanks Aunt Bobbye for letting me share this with everyone.

 Aunt Bobbye’s Chocolate Cake

Preheat oven to 350 degrees

2 cups flour

2 cups sugar

2 teaspoons baking soda

Dash of salt

Sift the ingredients listed above in a bowl

 Melt in a double boiler:

1 ½ stick margarine

½ cup cocoa powder

 Pull out and have ready: 2 eggs, 1 pint buttermilk (non fat), and 1 teaspoon vanilla

In a kitchen aid or mix master: Alternate flour mixture, margarine/cocoa mixture, eggs, and buttermilk. Add vanilla. Make sure to blend thoroughly.  

Pour in a greased 13×9 baking pan and cook for 40 minutes at 350 degrees. (My Aunts oven and my oven took about 33 minutes) I checked my cake at 30 minutes and realized it was still a pit loose so I put it back in the oven.

 Icing- start making it about 10 minutes before the cake is ready to come out of the oven

In a double boiler melt:

¾ stick of margarine

½ cup cocoa

3 cups confectioners sugar that has been sifted

Add sugar gradually and add about ¼ cup of milk (maybe a little more than that) to make the icing more pourable. The double boiler must be on high heat and must be stirred constantly. Pour on cake when it comes out of the oven. (The icing will start getting hard when it is removed from the heat so pour it all on quickly in the middle of the cake and then spread it to all the sides.)

I still need to work on my icing skills.

Serve with a big glass of milk!

I haven’t made lasagna in a while so I thought I would pull out my favorite recipe and update it a bit. I make it in a 9 by 13 glass dish. It makes a ton for the two of us but Justin will gladly take it for lunch tomorrow.

2 cups part skim ricotta

1 teaspoon garlic powder

1 teaspoon basil

1 large egg

Cooking spray

4 cups chopped zucchini

½ cup chopped onion

2 jars of your favorite spaghetti sauce ( we like lots of sauce in our lasagna, alternate if you want)

1 pound lean ground beef or turkey

9 oven-ready lasagna noodles (such as Barilla)

1 ½ cups (6 ounces) shredded part-skim mozzarella cheese

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees
2. Combine first 4 ingredients in a bowl and set aside.
3. Heat large nonstick skillet coated with cooking spray over medium-high heat.  Add zucchini and onion; sauté 5 minutes or until tender. Stir in spaghetti sauce; remove from heat. In another skillet brown the ground beef or turkey in 1 tablespoon of vegetable oil. When you can no longer see any pink combine with spaghetti sauce mixture.
4. Coat a 13 x 9 inch baking dish with cooking spray.
5. Spread ¼ cup spaghetti sauce mixture in bottom of a 13 x 9-inch baking dish.  Arrange 3 noodles over spaghetti sauce mixture; top with one-third ricotta mixture, one-third spaghetti sauce mixture, and one-third mozzarella.  Repeat layers with remaining noodles, ricotta mixture, spaghetti sauce mixture and mozzarella.
6. Cover and bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes or until lasagna is thoroughly heated.

Tonight I decided to try making Buffalo Wings. I wanted a recipe that my husband would like. He doesn’t like spicy food. I found a great recipe on All Recipes. I decided to tweak it. I thought they were perfect… not too spicy and not bland!

Baked Buffalo Wings

¾  cup all-purpose flour

¼  teaspoon ground red pepper

1 teaspoon garlic powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

15 chicken wings

1/2 cup melted butter

1/2 cup hot  sauce (I used  Frank’s Red Hot)

 Line a baking sheet with aluminum foil, and lightly grease with cooking spray. Place the flour, cayenne pepper, garlic powder, and salt in a plastic bag, and shake to mix. Add the chicken wings and zip bag closed. Toss until well coated with the flour mixture. Place the wings onto the baking sheet, and place into the refrigerator. Refrigerate for 1 hour.

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F .  Whisk together the melted butter and hot sauce in a small bowl. Dip the wings into the butter mixture, and place back on the baking sheet. Bake in preheated oven until the chicken is no longer pink in the center, and crispy on the outside, about 40 minutes. Turn the wings over halfway during cooking so they cook evenly. 

Serve with your favorite blue cheese or ranch dressing