Sunday, March 7, 2010

Smorgasbord!!!!

Tonight I had my family over for dinner to celebrate my grandparent's anniversary.   Since my Papaw is diabetic, and I don't eat sugar either, I made a chocolate cake sweetened with Agave.  It was really yummy and even the sugar eaters in my family went back for seconds!  If you've never cooked with Agave, it's a really awesome sugar substitute and is WAY better for you than all of those yucky artificial sweeteners.  

Here's the cake...well half of it anyway...
I forgot to take a pic before it got cut, haha. 

Anyway, here's the recipe:

Chocolate Agave Layer Cake
2 1/4 Cups all purpose flour
2/3 Cup cocoa powder
1 tsp salt
1/2 C butter
1/2 C brown sugar (I used the splenda stuff)
3 Large Eggs
1 C Agave syrup/nectar
1 tsp vanilla extract
3/4 C sour cream
1/4 C milk

Preheat oven to 350.  Grease two 9-inch round pans and line them with circles of wax paper.  In one bowl, sift together flour, cocoa, salt and baking soda.  In another bowl, cream together butter and brown sugar until light. Beat in eggs one at a time, followed by the agave and vanilla.  Stir in 1/3 flour mix, followed by the sour cream.  Add another 1/3 of the flour mix, then the milk, before stirring in the rest of the flour.  Mix only until just combined.   Divide into pans.  Bake for 22-28 mins.   Cool on a wire rack. Ice with a cream cheese frosting.  

Cream Cheese Agave Frosting: 
3/4 C heavy cream
1 C cream cheese
1/4 Cup Agave
1 T vanilla extract

Whip heavy cream until stiff.   In a separate bowl, whip cream cheese until smooth, then blend in agave and vanilla.  With a rubber spatula, gently blend the whipped cream into the cheese mixture. 
Yum!

In other news, I won the custom art giveaway from Jessica at 
I just received my custom paintings done by 
Lindsey found out about our love for music and the colors in our home, and made this custom numbered series for us:


Aren't they awesome?!   I LOVE them!
I hung them above the sink in my kitchen.


My family loved them tonight.  Thanks Lindsey and Jessica!

Go check out Lindsey's stuff!  She also does blog headers, etc.  

4 comments:

  1. I really want to try that cake! Sounds good... I have a huge sweet tooth but definitely need to cut back on my sugar.

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  2. What a great idea, I'll have to test this recipe out when I get hit with a another sweet craving. LOVE the art, so cute!♥

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  3. I definitely DO eat sugar.... but I'm going to try this recipe. Where did you buy the Agave? Whole Foods?

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  4. The cake sounds soo good!! I'll have to try out the recipe :-)

    The paintings look awesome! So unique :-)

    Have a great week!

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