Birthday "Fiesta"

Last night Felipe and I hosted a birthday "fiesta" (my birthday was last Monday - thanks to everyone for the well wishes!), and had a blast with our friends.

So I basically spent all day cooking and prepping the food, which was tiring but fun, and got to try out a few new recipes. Above you can see the table, all set and ready to dig in - except for some Carne Asada which was being prepared on our "grill". We had ground beef taco, chicken fajita, carne asada, black beans, Spanish rice, guacamole, a terrific and spicy tomatillo sauce that felipe made, and all the other typical taco fixings.


Chicken Fajitas


The Spanish rice - super yummy!

I got the recipe for the Spanish rice from Allrecipes.com, and it turned out super well.

Spanish Rice


Ingredients

* 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
* 1 cup uncooked white rice
* 1 onion, chopped
* 1/2 green bell pepper, chopped
* 2 cups water
* 1 (10 ounce) can diced tomatoes and green chiles
* 2 teaspoons chili powder, or to taste (I used 1 tablespoon and it came out well)
* 1 teaspoon salt

Directions

1. Heat oil in a deep skillet over medium heat. Saute rice, onion, and bell pepper until rice is browned and onions are tender.

2. Stir in water and tomatoes. Season with chili powder and salt. Cover, and simmer for 30 minutes, or until rice is cooked and liquid is absorbed.




The guacamole - also yum!

I got the recipe for the guacamole from Simply Recipes. Super easy to make, and delicious.

Guacamole


Ingredients

* 2 ripe avocados
* 1/2 red onion, minced (about 1/2 cup)
* 1-2 serrano chiles, stems and seeds removed, minced
* 2 tablespoons cilantro leaves, finely chopped
* 1 tablespoon of fresh lime or lemon juice
* 1/2 teaspoon coarse salt
* A dash of freshly grated black pepper
* 1/2 ripe tomato, seeds and pulp removed, chopped

Garnish with red radishes or jicama. Serve with tortilla chips.
Method

1 Cut avocados in half. Remove seed. Scoop out avacado from the peel, put in a mixing bowl. (See How to Cut and Peel an Avocado.)

2 Using a fork, mash the avocado. Add the chopped onion, cilantro, lime or lemon, salt and pepper and mash some more. Chili peppers vary individually in their hotness. So, start with a half of one chili pepper and add to the guacamole to your desired degree of hotness. Be careful handling the peppers; wash your hands thoroughly after handling and do not touch your eyes or the area near your eyes with your hands for several hours.

Keep the tomatoes separate until ready to serve.

Remember that much of this is done to taste because of the variability in the fresh ingredients. Start with this recipe and adjust to your taste.

3 Cover with plastic wrap directly on the surface of the guacamole to prevent oxidation from the air reaching it. Refrigerate until ready.

4 Just before serving, add the chopped tomato to the guacamole and mix.

Serves 2-4.


Tres Leche cake

I made a tres leche cake, recipe from Alton Brown, and everyone devoured it! It was super yummy (the pound of sugar doesn't hurt), but also very heavy!

Tres Leche Cake

Ingredients
For the cake:

* Vegetable oil
* 6 3/4 ounces cake flour, plus extra for pan
* 1 teaspoon baking powder
* 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
* 4 ounces unsalted butter, room temperature
* 8 ounces sugar
* 5 whole eggs
* 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract

For the glaze:

* 1 (12-ounce) can evaporated milk
* 1 (14-ounce) can sweetened condensed milk
* 1 cup half-and-half

For the topping:

* 2 cups heavy cream
* 8 ounces sugar
* 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

For the cake:
Directions

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly oil and flour a 13 by 9-inch metal pan and set aside.

Whisk together the cake flour, baking powder and salt in a medium mixing bowl and set aside.

Place the butter into the bowl of a stand mixer. Using the paddle attachment, beat on medium speed until fluffy, approximately 1 minute. Decrease the speed to low and with the mixer still running, gradually add the sugar over 1 minute. Stop to scrape down the sides of the bowl, if necessary. Add the eggs, 1 at a time, and mix to thoroughly combine. Add the vanilla extract and mix to combine. Add the flour mixture to the batter in 3 batches and mix just until combined. Transfer the batter to the prepared pan and spread evenly. This will appear to be a very small amount of batter. Bake on the middle rack of the oven for 20 to 25 minutes or until the cake is lightly golden and reaches an internal temperature of 200 degrees F.

Remove the cake pan to a cooling rack and allow to cool for 30 minutes. Poke the top of the cake all over with a skewer or fork. Allow the cake to cool completely and then prepare the glaze.

For the glaze:

Whisk together the evaporated milk, sweetened condensed milk and the half-and-half in a 1-quart measuring cup. Once combined, pour the glaze over the cake. Refrigerate the cake overnight.

Topping:

Place the heavy cream, sugar and vanilla into the bowl of a stand mixer. Using the whisk attachment, whisk together on low until stiff peaks are formed. Change to medium speed and whisk until thick. Spread the topping over the cake and allow to chill in the refrigerator until ready to serve.

After stuffing ourselves, we played a couple of games. Oh how I've missed game nights! We did both Taboo and Apples to Apples - we had to keep it to games that the 10-12 of us could play together. Taboo took a little getting used to - agreeing on or understanding all the rules and such. Felipe was super on top of controlling the buzzer!







Thanks everyone for coming over and having some food and fun. I had a terrific birthday!