Best Friend Birthday Cake

A no-bake dog chow sardine cake for the pooch in your life! Your best friend will love you even more after you make this. 

Do you have a very special friend?  Someone who is always there for you and is always delighted to see you?  You can be away from each other for five minutes, five hours or five days and the effusive greeting you get upon your return just about bowls you over?  I have a friend like that!  He is never in a bad mood, always listens to me with interest, especially when I am in the kitchen cooking, and he is never happier than when he is snuggled up next to me.  His love for me is total, unconditional and borders on adoration.  You may have guessed that I am talking about my dog.

I have to tell you, we started out rough.  He is skittish by nature and he didn’t take well to change.  We got him as a puppy in the summer of 2007 and from the very beginning, he would run behind our legs when a city bus went by our house in Houston – despite the fact that we were behind an eight-foot wooden fence, in our own yard.  

Cutest puppy ever.

After we went home to Malaysia, he stayed with my sister and her family until he was old enough for his first rabies shot and she said that when her Beagles would bark at a noise, he would run and hide.  Brave was clearly not in his vocabulary.  

Already bigger than them but not as brave. 

While he was there, my sister noticed he was lethargic and felt hot so she took him to the vet.  Thank God she did because, as it turned out, despite having had all his shots on schedule, he had Parvo.  He spent several days in the vet clinic on an IV drip until he was deemed healed enough to return home.  As you can imagine, we prayed fervently the whole time.  We were already so attached to his cuteness.  He recovered, got his rabies shot and they sent him on to us.  He was with us but a couple of months when we were transferred to Singapore.  It was a mere four-hour road trip but required 30 days in quarantine to enter the country.  We visited him every day that we were allowed but bless his little soul, he was a basket of nerves when he got out.  He is still a nervous Nellie but he is also a little sweetheart.

Today was his birthday and I made a cake for him.  He watched me, as he usually does when I am in the kitchen, but, frankly, the whole picture taking and candle lighting did try his patience.  He loved his cake and we love him.  You might want to make this no-bake "cake" for your pooch.  As if he or she doesn’t already love you enough!

Ingredients

1 1/2 cups or 180g dog chow of your choice (1 1/2 cups is Beso’s usual amount of dog food for each meal.  You can adapt this to your dog’s normal meal using his or her usual amount of chow and following the instructions proportionally with the hot water.  One can of sardines will probably add enough flavor no matter the amount of chow.)

1 can sardines

Your choice of dog treats for garnish

Method

Put one cup or 125g of the dog food in a heat resistant bowl.  Pour in 1 cup or 240ml of very hot water.  Cover with cling film and allow the chow to absorb the water.

Open your can of sardines and pour out the oil and save it.  Mash the sardines with a fork.

Once the dog chow has absorbed the water and is softened, mash it with a fork.  Add in the sardines and then the half-cup of dry dog chow, to add a little crunch.  Mix thoroughly.

Line two ramekins with cling film and pour half the reserved sardine oil in each.   Fill the lined ramekins with the chow/sardine mixture and pack them tightly.

Turn them out onto a plate, one on top of the other.  Decorate using whatever dog treats you have on hand. 

 Light a candle and sing Happy Birthday to You.  

Let your most faithful friend enjoy!

Whoa! Candle finally blew out.  Let's eat!

Check out that long tongue!

Just a little alarming.  Top layer fell off!

Never mind.  Still tasty.

And, it's gone!

Mashed Garlic Pumpkin

Roasted pumpkin drizzled with olive oil and then mashed with garlic makes a deliciously succulent side dish I'm calling mashed garlic pumpkin.

Here’s a post for all my old friends who used to think my life is glamorous.   We have finally gotten there!  Back when we lived in Paris, I remember friends exclaiming, “Paris! That is so wonderful.  I have always wanted to go to Paris!  What do you do there?” The answer to their question was, “Well, Mondays I do laundry, including the ironing. Tuesdays I clean downstairs. Wednesdays I clean upstairs. Thursdays the bathrooms have to be cleaned and Fridays are always bed linen changing and washing day.”  

And everyday, of course, I was caring for my two little darlings. Changing diapers, nursing the baby, potty training the toddler, getting spit up stains out of my t-shirts and cooking, always cooking.  Such a glamorous life I led!

But now, in truth, I can say that this last week has been pretty cool. No family responsibilities (except a baby sitter for the hound) and besides the fact that we flew economy class, the jet-setting started on Thursday with a dinner dance next to the pyramids in Egypt.

Beer and wine were served from 6 p.m. (and we brought some champagne and cocktails of our own) with the pyramids in full view!  Everyone was in tuxedos and lovely gowns just like the beautiful people.   We were the beautiful people! (Except for not being skinny and rich.)

Look!  One of the pyramids in the background.  Is that cool or what?!

Then the party went inside to the hotel ballroom, where we were served a sit-down meal and entertained by three or four live bands in succession.  We ate, we drank, we danced!  Then around 11:30 p.m., we headed home to change our clothes and collect our luggage.

We checked in for our flight to Bologna via Istanbul then hung out in the executive lounge (That Star Alliance gold card comes in handy!) until the flight was called.

Mere hours later, we found ourselves on a sleek train from Bologna to Venice, and then on a water taxi to the Splendid Hotel.  We enjoyed the sightseeing and reveled in the delicious meals that Venice offers. Glorious seafood! The hotel even had complimentary Prosecco – Italian sparking wine - at every breakfast.  Splendid indeed!

The Grand Canal in Venice, taken from the Rialto Bridge

After two wonderful days in Venice, we rented a car and drove down the coast roads to Ravenna for work (dear husband) and more sightseeing (me) and more delicious meals and wine (both.)

The altar: Basilica of Sant'Apollinare Nuovo in Ravenna

Then we were off  to Istanbul for more gorgeous seafood Tuesday evening at Afrodite Restaurant in the historic area of Kumkapi, and a Wednesday shipyard visit (him again) and more sightseeing and shopping (me.)  

The view from our hotel room in Istanbul. 

I am thinking that this is what my friends imagined I did all these years. Anyway, it certainly feels like a dream. We arrived home today almost a full week after our whirlwind departure from the pyramids, exhausted but happy.  Some work, some play but, all in all, a great week. 

Mashed Garlic Pumpkin

Here’s a quick easy dish that is delicious eaten with a spoon right out of the pan (me) or as a side dish.

Ingredients

1 1/4kg  or 2 3/4 lbs pumpkin

Olive oil

4-5 cloves garlic

Sea salt

Black pepper

Method

Preheat your oven to 200°C or 400°F.

Cut the peel off of your pumpkin and cut it into chunks.  

Put the chunks into your baking pan and drizzle liberally with olive oil.  Sprinkle with salt and pepper.  Toss then distribute the chunks evenly around the pan. 

Meanwhile, in a small bowl, drizzle your garlic with olive oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper.  Set aside.

Roast the pumpkin for about 30 minutes.

Add in the garlic, toss the pumpkin around, and roast for a further 30 minutes.  You want some browned bits but you don't want the garlic to burn and turn bitter so keep an eye on it.  

Using a potato masher, mash the pumpkin and garlic as smoothly as you like.  I like to mashed the garlic thoroughly but leave a few small bits of pumpkin for texture.   Check your seasoning and add more salt and pepper to taste.

Enjoy!

Green Beans with Fresh Tomatoes and Thyme

Green beans with fresh tomatoes and thyme are a great side dish chicken, steak, pork chops or fish. In fact they go well with everything. Or eat them on their own!

This week I am away from my kitchen, spending time in Venice and Ravenna, Italy and having a great time seeing the sights and admiring the art and architecture.  So here's something I cooked and wrote a while back but never posted.

Elder daughter has never been a fan of cooked tomatoes, so when she still lived at home, I didn’t make things in tomato sauce very often or add tomatoes to many cooked dishes.  She was not a picky child, this being her one dislike – she was the only other person in the family who joined me in the love of beets! – so it seemed a small concession to a mostly flexible eater.  I’m also not saying she wouldn’t eat the cooked tomatoes, after all, just that they were not her preference.

Her sister will not eat beets, but spaghetti Bolognaise and lasagna were two of her favorite meals.  Both traditionally have tomato-based sauces, of course.  So I walked a fine line of pleasing everyone by cooking those only occasionally but always when her sister was traveling or spending the night with a friend.  It’s all about planning.  Do other families do this balancing act?

Suddenly, with both girls away at university (and, boy, do I miss them daily) I am free, free to cook whatever I want.  (Also free to travel when dear husband has a business trip somewhere interesting!) Thankfully, their father eats everything.  (But beets.)  I love this dish because the colors are gorgeous.  And it tastes good too.

Green Beans with Fresh Tomatoes and Thyme

These are best made with red ripe tomatoes. If you don't have any, good quality canned tomatoes can be substituted. 

Ingredients

1/2 lb or 225g green beans

2 red ripe tomatoes

Generous sprinkle of fresh thyme leaves

5 cloves garlic

Olive oil

Sea salt

Black pepper

Method

Chop off the tops and tails of the green beans.

Cut the tomatoes into small pieces.

Pop your tomatoes into a dry non-stick skillet on high heat and brown (scorch) them a little.

Sprinkle on the thyme leaves, salt and pepper.

Meanwhile, slice your garlic very thinly.

Give the tomatoes a good drizzle of olive oil and add in the garlic.   Let it fry a little bit then add in the green beans.

Toss them in the tomatoes and olive oil and then add about half a wine glass of water and put the lid on.

Let the beans steam for a few minutes, depending on how soft you like them.  Crunchy beans will take just a few minutes.  Very tender beans might take as long as seven to 10 minutes.  Check them occasionally by tasting a bean and remove the pan from the heat when you are happy with the bite of the beans.  (Add more water if it gets dry before the beans are cooked to your satisfaction.)  While you are checking the tenderness, add more salt and pepper if necessary.

Serve along side some roasted chicken and rice with gravy.  

Beso admiring the roasted chicken in the oven.  We have never had an oven just his height before.
He finds it endlessly fascinating to watch meat cook.

Or whatever else you have on the menu.  These green beans with garlic and tomatoes go with just about anything.

Enjoy!