DB: Swiss Swirl Ice Cream Cake

This month's Daring Bakers' challenge was the Swiss Swirl Ice Cream Cake!

The July 2010 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Sunita of Sunita’s world – life and food. Sunita challenged everyone to make an ice-cream filled Swiss roll that’s then used to make a bombe with hot fudge. Her recipe is based on an ice cream cake recipe from Taste of Home.-

Since I currently do not have internet at home I will not be able to get the pictures up until this weekend when I am at the coffee shop. This challenge made me feel really proud of myself and was also very yummy. I was really excited to be making ice cream from scratch both with out eggs or an ice cream maker. I didn't know that you could make ice cream without an ice cream maker. So not only did I make both chocolate and vanilla ice cream from scratch I also made cake, whipped cream, & fudge sauce from scratch. I am telling you this recipe was so yummy. It was a bit on the time consuming side because of having to wait for the ice cream to set. You can find the recipe for the Swiss Swirl Ice Cream Cake here! This was so yummy. I loved the ice cream and the whipped cream although I wasn't too fond of the frozen cake & I think I would have like for it to have more of a chocolate flavor. I promise I will post pictures by the end of the week, so check back for yummy photos.

DC: Nut Butters

The July 2010 Daring Cooks’ Challenge was hosted by Margie of More Please and Natashya of Living in the Kitchen with Puppies. They chose to challenge Daring Cooks to make their own nut butter from scratch, and use the nut butter in a recipe. Their sources include Better with Nut Butter by Cooking Light Magazine, Asian Noodles by Nina Simonds, and Food Network online.

Okay so I am a day late posting this and did not take any photos of my finished dish at the time. I will remake this weekend and update this post with pictures.So the challenge was to make you own nut butters. Think peanut butter but using other kinds of nuts (i.e. Walnuts, cashews, pecans, etc.). I chose to make Walnut White Bean Dip With Rosemary & Sage. I chose to make this for a few reasons. Number 1 being that we were on a tight budget this past month and this seemed the most economically friendly. Number 2 being that this one gave me the most use of my magic bullet. I love my magic bullet unfortunately, it just doesn't give the love it deserves sometimes.

So what were my thoughts:
1. I really need to invest in some teaspoon & tablespoon measuring devices.
2. The nut butter from the Walnuts was really yummy and had a really cool texture.
3. It was so yummy with chopped celery.
4. I guess my only complaint is that it was a bit thick for my preference. I am sure I could leave in some of the liquid from the beans next time.

You can visit the Daring Kitchen website here and read about the challenge as well as view the recipe that I used.