Gluten/Wheat free Chocolate Cake

It may look hard, but it's much easier than it looks.
For easy assembly I made the layers the night before and left them in the freezer overnight with plastic wrap around them, they didn't get freezer burned or ruined and it took about 15 minutes to finalize the whole cake with frosting.
Absolutely delicious!

LIGHTER THAN AIR CHOCOLATE CAKE

For cake layers:
12 oz fine-quality bittersweet chocolate (not unsweetened), chopped
6 tablespoons water
12 large eggs, separated, at room temperature
1 1/3 cup sugar
½ teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons Dutch-processed unsweetened cocoa powder

For filling:

2 cups heavy cream
6 tablespoons confectioners sugar, sifted
4 tablespoons Grand Marnier*

* I substituted 4 tablespoons cocoa and 1 teaspoon vanilla

DIRECTIONS:

To Make cake layers: Preheat oven to 350°F. Grease four 9-inch circular cake pans and line bottoms of circles with a piece of parchment paper.

Melt chocolate with water in a small heavy saucepan over very low heat, stirring. Cool to lukewarm.

In your stand mixer, beat yolks, 2/3 cup sugar, and salt until thick and pale for about 5 minutes. Stir in melted chocolate until combined. In a separate HUGE bowl, beat 12 egg whites until they hold stiff peaks (clean your beaters). I use hand held mixer with a very large stainless steel bowl for this-

Add remaining sugar and beat until whites just hold stiff peaks. Fold one third of whites into melted-chocolate mixture, then fold in remaining whites carefully.

Spread batter evenly over four baking pans. Bake until the cake has puffed and the top is dry to the touch, maybe 16 minutes. I rotated my cake pans once to ensure they cooked evenly. Once the cake is done, cool the cake pans on cooling racks for about 10 minutes.

If you wish, sift cocoa powder over top of cake layers. Then place a piece of waxed paper over the top of the cake pans. Place a cookie sheet over paper and invert cake onto it, gently peeling off wax paper lining. For best results, place all of the layers in the freezer for at least 2 hours or until they are firm enough to be carefully lifted without breaking.

In order to make the filling: In a clean large bowl, beat cream with powdered sugar and Grand Marnier (or cocoa powder) until it just holds stiff peaks.

To assemble the cake:

Bring first cake layer out of the freezer (leave the others in the freezer until you are ready for them) and arrange on your cake plate, cocoa side down. Spread 1/4 of filling evenly over the cake layer. Bring the next cake layer out of the freezer, placing it gently over the filling, again cocoa side down. Repeat until the cake is assembled!

Keep cake in the refrigerator until serving time. The cake layers should thaw after about 2-3 hours of being in the refrigerator and the cake will be ready to serve.

Cream of Asparagus Soup

2 lbs asparagus, roughly chopped
1 onion, chopped
3 Tbsp butter
5-6 cups chicken stock
1/2 cup heavy cream
salt and pepper to taste

Cook onion in 2 Tbsp butter until soft. Add asparagus, salt, and pepper, then cook while stirring for five minutes. Add broth and simmer, covered, until asparagus is very tender- about 15-20 minutes.

Puree soup in batches in a blender until smooth, and return to pan. Stir in cream, and season with salt and pepper. Bring soup to a boil and whisk in remaining Tbsp of butter.

Rosemary and Onion Focaccia

1 Tbsp yeast
1 1/4 cups warm water
2 Tbsp olive oil
1 tsp salt
1 Tbsp rosemary
1 tsp onion powder
3 cups white flour
----------------
6 Tbsp olive oil
2 Tbsp rosemary
coarse salt
thinly sliced onion

Dissolve the yeast in 1/2 cup of the warm water- let sit until bubbly.

Combine first set of ingredients, mix thoroughly, then knead until smooth.

Allow to rise until doubled in size.

Use part of the remaining olive oil to oil a 9x13 pan. Punch down the dough and spread evenly in the pan. Dimple the top surface with your fingertips, then drizzle remaining olive oil on top of the dough. Sprinkle with rosemary and salt- place sliced onion rings on top as garnish.

Allow to rise for approximately 15 minutes.

Bake at 425 degrees for 20 minutes, or until golden.

Serve with olive oil for dipping.

Chocolate Cheesecake

Crust:
9 ounce package of chocolate wafer cookies, crushed
6 tablespoons of butter, melted

Mix ground cookies and butter- press onto the bottom and one inch up the side of a 9" springform pan.

Bake for 10 minutes at 350 degrees.

Filling:
16 ounces softened cream cheese
1 cup white sugar
4 eggs
1 pint heavy whipping cream
8 ounces semisweet chocolate

In the microwave or on a double boiler, melt the chocolate in the cream.

Beat together cream cheese and sugar until soft. Stir in the eggs, one at a time, mixing well between additions. Stir in the chocolate mixture until fully incorporated.

Pour into the crust, and bake for 55-60 minutes at 350 degrees.

Allow to cool until room temperature, then refrigerate for at least eight hours prior to serving.

Serve with whipped cream, caramel sauce, or raspberry sauce.

Raspberry Sauce

12 ounce package or frozen raspberries in syrup, thawed
2 teaspoons sugar
1 teaspoon cornstarch
3 teaspoons cold water

Mash berries through a sieve, throwing away the seeds.

Add sugar, heat until almost boiling.

Mix cornstarch with water, add a little at a time to the berries, stirring constantly until mixture starts to thicken. Cool in refrigerator.

Serve with anything dessert-like and delicious.

Chinese Noodles

1 pound spaghetti noodles, cooked
2 1/2-3 cups chicken or beef broth
1-2 tablespoons soy sauce

In a large pan, stir together the pre-cooked noodles, broth, and soy sauce.

Simmer on medium-low until all the liquid has soaked into the noodles.

Stir in:
1 onion, chopped
1-2 carrots, matchsticked
1/2 pound peas
-sauted together in olive oil.

Optional-
add 1-2 cups cooked chicken or beef to the noodles and broth while they simmer

Serves 2-3, depending on how hungry they are...

Ham

Not so much a recipe as a "this is cool."

Try cooking ham with beer. It's really good but remember the other spices because otherwise the ham will taste vaguely of beer.
It's as moist as if you made it with pineapple, but without the pineapple.