Green! I've Been Making Green Sweets!

Pandan Cake with Coconut Frosting

I work with a very young woman whose  people are from Thailand and Laos. She's a cook in one of my kitchens so I've been teaching her how to do that while she's sharing her some of her family's recipes with me.

It is so fun. 

Anyway along with durian (YIKES) she has had me try pandan.  I've fallen in love with the crazy green color and the subtle flavor. It's delightful. I have some leaves frozen, waiting to be beaten into paste. 

I also make cakes, or desserts actually, for all my staffs' birthdays. I came across an pandan cake mix at an import grocery. Yeah! I know! The directions weren't in English, but the numbers and pictures were enough for me to figure it out. She had a lovely birthday with a delicious crazy green cake. 

Green Tea Fudge

Green Tea Fudge

Then there was the recipe I came across for Green Tea Fudge at Not Quite Nigella. It needed Matcha-powdered green tea. It was amazing! I put that out by the coffee pot at work with a little sign because really, who's going to eat green fudge without being told it's tea? It was a hit! 

Green Tea Roll

Since I had the Matcha in the house I made a Green Tea Rolled Cake for a dinner party last week.  

A basic sponge filled with stabilized whipped cream and a strong green tea syrup to moisten the cake. Again, it was great. I loved how elegant it looked and my guests gobbled it up. 

Here are all the pictures. I've been having fun, but I've not had time to blog about it. 

Do you ever get on a jag? You know an ingredient or a technique you riff on? If so what? I've had meatball and peanut butter phases. How about you?  

Girl Scout Thin Mint Stuffed Cookie

I'm the mom who isn't the troop leader but who likes to participate, particularly when there's a call to cook something.

You see the daughter's troop is going to be doing the famous Girl Scout cookie sale outside a store tomorrow. There was a request to use cookies as ingredients so we can sample them to the folks coming by and hand out recipes. We are such over achievers where my daughter goes to school.


So I volunteered like I always do.

I also sit in the front of the class and actively interact with leaders at seminars. I'm that person. I'm okay with it. What I came up with were 4 recipes- A cookie, a pie, a salad (if you can call pudding a salad) and a soup.

The pie is peanut butter pie with Tagalongs mixed in and sprinkled on top-nothing crazy.

The salad is pudding, cool whip, canned oranges and crushed pineapple. Add Samoas for Tropical Samoa Salad.

The soup is pureed honeydew. Add whole blueberries and crumble Thank You Berry Much Cookies on top. I know a little weird and simple, super duper simple.


But the Thin Mint Stuffed Cookie? That was my brain child. A simple vanilla cookie dough that is slightly leavened wrapped around a thin mint. Taste? Awesome! 


2.5 cup butter
2 cup sugar
3 eggs
.25 cup milk
2 tsp vanilla (use mint flavor for a more minty cookie)
8 cups flour
4 T. baking powder
1 tsp salt

2 package Thin Mints

Sugar for sanding.

Cream the butter and sugar. Add 2 eggs, mix. Add milk and vanilla. In a separate bowl combine dry ingredients. Mix them into the butter. Will be a very dry dough.

For each cookie form two balls. One using 1 tablespoon of dough, the other using .5 tablespoon of dough. Flatten both. on the bigger round place the Thin Mint cookie upside down. Put the littler round on the bottom. Squish the dough around the Thin Mint evenly.

Scramble the remaining egg for egg wash. Brush each cookie, top with sanding sugar. Bake at 325 for 24 minutes.

So what kind of volunteer things do you do? Anything where you get to be creative? Let me know.