Bon Appetit's Spiced Chocolate Torte Wrapped in Chocolate Ribbons...sort of

James and I subscribe to Bon Appetit and we love it! We try to cook as much out of it as we can. So for Christmas this year, I told my mom that I wanted to do Christmas dessert, which was the Spiced Chocolate Torte Wrapped in Chocolate Ribbon. Well, I don't have a pasta machine, and neither does my mother, so the chocolate ribbons went out the window, which was fine with me. The next obstacle was that it requires a 1/4 of rum, well, I'm LDS I don't use alcohol in my cooking unless it would be cooked out, which this wouldn't have been. We adjusted and used rum extract for flavoring.

It took me a good chunk of Christmas Eve to make the torte and frost it with the butter-cream icing. Also, it didn't help that my mom's oven decided to explode just as I was putting in the cake pans to cook but we made it work by taking it up to my grandmother's and having it cook there.

All I had to do on Christmas was create the chocolate glaze that goes over the top of the butter-cream frosting. For a cake topper, we snipped off poinsettia (and in case you didn't know, the sap is poisonous, so be careful), wrapped the stem in saran wrap and placed it on the cake and dusted it with powdered sugar.

It was delicious! This type of torte is best in small slices. The spiced torte (cinnamon, cloves, and nutmeg) is three layers with chocolate-rum (rum extract) flavored butter-cream covered in a chocolate glaze. The flavors were really interesting and unique. I thought it was a great blend of flavors. In all it contained 7 1/2 sticks of butter. If you ever have an opportunity to make it, do it! It is on my list of best cakes.

Below are pictures, duh, me making this cake. Enjoy!

What to do with Baked Potatoes?

This is something my family did growing up. It's probably not the healthiest topping for baked potatoes but it's curry sauce, at least that's what we called it. It's extremely simple: mix mayonnaise and curry powder to taste. It sounds weird but it adds a different flavor to your typical baked potato, butter and sour cream. I asked my parents on time how on earth we came up with the idea and neither of them knew, it possible came from my grandfather on my mom's side. I love it on my baked potato.