I-Scream. U-Scream.

This week I turned 29.  It's shocking really.  I can't believe I'm almost 30!  When did that happen?  

I don't mind that I'm getting older.  It's just weird.  I wonder all of the time how I grew up so fast.  When did I become an adult?  I'm married.  Jordan and I have a life together.  And now we're creating a family of our own.  It's just...weird.  Don't get me wrong though--I love our life!  I feel so blessed to have all that I do and to celebrate another year.
As I said before, because of all of the rain our plans changed for the week as much of the city experienced a lot of flooding.  We were thinking about following through with what we had intended for the day because Jordan didn't want me to be disappointed on my Birthday, but when I went to go get ready, all I could picture was us on top of our car screaming for help and having to be rescued by a helicopter.  Oh that would be a memorable Birthday all right, but not one I really wanted to live out.  So we just played it safe and stayed in-doors.  I've loved every minute of our time together.  It's been refreshing to just sit and talk and discuss life and take it easy for a few days.  Having the day open up also gave me the opportunity to bake myself a cake and to churn up some homemade ice-cream.  

It definitely did not disappoint.  I've been meaning to make some homemade ice-cream for quite some time now.  I keep putting the ice-cream maker bowl in the freezer and then taking it out because I run out of room.  Luckily it was there and begging to be used.  I searched a few recipes and found this one and then adapted it to what I had on hand and what our tastebuds were craving.

Mocha Chocolate Chip Ice-Cream

(adapted from chef chloe)

Ingredients:
1 can full fat coconut milk
1 1/2 cups soy milk
1/2 cup agave
1/4 cup maple syrup
3 TBS. coconut oil
1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
1/8 tsp. salt
3/4 tsp. xanthan gum
1 1/2 TBS. Instant Coffee
2 TBS. Unsweetened Cocoa Powder

Chocolate chunks to add in later

Directions:
Blend everything together except for the chocolate chunks.  Once well combined, chill in the freezer for 2-3 hours.  When ice-cream is chilled, run it through an ice-cream maker according to machine instructions.  In the last 5 minutes of churning, add in chocolate chunks.  Place back in the freezer for at least 1-2 hours to firm up.  (Though this could be different depending on where you live.  It's hot here, so my ice-cream needed time to firm back up.)

Now it's all ready to serve!  I-Scream.  U-Scream.  We all- Scream for Ice-Cream!
But what's ice-cream without cake?  Once of my favorite cakes of all time has to be pound cake!  I've never had a pound cake as good as my Nanny made it.  She was quite the expert.  And trying to make cakes vegan and delicious has proven to be a bit challenging at times.  It's so important to get the ingredients right and not over mix them or your cake will turn into a spongy mess.  Not good.  So I looked through my cookbooks and found one that looked to be promising and got to work.

I've never been disappointed with anything out of Veganomicon.  The only changes I made was adding more vanilla and almond extract in place of the citrus extracts, and came up with the most flavorful poundcake I've ever made.  It was perfect!  It had all of the essence of a pound cake without the loads of eggs and butter than are laden throughout a normal recipe.  

It was a pretty chill day and I enjoyed with the man I love.  Guess it was best to keep it simple cause next year we're going all out!  Here's to my last year in the 20s!  Cheers!