Cook and Brew.

A few weeks ago, I joined a blogging contest sponsored by Red Ribbon in line with their newest cake product, the Cookies and Cream Cake. My entry was about the birthday celebration of dear hubby where I sent pictures of him and my son enjoying the Red Ribbon cake. And that could have tickled the fancies of the judges and picked my entry to win the first prize. No not as grand and luxurious as Las Vegas Show Tickets (how I wish!) but Php 1500 worth of Red Ribbon Gift Certificates. Thank you Red Ribbon because we enjoyed a Smores Cake for our Father’s Day celebration.

Tokyo Cafe's Chocolate Banana Parfait

For our Father’s Day lunch dessert at Tokyo Cafe, we had this very sinfully delicious Chocolate Banana Parfait. I can’t actually find the perfect word to describe how my taste buds went gaga over this. All I know is that I suddenly felt heaven when the sweet blend of the chocolate, cream and banana touched the tip of my tongue. I researched on the web the recipe for this one and this is the simplest I got from dole.com. I am yet to try this recipe so I can’t guarantee yet if this recipe is as heaven as Tokyo Cafe’s.

Ingredients:
1/4 cup boiling water
2/3 cup semisweet chocolate chips
2 DOLE® Bananas (1 extra-ripe, 1 firm)
1/4 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1-1/4 cups frozen whipped topping, thawed
1/2 cup DOLE Fresh or Fresh Frozen Raspberries

Directions:
* Pour boiling water over chocolate chips in small bowl; stir until smooth.
* Combine extra-ripe banana, brown sugar, vanilla and melted chocolate, in blender or food processor container. Cover: blend until smooth. Fold in whipped topping.
* Spoon half of mousse into 4 parfait or dessert glasses. Slice remaining firm banana over mousse in glasses. Spoon remaining mousse over bananas. Chill at least 30 minutes. Top with raspberries.
* Garnish with additional sliced banana if desired.

***Photographed by my beloved husband.

Last May 17, our niece celebrated her first birthday at Mcdonald’s West Avenue. It was themed Disney Princess and here’s her birthday cake from our local bake shop. The husband took this shot using our nifty fifty lens (50mm 1.8/f lens).

This month, we will be attending two birthday parties and the first one happened today. Here’s Janna’s birthday cake by Sugarbox, the same cake supplier who did my son’s birthday cake last March.