Ah, Valentine’s Day. A day spent either bragging on social media about how “amazing” your lover is for sending “insert gift here” or rolling your eyes as you scroll through social media, mocking people’s celebration of love. Isn’t it grand?! Frank and I have “celebrated” this ridiculous non-holiday of a day the same way since we met: we wake up, say “I love you”, hug, kiss and go off to work or whatever else the day holds. While we usually spring for a card for each other (we’re big card people naturally though) we would really rather save money than buy a stuffed animal for each other and I’m not a big fan of chocolate. (I know, I know, but if he bought me a bag of Nacho Cheese Doritos I would swear my allegiance to the end of time.) We do like to have filets for dinner and it’s become somewhat of a tradition for us.
Alllll that being said (thank you so much for a 25 min backstory Michelle – you’re welcome), I was home this Valentine’s Day and in need of a Pinterest Blog challenge. Thus – Valentine Pinterest Dinner was born! The only thing that was not a recipe from Pinterest was the steak and salad. I started off by scrolling through Pinterest with my morning coffee, pad of paper and pencil at the ready, to jot down all the ideas I had. My first big find was a recipe for Orange Dreamsicle Cake. https://www.pinterest.com/pin/172755335695305568/
Franky loves the orange/vanilla flavors so I was excited to try this. Then I saw that it was from scratch – and my “I’m amazing and can do anything I set my mind to” part of the brain kicked in. So despite the fact that I am not a baker, haven’t make a cake from scratch in…over a decade, at best, I said, “Oh heck yes, I got this”. Flour flying, 1,200 bowls on the counter, every measuring spoon I own, all spread across a kitchen the size of short hallway and I had achieved success! Well, truthfully, not so much success as freaking finally finished!
What I was trying for… 
What I ended up with. 
Frosting Gluttony 
What I did to my kitchen.
Now, I used the delicious oranges from our tree and so the flavors were there, but it was still way too much for me to take on alongside other new recipes I was planning to do as well. Here’s what I think went wrong: The cake took hours and a trip to the grocery store. Ew. I was covered in flour because I added it into the mixer too fast and somehow frosting ended up on the back of my shirt. I didn’t flour the cake pans enough and so I was shaking the bejezus out of the pans. I only had 2 8-inch rounds and used a random pie tin from World War II for the third. The frosting recipe was also homemade: buttercream. It called for 6 cubes of butter and 6 to 8 cups of powdered sugar. “Hm…that seems like a lot”, my brain said. “Oh well, just make it”, my dumb voice that tells me to do dumb things said. Well, turns out I needed a whole heap of powdered sugar more than the recipe called for to make it a frosting consistency instead of soup. I had to borrow sugar just to keep this cake on track. Finally, I spread it on as thick as deemed allowable by the Geneva Convention and STILL had 4 cups of frosting left over. I think something may have gone wrong in my calculations. Anyways, dessert is done – now I’m on to the sides.
I have an air-fryer and pressure cooker that are new to me and I have been trying them out with a few recipes which I have liked. So I picked two fun and somewhat simple Pinterest recipes. The first for an appetizer: Air Fryer Onion Rings. https://www.pinterest.com/pin/172755335695262966/ These ended up turning out great. The only problem was my air fryer is too small so I had to cook in batches which made me have to place them in warming dish on the stovetop and they become less crispy then fresh out of the fryer. But the taste was awesome! Success- less the mess of the batter prep!
I chose a Pressure Cooker potato recipe for yellow potatoes: https://www.pinterest.com/pin/AVVeUKvIcn49_ycdnM6JnSB_KXoPFMGVzdzQRqjiAEmujzyNNMG21U4/ This recipe was the best and easiest of the night. And one I will definitely make again! It was very easy with few ingredients, it took only 8 minutes to cook the potatoes and the flavor was delicious. While there was 3 tbsp. of butter in the “recipe” we didn’t need to add any butter to the dish at the table. Most of the moisture came from the vegetable broth we added to the cooker. It was really good and again, so easy!
BUT, the BIGGEST hit of the night; the ONE thing you HAVE to make if you try any of these pins; the you will NOT regret it if you love orange dreamsicles or dip or fruit or sweets is: the Orange Dreamsicle DIP! WOW! https://www.pinterest.com/pin/172755335695338619/ We loved this dip so much we didn’t eat the cake until the next day. It definitely was our dessert. It’s easy to make, keeps well in the fridge, and is delicious with fruit, vanilla wafers or graham crackers. I will definitely be making this dip again. It was Frank’s favorite as well. As you can see, it was already “tested” before I could even snap a picture!
All that was left to make this a perfectly Pinterest-y Valentine’s Dinner was to set the table, add a bottle of wine,make the salad and sear/saute the filets in a herb butter I made. We were so hungry by the time I was finished pretending I was Emeril I forgot to take a picture of the meal. But who the heck needs ANOTHER picture of someone else’s food?! Oh wait…that’s just what I…nevermind. Well, I hope you all had a day that you enjoyed spending just the way you like, with someone you like and who likes you too!
