Halloween Cake 2007

I met my parents and my brother last weekend for Sunday lunch and he came up with an idea for a Halloween cake. So I nicked it and made one myself.

I'm going to try to cart it into work tomorrow on the train. That's going to be 'interesting' I think.

Anyway, Happy Halloween, and here's a graveyard cake I just finished making...

Mexican Stand-Off, Part 2

Oh, I forgot to mention. I won the Mexican Stand-Off last weekend and I'm now the proud owner of the Silver Sombrero. Yay me!

To be fair, it's just a silver-painted tequila bottle top, but I won it fair and square.

Actually, that might not be strictly true. There was some confusion over the vote counting so I may have inadvertently Florida-ed my way to victory but, well, a win's a win.

We're already planning the next one. The theme's going to be Italian. I'm thinking home-made pasta and a super-tasty carbonara...

Ouch

New personal rules when cooking at home:

1) When chopping food in a hurry, don't stab the end of your finger with the knife. It hurts.

2) Especially not if you're chopping chillies. It hurts and then it stings.

3) Oh, and don't then put your finger in your mouth to try and make it feel better. You were handling chillies, remember.

I'll leave you to draw your own conclusions about what I did earlier.

Mexican Stand-Off, Part 1

So I'm hosting a dinner party next Saturday. Strictly speaking it's more of a cook-off - a friend will also be cooking at the same party and we'll be in direct competition for our guests' votes for favourite dishes.

The last time we did this it was a Chinese wok-off about a year ago and I lost. The competition itself is all very friendly, and it's only for bragging rights but that's the reason why I *must* win this year, otherwise he'll be the holder of the Golden Chopsticks *and* the Golden Piñta and I'll never hear the end of it.

I'll have the advantage of home turf as it's at my house this year, but I can't afford to rest on my laurels. I've got one killer dish up my sleeve - Mexican pork with rice, but we've got to do two dishes each and I'm kind of stuck on the other one.

I mean, fajitas are all well and good, but I'm not going to get any points for culinary innovation. Unless I can somehow find the most amazing fajita recipe known to man (or woman)...

In fact, here's a challenge: Does anyone have any good Mexican recipes that will assure my victory next Saturday? I'll try and cook any suggestions between now and the 20th and let you know if any look like good candidates. And if I win you'll have the knowledge that it was you who propelled me to success :-)