Avocado Mexican Bar and Grille

1857 Lower Muscatine Rd., Sycamore Mall Parking Lot, SE Iowa City

We tried out this new restaurant which is in the building Okoboji Grill used to be in. The 1st thing I noticed was that it's Mexican and using the "e" on the end of the word Grill, which doesn't seem like a very Mexican-y thing to do.

The atmosphere is basically the same as Okoboji Grill was, not a lot has changed inside. Except when we went to Okoboji Grill without a kid, we always got seated at the bar area, and when we went with a kid they always sat us away from the bar area, where we noticed other families with kids were seated. Avocado doesn't seem to segregate families vs. non families in this way.

It took us awhile to choose what to order. In my defense, it was my 1st time there and they give you a novel of a menu to peruse. Our server asked us several times if we were ready to order and we kept saying "nope". Then another server stopped by and recommend the fajitas and said "they the BOMB for real". 

I had a question about an item on the menu, which I asked our server. The question was about a word on the menu that the empanadas came with. The server basically said she didn't know what that was, and then guessed that it might be grilled veggies. That sounded good to me, so I ordered it. When the empanadas then came with just ground beef in them, I wondered if our server had previously worked at Best Buy. Because, you see, when you ask someone at Best Buy a question they don't know the answer to, they just make up an answer on the spot. And it's usually wrong. I'm saying this because it has happened to us on several occasions. If you walk into a Best Buy with more IT knowledge than the sales clerk, you can entertain yourself for hours.

Anyway, while I wasn't too pleased with our server, the empanadas were quite good. If anyone from Avocado reads this, though- I think they would be even better with grilled veggies. My husband got the enchiladas which were average, except for the one filled with liquid cheese. Real melted cheese would have been much better. And our elementary-aged son loved his kids' burrito, he loved the server, and he loved the bowl of ice cream, whipped cream and chocolate syrup he got as a bonus after his meal! He even took a photo of it before eating it.

He walked out of there declaring Avocado one of his 3 favorite restaurants (Fair Grounds and Jimmy Jack's being the other two).

The bill came to $27 with the tip, and the server brought a bonus ice cream for my husband and I for no charge. And with the free chips and salsa we had before the meal, we waddled out of there quite stuffed.

Next time (and my son INSISTS on there being a next time)- we'll get the "Guacamole at the table" where they bring a portable table and mortar-n-pestle real avocados into an amazing looking guacamole in front of you.

In conclusion, you get pretty darn full for a good price, it's very kid-friendly, and the servers might make stuff up but they're generally friendly. Also they have random things for sale by the door.

Cake #21: Devil's Food Cake with Quick Fudge Icing and Raspberry Jam

I skipped ahead in the book to make this cake, because it was January 8 which happens to be both my grandpa's birthday as well as Elvis' birthday. Any excuse to make a cake...


I chose this one because I had some leftover raspberry-rhubarb jam in the fridge that I wanted to use up and I thought this would be the perfect way to use it. Turns out I was wrong, but the taste was good!

The cake is a good one, and not too difficult to make. The odd thing about it is that it calls for a mixture of "strong coffee" with unsweetened cocoa. As usually happens on Sunday mornings, we drank all the coffee in the pot so I used instant Folgers coffee instead, which I think was fine. I mixed butter (the recipe calls for shortening and I always assume butter will work fine) with sugar (I used raw/unrefined because it didn't say not to). Then I added 1/2 of the "dry ingredients" mix of cake flour, baking soda, salt and baking powder, then all of the coffee/cocoa mixture and then the other 1/2 of the "dry ingredients" and let the kitchen aid work its magic for awhile. That's it! See, the cake is pretty easy.

The frosting, however....

I mixed semi sweet chocolate chips with a 1/2 can of evaporated milk and melted it in a make-shift double broiler. We usually use chopstick holders for this but since my mom visited I can't seem to find where the chopstick holders disappeared to. (She has a method of putting things she thinks we use and things she thinks we don't use much in very different places and we get to play a fun "Where's Waldo" type of game for several weeks after each visit.) So I used some small sauce plates which sort of worked. Anyway, the chocolate melted even though I didn't stand there stirring constantly as the book instructed me to. Then I added powdered sugar to the melted chocolate slowly and let the kitchen aid mix it for quite awhile.

Finally, the cakes were baked and cooled and the frosting was room temp, so I did the layer-method as suggested, putting a layer of frosting on the bottom cake, then spreading the jam on top, then the 2nd cake on that, then frosting, jam, and more frosting.

Turns out the jam acts as a sort of lube and the frosting was quite runny and so, the cakes slid all over the place. They looked like crap but they tasted good!

Next time, I would use a frosting that is less runny (more of the store-bought consistency), I would use a store-bought jam rather than a runny homemade kind, and my husband suggests never, ever, cutting a layered cake in half like it's a pizza. Now knowing it might slide all over the place, I'm more inclined to cut wedges out to keep the thing together.

Although, after eating this one, I'd say really you could skip the layering part all together since 1 piece of layered cake is really like eating 2 pieces of cake and when it's rich like this, you might be better off eating just one piece. The frosting is still way too runny though.

Cake #20: Butter Rum Cake

 

I made this cake in celebration of my dad's birthday and my anniversary with my partner, both in early March. I used Cruzan rum for the cake and a "regular" rum for the glaze. That's what my notes say, I don't remember what the "regular" rum brand was. Then I mixed milk w/ lemon juice for the "sour milk". I poked into the cake with a wooden skewer before glazing it so that it would get down in there. Then I put it on a rack to cool and it stuck to the rack. Maybe use a platter next time, something to catch the glaze running off of it. 

 Next time, use chopsticks instead of a skewer because the glaze is so thick it won't go into the small holes the skewer left. Also use more rum (couldn't taste it very much, and, well, it's in the title). This cake is good, but it does not go with ice cream, better on its own.

Cake #19: The Naughty Senator (Peppermint and Chocolate Rum Marble Cake)

This cake was what I chose for our family's Valentine's Christmas (we put it off until after a baby in the family was born so that all the travelers could meet the baby). We didn't have peppermint extract, so I used almond extract instead. So half the batter was made with the almond extract and the other half was made with cocoa/sugar and spiced rum. My 4 year old loved helping with the kitchen aid and doing the marbling effect!
This cake was not too difficult, good tasting, and could be done with a few different variations. Next time I think I'll skip the green food coloring and it'll be a brown and white colored cake.

Another attempt at egg dye....

This year I tried using turmeric as a natural egg dye. I heated up some water, added vinegar, and poured in a bunch of turmeric. Then I put a rubber band around the egg (the kind broccoli comes in) and put the eggs in a container in the fridge for awhile. The second batch was in much longer than the first batch, and the length of time didn't seem to matter a whole lot. This is about as dark as they got.
Also, I'm not convinced that heating up the water actually does anything.

Cake #18: Mary Carole Battle's Mother's Wacky Cake with Seven-Minute Frosting

I had skipped over this cake previously, and I'm not sure why- in the book it falls between Chocolate Pound Cake and Cocoa Bread with Stewed Peaches. This is called "Wacky" cake because they made them during World War II when dairy products were scarce. Today we call such things "Vegan" cakes. On 2/2/14, I decided to make two versions, one with oil, like the recipe calls for, and one with applesauce. 

The cake on the left is the one with oil and the one on the right was with applesauce. I could tell the difference out of the oven, but after they were frosted, I wasn't sure which was which. 

With this cake, you put all the dry ingredients in, then make three holes in the mix- one for vinegar, one for vanilla extract and one for oil, or applesauce in my case. We had a friend try it who had not heard of "wacky" cakes but knew them as "crazy" cakes, and knew about doing the 3 holes in the dry mixture too.

The cake was very easy to make. The frosting was not.

I didn't have a double boiler, so I stirred the ingredients (egg whites, sugar, cream of tartar, water and vanilla extract) in a stainless steel bowl and then put it in a pan of boiling water. I used an immersion blender for 7 minutes, and it didn't work, the frosting was still liquidy. Then my husband pointed out that the point of the hand blender is to whip air into it, which a immersion blender does not do (it's submersed),  so I got out the whip and hand-whipped it for about 10 minutes. I wasn't able to do it very fast and therefore it was not thickening. Then he pointed out that the egg whites were probably well-cooked by now, so I could just use the kitchen aid. We got that out and kept it in the hot stainless steel bowl, making sure to hold it the whole time, and whipped it on high for about 10 minutes. It never formed the stiff peaks it said it would, so I gave up on it when it was about the consistency of marshmallow creme. I don't know if the look had something to do with it or not, but it kind of had the flavor of marshmallow creme too. It wasn't very good, and definitely not worth the effort, especially if you don't own a double boiler or a hand-held electrical whipping device! But, if you like the fact that it is a frosting with no butter or fat at all in it, and you like marshmallow creme, then by all means go for it! I'd rather sprinkle powdered sugar on top and serve it with homemade ice cream.  

I learned that you can save the egg yolks (when making things like this that call for only the whites) in the freezer- label them w/ how many are in there, and you can use them in the future for cakes that only call for egg yolks!

Being Superbowl Sunday, I frosted (or cremed) the cakes and they looked pretty boring, so I put a "B" on one and an "S" on the other for Broncos and Seahawks. It turned out to be BS!

Later that week, I decided to try it again (and I had a potluck to go to and I needed something to bring) as a healthy version. I changed enough things about it that I decided I could call it my own recipe and give it a new name. So, here it is- a cake I just invented based on the WWII/Wacky/Crazy cake recipe of Mary Carole Battle:

Vegan Healthy Chocolate Cake:
3 cups whole wheat flour
2 cups raw sugar
1/2 t salt
1/2 c unsweetened cocoa
2 t baking soda
After stirring together, make three holes and add to each one: 
2 t vanilla extract
2 T vinegar
3/4 c apple sauce (or pear sauce)
Then on top:
2 c cold water
Stir and add:
1/2 c chocolate chips
Pour into two cake pans, well greased. 
Bake at 350 for about 35 minutes, a toothpick should come out clean. 
Let cool and add powdered sugar for the "frosting".
Don't cover or the powdered sugar will dissolve and disappear.
Since this is enough for 2 cakes, you could also stack them with frosting in between and on top and sides. But then you'd have to remove "healthy" from the title. Or, actually, you could still call it "healthy" cake, because the cake is healthy even if the frosting is not, right?

Cake #17: Angel Food Cake

It was my dad's 60th birthday so I skipped way ahead in the book to make a homemade angel food cake. March 2013. I was surprised at how easy it was to make, and that angel food cakes don't have any butter or oil! That being said, this cake was a lot different than the other cakes I have made. You just add stuff to the kitchen aid and beat until the egg whites are forming peaks. Not overbeating is important.

I used 8 egg whites, which were a little less than 1 cup. There were 8 egg yolks left over, so my male companion made a double batch of custard with them.

You need to line the angel food pan (different from a bundt pan in that it comes apart) with parchment paper. I didn't know how to do that, so I just lined the bottom with a hole cut out. 

Then you pour the batter into the parchment paper-lined, ungreased tube pan and bake it. 

Then you let it cool for a few minutes and then you find out what that hole in the middle is for- to fit on a wine bottle!

You stick the wine bottle in there and flip the thing upside down so that it doesn't collapse on itself. This is also why the pan was not greased- so that it won't fall out while cooling upside down.

When it's fully cooled, it can go right side up on a plate. You have to remove it very carefully with a knife and/or a spatula. Now you can see that parchment paper with the hole cut out (above)

After removing the parchment paper, the top looks like this (above).

And the sides look like the photo above- all nice and fluffy.

The funny thing is, most people buy angel food cake mix and make it from that. But the mixing of the ingredients is the easy part. The cooling and removing is what takes the most effort here. I, for one, will make angel food cakes from scratch from now on! And plus, when you make it from scratch, you know it doesn't have too many calories, so you can make up for that fact with the frosting.

The trick with angel food cake frosting is to put a round piece of cardboard over the top and frost over it to give it a smooth look. Then the birthday boy gets to lick the cardboard. Six-pack beer boxes work best. Or maybe that's what's always available in my house.

Then serve with homemade vanilla ice cream.