Rum makes everything better!

This weekend was one of my best friend's birthdays!  I invited her over for lunch.  I served shephard's pie (which I've blogged about before) along with rum cake and rum fudge! You can never have too much rum! ;)

First up the fudge!  I got the idea from Steph Chows.  She made coconut fudge with Captain Morgans last week. At the time I had banana rum so I thought I'd sub that.  Then I decided I should add macadamia nuts and make it Tropical Fudge!  So I did.  I'd never made fudge but this was soooo easy!
In a saucepan I poured 1 (14oz) can low fat Eagle brand condensed milk.  Then I added one bag of semi-sweet chocolate chips.  I simmered until the chocolate melted then added one shot of banana rum and stirred until creamy.  I removed the pan from heat and added 2 handfuls of sweetened flaked coconut and around 2 handfuls of chopped macadamias.  Then I poured it into a 8 in. pan lined with wax paper and threw in the fridge overnight.  It turned out perfect!  My friends said it was the best fudge they'd ever had so I was pretty proud of it!

For her birthday cake I made a rum cake.  I got the recipe from Recipezaar.  Naturally I had to make a few changes.  First up I used Captain Morgans rum because I'm not crazy about vanilla and I thought spiced rum would be better.  My second big change was obviously making it gluten free.  I subbed the flour in the recipe for Pamela's Baking mix and omitted the leavening agents.  I must confess though that I misplaced my non-stick cooking spray and tried to drizzle the pan with canola oil.  The cake stuck pretty bad and came out in four pieces! lol!  The taste however was out of this world!  Seriously the best cake I EVER ate. You totally couldn't tell it was gluten free!  I am making myself one for my own birthday in a couple of weeks!

Here is me with the birthday girl!  She seemed to enjoy her lunch!  I just love cooking for people! :)