Antipasto Salad and--BUNNY CAKE!

Had some friends over today to color Easter eggs, and wanted an easy lunch, so I bought some hot dogs and threw together a pasta salad. It was based loosely on a recipe from Taste of Home.

1 package penne pasta, cooked (spirals would have been better, but I wanted to use up some of my excess pasta)
1 small jar quartered marinated artichoke hearts
1 green pepper, diced
1/2 onion, diced
bunch of cherry tomatoes, halved (I just kept putting them in until I thought I had enough)
about 4 oz provolone cheese, cubed
about half a can of black olives, halved
about 1 lb low-fat salami, chopped

dressing:
1 1/2 cups olive oil
1/2 cup red wine vinegar
1/4 cup sugar
about 2 Tbsp fresh oregano, chopped (or 1 dried)
1 tsp salt

Combine all ingredients in large bowl. In small bowl, combine dressing ingredients. Pour dressing on pasta mixture and toss to coat.

I took out some of the pasta salad before adding the salami as one of our friends is Muslim and doesn't eat pork. But after she went home I threw it all back together. :) I know, I know, our Muslim friend came over to decorate eggs. It's a multi-cultural world, my friends.

Also, the original recipe called for chickpeas (aka garbanzo beans), but I couldn't seem to find any at Safeway and I didn't have any at home (I could have sworn I did). It also called for pepperoni in addition to the salami, but they didn't have turkey pepperoni at Safeway and do you know how much fat is in that stuff?

It was good, and will be even better tomorrow. I may eat some for dinner, too.

Then after naptime, the geeks and I made a bunny cake.

Here's what you do:

1. Make a cake in 2 round pans. Whatever kind you like. Mine is carrot.
2. After they cool, cut one of the rounds to make the ears and a bow tie. It kind of looks like this when you cut it: ()() Ok, imagine those parenthesis are part of a big circle. If you google "bunny cake" you can find pictures.
3. Cover a cookie sheet or tray or something (piece of cardboard?) with foil and place the cake so that it makes a bunny with a bowtie shape.
4. Frost with white frosting. Since my cake is carrot, my frosting is cream cheese. I do not suggest using the low-fat cream cheese to make cream cheese frosting. It's kind of thin. But we survived.
5. Decorate. We put coconut on the bunny to give him "fur" and used candy and some pink decorator icing for the rest. Tint some coconut green by putting it in a ziplock bag with a few drops of green food coloring and shaking.
6. Admire your bunny cake!