I’ve never met a person who didn’t like s’mores.  Even my non-sweet eating husband has been known to sneak a bite or two behind the barbecue grill when no one was looking.  I’m not surprised.  What’s not to love about oozey melted chocolate and ooey, gooey toasted marshmallows sandwiched between crunchy graham crackers?   Nothing, that’s what.  Never mind that they’re sticky and messy and a pain to eat.  That’s part of their charm.  They’re “s’mores”, and the name speaks for itself.

Although I found no concrete proof of this, s’mores are said to have been invented by a group of Girl Scouts on a camping trip, in the early part of the 20th century.  In fact, the first published recipe for s’mores appeared in the 1927 Girl Scout Handbook.  You’ve got to hand it to those Girl Scouts.  They’re an industrious bunch!  I wish I had been a Girl Scout when I was a kid.  My mother told me that that that they didn’t have Girl Scouts where we lived.  I think she made that up.  She said the same thing when I asked if I could take ballet lessons.  My mother was never much of a joiner.

Mini SGCC was a Girl Scout though.  She made it all the way through from Brownies to Cadettes.   Then she discovered boys, and that was the end of scouting – and s’mores. 

This S’more Pie is a slightly more sophisticated take on the original, though it has all of the same elements:  crunchy graham crackers, smooth, creamy chocolate and toasted marshmallows.  The graham crackers make up the crust and the chocolate comes in the form of a rich, velvety dark chocolate pudding.  And the toasted marshmallows…  Well, they’re still just toasted marshmallows.  I had other plans for them too, but I’ll get to that later.

The recipe for this chocolate pudding came from Gourmet Magazine.  It’s made with milk, cocoa powder, bittersweet chocolate, and thickened with cornstarch.  What I liked about this recipe was that it didn’t have a custard base, so there were no eggs to worry about tempering.  This made it all about the chocolate.  Sometimes, eggs can get in the way and muddle things up.  Feel free to use your own favorite chocolate pudding recipe, if you have one.

The graham cracker crust is just a mixture of crushed crackers, sugar and melted butter.  It’s one of the simplest things in the world to make.  Maybe that’s why I love it so much.  No rolling, and it always turns out right.

The chocolate pudding is really a cinch to make too.  You just heat all of the ingredients together in a saucepan, and whisk until they thicken.   Gotta love that!

Before the marshmallows go on, the pie needs to be chilled for a few hours.  If you skip this step, you might end up with chocolate pudding soup when you toast them.  Chocolate pudding soup would probably still taste good, but it would be a little  difficult to eat with a fork.

I had originally planned to be all fancy and pipe Marshmallow Fluff rosettes all over the top of this pie.  This was a great idea in theory, but not in application.    While you would think that Fluff has enough substance to stand up when piped, it does not.  At least, mine didn’t.    My rosettes kept flopping and falling, and I’d have to keep pulling them off and start over.    I went through an industrial sized vat of the stuff before I finally gave up.  Burnished little peaks would have definitely been prettier, but sometimes you have to cut your losses and move on.  Besides, the pie looks more “s’more-like” with mini marshmallows on top.  I think it has a certain “rustic charm”, don’t you?

I will also tell you that this pie is not easy to cut.  The marshmallows are way too sticky and gooey to get a neat slice.  Of course, if you aren’t planning to photograph it, it doesn’t matter.  If you are, like I was, then use a really sharp knife moistened with a light coating of flavorless cooking oil.  I didn’t figure this out until after I had already massacred half of the pie – which is why I don’t have a shot of any of the slices.  I make these mistakes so you don’t have to.  You can thank me later.

All glitches aside, this S’more Pie is really some kind of wonderful!  And, you don’t even have to fire up the grill to make it.   But, don’t take my word for it.  Make one for yourself and you’ll see what I mean.

Anyone remember the old Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups commercials?  In them, two unsuspecting souls would be strolling down the street – one eating peanut butter and the other eating a chocolate bar -  and would somehow collide with each other, smushing the peanut butter and chocolate together.  Each would be outraged, but after tasting the resulting chocolate/peanut butter concoction, they would be be smitten and wander off together,  hand in hand, licking their lips.

Take a look.

Yeah, I know. Who the heck walks down the street eating a jar of peanut butter? The Hershey Company, which owns Reese’s must be doing something right, however. Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups are one of the top selling chocolate bars of all time, generating approximately $398.9 million in revenue last year. That’s a whole lot of peanut butter and chocolate!

The point is that peanut butter and chocolate is a wildly popular and much-loved  combination, not only in candy bars, but in all kinds of sweets.  And, you’d be hard pressed to find a better example than these Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies. 

There are tons of peanut butter cookie recipes floating around the web, and many of them are very good.  But, my all time favorite is the one from The Magnolia Bakery Cookbook.  The recipe is easy to make and the cookies are divinely soft and chewy. The addition of peanut butter chips (Reese’s, of course) to the dough really amps up the peanut butter flavor.

The original recipe calls for chunky peanut butter.  I like to use the super chunky kind.  Those little peanut bits add a nice texture and extra crunch to the cookies.   Magnolia’s recipe also doesn’t include chocolate chips, but I say – why not?  Adding the chocolate chips just puts these cookies way over the top!  And, what’s not to love about that?

If you’ve never baked your own peanut butter cookies, this is a great recipe to start with. They truly are the best I’ve ever eaten.   I highly recommend having a nice icy cold glass of milk handy when you eat these cookies to help wash down all of that peanut buttery and chocolate goodness.  These cookies are rich, rich, rich!

]]> http://stickygooeycreamychewy.com/2011/10/25/irresistible-peanut-butter-chocolate-chip-cookies-recipe/feed/ 18 http://stickygooeycreamychewy.com/2011/10/06/faux-nutella-recipe/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=faux-nutella-recipe http://stickygooeycreamychewy.com/2011/10/06/faux-nutella-recipe/#comments Thu, 06 Oct 2011 16:56:17 +0000 Susan http://stickygooeycreamychewy.com/?p=3924 I’ve made no secret about the fact that I’m addicted to Nutella.  Just leave me alone with my own jar of that creamy, dreamy, chocolatey deliciousness and a great, big spoon, and I’m happy.  But, let’s face it. Nutella isn’t exactly considered a health food.  It contains gobs of …]]>

I’ve made no secret about the fact that I’m addicted to Nutella.  Just leave me alone with my own jar of that creamy, dreamy, chocolatey deliciousness and a great, big spoon, and I’m happy.  But, let’s face it. Nutella isn’t exactly considered a health food.  It contains gobs of sugar and smaller amounts of some yucky stuff like palm oil and artificial vanilla flavoring, whatever that is.  In light of my obsession, I can live with that.  But, considering how much Nutella actually consume, I thought I should maybe look into some other options.  

When I was visiting Portland last month, I picked up a few bags of hazelnuts at the farmers market.  Did you know that Oregon is the number one producer of hazelnuts in the United States?  I had no idea!   Anyway, I decided to use some of them to make my own chocolate-hazelnut spread, aka faux Nutella.   There are a slew of different recipes floating around the web, but the one I liked best came from the Encyclopédie du Chocolat via David Lebovitz’s site.  The reason that I chose it was because it didn’t call for any processed sugar, oils or additional fats, which was what I was trying to avoid.

I did change some things around, though.  Instead of a mix of hazelnuts and almonds, I used only hazelnuts.  I cut the amount of honey in the original recipe down by one tablespoon, and used nonfat dry milk because I couldn’t find the whole milk kind.  I altered the proportion of milk and dark chocolate, and also added a few tablespoons of cocoa powder.  It was fantastic -  rich and creamy, with an intense, but not bitter, chocolate flavor.   I am officially in love!

Although there are several steps involved in making this faux Nutella, they are all pretty quick and easy to do.    First, you have to toast the hazelnuts and rub off their skins.  Then you have to grind them as finely as you can.  After that, you add ribbons of melted chocolate, followed by the rest of the ingredients.

The mixture that you end up with is very thin.  David warns about this in his post.  But, he also says that the spread thickens up nicely after being chilled for a few hours – which it does.  You also may find it to be a little bit grainy.  The original recipe does say to strain the mixture, but I didn’t – and I thought it was fine.  If you are bugged by it, by all means, strain away.

We’ve been enjoying this spread in lots of different ways, but I’ve become infatuated with it sandwiched in between two vanilla wafers.  It’s the perfect little bite!

So, go ahead and indulge in this guilty pleasure, with a little less guilt, by making your own faux Nutella.  I am!

]]> http://stickygooeycreamychewy.com/2011/10/06/faux-nutella-recipe/feed/ 20 http://stickygooeycreamychewy.com/2011/08/22/the-perfect-chocolate-chip-cookie-recipe/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=the-perfect-chocolate-chip-cookie-recipe http://stickygooeycreamychewy.com/2011/08/22/the-perfect-chocolate-chip-cookie-recipe/#comments Mon, 22 Aug 2011 18:05:01 +0000 Susan http://stickygooeycreamychewy.com/?p=3838 When Ruth Graves Wakefield mixed bits of semi-sweet chocolate into a vat of cookie dough back in the 1930’s, she unwittingly created what is arguably the most popular recipe of all time – the chocolate chip cookie.  By some accounts, it was an accident.  Others claim that Wakefield intentionally …]]>

When Ruth Graves Wakefield mixed bits of semi-sweet chocolate into a vat of cookie dough back in the 1930’s, she unwittingly created what is arguably the most popular recipe of all time – the chocolate chip cookie.  By some accounts, it was an accident.  Others claim that Wakefield intentionally added the semi-sweet chocolate when she ran out of regular baking chocolate.  Whichever version is true, cookie lovers everywhere are thankful.

Since then, professional chefs and home cooks alike have been on a quest to find the Holy Grail of chocolate chip cookie recipes.   A quick Google search turned up almost 2,500,000 entries.  That’s a lot of cookies, folks!   Of course, every chocolate chip cookie aficionado has their own criteria for what makes a cookie “the one”.  Some love them thin and crispy, while others seek out the thick and chewy.  Most people consider the ultimate chocolate cookie to be somewhere in between – thin and shatteringly crisp on the outside, while soft, gooey and chewy on the inside.    I’m an equal opportunity cookie eater.   I can definitely appreciate the joys of both the crispy and the chewy. How about you? 

To further confuse the issue are the numerous chocolate chip cookie mutations that have evolved over the years, including those containing various kinds of nuts, fruits, toffee chips and oh yes, even bacon.  It’s enough to make one’s head swim, preferably in a sea of melted chocolate!

A few years ago, on a mission for the New York Times, David Leite set out to find the perfect chocolate chip cookie.    In his search, he left no chip unturned.  One of his most interesting revelations was that letting the dough “rest” in the fridge for at least twenty-four hours before baking makes for a much better cookie.  The chilling process is said to allow the dough to “dry out”, which bakes to a better consistency.   Leite also discovered that Ruth Wakefield’s original recipe for the Toll House cookie did, in fact, call for letting the cookie dough chill in the fridge overnight.   Somewhere along the way, that little nugget of information got lost in the translation, and has never been included in the official recipe.  How do you like that?  For over seventy years, we’ve been doing it all wrong!

And apparently, size does matter when it comes to chocolate chip cookies as it does with other things in life.  On his journey to cookie enlightenment, Leite learned that  the bigger the cookie, the  greater the delineation of texture, from crisp to chewy to soft.  Among the gurus that he interviewed, the consensus was that the ideal chocolate chip cookie should bake up to a whopping five to six inches in diameter.  Now, this is where I draw the line.  If I got into the habit of eating six-inch chocolate chip cookies, or any cookie that big, I’d have to climb into my closet and dig out the “fat pants”.  And, I ain’t willing to dig them out again for anything – not even the most perfect chocolate chip cookie on the planet!  Besides, if I shoved a six-inch cookie in Mini SGCC’s face, she’d probably run screaming into the night, never to be heard from again!

What I was willing to do, however, was try this recipe making smaller cookies.  Instead of monster cookies, I made three inchers.    I still let them rest for thirty-six hours before I baked them.  I also still used a good quality bittersweet chocolate and sprinkled them with sea salt.  And, I added  some nuts, just because that’s how I roll.   I have to say, they were pretty damn fabulous!  They had a thin edge of crispy that splintered upon contact with my teeth, which then yielded to a soft, chewy, chocolatey center.  There were toffee and brown sugar undertones too -  just like there was supposed to be – that were beautifully enhanced by the little flakes of salt on top.  All in all, an amazing cookie.  Were they worthy of being dubbed the perfect chocolate chip cookie?  I don’t know. I think I’ll let you decide.

When we were kids, every family barbecue ended the same way.   We’d run around the backyard looking for long thin sticks, and load them up with marshmallows.  Then, as the fire on the charcoal grill began to die down,  we’d toast them over the glowing embers.   My little brother was all about instant gratification.  He’d jam his marshmallows right into the coals which usually caused them to catch on fire.    I, being older and wiser, patiently held my marshmallows over the coals, turning them every few minutes, until they were a nice golden brown.  My brother would look at the charred, black blob on his stick,  and then at my perfect toasty specimens and  turn on the waterworks.  What else could I do but share some of mine.  As much as I loved toasted marshmallows, I loved my little brother more.

Sometimes, my mother would present us with a box of graham crackers and some Hershey bars, and we’d make s’mores.  What bliss!  Seriously, is there anything better than a sticky, gooey toasted marshmallow sitting on top of melty milk chocolate and a crunchy Honey Graham?  I think not.  And boy, were they messy!  After eating them, my dad would have to hose us down before my mother would let us back in the house.

When Mini SGCC was little, we made s’mores too.  By that time, everyone had gas grills instead of charcoal ones.  I’m sorry, but to me, toasting marshmallows on a gas grill just isn’t the same.   Mini SGCC didn’t seem to mind, though.  She devoured her s’mores just the same – and made just as big a mess!

Since I wasn’t too keen on hosing down my sweet little cherub, or cutting strands of melted white goo out of her mass of golden curls, I came up with a much neater way for her to enjoy s’mores – Crunchy S’mores Bars.

Crunchy S’mores Bars have all of the essential elements of traditional s’mores – marshmallows, chocolate and graham –  but without the mess.  They are so ridiculously simple to make, that I’m almost embarrassed to share them with you.  But, they are also so incredibly good, that I’m willing to risk the humiliation.  Actually, they’re just an amped up variation of Rice Krispies Treats, except without the Rice Krispies and with chocolate.

To give these bars their “s’moreness”,  I use Golden Grahams cereal and milk chocolate chips.  Trust me, it works.  All you do is melt the marshmallows in a saucepan with some butter, and mix in the cereal and chocolate chips.  Then, you press the whole gooey glob into a pan, drizzle it with melted chocolate and voilà!  Crunchy S’mores Bars!

I suppose that I could have fancied things up a bit and browned the butter, added bacon or used some exotic, organic, single origin, fair trade certified chocolate.   You know, to try and impress you.  But, these are cereal bars, people.   Sometimes, it’s better to leave well enough alone.   Besides, everyone who’s ever tried these bars has loved them, so who am I to mess with success.

Have you ever wondered why it is that certain foods can elicit such strong emotions in us?    I was told once that every experience we have ever had is filed away in our subconscious mind.  Even though we may not remember them, they are all there – waiting to be triggered by some seemingly unrelated sight, touch, taste or smell.  I have found myself in this situation many times.  I’ll be going about my business and then suddenly – POW!   A familiar scent wafting out of  someone’s window as I walk by,  the locking of eyes with a kindly stranger on the street, or even watching a television commercial can send a flood of long-forgotten memories rushing to the surface.   The process of making this Mint Chocolate Chip Ice Cream was one of those times.

As I gathered the fresh mint I needed from my garden,  I suddenly saw myself at five, lying in a patch of green.  It took a minute or two, but I eventually realized that I was remembering myself as a little girl playing in my grandmother’s garden.  She had lush, thick rows of fragrant, fresh spearmint growing up and down the little flagstone path that led from the street up to her front door.  I thought it was so exotic!  I would lie down in the piles of feathery, textured leaves, drinking in their intoxicating scent, until Grandma would come out of the house and tell me to get up because I was “a crusha da meent”.   I can only imagine what the neighbors must have thought seeing this crazy little kid rolling around on the ground!

Now that I can recall the experience again, it is so clear and vivid in my mind.  And, I’m very grateful to that mint for bringing such a cherished memory back to me.  That must be why I’ve always felt the need to have fresh mint growing somewhere in my yard, even though I don’t normally use it all that much.  Somehow, just knowing that it’s there is a comfort.  

When I bought some new little mint plants at the farmers market a few months ago, the guy that sold them to me warned me that they would grow like crazy.  Boy, was he ever right!  I’ve got peppermint, spearmint and applemint growing everywhere – scads of it!  Among other things, I’ve been steeping it into tea, chopping it into salads and pureeing it into soups.  I love that fresh, clean burst of flavor it brings wherever I add it.    The funny thing is that, while I enjoy using mint in all kinds of savory dishes, I really don’t care for it in sweets.  I especially don’t like it paired with chocolate, which is why nobody was more surprised than I to find that I absolutely adored this Mint Chocolate Chip Ice Cream.  Yes folks, it’s true.  I loved, loved, loved this ice cream!  I’m such a dichotomy.  Or pain in the butt.  You decide.

Why then, you might ask, would I even bother to make an ice cream whose main ingredients are chocolate and mint – a combination I usually dislike?  The answer is simple.  I’m trying to use up some of that damn mint before it takes over the rest of my garden!  I’m sorry, but there’s only so much peppermint tea that one can drink.  And frankly, I’m getting a little sick of tabbouleh.

The recipe for this ice cream came (again) from David Lebovitz’s The Perfect Scoop.  I know that I use this book a lot, but I just haven’t found another I like better for making frozen desserts.  David’s recipes are easy to follow – and they work.

So, let’s make some ice cream!

The first thing you need to do is collect a big pile of fresh mint leaves.  I used a combination of peppermint and spearmint, because I had both.  The mint is simmered with milk, sugar and cream, and then steeped in them for about an hour.  This infuses the mixture with lots of lovely “mintiness”.

Next, it’s time to make the custard.  Whisk up some egg yolks and pour a little of the warm, milky mint mixture in.  Keep on whisking so that the eggs don’t scramble.  Add it back to the pot and cook it slowly until it gets nice and thick.  You’ll know it’s ready when you can run your finger down the back of a wooden spoon and leave tracks.  After that, you’ll need to strain the custard in case there are any curdled egg bits in there.  You definitely don’t want little globs of scrambled egg in your ice cream!

Make sure you chill the custard for a good, long time.  Otherwise, your ice cream will not set up properly, and that would be a crying shame.  Once it is thoroughly chilled, churn it up in your ice cream maker.

Now, here’s the tricky part.  To make your “chips”, melt some bittersweet or semisweet chocolate.  I just do this in the microwave.  When the ice cream is about two to three minutes away from being done, drizzle the melted chocolate right into it in a thin stream.  When the warm chocolate makes contact with the cold ice cream it will break up into small, very thin and shatteringly crispy flakes.  Forget chocolate chips.  This is way, way better!

When your ice cream has finished churning, scoop it into a freezer container and freeze it for as long as you can wait before diving into it.  And I warn you, this might not be very long at all.

You’ve probably noticed that while this ice cream has a pale, greenish tinge, it isn’t really green.  That’s how it’s supposed to look.   If you need to see a more “in your face” green, you can add a few drops of green food coloring.  I  think it looks pretty and much more palatable the way it is, but to each his own.   Whatever you do though, please, please, please don’t add any of that fake, mediciney tasting mint extract!  It doesn’t need it.  And if you do, please don’t tell me about it, because I might just cry.

Enjoy!

I’ve been feeling a little blue lately.  It’s a barely perceptible, nondescript blue,  like a bad color cast, which is the worst kind because it’s the hardest blue to define.  I’m not quite sure exactly where it came from either.  One day I looked around and it was just there.  Every so often, a bunch of little things start to pile up on top of each other and the blue just sneaks in.   I’m sure my  recent “pot stirring” experience didn’t help.   This blue is a tricky little sucker too.  Depending on the direction of the light, it sometimes seems to disappear, and you think it’s moved on.  But then, when you least expect it – poof – it’s back again, and your white balance goes all off.

There are only so many things you can do to ward off the “blue”.  I already made homemade caramels last week, so my only other alternative was to bring out the big guns – chocolate.  Did you know that chocolate, particularly dark chocolate, has mood enhancing qualities?  It contains small amounts of phenylethylamine -  a mood-regulating chemical naturally found in the brain.   Chocolate has also been shown to boost serotonin levels – our brain’s  own natural antidepressant – as well as endorphin levels.  Endorphins are neurotransmitters produced in the brain, usually during some kind of physical exercise,  which serve to reduce feelings of stress and pain, and can actually induce feelings of euphoria and well-being.  Just a few bites of your favorite chocolate can help chase away your blue too.

Short of nibbling on an actual chocolate bar, I can think of few ways to replicate that pure, intensely chocolate flavor.  The best I know is with this chocolate sorbet from David Lebovitz’s The Perfect Scoop.  With no milk, cream or eggs to muddle things up,  this sorbet is pure, unadulterated chocolate love.  And, if that doesn’t make you happy, I don’t know what will. 

First, scrounge around your kitchen for some deep, dark chocolate pieces – the darker the better.  One great thing about this recipe is that you can mix and match leftover bits from other recipes.

You’ll also need some unsweetened cocoa powder.  David recommends the Dutch-process kind.  I don’t really know what difference it makes, but if David says to use it, I just do.  He is the god of frozen desserts.

Mix the cocoa powder in a saucepan with sugar and a pinch of salt.  We all know that a little salt enhances the sweet.

Add water and bring it to a boil.

After the cocoa mixture has boiled, take it off the heat and whisk in your lovely dark chocolate bits.

Ooooh!!!

Add some more water and a splash of vanilla.  Then, chill.

Anybody wanna lick the whisk?

Once the sorbet base is super chilled,  pour it in your ice cream machine and churn, baby, churn!

I’m telling you, people, this chocolate sorbet is the stuff dreams are made of!   It reminds me of that smooth, thick, dark, impossibly rich chocolate chaud, or drinking chocolate, that I slurped down all over Paris back in the day – only frozen.   It has a lush, velvety texture that kind of lives on your tongue for a minute or two after melting.  I swear I can actually feel those endorphins bubbling up and rushing through my body just thinking about it.  Lucky for me, I still have a small container of sorbet in the freezer that accidentally got stashed underneath the frozen lima beans.  That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

You have got to make this one, people.  It’s sinful, I tell you – absolutely sinful.  And, the recipe is so easy.  There’s no egg yolk tempering or cornstarch thickening or ice baths to worry about.  Forget the “runner’s high”!   A chocolate high is much more fun and requires no more exertion than moving your spoon from the bowl up to your mouth.    Trust me.  This indescribably delicious chocolate sorbet will not only chase away your “blue”,  it will make you forget that it ever existed!  I promise!

Enjoy!

It’s that time of year again.  The time when Girl Scouts everywhere literally are everywhere, selling their Thin Mints, Samoas and Tagalongs.  I’m talking about Girl Scout cookies, people.

Yes, the little darlings are out en masse, camped out in front of every supermarket in town, hawking their wares. And, they are good at it, too!  Seriously.  They must throw in a Dale Carnegie course or two when they sign you up!  It would take the most hardened of hearts to resist those sweet, angelic faces. I don’t know about you, but my steely resolve goes right out the window each time I look into a pair of those sad and pleading eyes.  So, I buy cookies – lots of them.  And then, I take them home and try to figure out what the heck to do with them!

This is my niece, Samantha.   She’s a Daisy.  Sammie takes her Girl Scout cookie selling very seriously.  Could you resist that face?  I didn’t think so.  I bought ten boxes from her.  Is there a twelve step program for this?  If so, sign me up. 

Over the years, I’ve found some fun and creative ways to use my stash of Girl Scout cookies. By far, one of my favorites is in these Tagalong Crescents.  These buttery, flaky treats are super easy to put together and they take hardly any time at all.  The pastry is nothing more than store bought refrigerated crescent roll dough.  The dough is filled with a  rich and creamy blend of cream cheese,  peanut butter, sugar, chocolate chips and crushed Tagalong cookies.  Honestly, from start to finish, these little babies will take you less than a half hour to prepare.  As you take that first delectable bite of tender, warm from the oven pastry surrounding smooth and lush chocolate-peanut buttery goodness, you’ll wonder how you ever lived without them.

Once you’ve stockpiled your cookies, the first thing you need to do to whip up these Tagalong Crescents is make the easy peasy filling.  Beat some cream cheese, peanut butter and powdered sugar together.  I use creamy peanut butter, but crunchy will work fine here too.  Don’t use that “natural-style” peanut butter, though.  It’s oily and grainy and well… it just looks a little bit gross to me.  I don’t know how it would bake up, either.  If you do use it and your crescents suck, don’t say I didn’t warn you.

When your cream cheese and peanut butter mix is nice and fluffy, stir in the crushed cookies and some chocolate chips.  I use mini chips because I find that they melt a little easier.  But, just use what you have handy.  I don’t think it really matters a whole lot.

Once your filling is ready, it’s time to unroll the crescent dough.  Set the triangles on a baking sheet lined with either parchment paper or a Silpat, and spread a small blob of filling onto each one.  Leave a small border around the edges so that you don’t have a big, oozing, melted mess when you bake them.  Unless of course, you like big, oozing, melted messes.  Then, by all means, spread to the edge!

After that, roll up each of the dough triangles, starting from the wide end.

After all of the triangles are rolled into crescents, brush each with some egg wash and sprinkle with granulated sugar.  This will make the crescents all nice and glowy.

Bake the crescents until they puff up and brown.

Let them cool for a few minutes and drizzle some melted chocolate chips on top.  You can skip this step, but since you already have an open bags of chips, you might as well use them.

That’s it!   Didn’t I tell you that this recipe was easy?  And, you probably already have all of the ingredients lurking around in your kitchen, except maybe for the Tagalongs.  But, I’m sure it won’t be too hard to find those.  If you need a few boxes, I’m sure that Sammie can hook you up.

Whenever I imagine an intimate, candlelit dinner for two, there are certain foods that are always on the menu, like lobster, oysters, decadent dark chocolate and a fluffy, ethereal soufflé – especially the soufflé.   To me, a soufflé is the ultimate indulgence, reserved for only the most special occasions.  Maybe because it’s French, and I find all things French impossibly romantic and luxurious.  There’s a certain mystique about the soufflé.  It has the reputation  of being temperamental, unpredictable and a tad capricious.  There’s no doubt about it.  The soufflé is a diva. And, divas often get away with their bad behavior because they are brilliant and adored.

Until today, I’d always worshipped the soufflé from afar.  Too fickle for me!  I like a sure thing, and a chocolate cake has never let me down.  But  there comes a time when you have to face your fears and this was my time.  After all, didn’t I overcome my  aversion to dough?  And, what about when I stared my terror of deep frying right in the eye and kicked its butt?  I even survived two Yule Logs and lived to tell about it.  If I could do  all  that, I figured one poufy, phoofy, Valentine’s Day soufflé couldn’t take me down. 

Once I made the decision to go for it, I then had to decide what kind of soufflé to make.  Chocolate was the obvious choice, but If I wanted Mr. SGCC to even taste it,  that wasn’t going to work.   I looked at a lot of different recipes and I finally settled on Daniel Boulud’s version of Passion Fruit Soufflé.  What could be more perfect for Valentine’s Day than a passion fruit dessert?

Boulud pairs his soufflé with a caramelized pear sauce, which honestly, sounds fantastic.  But, I really wanted to find a way to work some chocolate into the dish.  Even though Mr. SGCC doesn’t like chocolate, I still do, and it wouldn’t be a Valentine’s Day dessert to me without it.   So, we struck a happy compromise and I made David Lebovitz’s luscious bittersweet  chocolate sauce to drizzle on top.

Surprisingly, the process of making the soufflé was not nearly as difficult as I expected it to be.  I whipped some egg whites and sugar into oblivion, and then gently folded them into a mix of egg yolks and passion fruit puree.  Then, I plopped the resulting mixture into small soufflé dishes and popped them into the oven.  To help things along, I made the sign of the cross and prayed like hell that they would rise!

Boulud suggests piping the soufflé mixture into the dishes using a pastry bag.  Don’t do it! That stuff is way too thin and fragile.  I lost almost a whole cup of it as it oozed out of my pastry bag and all over my kitchen counter!  I make these mistakes so you don’t have to.  Do yourself a favor and use a spoon.

I’m pleased as punch to report that my little soufflés turned out perfectly.  They were brown and crusty on top and soft and pillowy inside.  And, they rose up like they had wings!   I was so excited that I did a little happy dance all the way to my photo set-up.

I’d read that you have to move quickly when trying to photograph soufflés.  There is a very short window of time before they start to fall.  That’s an understatement!  My soufflés began to sink before I could even get them in front of the camera.  You can see the various height differences in the photos.  Forget food styling!   I was frantically snapping shots like a madwoman!  And, still they fell!

Sinking soufflés aside, I am so glad that I took the plunge and made these.   First, because I proved to myself that I could do it.  I will never fear the diva of desserts again!  And second, because they tasted as divine as they looked!     And, I have to give an extra shout out to David for his fabulous chocolate sauce.  He calls it his little black dress of sauces because it goes with everything and never fails to impress.  He is so right!  That sauce took about five minutes to prepare and was just amazing.  Plus, it didn’t have a drop of butter or cream in it.

Please, please, please don’t be afraid to try these soufflés for yourself.  If I can do it, so can you.  And just think how special your sweethearts will feel when they see what a masterpiece you created just for them!

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Everyone knows that Valentine’s Day is synonymous with chocolate.  It’s the food of love.  Who doesn’t melt a little when presented with one of those precious little heart-shaped boxes on this day when we celebrate love and romance?  But, chocolate isn’t only for the sentimental.  It’s big business too.  In fact, in these days leading up to V-Day, American consumers are expected to buy more than 58 million pounds of chocolate, and shell out around $345 million dollars to do it.  That’s a lot of chocolate!

But what about those of us, myself included, whose sweethearts don’t have a sweet tooth?  (Yes, Mr. SGCC, I’m talking about you!)  Don’t they deserve a rich, delicious, velvety chocolate token of your affection too?   I think so, and that is why I’m excited to share this pasta dish with you. 

I saw TV chef, David Rocco, prepare this Penne al Cioccolato con Acciughe, or Chocolate Penne with Anchovies, on his show a few days ago, and it intrigued me.  I wasn’t surprised that he was using chocolate in a savory dish.  People have been doing that for ages.  What really drew me in was that instead of as an add-in, he was using chocolate as the main ingredient in his dish – and a lot of it.  I was also fascinated by the fact that he paired the chocolate with anchovies.  When I saw that, I had quite a WTF moment!  It must have worked though, because when David fed a taste of the concoction to his wife, she kind of swooned a little.   That was when I knew I had to recreate this dish at home.

Penne al Cioccolato con Acciughe requires only a few ingredients and is very quick and easy to prepare.  You put your pasta on to boil and make the sauce while it cooks.  By the time the pasta is ready, the sauce is too.  It’s also all tossed together in one pan so cleanup is minimal, leaving more time for…well…other things.

But, how did it taste?  Pretty darn good, actually!   It was definitely chocolatey, but not really sweet.  And, it was rich!  The anchovies were very subtle, adding just a hint of smoky saltiness to the dish – not “fishy” at all.   While Penne al Cioccolato con Acciughe will probably never replace truffles as my chocolate indulgence of choice, it is definitely an interesting dish that is well worth trying – especially for Valentine’s Day.  And, while it didn’t instantly convert Mr. SGCC into a chocolate lover, I think it got him one step closer.