chocolate – Page 2

Lightened Up Buckeye Dip

February 15, 2017

Do you like peanut butter and chocolate? Yes?! Okay, we can be friends. I can think of no other flavor combination I love more! Reese’s peanut butter cups, Tagalong cookies, and Buckeye balls are some of my favorite foods ever. Which is why I could not wait to make this Buckeye Dip!

I made this particular dip for a Super Bowl party a couple weeks ago. It was a huge hit with the crowd, but especially with this girl. I took the rest of the dip home, eating it for the rest of the week until I was scrapping that last of it from the bowl with a spoon. I had run out of graham crackers and apple slices but couldn’t bare to let it go to waste. Hence the spoon. Don’t judge.

I didn’t really feel all that guilty about ~~stuffing my face~~ snacking on this buckeye dip because I cut out a lot of fat, calories, and sugar compared to some of the other recipes I have seen online.

Don’t believe me?

I compared my recipe to one of the most popular recipes out there (according to Google) and ran them both through MyFitnessPal’s handy dandy recipe calculator. Using the same serving size, this recipe cuts out 24 grams of fat (that’s HALF the fat of the original recipe), 10 grams of sugar, and 250 calories per serving!

So what’s the secret to making this dip a little bit lighter? Well, I have a couple. First, instead of butter I used Greek yogurt. I used fat free, but if you are worried about the tartness of the Greek yogurt coming through, I would recommend using 2% or full fat Greek yogurt, which has a much milder flavor.

The second secret is peanut butter powder! I have been using peanut butter powder in a lot of recipes lately because it is just so easy to work into baked goods. It also cuts out a lot of the fat without compromising flavor.

I threw everything except the chocolate chips into a bowl and whipped it up until nice and fluffy. Then I mixed in some chocolate chips and also drizzled in some melted chocolate.

To make the presentation a bit more fun, I drizzled some chocolate around the inside of a glass bowl and then popped it in the fridge until the chocolate had hardened. Then I spooned the peanut butter dip right on top. I also like to mix in some melted chocolate along with the chocolate chips. I spooned about a third of the dip into the bowl then drizzled on some melted chocolate before adding in more dip. Then I topped the whole thing off with more chocolate drizzle and a chocolate chips.

I recommend serving this buckeye dip along with some graham crackers, chocolate cookies, and/or apple slices. Just make sure to bring enough, because if you run out, your friends may resort to eating this with their fingers.

[amd-yrecipe-recipe:126]

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Classic Red Velvet Cupcakes (made without Food Coloring)

February 13, 2017

My very first experience with Red Velvet cake was watching Steel Magnolias as a kid. Not sure why, but that experience didn’t really inspire me to try red velvet cake for myself (maybe something to do with the Armadillo shape to the cake). It would take another 10+ years and a move to the South for me to have my first bite of red velvet.

And I have been hooked ever since. I have experimented with several recipes over the years trying to find the ultimate recipe for red velvet cupcakes.

But there is something a little bit different about my red velvet cupcakes. Beet juice. Yes friends, my secret ingredient is beet juice. Well, it’s not that big of a secret. A couple of decades ago, just about every red velvet recipe called for beets to give the cake that redish hue. Nowadays, we just dump a whole bottle of red food coloring into the batter and call it day.

But aren’t you kind of sick of using excessive amounts of food coloring? I think it says a lot that the girl that owns no less than 75 bottles of food coloring is telling you not to use food coloring. But I promise, you will feel so much better about eating these cupcakes knowing that they are pretty much au naturale.

Just like any other red velvet recipe, this one combines flour with a touch of cocoa powder and buttermilk to get it that moist velvety texture.

Then to put the red in red velvet I used Mother Nature’s very own food coloring. I actually found some beet juice in the juice aisle of my local grocery store. But I wanted to have a much more concentrated color pay-off without adding too much moisture. So I decided to reduce it on the stove. I poured half a cup of the juice into a sauce pan and let it simmer on the stove for a few minutes until it had reduced by half, resulting in 1/4 cup of some thick beet juice.

I know that seems like a little bit more work than your typical cupcake recipe. But look at how great that batter looks? It’s nice and red, but not artificially so. You know, it’s not that bright stop-sign red.

Once they are baked, they are wonderfully moist and delicious! There is absolutely no sign of beets anywhere in these cupcakes except in color. There is a subtle chocolate flavor, but it’s not too heavy or rich.

And of course I topped off my red velvet cupcakes with my favorite cream cheese frosting. Because in my opinion it’s the cream cheese frosting that really makes a red velvet cupcake so good.

While red velvet is definitely appropriate for Valentine’s Day, I think of red velvet being in season year round. It’s a perfect cake for Summer, since it’s not as rich and heavy as chocolate cake can be. It also seems like a perfect choice for Christmas paired with some green sprinkles or something festive. But please, whatever you do, don’t turn it into an armadillo cake like they did in Steel Magnolias. Nobody wants that.

[amd-yrecipe-recipe:128]

Winter Berry Cheesecake Tart

December 14, 2016

I have an quick and easy way to make any pie, tart, or cake look fancy:

Pile a bunch of berries on top!

That’s what makes this otherwise ordinary cheesecake tart much more sophisticated, let alone colorful! Even though berries are more of a Summer fruit, somehow they work perfectly for Winter when you roll cranberries in sugar to make them “frosty”. And with the addition of the mint leaves, it takes on a very Christmas-y look, don’t you think?

The foundation of this tart is a chocolate cookie crust. Sure, I could have made a plain old graham cracker crust, but chocolate seems so much more appropriate for the holidays. Plus, I am a sucker for chocolate and berries. It’s one of my favorite flavor combinations!

The next layer of the tart is my (aka my mom’s) classic cheesecake batter. Because this tart is much thinner than the New York style cheesecake that I usually make, I only made a third of my usual recipe.

What’s great about making cheesecake in a thin tart pan is that it bakes so much quicker. Cheesecake usually takes over an hour to bake. But this barely took 30 minutes. I made this just a few hours before I served it, which I would never do with my usual cheesecake recipe!

While the cheesecake baked, I worked on sugaring my berries (why does that sound dirty?). I have never sugared cranberries before, so I turned this really helpful post. Well, it would have been more helpful if I had followed direction. Of course, I like to think I know what I am doing all the time, but sometimes I really don’t. I skipped one pretty important step: letting the simple syrup dry before rolling them in the sugar. Whoops!

Then, once the tart had chilled and I had added a layer of sweetened sour cream, I just piled the raspberries and cranberries right on top. There wasn’t any rhyme or reason to it, clearly. But it still turned out so nice! I love the disorganized and rustic look of a pile of berries!

One slice of this tart is the perfect bite of chocolate crust, rich cheesecake, and fresh berries. All the flavors were there and complimented each other wonderfully! I also love the combination of the tart raspberries and crisp cranberries. Since the cranberries were soaked in simple syrup and rolled in sugar, they had a crunchy outer crust and were much sweeter than normal. They weren’t overly sweet, which made them a perfect pairing for the super sweet cheesecake!

You should probably make this cheesecake tart ASAP. It would be perfect for a holiday party. And you will want to make this while you can still easily get your hands on some fresh cranberries.

But, if you don’t want to make this now, you can make the same tart this Summer and pile on some strawberries, blueberries, or any one of your favorite fruits!

[amd-yrecipe-recipe:107]

Christmas Oreo Truffles

December 5, 2016

Who else is in the full swing of Christmas baking? This past weekend I probably made 10 pounds of gingerbread dough in addition to a few other Christmas treats. Even though I love it, sometimes it can all get to be too much. Too much melting, mixing, baking, frosting, etc. It’s in these moments that I am so thankful for some really easy, fool-proof Christmas treats. These Oreo Truffles, for instance. They could not be easier to make. 2 ingredients mixed in a food processor and coated in chocolate. And no matter how they look, they taste delicious!

I wanted to do something a little different with my Oreo truffles, so I placed them in a Christmas Ornament candy mold so that each truffle looked like a tiny ornament. So cute, right? It may seem like a lot of work, but I promise, it’s actually really easy!

First, to make the truffles, I processed a box (bag? container? What would you call that thing Oreo’s come in?) of Oreos. Once they were finely ground, I added in a brick of cream cheese and processed until it formed a ball. The I set the mixture aside while I worked on the molds.

I piped melted white chocolate into the details of the mold, flipped the mold over and tapped out the extra chocolate. Then I filled the mold with semi-sweet chocolate and again flipped the mold over and tapped out the extra chocolate.

Once the molds were ready, I rolled small balls of the Oreo truffle mixture and pressed them into the mold. Then I popped the whole thing in the freezer until the chocolate was hardened. Once out of the freezer, I popped the truffles out and repeated the process to fill the molds. I then stuck the other half of the truffle into the fresh mold, making sure that the edge of the hardened chocolate touched the melted chocolate.

Then I froze the truffles again until the chocolate was hard. After that, all that was left was to pop them out. I did a little touching up on some scraggly edges with a warm knife, cutting off the excess chocolate.

See, not so hard? Right? Of course, you will need a candy mold, which you may not have laying around. If you don’t want to buy one, you could always just make them the classic way by dipping them in melted chocolate. I like dipping them in dark and white chocolate for a swirled effect. Just remember to freeze the balls first so that they stay rounded when you dip them.

Either way, they will taste amazing and look very festive. No one can pass up an Oreo truffle!

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[amd-yrecipe-recipe:103]

Chubby Hubby Brookies

November 9, 2016

Okay, I bet you are asking yourself a couple questions right now. 1) What is a brookie?, and 2) What makes it a Chubby Hubby Brookie?

Both great questions. Let me inform you.

A brookie is a brownie-cookie. In this case, it’s a brownie that is mixed with a cookie dough and baked in a bar form. In some cases it can be brownie mix baked in cookie firm.

A Chubby Hubby brookie is a brownie combined with a peanut butter cookie,and topped with pretzels. Basically all of my favorite foods in one delicious and indulgent bar.

I can’t take credit for the name “Chubby Hubby”, which was coined by the fine folks at Ben and Jerry’s when they created the Chubby Hubby ice cream. Nor can I take credit for having a chubby hubby. My hubby is most certainly not chubby, but I am sure I could get him there if I made these brookies more often.

I started with a layer of peanut butter cookie dough, then topped it with the brownie batter. I would not recommend switching the order of these layers. If you start with the brownie batter, then top with the dough, the dough will just sink to the bottom. I like having the two distinct layers of the cookie and the brownie.
In between the two layers, I popped a couple pretzel pieces, just for some extra crunch! I also added the pretzels to the top of the brookie which get extra crispy in the oven and also add that nice salty bite.

My only gripe about these (and with brownies in general), is that you can’t really dig into them right away! It’s best to let brownies cool completely before cutting them so that they don’t get stuck on your knife. Most of the time I can’t wait that long. It was so hard to have these sitting on the counter, smelling the wafts of sweet chocolate and peanut butter, and not cutting myself off a corner (I am team corner brownie all the way!).

But finally, when I was able to give them a taste, I was in heaven! Like I said before, peanut butter and chocolate AND pretzels is pretty much the all my favorite flavors combined, so these were pretty damn near perfection. They not only had all my favorite flavors, but I loved the mix of textures, too. The peanut butter cookie is crumbly, almost like a crust, and the brownie is soft and fudgy (if that’s even a word). Then, with every bite there’s that little pretzel crunch!

Sounds amazing right? Well, I suggest you make these for your chubby (or not so chubby) hubby immediately!

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[amd-yrecipe-recipe:95]

Peanut Butter Chocolate Popcorn

October 31, 2016

Do you need a last minute treat to make for Halloween? I’ve got you covered!

This peanut butter chocolate popcorn mix was something I mixed up at the last minute for a pumpkin carving party last night. I has just spend the weekend baking cookies for a baby shower and my cookie decorating class, so the last thing I wanted to do was bake something. Since one of my favorite holiday treats involves popcorn and melted chocolate, I figured I could adapt that to make it more suitable for Halloween.

I started by popping 1/4 cup of popcorn kernels over the stove (which will make approx. 6 cups of popcorn). You could always pop the popcorn with an air popper, or use the microwave popcorn, but I think stove-popped popcorn tasted a little bit better.

To pop the popcorn on the stove, I start by putting the oil and a couple kernels in the bottom of a stock pot and place it over medium heat. Once the kernels have popped, I know the oil had heated up enough to pop the rest of the kernels. I add the rest of them in, put the top on the pot, give it a good shake, and let them pop away. When I don’t hear any more popping, I remove the pot from the heat.

For the toppings, I used white chocolate, bittersweet chocolate, and peanut butter chips. I wanted it to look white, orange, and black, so I added a bit of orange food coloring to the peanut butter to brighten it up a bit. I also ended up mixing in some white chocolate because it was looking a little too dark.

Once all the popcorn was coated in chocolate or peanut butter, I dumped it all out on a sheet of parchment to harden. I also too the opportunity, while the chocolate was still wet, to add in some sprinkles and candies. I used orange and black sprinkles, candy corns, and M&Ms. Reese’s piece would have also have been good in this (But, I didn’t want to buy the giant bag of them, knowing I would only use a handful. I would just send up eating the rest…probably in one sitting. I certainly didn’t need that.)

After the chocolate was hardened, I tossed all the popcorn together. That way each bit contains a bit of chocolate and peanut butter!

The popcorn mix came out just as I had hoped. It was perfectly festive, and most importantly, very tasty! It made a great little treat to snack on while we carved pumpkins. If you want to make this in the last remaining hours of Halloween, you could serve it in a bowl or in little treat bags, which would be very cute.

If you happen to read this after Halloween, you can still make this recipe! Just skip the food coloring in the peanut butter chips and swap out the Halloween-themed candy! Peanut butter chocolate popcorn is good all year long!

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[amd-yrecipe-recipe:90]

Chocolate Sugar Cookies

October 10, 2016

We are heading into cookie season. Well, for me it’s always cookie season. But it really picks up with all the holidays coming up.

I have been wanting to try some other sugar cookie flavors for a while, and have been testing out a chocolate sugar cookie flavor, which I think will come in really handy for Christmas cookies! It is very similar to my classic sugar cookie recipe and creates the perfect cookie for decorating since the edges stay nice and crisp.

Really the only difference with this cookie recipe is the addition of cocoa powder and a bit more sugar. I also like adding a little bit of coffee extract (which you can easily make at home by soaking coffee beans in vodka for a couple weeks) in addition to the vanilla because the coffee flavor really enhances the cocoa flavor.

One of the biggest questions I get about my cookie dough recipe is how to know when the dough is the right texture or consistency. Some people find the dough to be too dry then some people will make the exact same recipe and it will be so moist that it sticks to their counters. So, here is what I do:

After the butter, sugar, eggs, and extracts are all mixed together, I mix in the first cup of flour. Then I mix in the next 1/2 cup and test the dough.

I test the dough by pressing it with a finger and if the dough sticks to my finger it’s not ready.

Add 1/2 cup more, then test.

By this point, the dough should be tacky, but not stick to my fingers. If it does, I keep adding flour 1/4 cup at a time.

I hope that helps clarify the recipe. Because you want these cookies to keep their shape when they bake, it’s best for the dough to be pretty dry. They aren’t going to be like Lofthouse-soft sugar cookies. They are going to be more like a shortbread cookie. Unfortunately, I don’t know of a way to get the best of both worlds.

The great thing about these chocolate sugar cookies is that the cocoa powder has a bit of extra fat in it which makes these cookies a little bit more moist than normal. Almost like a brownie in cookie form….almost.

Either way, be prepared to see a lot of these chocolate sugar cookies on Instagram and Snapchat in the next couple months. They are going to be my go-to recipe between now and Christmas.

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[amd-yrecipe-recipe:85]

Chocolate Dipped Cheesecake Bites

October 7, 2016

Do you have that one recipe that is your “signature” recipe? Like the recipe that you make when you really want to impress people. That recipe that you know by heart because you make it so often.

As someone who makes a lot of recipes, it was actually kind of difficult for me to come up with a signature recipe to make for an office bake-off. Sometimes I tend to bake things that are a little to experimental and not necessarily “bake-off” contenders. Not that they aren’t good, but to win a bake-off, you have to play to the crowd. It’s all about strategy folks!

After thinking about for a while I concluded that while I may not have a signature recipe, my mom does! So I made my mom’s cheesecake recipe (also seen here), which I knew would be a contender, if not the winner!

To make the cheesecake a bit easier to eat, I decided to make them into little bites (of course, I had to do something to make the recipe my own) and dip them in chocolate.

I started by baking the cheesecake in a square baking pan with a graham cracker crust. After the came out of the oven, I let them cool to room temperature, then chill in the refrigerator overnight. It’s always good to let cheesecake cool completely before serving, but this also made it a lot easier to cut into bite-sized pieces.

I then dipped the chilled pieces of cheesecake into melted chocolate, first dipping the tops and letting the chocolate harden, then dipping the bottom half of the cheesecake bite. I tried drizzling the chocolate and some other dipping techniques, but this way worked the best for me. You can do it however you like.

After all the bites were covered in chocolate, I popped them all back in the freezer to harden. I would also recommend dipping the bites in batches, and keeping the un-dipped ones in the freezer until you are ready. They are much easier to handle when they are practically frozen.

Well, I would love to tell you that these cheesecake bites won the bake-off. They actually came in second behind a surprisingly delicious banana cake. Seriously, if a banana cake can beat cheesecake, it’s got to be one damn good cake. Don’t worry, I got the recipe so I will have to make it and share it with you guys.

But second place it’s bad at all! I’ll take it!

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[amd-yrecipe-recipe:84]

Cookies and Cream Brownies

September 2, 2016

This is going to be a pretty quick post because as I sit here writing this we are waiting for our Uber to pick us up and take us to the airport and this is the last post I wanted to get scheduled before I go. Where are we?? Well, if you follow me on Instagram or Twitter, you probably already know. We start our trip in Berlin, but by the time you read this we will be in Prague.

So I apologize for the short post, but these brownies pretty much speak for themselves. I don’t have to tell you how good they are because they look delicious! I know they were delicious because my husband, who lacks a sweet tooth, devoured about half the batch in 2 days.

I started with my favorite brownie mix (Ghirardelli) and mixed in some crushed Oreos. Then I made a cream cheese mixture and folded in some more Oreos.

I then poured the cream cheese mixture on top of the brownie batter and swirled it all together. I should note, I would have loved to add more cookies on top, but my husband ate a few too many Oreos before I could make these. Silly boy.

I baked these following the same instructions on the back of the brownie mix box and they turned out perfectly. It was a struggle to let them cool all the way before I cut into them. Clearly I didn’t wait to long before digging in.

The brownies along are amazing. Ghirardelli seriously makes the best brownie mix. Like I don’t even bother making them from scratch because it’s so much easier to mix up their batter. But with the pieces of cookies and the creamy swirl that almost tastes like cheesecake, these brownies are delish! It is just such an easy way to take a basic brownie and make it even better.

[amd-yrecipe-recipe:74]

Mexican Hot Chocolate Cookies

August 26, 2016

Mexican Hot Chocolate Cookies

So this is actually an old recipe that I had published way back in the day. However, if you were to go back and look for it, the pictures won’t load and the recipe isn’t correct. Not all the helpful is it? I finally decided to take one for the team and make a batch of these yummy Mexican Hot Chocolate cookies so that I could post an updated recipe.

It’s a hard job, but someone has to do it.

What I love about these cookies is that they are so unexpected. They look like a chocolate cookie, but they are so much more than that. They are definitely chocolatey. But they are also spicy! Not like “whoa, that’s hot” kind of spicy. Like a “hmmm…what is that flavor I’m tasting?” kind of spicy. Don’t worry, it totally works! The cinnamon and chocolate flavor combination is somewhat unusual, but they go together so well. The cinnamon almost makes the chocolate a little sweeter by balancing out the bitterness.

Mexican Hot Cocoa Cookies-1

But the kicker is that teeny tiny bit of cayenne pepper that I throw in there, too. I don’t actually tell people that it’s in there because it’s not all that evident. No one is going to take a bite and immediately think there is cayenne pepper in the cookie. But its just that little but of heat that you pick up a the end that really makes these cookies interesting, in the most delicious sort of way.

Mexican Hot Cocoa Cookies-5

To add to the “hot chocolate factor” I of course add some marshmallows. Why the heck not!? Because marshmallows will melt completely if I threw them in with the batter, I actually just stick them on the top of the cookie when they are about 5 minutes away from being completely baked. The cookie is still soft and the marshmallow just sinks right in. The last 5 minutes of baking, the marshmallow puffs up and gets very soft.

Mexican Hot Cocoa Cookies-3

These are definitely not your average cookie, but they are so good! Soft, rich, sweet, and a teeny bit spicy. If the extra spices make you nervous, you can omit them from the recipe and just make hot chocolate cookies. But I promise they won’t be as good!

[yumprint-recipe id=’174′]

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies

August 19, 2016

Is there any better flavor combination than peanut butter and chocolate? Seriously! Name one that’s better! I dare you!

Even though I don’t eat as much peanut butter these days (damn you, Whole 30!), every once and a while I get a serious craving for peanut butter and chocolate. What do I do to satisfy that craving? Make peanut butter chocolate chip cookies! (Or one of the Reese’s Eggs I store in my freezer after Easter. You know…if I’m in a pinch.)

When these cravings hit…and they hit hard…I don’t ~~have time~~ want to take the time to try to come up with my own recipe. So I turn to the wonderful Internet and it’s plethora of recipes to find one that a) looks good, and b) doesn’t require any ingredients I don’t already have on hand. I have tried quite a few and for some reason have been a little disappointed. The recipes I have tried are often WAY too dry. I know peanut butter cookies are often on the drier side, but there’s got to be a sweet spot where they are still a bit crunchy, but also not a cracker!

Well, I was determined to figure it out.

After some trial and error, I found that the trick is brown sugar. Brown sugar helps keep the cookies moist so they are a lot softer than your average peanut butter cookie. Brown sugar also reacts with the baking soda so that they rise a little bit more making them more soft and less dense.

My other new trick that I picked up from my favorite chocolate chip cookie recipe, is a sprinkle of sea salt on top. I think a sprinkle of sea salt should be mandatory on just about all chocolate chip cookies. It takes them to a whole new level!

[amd-yrecipe-recipe:69]

Mexican Hot Chocolate Trail Mix

August 8, 2016

The good folks at Nuts.com recently challenged me to create a unique and delicious trail mix in for National Trail Mix day on August 26th. Of course I had to accept! I love nuts (I eat a ton of them every day) and I absolutely love trail mix!

My favorite trail mixes are anything that combines a few different types of nuts, flavors, and textures. It also must contain something sweet. I consulted my pantry where I currently have no less than 6 different types of nuts to see what inspiration would strike. I eventually got inspiration from one of my favorite cuisines to create this Mexican Hot Chocolate Trail Mix.

You may be wondering what is different about Mexican Hot Chocolate. Well, Mexican chocolate, or hot chocolate, typically has some cinnamon and a hint of spice to it. I love to make Mexican chocolate brownies and cookies (recipe coming soon!) by adding a touch of cinnamon and cayenne. To get this flavor incorporated into the trail mix, I candied some pepitas (pumpkin seeds) in a mixture of sugar, cinnamon, and cayenne.

I then mixed those pepitas in with some of my favorite nuts – hazelnuts, almonds, and macadamia nuts – and, of course, some chocolate – dark chocolate chips and chocolate covered espresso beans.

And because this is hot chocolate trail mix, I had to add some marshmallows!

I knew that this would be delicious, but even I underestimated how good this would be. The macadamia nuts are sweet with a slight coconut flavor. The hazelnuts are rich and pair perfectly with the chocolate. Then the almonds provide that classic nut flavor.

The icing on the cake is the candied pepitas which are sweet, salty, and a bit spicy. I think the perfect bite of this trail mix is a chocolate chip, marshmallow, a couple pepitas, and a hazelnut. Oh man, it’s delish! I pretty much powered through about half of this jar while watching the Olympics this weekend.

What makes trail mix such a fun thing to make is that you can personalize it to fit your tastes! Don’t like macadamia nuts, substitute in with more almonds or cashews. Want more sweetness, use milk chocolate instead of dark, or replace the chocolate covered espresso beans with more chocolate. Seriously, make it your own! You won’t be able to get enough of it!

[amd-yrecipe-recipe:64]

Peanut Butter Chocolate Overnight Oats

July 25, 2016

Lately I have turned to making my own overnight oats as a quick, yet healthy breakfast option that I can just throw in my lunch bag on my way to the train in the morning. My first few attempts were pretty bland and, frankly, not all that good. In search of something a bit more palatable, I turned to my all-time favorite flavor combination: peanut butter and chocolate.

When I make these peanut butter chocolate overnight oats, I actually make a big batch and portion it out into 4 jars so I have breakfast for most of the week. I start with the peanut butter oatmeal. I mix together old fashioned rolled oats (not quick/instant oats), milk (I use whatever nutmilk I have on hand), honey, and peanut butter powder.

Next is the chocolate chia seed pudding. For this, I mix together chia seeds, milk, coco powder, and stevia or honey. Both the oats and the chia seed pudding need to sit overnight so that all the moisture is absorbed. What I am left with is thick and creamy peanut butter oat meal and rich and chocolatey chia seed pudding. Then I spoon about a quarter of each into a small jar and keep them in the fridge until they are ready to be eaten.

I don’t know about you, but I am in a frenzy running out the door to work in the morning. Which is why I love these peanut butter chocolate overnight oats. They keep in the fridge all week. They are a mix of complex carbs and healthy fats that keep me full until lunch. And not to mention, they are delicious!

And for those weeks when I am trying to be extra healthy, I add protein powder to the oats which really makes them a complete breakfast. I will definitely be experimenting with more flavors of overnight oats. They have quickly become my favorite week day breakfast.

[amd-yrecipe-recipe:60]

Chocolate Chip Cookie S’mores

July 1, 2016

The best thing about having a best friend who also likes to cook and bake is that when I have some weird recipe idea, she doesn’t look at me with judgement. Instead, she helps take the recipe to a whole other level. And that is exactly what happened with these chocolate chip cookie s’mores.

While she was in town a couple weeks ago, I wanted to enlist her help to make some sort of cookie sandwich. I didn’t know quite what I had in mind. But then through some brainstorming and bouncing ideas off each other we landed on chocolate chip cookie s’mores with roasted marshmallow fluff.

Sounds delicious, right? Boy was it!

We started by baking some classic chocolate chip cookies. Then once the cookies were out of the oven and cooled, we piped some marshmallow fluff on to one cookie and topped it with another.

Then to makes these taste even more like s’mores, we took the crème brulee torch to the exposed marshmallow fluff to get it nice and roasted.

A quick warning to any of you who choose to make these (and I highly recommend that you do), marshmallow fluff can get really runny. Once you assemble these cookie sandwiches, eat them immediately! Many chocolate chip cookies sandwiches sacrificed themselves for us to finally figure this out. And by sacrifice, I mean Michelle and I ate them because they weren’t “pretty” enough for the picture.

It’s a hard job, but someone has to do it.

An alternative would be to use the big marshmallows and roast them over a fire or under the broiler, then sandwich them between two chocolate chips cookies. I mean, however you have to do it to get the job done. A marshmallow between two cookies can never be bad, can it?

[amd-yrecipe-recipe:45]

Chocolate Chip Cookies

June 15, 2016

There are a whole lot of chocolate chip cookie recipe out there. I mean, I have a whole Pinterest board dedicated to chocolate chip cookies. Despite the vast quantity of recipes, they are pretty much all the same, maybe just a few tweaks in the amount of ingredients or the quality of the chocolate.

I have been on a quest to find the best chocolate chip cookies for a while. Actually, don’t be surprised if you see a whole challenge in the future where I pit one recipe against the other for total chocolate chip cookie supremacy (hence the chocolate chip cookie Pinterest board). But I recently whipped up a batch of cookies using a very familiar and classic chocolate chip cookie recipe as my guide. Of course, I made a few tweaks to it, because that’s what I do, and the cookies turned out incredible.

I didn’t use any fancy chocolate or extremely expensive or exotic ingredients. My special ingredients are two things you might already have in your pantry: sea salt and coffee extract. Other than that, my fancy shmancy chocolate chips cookies are basically the Nestle Tollhouse cookie recipe.

[Side Note: does this not remind you of the Friends episode where Monica is desperate to get Pheobe’s “grandmother’s” famous chocolate chip cookie recipe?]

While I am known to change things up a bit and make a recipe my own, I did follow strict instructions to freeze my dough. I let the dough chill for an hour before I scooped it onto the baking sheet, then I chilled it again for another 15 to 30 minutes. Not only did this improve the shape of the cookies (they didn’t spread as much) but the flavor was better, too.

The resulting cookie was crispy around the edges and soft in the middle, just how I like them. If you like really soft slightly gooey cookies, then I would recommend baking then just a few minutes less so that the center are just a tad under baked but the edges still have some structure to them.

I couldn’t stop eating these cookies. They tasted like a better version of the chocolate chip cookies I would eat as a kid. They were sweet and rich. The chocolate flavor was accentuated by the coffee extract. But the sea salt is what really put these cookies over the top. I will never again make a chocolate chip cookie without a sprinkle of sea salt. It just takes them to a whole new level.

Since I couldn’t stop eating them, I got the out of my house and brought them into my office where my coworkers gobbled them up as well. Even though at that point they were a couple days old, everyone raved about them.

I wanted to tell them they were this very complicated recipe using expensive gourmet chocolate, because they would have totally believed it. Instead I told them the truth: it’s pretty much just a Nestle Tollhouse chocolate chip cookie. Can’t beat a classic!

[amd-yrecipe-recipe:44]

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Muffin

April 19, 2016

It’s been a while since I have made muffins, hasn’t it? I used to make muffins all. the. time (ex. here, here, and here). It took a special occasion to get me back to muffin making. One of my coworkers and friends had a birthday last week. Her and I did the Whole 30 challenge together the first time, and started our second round together on Monday. Since she was about to give up all the wonderful food groups, like gluten, chocolate, and sugar, I wanted to make her something that packed all of them into one convenient package! Thus was born the peanut butter chocolate chip muffin!

While this recipe is very similar to my basic muffin batter recipe, I did add in one critical ingredient: peanut butter powder. My original plan was to mix in classic peanut butter, but when I was perusing the grocery store aisle I came across this powder. I figured that this would actually be so much easier to incorporate into the muffin batter and wouldn’t add as much fat. But, since it is peanut butter chocolate chip muffin, I did add in a swirl of peanut butter which add just the right amount of peanut butter creaminess throughout the muffin.

And for an extra punch of peanut butter goodness (because who can get enough peanut butter?), I mixed together a strussel topping using some of the pb powder. I think it was the topping that made the muffin. I mean, the top of the muffin is the best part anyways; it’s crunchy on top and flaky on the bottom. But this just put it over the edge and gave it even more peanut flavor to balance the semi-sweet chocolate chips peppered throughout the muffin.

So really, when you think about it, this muffin is pretty much a cupcake without the frosting. But what is wrong with cake for breakfast? Especially on your birthday!

Nothing. Nothing is wrong with that.

[amd-yrecipe-recipe:21]