Lately

There really isn't much to write about lately - except for food. Daniel has been very busy with school work, so that means that I get kind of bored in the evenings while he's doing homework. I decided that I should probably try and do something productive instead of just remain bored, so I've been baking. Now, we can certainly argue about the "productivity" of baking, but at least it's keeping be occupied.

Here are a few of thing things I've made lately:

No Cook Peanut Butter Fudge - This was really easy to make and tasty, but definitely not the consistancy of real fudge. I felt like it would have been better rolled into balls and dipped in chocolate (a la Buckeyes) and so that's exactly what I did after a few days with the remaining fudge and it was delish.

Mom Gerow's Brownies - I'm not sure if she's actually given these tasty treats a name, but she came up with the recipe so that's what I'll call them for now. These became one of my all-time favorite treats the moment I tasted them (yes, they're that good). So, I made them for a co-worker's birthday this week and they were a hit.

Bottom layer: make a 9x13 pan of brownies (any box variety will do) except stir in 1/2 cup peanuts to the batter.

Middle layer: cream together 8 oz cream cheese, 1/2 cup (or more) peanut butter, 1/4 cup powdered sugar. Then fold in 8 oz whipped topping and spread over the cooled brownies.

Top layer: spread 8 oz whipped topping over the top and sprinkle with 1/2 cup each peanuts and mini chocolate chips.

Chill for at least 2 hours and then enjoy - and try not to eat the whole pan yourself!

Molten Chocolate Cakes - I've had these before but never made them myself so I thought I'd give it a try. There are lots of recipes out there, but I chose this one because I had all the ingredients and it was easy to scale down from the 8 serving size to a 2 serving size (see, I do have some self control). The recipe does call for 5 eggs which doesn't really divide nicely, but I just used 1 large egg and it seemed to turn out fine. And I made them in ramekins instead of muffin tins. Because I've never made these before, I wasn't sure how they were supposed to look when "done" so after the 8-10 minutes of baking time in the recipe, they still looked way under cooked to me, so I let them bake for about 2 more minutes.

I guess all of them were a success because Daniel ate them - but then again, there's not much that he won't eat - especially if it has sugar in it :)

Sorry I don't have any pictures, I forget until the foods already eaten.