Pixelated Crumb

I’ve got a growing number of chocolate peanut butter treats appearing on this site and there is one primary reason for that: my husband. Now, I’m in no way saying that I don’t love the combination of chocolate and peanut butter, but whenever I want to do something nice for Joseph, I tend to think towards the chocolate and peanut butter spectrum because he loves this combo.

Joseph was recently out of town for a few days for a conference and I wanted to have something nice for him when he returned, and these peanut butter brownie bites seemed like the perfect thing. They’re easy to make and they certainly met the chocolate and peanut butter criteria. I made sure I had all the ingredients I needed and was all set to make them. But then we were walloped by a huge snow storm.

I was just a few weeks into my third trimester in all it’s glory (oh, the back pain!!), and our neighbor, knowing I was home alone, did all of the shoveling and even cleared our car off for me. I was so overwhelmed by her generosity that I headed straight to the kitchen and made her one of my very favorite cookies, the perfect chocolate cookies from Cook’s Illustrated. Now, I try to be a nice wife, but frankly, that was the only baking I was up for that day, so I just made sure to save a couple of cookies for Joseph. He didn’t complain, but I was still eager to try the peanut butter brownie bites. Continue reading

One of my very favorite Christmas cookies is a meringue – the Forgotten Meringue, a vanilla meringue with chocolate chips – and I was excited to try another recipe out this Christmas. I figured I really couldn’t go wrong with chocolate, almonds, and a Dorie Greenspan recipe.

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By far the most popular recipe on the site is the one for chocolate turtle cookies (with very good reason – it’s one of my favorites too!) and I thought it was about time for another thumbprint cookie recipe. This one comes by way of Food52 and is such a great, easy cookie to add to your holiday repertoire. Just look at the ingredient list – only 9 ingredients, and one of them is optional! I even happened to have everything on hand already, including exactly 3/4 cup of almond meal, left over from making some chocolate almond meringues (recipe coming soon!).

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I had never had dulce de leche before I spent a summer in Santa Cruz, Bolivia over 10 years ago. In fact, I’m not sure I had even heard of it before then. But one taste of the sweet, sticky, caramelly spread and I was instantly hooked. I was in Santa Cruz volunteering as a supervisor for Amigos de las Americas and was often in a rush to get out of the door in the morning, but not without having my bread and dulce de leche. It always seemed like an indulgent breakfast – I was essentially starting the day off with dessert – but hey, do as the locals do, right? It certainly gave me something to look forward to when my alarm when off in the morning!

When I came back to the States after 3 months of bread slathered with dulce de leche, I went into a bit of withdrawal. It’s probably better that I didn’t know then how easy dulce de leche is to make, or I would have eaten it by the gallon. Ok, I confess, I still haven’t made it myself, but it’s basically just sweetened condensed milk that’s heated up slowly until it becomes thick and creamy. Sounds easy enough, right? But these days it’s much more accessible in grocery stores (often in the international aisle), making these chocolaty dulce de leche duos even easier to make. Continue reading