Bacon Butter Cups

I know.

I don't even know.

Here's the thing: My gentleman has a pan here. It has a big B on the underside so we know it's his pan. He is a carnivore. He eats meat. You know this from the recipe I posted a little while ago about cooking steak in the oven.

Meat is cooked in my house now.

As a result, there are beef patties and chicken breasts in the freezer, bacon and pepperoni in the refrigerator. My gentleman's influence has taken over, and I am completely okay with it. For the first time in my life. Ever.

(I STILL DO NOT EAT IT.)

So my buddy posted a recipe on my Facebook a little while ago for "Bacon Buttercups" from the Facebook page "Occupy Bacon." These little treats were homemade reese's peanut butter cups with a surprise layer of bacon in the middle.

I know.

I told him, "I can't make this. I don't cook meat. I want to make these for you because it is an exciting adventure and a challenge, but I just don't think I can bring myself to do it."

Well, when I was making the cookies for Cookie Monday, I ended up with some extra peanut butter mixture... and some melted chocolate... and there was bacon in the refrigerator...

So I made the peanut butter bacon cups.

I don't have a picture. I only made six. I fed one to my gentleman and his parents at a barbecue Sunday night, and then to a couple of friends at work (including the one who'd asked for them in the first place). Only one person did not like them (I'm looking at you, Trevor) and the rest felt that they were insanely amazing. As a vegetarian/pescetarian, I can't imagine the combination of bacon and peanut butter and chocolate being good, but apparently it is. These went over so well (and were so fun to make!) that I would consider making them for things like parties or Christmas. I'm pretty proud of myself!

The original recipe's post is here: Post-Christmas Bacon Hangover

Here is the recipe:

Bacon Butter Cups
27 tons of Bacon, cooked
2 pounds of milk chocolate
14-16 ounces of creamy or smooth peanut butter (Lauren note: I mixed this with some confectioners' sugar to get the consistency of a Reese's)
2 1-dozen mini muffin tins with mini paper cups

Begin by putting the Bacon in the freezer for 15-20 minutes.

Place 24 paper cups in the 2 of the mini muffin tins. Next, melting 1 pound of chocolate in a double boiler. Once tempered, add a generous dollop to the bottom of each cup. Using the back of a soup spoon, gently push the chocolate upwards to coat the sides of the cup. Repeat until all 24 cups have been filled.

You may need to retemper the chocolate depending on how quickly you work.

Place them in the refrigerator for approximately 2 hours to harden.

While they’re setting, remove the Bacon from the freezer and dice in to bit sized pieces. Pan fry them in small handfuls over medium to low flame. Place it off to the side to cool.

After the 2 hours, remove the cups from the refrigerator and add a cluster of Bacon to each chocolate shell.

Melt an additional 1/2 pound of chocolate and drop a modest dollop of chocolate on to the Bacon. Set it back in the refrigerator for approximately 2 hours.

Once set, begin mixing the peanut butter until it’s smooth. Add a small scoop to the cups and smooth out. Make sure to leave room for the chocolate top.

Melt the remaining 1/2 pound of chocolate and spoon it on top if the peanut butter.

Tip: work from the center out, pushing the chocolate to the sides rather than spreading it.

Place them in the refrigerator for approximately 4 hours.

Plate, serve, and devour.

Cookie Monday: Dark Chocolate Peanut Butter Pretzel Cookies

As is becoming the trend lately, a friend posted this recipe to my Facebook. A lot of people do this now, largely because they know I'll probably end up making them eventually. (I will have another post later that is about another Facebook-prompted food project.) So these sound like everything amazing in life: chocolate cookies stuffed with peanut butter, topped with pretzels. I happened to have a bag of Trader Joe's Peanut Butter-Filled Pretzel bites so I used those for the topping.

I didn't love these, but a LOT of other people did. I personally felt that they were too dense and - surprisingly - not chocolatey enough. I had a huge amount of trouble with the dough - it wouldn't set up. It kept being too liquidy, like a brownie batter. I added sooooooo many more dry ingredients (trying very hard to keep up the ratios, but I'm sure this is what caused the density of the cookie) before it was even remotely malleable. It was really frustrating.

But! Like I said, a lot of people liked them. And that's good enough for a Cookie Monday. I just don't plan on making these again. Boo!

As my mom pointed out, these look kind of like poop. Sorry.


Dark Chocolate Peanut Butter Cup Pretzel Cookies
Tasty Kitchen

8 ounces (weight) Baking Chocolate, Roughly Chopped
4 tablespoons Unsalted Butter
2/3 cup All-purpose Flour
3 tablespoons Cocoa Powder
1/2 teaspoon Baking Powder
1/2 teaspoon Baking Soda
1/2 teaspoon Salt
2 whole Eggs
3/4 cup Dark Brown Sugar
2 tablespoons Granulated Sugar
2 teaspoons Vanilla Extract
1/2 cup Creamy Peanut Butter
1/4 cup Powdered Sugar
1 cup Pretzel Crumbs
2/3 cup Semisweet Chocolate Chips

1. Preheat oven to 350ºF.

2. Melt the chopped baking chocolate and the unsalted butter in a double boiler (or a makeshift double broiler: simmer water in a pan and set a glass bowl over the top). Stir frequently, and remove from heat as soon as it melts.

3. Whisk together the flour, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a separate bowl.

4. In a large bowl, beat together the eggs, sugars and vanilla until fluffy. Slowly mix in the melted chocolate. Gradually add the flour, scraping the bowl after each addition, until just combined. Fold in chocolate chips.

5. In a separate bowl, beat together the peanut butter and powdered sugar until fluffy. Set aside.

6. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper. Scoop heaping tablespoons of dough, roll into a ball, and set on the parchment paper, then flatten with your hand. Drop about 1 teaspoon of the peanut butter filling in the center of the dough, then fold the dough around the peanut butter. If the peanut butter comes out of the top, just grab some extra dough to fill in the gap.

7. Once you have a ball of dough with the peanut butter in the center, flatten the ball slightly and then drop into the pretzel crumbs. You can coat one side or all over. Repeat with remaining dough.

8. Bake for about 11 minutes. Watch carefully after 10 minutes, because you want these just a bit underdone.

Servings: 24

Cookie Monday: Butterfinger Brownie Cookies

Today for Cookie Monday I made these chocolate cookies with bits of Butterfinger crumbled up in them. The bigger chunks stayed put during cooking, but the tinier pieces seemed to melt into the cookie and were unnoticeable. Boo! BUT! The cookie itself is wonderful. It would be an excellent base chocolate brownie cookie to use for other combinations. Like Rolos! Or white chocolate chips! Or peanut butter chips! It was good with the Butterfinger, but I bet it would even be good as a standalone cookie recipe.

I doubled the recipe as usual and got about five dozen good-sized cookies. They are definitely on the larger side of the cookies I usually pass out during a Monday. I liked these a lot. Even my chocolate-haters enjoyed them so that's cool.



Butterfinger Brownie Cookies
From RecipeGirl via Pinterest

4 tablespoons unsalted butter -- (1/2 stick) cut into pieces
8 ounces bittersweet chocolate chips
1 cup granulated white sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 large eggs
1/3 cup All Purpose Gold Medal® Flour
1 tablespoon All Purpose Gold Medal® Flour
1/8 teaspoon baking soda
2 cups chopped Butterfinger candy bars

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line cookie sheets with silpat mats or parchment paper.

2. Put butter and chocolate chips in a glass bowl. Microwave for 2 minutes, stir, then microwave an additional 15 to 20 seconds if needed until the mixture is melted and smooth. (alternately, you can heat the butter and chocolate in the top of a double boiler or in a metal pan set over a pot of simmering water).

3. Stir sugar, salt and vanilla extract into the chocolate mixture. Add the eggs one at a time, stirring until they are completely incorporated.

4. In a small bowl, whisk together the flour and baking soda, then add the flour mixture to the chocolate batter. Stir vigorously with a wooden spoon. Give it all you've got for a good 2 to 3 minutes of mixing. The batter should be smooth and glossy and thick. If the batter is cooled off, stir in the butterfingers.

5. Drop heaping tablespoonfuls of batter onto your prepared cookie sheets- leaving about 2-inches between cookies as they'll need space to grow. Bake 10 to 12 minutes. They'll spread out and puff up. You want to take them out when they've crackled but they're still soft and gooey. They'll sink and become more firm as they cool. Wait a few minutes, then transfer them to a cooling rack to cool completely. Eat them up within 2 to 3 days (stored in a covered container).

Yield: 2 1/2 dozen cookies

Cookie Monday: Banana Chocolate Chip Cookies

I had originally planned to make these banana cream pudding cookies, since I'm on this whole pudding cookie kick lately, but when I realized the entire flavor of the cookie came from an artificial banana pudding, I decided against it. I took to the internet to find a recipe that would use the actual bananas I had in my kitchen (especially since fresh produce is a rarity in my home!) but would still be tasty.

I decided on this recipe for Banana Chocolate Chip Cookies. All the reviews complained that the cookies were too much like pancakes. This did not sound off-putting to me; this sounded perfect! The cookies were very easy to make and baked well - I cooked them about a minute less than suggested and they turned out fine. Even making tiny cookies, though, I still ended up with only 3 1/2 dozen. I doubled the recipe! It had said it yielded 3 dozen cookies. Doubling it should have brought me to 6 dozen, but alas! Oh well. I think it was still okay.

The cookies are good. They do taste like little pancakes, which I used to my advantage to convince people to eat them. "You can totally eat one at 8:15 in the morning; it's like a pancake. It's breakfast." It was also pointed out to me that they are kind of like muffin tops, which is neat too. They're really good and have good banana flavor without turning into banana bread.



Banana Chocolate Chip Cookies
Taste of Home

1/3 cup butter -- softened
1/2 cup sugar
1 egg
1/2 cup mashed ripe banana
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips -- (6 ounces)

In a small bowl, cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in the egg, banana and vanilla. Combine the flour, baking powder, salt and baking soda; gradually add to creamed mixture and mix well. Stir in chocolate chips.

Drop by tablespoonfuls 2 in. apart onto baking sheets coated with cooking spray. Bake at 350° for 9-11 minutes or until edges are lightly browned. Remove to wire racks to cool. Yield: 3 dozen (supposedly)

Restaurant-Style Steak

No shit, that's actually what this post about: steak.

I must really love my gentleman. He was craving steak, I remembered a pin I'd seen frequently on Pinterest about cooking steak indoors to rival restaurant steaks, so...

I let him cook steak. In my house. In his own pan, which is forever marked with a giant B on the bottom so I don't accidentally cook non-meat things in it. AND: I participated. Omg. Sort of. I helped season it (without touching it) and I made the compound butter.

Other than grilling, this is unprecedented in my home.

AND: it apparently was better than restaurant steak. He loved it. He said the lemon in the compound butter made the steak taste kind of like lobster. Yup. I obviously can't vouch for this, but I'll trust his judgment and recommend it to you meatatarians out there. I don't know what cut of meat the gentleman used but it was not the same as the one in the original post.

This is what it looked like:


Restaurant-Style Steak
From Whit's Amuse Bouche
Side note: this chick's blog is wonderful. She's hilarious and has great recipes.

Two 8-oz pieces of beef - filet mignon or whatever
4 teaspoons kosher salt
4 teaspoons freshly cracked pepper
1 stick butter
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 cloves garlic, chopped
1 tablespoon parsley, chopped
1 tablespoon thyme, chopped
1 teaspoon lemon zest

Take 1/2 stick of butter, softened, and mix well with the peeled, chopped garlic, the chopped herbs, and the lemon zest. Form into a log and refrigerate.

Generously season the filets with salt and pepper, approximately 1 teaspoon of seasoning per side. Heat the remainder of the butter (1/2 stick) and the olive oil in a cast iron skillet to a screaming hot temperature. Preheat your oven to 400 degrees. Sear the filets in a screaming hot pan for about 2-3 minutes per side, or until a nice brown crust has formed. While the steak is searing, continue to spoon the residual butter in the pan on top of the meat while it's cooking. Once both sides are seared, place in the center of the oven for about 6-8 minutes, depending upon how thick your steak is.

In the last minute of cooking, take the log of compound butter and slice a nice thick piece to place on top. Your steak will be ready (medium rare) when it is approximately 135 degrees in the center, or when you push lightly on the top center of the steak and it gently and slowly bounces back.

Hash Brown Casserole

At work, my department often has breakfasts to celebrate events. Nurse's Week, baby showers, elopements - breakfast is an inexpensive way to celebrate, at a time when we know we'll all be in the office. There's generally a routine. E will bring rice and little empanada-type things. C will bring her french toast casserole. L will bring the maple syrup for the french toast casserole. Sometimes S also brings a competing french toast casserole. LD brings a cherry/apple cobbler. Someone brings fruit and coffee. Breakfasts are wonderful but there are rarely surprises.

A few weeks ago, to celebrate Nurse's Week, we had a breakfast. All the regulars were present on the table, and then... a pan of hash brown casserole. We each took a little, then a lot, and before we knew it the ginormous aluminum pan was empty. It was the most magical surprise. It is the best breakfast food I've ever eaten (sorry, C and S). I tracked down the coworker who brought it - Miss Debbie - and got the recipe. She has given me permission to post it, so I am going to share it with you.

I made it earlier this week - the whole recipe, which makes an enormous amount - and filled up a casserole dish, plus two aluminum pans. I didn't bake the ones in the aluminum, and instead stuck those in the freezer to make in the future. Best idea ever. When my little casserole dish came out of the oven, I let it cool and then decided to try just a little bit of it til my gentleman got to my house for dinner. Just one little forkful. Delicious. Then another little forkful. By the time he got to my house, I was sitting on the kitchen counter eating potatoes right out of the dish while watching Wheel of Fortune. A moment of shame? Yet a moment of pure happiness. Thanks, Deb!

Sorry for the terrible photo; it was really hard to tear myself away long enough to take a picture.


Hash Brown Casserole
This makes a huge amount of casserole, so be prepared.

2 pound bag frozen shredded hash brown potatoes
1 pint sour cream
1 can cream of anything soup (she used chicken, I used celery)
2 cups cheddar cheese
1 soup-can full of milk (or more - enough to help everything mix together)
Finely chopped onion
Salt and pepper

Mix everything together. Bake for an hour to an hour and a half at 350.

Cookie Monday: Potato Chip Cookies

My beloved Denise sent me this recipe the other day and told me I needed to make it for Cookie Monday. While she lives in Oregon and does not get to reap the benefits of my cookie-baking, I love that she thought of me and am thankful she passed this recipe along.

I know it sounds weird. Potato chips in cookies? I swear though, it's really great. These taste a lot like pecan sandies. The original recipe called for "potato chip salt" which basically was just adding extra salt and potato chips on top, which I felt was overkill. It also suggested dipping the cookies in melted chocolate, which I'm sure would taste good but is also a little but of overkill. I liked the cookies plain. They aren't salty at all, which is why the recipe suggests adding more salt. I didn't know how many cookies this recipe would yield so I took a guess and made one-and-a-half batches. I got about 55 cookies. Less than I would have liked, but enough!

This is where I should point out that this contains nuts. I forgot to tell one of my coworkers and nearly killed her. Make sure you tell people when you put nuts in things. Sorry, Barb :(



Potato Chip Cookies
From Smitten Kitchen

1 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 cup granulated sugar, divided
1 teaspoon pure vanilla
1/4 teaspoon table salt (optional)
1/2 cup chopped and toasted pecans
1/2 cup finely crushed potato chips
2 cups all-purpose flour

1. Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper and set aside. In a large bowl, cream together the butter with 1/2 cup of the sugar until lightly and fluffy. Mix in the vanilla and table salt, if using, until smooth. Add the pecans, 1/2 cup crushed potato chips and flour together and mix until just combined.

2. Place the remaining 1/2 cup sugar in a small bowl. Scoop a tablespoon-sized mound of dough and form it into a small ball with the palms of your hands. Roll the ball in the remaining sugar until coated. Place on prepared baking sheet and using the bottom of a drinking glass to slightly flatten the cookies. Cookies only need to be an inch apart; they only spread a little. Repeat with remaining dough.

3. Bake cookies until lightly golden at the edges, about 12 minutes. Transfer to cool on a wire rack.

Yield: About 3 dozen

Mexican Polenta

I've had this tube of polenta in my pantry since Thanksgiving, when I went to visit my parents and had a chance to stop by Trader Joe's (thank goodness for a long shelf-life). Yesterday I had this surge of energy and decided I MUST COOK, so I went through my pantry and found the polenta. Then it became my mission to cook something with it. BUT WHAT? I immediately googled it. I can't remember the exact search term, but it was something like "What to do with a tube of polenta." Lo and behold, the very first search option was a post on a message board from 2008.

What To Do With Polenta In A Tube ~~~~ MY POST. Something I had posted on a message board years and years ago. Omg. I died. And the best part about it? I offered a recipe! In my post! I never even remembered making it!

So guess what I made last night? My own recipe! The one for Mexican Polenta! I am such a tool.

It was delicious, though!