Sunday, February 13, 2011

Valentine's Dinner and Dessert

It required a car nap on the way over to Eena and Papa's house, but we got our dinner for two this evening!


Oh yeah, the dessert?

Chocolate Peanut Butter Brownies with Reese's Cup Icing


Peanut Butter Chocolate Brownies
Cooks.com

1 c. peanut butter
4 tbsp. butter
2 eggs
2 c. sugar (I used powdered, because it's what I had)
4 tbsp. cocoa
4 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
2 c. flour
1 c. milk

Mix all ingredients together. Place in a greased 9 x 13 inch pan. Cook in a 350 degree oven for approximately 40 minutes. (I used a muffin pan and cooked them for 15 - 20 minutes.)



Reese's Cup Icing
BettyCrocker.com

1 cup granulated sugar (I used powdered)

2 Reese's Peanut Butter Cups
1/4 cup butter
1/3 cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
4 tablespoons Hershey's Chocolate Syrup

  1. Add all of the ingredients except for the vanilla extract and Hershey's Syrup to a small pan.
  2. Put the pan on the stove and turn the burner on high.
  3. Mix together the ingredients very well while waiting for them to boil.
  4. Once it boils, let it continue to boil for 1 minute, stirring constantly.
  5. Remove from heat.
  6. Add the vanilla extract and blend together.
  7. With mixer, beat the ingredients for approximately 15 minutes...or until it becomes cool and reaches the consistency of icing.
  8. Ice cake.
  9. With the remainder of the icing, add the Hershey's Chocolate Syrup.
  10. Beat until well blended. Approximately 3 minutes.
  11. Add mixture to baggy and tie a knot.
  12. Cut tip from baggy and begin to write :)
After icing 18 cupcakes, there was no "remainder" of the icing (I had to really scrape the pan to get them all covered!) so I just drizzled Hershey's syrup over them.

This afternoon, it occurred to me that what they really needed to make them perfect was vanilla ice cream, so I had Shrike pick some up on her way home from dropping Peeper off. I was right. That was the perfect touch.

3 comments:

  1. That looks decadent and delicious, and I did not guess that's what you were making! I've used a lot of cooks.com recipes, and they usually turn out good. What was the main course? My husband took me out for dinner tonight and I had a honey-dijon chicken wrap. It should have been good, but they left out the dressing. I kept eating, thinking it had to be in there somewhere, but it wasn't. You guys made a better decision. Eat at home.

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  2. They were amazing. The "toast" in the pan yesterday was pieces of Reese's cup. That's actually what inspired me to play the guessing game. I wondered if anyone could identify them. :-)

    The main coarse was "lazy lasagna" - and it was super-lazy this time, because I just thawed and heated a pan of it that had been in the freezer for . . . three months.

    It was leftovers from when we cooked for a MOMS Club friend who'd just had a baby. I actually made a triple recipe that day - one for that family, one for another MOM who was in the middle of packing to move to California with four kids - all alone, because her husband had already started his new job there, and a third - cooked in two half-size pans - for us.

    We ate one then and froze the other. It does quite well frozen and thawed, even after that long.

    And what you see on our plates there is cheesy garlic toast, made on regular old too-many-grains bread. Shrike's is just butter and parmesan, mine is butter, parmesan, mozzarella, yellow-combo-mix-cheesy (Mexican blend? Four cheese? Whatever was on sale.), garlic and Italian seasoning.

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  3. I was right; It is yummy to live at your house.

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