Ice Cream Sandwiches: Peanut Butter Cookies with Honey Ice Cream

Last week, I went on a baking binge.  In a span of five days, I baked a mascarpone cheesecake, a Mississippi mud pie, and two kinds of ice-cream to sandwich between two kinds of homemade cookies.  I had to throw a party just to get rid of it all! Ok, that's a lie, the party was the excuse for the baking (but baking can be a great excuse for a party!).  Miraculously (or perhaps due to my baking prowess?), every dessert went off without a hitch and attained blogworthy levels of deliciousness.  Pretty good track record for a total of six recipes (five new and never tested!).  I shouldn't gloat though... the universe will undoubtedly punish such pridefulness by causing my next six attempts to burn and curdle.  If I've exhausted my baking karma, the following four posts (oozing with chocolate, swimming in whipping cream, extolling the velvet textures of cheesecake and ice cream alike) should suffice until the divine deity of deliciousness warms up to my efforts again.

Let's start with the ice cream sandwiches... in particular, with the peanut butter cookie, honey ice-cream sandwiches.  For years, Peanut Butter has cheated on Jelly with Honey (including threesomes with Banana behind Jelly's back!).  Jelly's old hat, and this ice-cream sandwich needed something fresh, something special.  We're not talking Eskimo pies here, people (worst dessert.  Belongs in the same category as the tootsie roll - the cookie portion of the Eskimo pie purports to be chocolate but tastes like "brown").  I wanted a frozen treat to put It's It's, Klondikes, and even Haagen Dazs bars to shame.  I wanted an ice-cream sandwich that would seduce you into eating several even if you were too full for a single bite.  Peanut butter and jelly-ice-cream sandwich?  I don't think so.  Gloppy Jelly, tart and mottled with nagging seeds couldn't hold a candle to smooth, golden-sweet Honey.  Jelly was toast, and Peanut Butter (cookies) embraced Honey (in a billowing ice-cream gown bedecked with golden toffee-nuts).  They lived happily ever after ("until dessert do us part!").  At least, that's the romanticized version...

Both the ice cream and the cookies are fantastic by themselves as well.  The honey ice-cream is very rich, and the crunchiness of the toffee-nuts contrasts nicely with the silky cream.  I'm not a fan of crunchy cookies, however, so I specifically opted for a recipe that claimed to produce soft ones.  The key is to bake the cookies for just the right amount of time - if they start to brown, you've gone too far and they'll be on the crunchy side.  A perfectly baked batch of peanut butter cookies will still look a bit like melted balls of dough when you take them out of the oven.  Don't worry they'll firm up (without turning crunchy!). Thomas Keller, reigning King of Deliciousness, says that if you want soft cookies you should mist them with water before popping them in the oven, instead of under-baking them.  I can't vouch for that method, but go ahead and try it if you're willing to eat crunchy cookies should the mist method go awry. 

You may want to start the ice cream a day or two early to give the "batter" plenty of time to chill before you freeze it in your ice-cream maker.  Make sure to freeze your ice cream drum ahead of time!

Honey Ice Cream
1 vanilla bean
2c. heavy whipping cream
1c. whole milk
1/2 c. clover honey
1c. toffee peanuts

In a large saucepan, combine the milk, cream, and honey.  Slice the vanilla bean in half, carefully scrape the seeds into the pot, and then toss in the whole pod.  Stir over medium heat to dissolve the honey, until the cream is scalded (begins to form little bubbles around the edges).  Remove from heat and steep, covered, for one hour.  Cover and refrigerate until thoroughly chilled (overnight is best).  When you're ready to make the ice cream, remove the vanilla pod, stir the mixture to recombine the ingredients, and then pour into an ice-cream maker and proceed according to the ice-cream maker's instructions (usually the mixture churns for about half an hour).  After about fifteen minutes, pour the toffee peanuts into the ice-cream machine.  Continue churning according to the manufacturer's instructions (another 15 minutes) and then transfer the ice cream to a container and put it in the freezer to firm up (I recommend overnight, but a few hours should do the trick).  Meanwhile, make the peanut butter cookies. 

Soft Peanut Butter Cookies
1 c. creamy peanut butter (not the oily natural kind)
1c. packed dark brown sugar
1c. white sugar
1c. softened butter
2 eggs
1t. baking soda
1t. baking powder

1t. vanilla
2 1/2 c. flour

Preheat the oven to 350.  Cream the butter, peanut butter, and sugars together.  Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition.  Beat in the vanilla.  In a separate bowl, combine the baking powder, baking soda, and flour.  Stir the flour mixture into the rest of the batter until completely incorporated.  Shape the dough into balls (1 to 1.5 in will give you 40-50 cookies... more than you'll need!  The ice cream recipe makes enough to fill about 20 ice cream sandwiches depending on how big you make your cookies, and how thick you want your sandwiches) and roll the balls in sugar.  Place the dough-balls on cookie sheets, leaving about 2 inches between each cookie (I never follow this instruction, and my cookies always run together so that I end up with one giant cookie that I have to cut into squares... oh well, squares taste just as good as circles).  Use a fork to flatten the cookies by making a crosshatch pattern on each ball.  Dip the fork in sugar between each cookie to prevent it from sticking.  Bake the cookies for 6-7 minutes (resist the temptation to bake them longer if you want soft cookies!). Let the cookies cool completely before making the sandwiches.

When the cookies are completely cool and firm enough to handle, take the ice cream out of the freezer.  If you're ice cream has been chilling overnight, let it sit at room temperature for ten minutes so it will be more pliable.  Grab a cookie.  Dollop your desired amount of ice cream onto the underside of the cookie and gently press and spread it a bit with the back of a spoon.  Top with another cookie and pop the sandwich in the freezer while you repeat the process with the remaining cookies and ice cream.  When you run out of ice cream, remove the sandwiches from the freezer and either wrap them individually in plastic wrap, or do like me and toss them in a big Ziploc bag.  They will keep in the freezer for a few weeks (probably longer, but mine were eaten before I could test that theory out...).  Serve with a more ice cream sandwiches, a cheesecake, a pie, and party!

Up next... Brer Rabbit ice cream sandwiches (Molasses Cookies with Brown Sugar Ice Cream)

Old Fashioned Blueberry Cake

I'm always suspicious of bakeries endorsed as "the best" by celebrities or the general media, and I'm even more suspicious of the subsequent cookbooks published to capitalize on that new-found fame. Case in point: the cupcakes I sampled at Magnolia Bakery, featured in Sex In The City, were some of the driest, blandest cupcakes I've ever eaten, yet everybody raved about them and probably purchased scores of Magnolia Bakery Cookbooks, exacerbating the dry cake epidemic that plagues many bakeries. Thank goodness Sprinkles set the cupcake trend back on track with their moist and fluffy works of cakelet perfection... mmm must try the new salty caramel flavor...

Anyways, when I received the Hummingbird Bakery Cookbook, with a quote from Gwyneth Paltrow on the front touting their cupcakes as "legendary" and claiming her special occasions are "always chock full of Hummingbird goodies," I was immediately skeptical. How do I know Gwyneth Paltrow is a bona fide foodie with trustworthy taste in cupcakes? And how can Hummingbird's cupcakes be "legendary" when the bakery's owner admits that "cupcakes seem to be unknown in London" (Hummingbird opened in London in '04)? Fishy! Or maybe I'm just hyper-logical... law school will do that to you.

No offense to the Brits out there, but as far as I know, the UK isn't exactly renowned for its culinary prowess. If you want a sticky or steamed pudding, sure, but can a British bakery turn out a moist cake without covering it with custard, dousing it with sugar-syrup, or baking it in a steam bath? Why, yes, in fact it can.

Despite my misgivings, I was seduced by the mouth-watering photographs in the Hummingbird Bakery Cookbook, and embarked on the Blueberry Cake, pictured with frosting but claiming to be "moist enough to be served without the frosting, if you prefer." I do not prefer frostingless cake, but I demand moist cake! And so I commenced baking. The recipe proceeded a bit oddly, and I've altered the steps for a smoother baking process, but nonethless my cake baked up beautifully- heavy, fragrant, and practically oozing moisture. The frosting recipe likewise proceeded in a strange and backwards manner (Oh those Brits!), but produced a cream cheese frosting so light and fluffy that people proclaimed that it must be made of marshmallows! Not so! The towering, blueberry-bespeckled confection was a sight to behold... But I was unprepared for the first bite...

Perhaps in the UK, people don't consume pounds of sugar every day, and so are accustomed to mild cake. Still slightly warm from the oven, with a crumbly yet moist crumb, the cake at first seemed like a success. As I forked it into my mouth, however, I couldn't help but furrow my brow... it was...somewhat bland, and had an odd baking-powder bitterness like an undercooked pancake. The frosting was spectacular, but I was horrified to serve bland cake. I held my breath and hoped the clouds of frosting would woo my guests into overlooking the cake's pancakish tastelessness. No one complained, but I took the Hummingbird Bakery Cookbook and banished it to the back of my bookshelf with a disgruntled shove. But the story doesn't end there...

Although I had vowed not to eat another bite of the disappointing dessert, I succumbed to the sight if its silky frosting and toothsome interior the next morning... and was amazed!!! Overnight, the baking-soda bitterness had dissipated, the cake had softened, and its mild, muffiny flavor paired perfectly with the oh-so-sweet frosting. It was like the cake-fairy had come in the night and magically transformed the ugly cakling into the graceful swan of sweets! I've devoured about half of the cake on my own since that moment, and I'm already planning my next baking adventure from the Hummingbird Bakery Cookbook.

While I definitely warmed up to this recipe, I must note that you should be prepared for its unusually mild, almost elegant, not-so-sweet flavor. It's reminiscent of cakes I imagine someone's grandmother might have baked (hence the "old-fashioned" moniker). I recommend baking it the night before you plan to serve it, because the flavor undeniably improved overnight.


Cake Ingredients
3 sticks unsalted butter, room temperature
1 3/4 c. sugar
6 eggs
1t. vanilla
3 1/2 c. flour
2T plus 2t. baking powder (make sure it hasn't expired!)
1c. sour cream
3T. whole milk
2 pints fresh blueberries (some will be used for decorating)

Frosting Ingredients
4 2/3 c. powdered sugar
1 stick unsalted butter, softened
8oz cold cream cheese

Prepare the cake:

Preheat the oven to 325. Butter a 10-in ring mold (or angel-food cake pan if you don't have a ring-mold... who has a ring mold??) and lightly dust it with flour. Cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well and scraping down the sides of the bowl after each addition. Beat in the vanilla. In a separate bowl, combine the flour and baking powder. Beat in the flour mixture in 3 additions, alternating with the sour cream (starting and ending with the flour mixture). Stir in 1 1/2 pints of blueberries (reserving the other half-pint for decoration). Pour the batter into the prepared pan, and bake until golden brown. The recipe claimed this would take 40 minutes, but my brand-new, perfectly calibrated oven took an hour to bake this puppy up. Check the cake after 40 minutes, but if it's barely browning, and a knife inserted comes out gooey, put it back in and check every 10 minutes until the knife comes out clean and the cake is golden. Once you're satisfied with the cake's doneness, allow it to cool in the pan for about 15 minutes before turning it out to finish cooling completely on your wire rack, or cake stand. When you're nearly ready to frost the cooled cake, make the frosting.

Note: I edited both the cake and frosting steps for a smoother baking process.

Beat the softened butter and cold cream cheese until fluffy and well-mixed. With the mixer on low, beat in the powder sugar in four additions (you could add it all at once, but a billowing cloud of powdered sugar will surely coat you and your kitchen in a fine layer of sugar-dust). When all of the ingredients have been incorporated, turn the mixer to medium-high and continue beating the frosting until fluffified, at least five minutes (this is where having a stand-mixer comes in handy). According to the book, you should not overbeat the frosting or it will begin to weep, but it should be fine if you stick to the five-minute rule.

Slather the big 'ole cake with gobs of frosting, covering the top, sides, and center with as many thick, rich layers as it can hold. Dot the top with the remaining half-pint of blueberries, and to really gild the lily, garnish the cake with a final sprinkle of powdered sugar. SERVE THE NEXT DAY for maximum deliciousness! Unless you don't mind the flavor of baking powder...

Poppyseed Lemonade Cupcakes

Raise your hand if you suffered through a very long, very painful, calorie-busting hour of "Skinny Jeans" and then promptly donned sweatpants and consumed twice as many calories in cupcake batter and cream cheese frosting as you burned doing squats to Poker Face.  Proof that exercise actually causes weight gain!  Luckily, I think the hedonistic pleasure of stuffing these scrumptious cupcakes into my cheeks more than compensated for my wasted workout.

I normally consider baking from a box to be a form of cheating, but I like to bend the rules when it comes to cake mixes because they make damn good cakes.  And if I doctor the mix, it basically counts as a scratch cake!

These cupcakes were especially satisfying because I made them entirely out of ingredients I had on hand.  An old bag of poppy seeds, the sad little half-package of cream cheese in the fridge, and a redolent lemon that had tumbled into the grass from its perch on the lemon bush combined with pantry staples and a cake mix to make a batch of fluffy, citrusy, springtime treats.  These would be really cute if you topped them with sugared lavender or rose petals, but even I'm not crazy enough to have those on hand! Although, I do have roses in my garden, and the recipe for sugared blossoms committed to memory... but I wanted instant, workout-negating, my-ass-will-hurt-for-the-next-three-days-so-I-deserve-it, gratification.  That's why I love cake mixes!  So easy, so yummy, so EVIL...



Cupcake Ingredients
1 butter recipe golden cake mix (butter recipe is always better because butter is always better)
The things the cake mix tells you to use (probably a stick of butter and two or three eggs - check the box)
1 LARGE lemon (mine was the size of a softball, no joke)
2t. poppy seeds, plus extra for decorating

Frosting Ingredients
4oz cream cheese
1 stick of butter, softened
3c. powdered sugar
1t. vanilla

To make the cupcakes, follow the cake mix directions for preheating the oven, and prepare your muffin tins by either lightly buttering each muffin-well, or filling the tins with cupcake wrappers.  Obviously in my lazy state I went with the latter.  Zest and juice the lemon.  Check to see how much water your cake mix requires.  Pour the lemon juice into a liquid measuring cup, and then add water until you have the amount of liquid specified by the cake mix directions.  In a medium bowl, combine the lemon-water with the cake mix, the other ingredients called for by the mix (e.g., butter and eggs), and the zest of the lemon.  Add the poppy seeds and beat on low speed until thoroughly mixed.  Pour the batter into the prepared pans and bake for the time specified on the cake mix box (aaah this recipe is such a cop-out... but it's goooood).  The cake is done cooking when a toothpick inserted into the center of a cupcake comes out clean.

While the cupcakes bake, make the frosting.  Beat the cream cheese and butter together until light and fluffy.  Add the powdered sugar half a cup at a time (adding it little by little will prevent a cloud of powdered sugar dust from erupting over your kitchen), mixing slowly and thoroughly after each addition.  Mix in the vanilla.

When the cupcakes have cooled completely, frost with the cream cheese frosting, and sprinkle with poppy seeds (or sugar encrusted rose petals...).  Eat cupcakes as needed with a glass of milk to mitigate muscle pain caused by Skinny Jeans workouts.  Doctor's orders.

Not much of a sweet tooth?  Check out Evil Batch's new savory-sister blog, Wicked Lickens, jointly edited by me and my beau.  First up, bacon-salmon sandwiches!

Strawberry Ice Cream

As of late, my poor ice cream maker has languished amongst my random and rarely-used kitchen appliances (fondue pot, pressure cooker, cannoli tubes, giant cast iron dutch oven...).  This was mostly due to the fact that my freezer was stuffed to the brim with God-knows-what (the freezer was full when I moved into my last apartment, but the roommates denied ownership of most the contents... maybe we had our very own freezer time capsule memorializing the diets of the previous owners!).  No freezer space means no space for the absurdly large and heavy ice cream drum that needs to freeze overnight prior to ice-creaming.  So, summers have come and gone over the past three years, sans home-made ice cream.  But I will be ice-creamless no more!

After moving into my spanking-new cottage a few days ago (complete with a big, sparkling clean, EMPTY refrigerator and freezer!!!), homemade ice cream was at the top of my priority list (seriously, as in right after unpacking my ice cream maker, and before unpacking all of my clothing).

I normally opt for non-fruit desserts (mmmmm chocolate....), but now that it's spring (and the strawberries and peaches aren't being shipped from Venezuela or wherever) it's pretty hard to resist the shiny, fat apples, fragrant, fuzzy peaches, and giant jewel strawberries in the produce section.  Hence the strawberry ice cream!  This custard-style recipe contains a lot of fat, which promotes aeration and produces a luscious, creamy (almost fluffy!) ice cream.  The strawberries are finely chopped rather than pureed to lend a pale pink hue and light strawberry flavor to the finished treat, with every mouthful punctuated by vibrant, tangy bits of fruit.

As a bonus, the cooked custard that forms the ice cream base (minus the strawberries) can double as a wonderful creme anglaise - just halve the ingredient quantities, omit the lemon and replace it with 1t. vanilla (or use a the seeds of a vanilla bean if you want to get fancy... and expensive...), and proceed as directed.  Once the creme anglaise has cooled, add chocolate cake!

But I digress... (thoughts of chocolate tend to do that) back to the ice cream!

Ingredients
1 pint fresh strawberries
1T. fresh lemon juice
2 large eggs
1c. sugar
1c. whole milk
2c. heavy whipping cream

If you are using an ice cream maker with a drum that must be frozen in advance, make sure it's frozen!

In a large saucepan, combine the cream, milk, lemon juice, and 1/2c. sugar.  Heat on low until scalded (little bubbles will start to form at the edges, but do NOT let it boil!).  While the cream mixture heats, beat the eggs with 1/4c. sugar until well combined.

When the cream mixture reaches scalding temp., temper the egg mixture.  The eggs must be tempered, i.e., slowly brought up to the temperature of the cream, before they are added or the cold eggs will scramble when they hit the hot cream, and I'm pretty sure scrambled-egg ice cream won't be as delicious as strawberry.  To temper the eggs, whisk them continuously while slowly drizzling in a thin stream of hot cream.  I usually whisk with one hand, and ladle with the other, but you can also enlist a helper to either whisk or ladle.  Keep whisking and ladling until you've added about half the cream mixture to the eggs, and they are hot to the touch.  At this point, you can safely add everything back into the sauce pan, but you're not out of the woods yet!!!  The mixture still needs to be heated until it reaches that velvety, custard consistency.  Keep the heat on low, and stir constantly until the mixture thickens slightly (supposedly this happens around 170, but I only had a meat thermometer and it probably wasn't very accurate in custard so I stopped cooking mine when the thermometer said 160).

It is very, very important to stir constantly, and not leave the custard unattended even for five seconds while you search for your candy/meat thermometer.  It will curdle (i.e. the eggs will scramble).  Don't feel bad if your eggs scramble, but don't bother trying to resuscitate curdled custard.  I promise you it will be disgusting.  Just bite the bullet, and throw the lumpy mess out.  Yes, I did curdle my eggs (thanks to my five-second thermometer hunt), and yes I threw the entire thing down the drain and started over (it might be a good idea to have some extra ingredients on hand if you're a custard newbie).  The second time went smoothly though! (literally, haha). When your custard thickens, remove it from the heat and pour it into a metal bowl.  Cool completely, either by refrigerating, or by placing the metal bowl in a bigger bowl filled with ice and stirring the custard to chill it (this speeds up the cooling process, which otherwise takes about 2 hours).

While the custard chills, remove the stems from the strawberries, and chop finely.  Combine the chopped/crushed berries with the remaining 1/4c. sugar in a small bowl, and refrigerate until the custard is cooled.

When your custard is cold, stir in the berry mixture, and pour the entire mixture into your ice cream maker.  Let the directions for the ice cream maker take you from here! (usually it freezes for about 30 minutes in the ice cream maker, and the resulting ice cream is very soft.  I like to pack it in tupperware, and freeze it again overnight for the familiar, solid texture).

Serve with chocolate sauce (what else? ha.)

Graham Cracker Buttermilk Bundt

You never know when baking inspiration will strike.  Studying has recently stymied my usual obsessive recipe reading, and I thought my baking dry spell would continue through finals, but lo and behold, this recipe snuck through my distraction radar!

In a moment of weird and impromptu food creativity, I had decided to try graham crackers with brie and jam instead of regular crackers (very good - you should try it).  As I inspected my age-old graham cracker box for an expiration date (three weeks ago, but I figured they were fine since they were still sealed...), I noticed the box featured a recipe for something other than graham cracker crust. Interesting!  Apparently you can make bundt cake from graham cracker crumbs!  I had to try it.

I'm normally skeptical of bundt cakes because they tend to turn out dry, but I noted that this recipe called for drenching the entire warm, spice-laden, walnut-studded cake with a hot sauce composed of butter and sugary buttermilk.  Can't go wrong there!  Solution to dry cake? Poke it full of holes and pour in tasty liquid.  Worked like a charm!  Hello warm, moist dessert.  I recommend reserving some of the hot sauce to pour over individual slices.  Whipped cream wouldn't hurt either.

Graham Cracker Buttermilk Bundt Cake

Cake Ingredients:

1/2 c. vegetable oil
1 stick butter, melted (1/2 c.)
1 1/2 c. sugar
3 eggs
1t. vanilla extract
2 c. all-purpose flour
1 c. (14 squares) graham cracker crumbs
1/2 t. salt
1 t. baking porwder
1 t. baking soda
1 t. cinnamon
1 t. allspice
1 t. nutmeg
1 c. buttermilk
1 c. chopped walnuts

Buttery Buttermilk Sauce ingredients:
1 c. sugar
1/2 c. buttermilk
2 t. vanilla
1/3 c. melted butter

Preheat the oven to 300.  In a large bowl, blend the melted butter, oil, and sugar thoroughly, and add the eggs and vanilla.  Mix well.  In a separate bowl (or in your Cuisinart if you're going to pulverize the crumbs in there anyways), stir together the graham cracker crumbs, flour, baking soda, salt, baking powder, and spices.  Add the flour mixture to the egg mixture in three additions, alternating with the buttermilk (start and end with the flour mixture - i.e. flour, buttermilk, flour, buttermilk, flour).  Stir in the chopped walnuts.  Pour the batter into a well-greased (grease that sucker REALLY well - my cake got stuck to the pan and I had to repatch it after inverting) bundt pan.  Bake 1hr., or until a knife inserted into the cake comes out clean.  Cool the cake in the pan for 15 minutes (make the sauce while the cake cools), then invert onto a plate.

To make the sauce, combine sauce ingredients in a saucepan and boil for one minute.  Reserve about 1/3 c. of the glaze for spooning over individual slices. Use a skewer to poke holes all over the cake (Everywhere! Really go crazy.  More holes = more sauce-cake contact = more moistness!), and then spoon the hot sauce over the warm cake.  Spoon the "run-off" back onto the cake to ensure thorough moistening.  Do not let one drop escape!

Serve the cake with the extra sauce, and freshly whipped, sweetened whipping cream.

The Art of Sharing Food

Any foodie worth their salt knows that when you go out to eat, you should order family style.  Sharing maximizes tasting potential, and avoids the inevitable quandary of whether to order that delicious pork-belly with butter-sauced morels, or the potentially equally delicious gorgonzola gnocchi with toasted walnuts. Mmmmmmmm.  Order/eat both!

There is nothing worse than the awkward experience of dining with a "non-sharer" - someone who looks askance at the suggestion of sharing and proceeds to order, all for themselves, a huge entree that couldn't possibly be consumed by a single person anyways!  While the rest of the table exchanges plates and comments on the flavors with gusto, the lone-orderer huddles in the corner and suspiciously hoards his or her precious meal.

Worse is the scenario in which you go to dine with one other person who insists on order the SAME meal that you have just ordered!!! This is completely unacceptable foodie behavior unless one of you has a grave communicable disease, or the rest of the menu is disgusting (in which case, why are you eating there to begin with??).

Of course, there are certainly scenarios in which food-sharing is neither desirable, nor acceptable.  For instance, I object to requests for bites of my sandwich, licks of my ice-cream, or tastes of my teeny-tiny truffle that barely serves one person (unless we have previously agreed to share this particular morsel).   Sandwiches are absorbent, carefully balanced affairs.  Unless I'm already swapping saliva with the "sharee" on a regular basis, I don't want the edges of my sandwich bread moistened by someone else's saliva, nor do I want them spilling all of my avocado and tomato out before I've finished enjoying my meal.  The saliva argument also holds for the ice cream cone.  After someone else's warm tongue has melted the side of your ice-cream so that the drips dribbling down the side of the cone are mixed with stranger-saliva, the whole treat just loses its appeal.  Asking for a lick of ice cream is like asking to borrow my toothbrush!  Gross!  And one should never take the last bite or sip of another's delicious meal or beverage (nor should one take a GIANT bite of someone else's minuscule treat).  Just the other day I purchased an adorable, mini peanut butter cupcake to savor during the long hours of professional responsibility, and as I walked to class, I was overcome with anxiety that some uncouth person would ask for a bite!  I even contemplated scarfing down the little morsel before heading to my seat to prevent such a tragedy.  There are subtle ways, however, to deter efforts at misguided sharing.  So, while I encourage you to order family style when dining out, you can follow these tactics when you want to preserve the integrity of your sandwich, or when your truffle is just too good to share:

When eating something delicious:
1. Do NOT comment on its deliciousness!  This will encourage responses of, "oooh, can I have a bite?"
2. Do not try to feign disgust.  This might seem like a good course of action, but believe it or not, it might encourage your fellow diners to ask for a bite just to see how gross your food tastes.  This sounds counter intuitive, but think about it, how often do you take a big whiff of the air after someone says, "Ew, what's that smell?" Same concept.
3. Do claim that you have a cold, or even better, claim that you have a festering cold sore in your mouth.  No one will want to share with you.  Downside - people will think you have herpes.
4. Preemptively provide a crumb to deter requests for larger portions.
5. Eat your food in a really gross manner, e.g. slobbering all over your sandwich, or smearing it around on your plate.  If someone still wants a bite, give them the cold, wet corner of the bread (that might be too gross to actually go through with...).
6. Tell the requester you are diabetic, and that you must eat the entire portion to prevent a hypoglycemic coma.
7. Be a true evil biatch and just say NO.

Recipes to follow shortly... a.k.a after finals!

Panna Cotta "Eggs"

These looked almost TOO much like wiggly soft-boiled eggs to enjoy as a dessert, but they were fun to make!  The shell is constructed by spreading melted, cooled white chocolate (about 3/4 of a bag) over partially inflated balloons.  The white chocolate was pretty hard to work with - it refused to melt into a smooth, glossy liquid like normal chocolate - so my "egg shells" ended up a little, um, rustic looking... If you like regular chocolate better than white chocolate, and you don't care about creating an authentic looking egg, go with regular chocolate for ease of construction (you could pretend it was a really really dark brown egg!).  If I made these again I'd stick with white chocolate despite its relative fussiness because I personally think lemon tastes gross with regular chocolate (as does any fruit. That includes raspberry!). 

The hardest part of this whole process is inflating the balloons.  I think I must be a sissy or something because I could not inflate a single balloon to save my life!  I finally gave up and had to enlist my younger brother (whom, I might add, has chronic lung problems, yet had no trouble blowing up those suckers). 

Two balloon tips: 1) don't over inflate them... you're going for chicken eggs, not ostrich eggs; and 2) do NOT spread the chocolate on the balloons until it has cooled or you will create a chocolate hand grenade instead of a chocolate egg-shell. 





As the chocolate hardens, the balloons will begin to deflate.  Snip a tiny hold in the deflated portion of the balloon and SLOWLY let the air escape.  Peel the balloon off the chocolate to reveal a cute little eggshell cup!

Panna cotta with a dollop of lemon curd mimics the eggy innards to complete the look.  For some reason, my panna cotta started to weep, which normally irritates me, but in this case it worked with my theme because it looked like wet egg-white (slightly unappetizing, but oh well).

Panna Cotta

3 c. heavy cream, divided
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 c. sugar
2 tsp. gelatin
1/4 c. water

Lemon Curd
1/2 c. sugar
3 egg yolks
1/4 c. freshly squeezed lemon juice
1/2 stick softened butter
2 tsp. grated lemon rind 

To make the panna cotta, combine the sugar and half the cream in a saucepan over medium heat.  Stir to dissolve the sugar, and bring to a simmer.  Turn off the heat.  Pour 1/4 c. water in small bowl and sprinkle the gelatin over the top.  Let sit for a few minutes so the gelatin can soften.  Add the gelatin mixture to the cream and sugar and stir well to combine.  Add the remaining cream and the vanilla, stir.  Put the liquid panna cotta mixture in the fridge until you have completed the lemon curd (but don't take forever or you'll end up with a big pitcher of firm panna cotta!)

Make the lemon curd: In a small saucepan, combine the sugar, egg yolks, and lemon juice over low heat.  Stir constantly until the mixture is thick enough to coat the back of a spoon.  Remove from heat and stir in the butter and the grated lemon rind.  Set the lemon curd in the fridge to cool.

Remove the panna cotta from the fridge and carefully fill each egg-cup.

Place filled egg cups in the fridge until the panna cotta has hardened completely.  When firm, add a spoonful of lemon curd yolk.

I think I might try adding the lemon curd to the center of the panna cotta before it hardens next time to see if it solves the gross wet weeping problem.  It really did look like an egg...