Coincidental Columns: Cups and Caps

The best part about making homemade peanut butter cups?

Where to start! Well,  they are about 3 times bigger, you can use Ghiradelli dark and milk chocolate, there’s no limit to the  amount of peanut butter filling and they are all yours!

I loved the way the tin liners made the scrumptious cups look just like the real thing.

I also loved the way it made them look like bottle caps.

And they both have super secret surprises on the inside!

The riddles on those darn Ballantine Caps are always so tricky, unlike the recipe:

PB Cups

1 cup Peanut Butter

1/2 cup confectioner’s sugar

1 Tbsp. vanilla extract

1 bag chocolate chips, whichever you fancy; semi-sweet, dark, milk, all work fine

First, mix together the PB, sugar, and vanilla in a small bowl. Set it in the refrigerator until needed.

Next, prepare your muffin tin with liners. This would work great if you had a mini muffin tin as well. Then it’s time to temper your chocolate. You can do this in the microwave in 15 second intervals, stirring after each burst. We don’t have a microwave so I just made a make-shift double boiler and melted my chocolate that way. Once the chocolate is nice and workable use a brush or spoon to cover the bottoms and sides of the paper liners. Stick in the fridge for about a half hour, or until the chocolate has hardened.

Next, fill the hardened shells with as much delicious PB filling as you like. Then, get your chocolate warmed again and cover the tops of your cups with the melted chocolate. Throw them into the fridge one last time for another half hour or until you just can’t wait anymore.

Peel off the paper, admire your handiwork, and eat up.

Lovely Day

The weather has been perfectly delightful these past couple of days. We can finally open the windows and let the spring breezes air out this stuffy apartment. It seems like just yesterday I was knee-deep in snow, but boy am I glad we are over that! Winter is always good for baking warm pies and cookies, but the spring is a time to celebrate fresh fruits and vegetables.

To honor the coming of summer solstice I decided to whip up a quick guacamole, fry up some tortilla chips, pop open a seasonal brew and take a leisurely break.

I went with Anchor’s Summer Beer, it’s a superb seasonal selection. My roommate started drinking these Anchor beers from San Francisco awhile ago. They have a ton of different brewskies and they all taste great!

Perhaps, I will look into having a little Anchor brewery tasting night…

Classic Guacamole

2 Ripe avocados

1 Nice sized on-the-vine tomato

1 Small red onion

1 Jalapeno

2-3 Tbsp. Sour cream

Juice of half a lime

Salt + Pepper to taste

Mash up your avocados in a bowl, I like to leave it a little chunky. Cut your onion, jalapeno, and tomato pretty small and add to the avocado. Add the sour cream, mix up. Add your lime, salt, and pepper to your liking.

Easy Peasy lemon squeezy!

Oh yeah! and you have listen to this song while you do all of this.

Lovely Day by Bill Withers