Cadbury Creme Eggs Benedict

I saw this on Serious Eats and had to make it. It is completely gross yet terribly funny. I originally planned on making it for April Fools Day but as you can see, it's April 18th so we'll just say I made it for April Fools Month.

The instructions are detailed on Serious Eats and I made only slight modifications:

• I didn't have a pound cake and wasn't going to buy one just for this purpose but I did have very thick slices of a sweet white bread. I fried that in the frying pan and sprinkled a mix of cinnamon and sugar on it.
• I used cream cheese frosting instead of buttercream because it's what I had leftover from a recent cake I made. Cream cheese frosting beats buttercream frosting out anytime anyway. I should have warmed the frosting a bit more so the consistency would have looked more like the sauce.

And here are the steps in picture form:

Oh Cadbury eggs do I have a use for you...

The breakfast "potatoes":

The gooey, melty, "eggs" atop the brownie "hams" and "English muffin":

The final plate - it looks so appetizing! 

The dissection: the "English muffin" is a cake doughnut, the "ham" is a brownie, the "eggs" are Cadbury Creme Eggs of course, the "Hollandaise sauce" is cream cheese frosting, and the "breakfast potatoes" are pieces of white bread toasted with cinnamon and sugar.

It was a fun project! I was prepared to throw it in the trash but surprise (or maybe not), the BF wanted to eat it. Ew.

Christmas Treats, Part 2

In part 2 of the Jen Wong Christmas Treats story, I bring you the second candy-like item I made for the holiday ...

Oreo Truffles!!

Sooooo easy! I had seen the recipe floating around the internet for a couple of years now but never had an opportunity to make them. I seem to be a last-minute baker who is making something the night before an event and since these required refrigeration, they usually got pushed off for another occasion.

Like the peanut butter cups, there is no baking required and they are super easy. THREE INGREDIENTS! Just Oreos, cream cheese, and chocolate.

Since I'm a Trader Joe's fan, I bought Jo-Jo's, the chocolate-sandwich cookies that strangely resemble Oreos... This time of year they also have a mint version so I decided to make mint oreo truffles as well.

Oreo Truffles (from Kraft)

1 package (1 lb. 2 oz.) Oreo Cookies, finely crushed, divided
1 8 oz package cream Cheese, softened [I used light]
1 lb dark chocolate

Remove 6 Oreos. Grind in a food processor into crumbs. Set aside.

Grind the remaining Oreos and cream cheese in a food processor. Refrigerate at least one hour.

Roll into 1" balls.

Dip balls into melted chocolate. Coat until covered, then remove and let dry on waxed paper. Sprinkle reserved cookie crumbs on top of truffle. Refrigerate until set.

Store leftover truffles in a tightly covered container in the refrigerator.

Peppermint variation!

For the mint version, I used mint Jo-Jos, and added about a teaspoon of peppermint extract to the chocolate coating. I sprinkled crushed peppermint candies on top for decoration.

I used forks to roll the balls around in chocolate, which worked well, but I had some trouble with fork tine-marks along the sides of some of them. Just noting in case beauty is an issue...

They were so well-received, I had to make more the following weekend!

Christmas Treats, Part 1

Yes I realize it is JANUARY but obviously I am behind in posting. Anyway, if I posted ahead of time, then the surprise would be ruined! Um yeeeeah, that's the story I'm sticking to.

Every year around October or November, I embark the yearly tradition of making treat items for close family and friends. Sometimes they are old recipes that I love, and other times they are brand-new and I'm hoping they are a hit! It's a lot of work and even though every freaking year I swear I will NEVER do it again, somehow I end up in the kitchen burning the midnight oil.

This year I made some old favorites: Cook's Illustrated gingerbread cookies, almond toffee (dark chocolate, thank you), and chocolate-orange cookies. But this year I made a couple of new ones as well. The first...

Homemade Peanut Butter Cups!

(I just realized I have pictures of the steps but no pictures of the resulting product! Boo)

Now, you may be asking yourself, why the heck would you want to make your own peanut butter cups when Reese's peanut butter cups are so easily available (and undoubtedly cheaper)? Well, I'll tell you... (1) the novelty (I like to bake for fun okay?) and (2) because there aren't as many ingredients I don't recognize. TBHQ anyone?

I followed this recipe from Baking Bites because it seemed simple enough. The only change I made was to use all crunchy peanut butter because honestly, who keeps two types of peanut butter in their pantry? It was a relatively easy process, except somewhat time-consuming because each stage involved refrigerating the cups to get the chocolate to harden. You want to make these on a nice, lazy afternoon. Not at uh, 10 pm. Not that I know what that is like.

I also found that I ended up using A LOT of chocolate overall. Definitely not cheaper than the Hershey product since I was using higher quality chocolate.

The resulting product didn't taste like a Reese's Peanut Butter cup. It didn't quite have that sickly sweet junk food taste. It tasted more like something from a gourmet chocolate shop, with a crunchy bite to the chocolate and chunks of gooey peanut butter inside. Delicious!

I want to try them with almond butter next time...