Chocolate Peanut Butter Coffins

This picture was from a couple of Halloweens ago when I first made these. It was just a fluke - I thought I'd make Rice Crispy Treats with Cocoa Pebbles instead. Then I think Brian said, "I wonder if you can add peanut butter." So I added Reese's Peanut Butter chips. The result was a hit!

If you want something less morbid, you can always just cut them into squares.

Chocolate-Peanut Butter Crispy Coffins

3 TBSP butter
1 10 oz. package marshmallows
6 C Chocolate Rice Cereal
1 package peanut butter chips

Melt butter in a large pan.
Add marshmallows, and stir until melted. Remove from heat.
Add Cereal, and stir to coat.
Stir in peanut chips (they will melt).
Spoon into greased 13" x 9" pan, spread around and pressed until firm. It should look marbled.
Allow to cool, then cut into coffin shapes.

Blondies are back

That Throwdown with Bobby Flay really inspired Brian to come up with the perfect blondie. So here we are again, trying another recipe.

This time we used the Nestle recipe for Blonde Brownies

Blonde Brownies
Estimated Times:
Preparation - 10 min | Cooking - 20 min | Cooling Time - 20 min cooling | Yields - 36 brownies

Golden brownies with pure brown sugar, butter and vanilla for a caramelesque, butterscotchy flavor. A super treat to tuck into lunch bags.

Ingredients:

2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 3/4 cups packed brown sugar
3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) butter or margarine, softened
3 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 cups (12-ounce package) NESTLÉ® TOLL HOUSE® Semi-Sweet Chocolate Morsels

Directions:
PREHEAT oven to 350° F. Grease 15 x 10-inch jelly-roll pan.

COMBINE flour, baking powder and salt in small bowl. Beat sugar and butter in large mixer bowl until creamy. Beat in eggs and vanilla extract; gradually beat in flour mixture. Stir in morsels. Spread into prepared pan.

BAKE for 20 to 25 minutes or until top is golden brown. Cool in pan on wire rack

.

Instead of Semi-sweet chips, we used White chocolate, and we added about 1/2 cup of chopped cashews. Pretty good, but I screwed up and took them out of the oven before they were done (I was tired!), and Brian put them back in. These were more cakey than the other's we've made.

Blondies, Revisited

Back in December, I decided to try to make Blondies for our holiday staff party. I had never made Blondies before, but had some made by friends before and loved them.
I used this recipe out of my Hershey cookbook, and changed it up a little bit.

Three Great Tastes Blonde Brownies
2 cups packed light brown sugar
1 cup butter or margarine, melted
2 large eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
2/3 cup (of each) HERSHEY'S
Semi-Sweet Chocolate Chips, REESE'S Peanut Butter Chips, and HERSHEY'S Premier White Chips
Chocolate Chip Drizzle (recipe follows)

Heat oven to 350°F.
Grease 15 1/2 x 10 1/2 x 1-inch jelly roll pan.
Stir together brown sugar and butter in large bowl; beat in eggs and vanilla until smooth. Add flour and salt, beating just until blended; stir in chocolate, peanut butter and white chips.
Spread batter into prepared pan.
Bake 25 to 30 minutes or until wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool completely; cut into bars.
With tines of fork, drizzle Chocolate Chip Drizzle randomly over bars.
Makes about 6 dozen bars.
Chocolate Chip Drizzle: Place 1/4 cup HERSHEY'S Semi-Sweet Chocolate Chips and 1/4 teaspoon vegetable shortening (do not use butter, margarine, spread or oil) in small microwave-safe bowl.
Microwave at HIGH (100%) 30 seconds to 1 minute; stir until chips are melted and
mixture is smooth.
Recipe and photograph provided courtesy of The Hershey
Company, Copyright ©1995-2005.

My version of the Blondie:

Blondies
2 cups packed light brown sugar
1 cup butter or margarine, melted
2 large eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
2/3 cup chopped pecans
1 10 oz. bag semi-sweet chocolate chunks

Heat oven to 350°F. Grease 15 1/2 x 10 1/2 x 1-inch jelly roll
pan.
Stir together brown sugar and butter in large bowl; beat in eggs and vanilla until smooth. Add flour and salt, beating just until blended; stir in Spread batter into prepared pan.
Bake 25 to 30 minutes or until wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool completely; cut into bars.

Verdict on this one? It's kind of a weird thing - I'm not sure exactly what a blondie is "supposed" to be like, but it came out a lot like the brownies I make and love, so I suppose it was a bit of success. I believe my biggest problem was that I used mostly dark brown sugar instead of light brown, because I ran out of light brown. That could have added more moisture to the mix.

For Christmas, I received a big (and I mean big!) box of chocolate-covered macadamia nuts. I knew I would never eat them all, so I tossed them in the food processor, and folded them into another recipe for Blondies (Butterscotch Blondies to be exact) - also from the Hershey's cookbook. I just substituted the chips and nuts for the chopped up chocolate covered macadamia nuts.

Butterscotch Blondies

3/4 cup (1-1/2 sticks) butter or margarine, softened
3/4 cup packed light brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
2 eggs
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1-3/4 cups (11-oz. pkg.) HERSHEY'S Butterscotch Chips
1 cup chopped nuts(optional)

Directions:
1. Heat oven to 350°F. Grease 13x9x2-inch baking pan.

2. Beat butter, brown sugar and granulated sugar in large bowl until creamy. Add eggs; beat well. Stir together flour, baking soda and salt; gradually add to butter mixture, beating until well blended. Stir in butterscotch chips and nuts, if desired. Spread in prepared pan.

3. Bake 30 to 35 minutes or until top is golden brown and center is set. Cool completely in pan on wire rack. Cut into bars. About 36 bars.

When I was spreading the mixture out into the pan, I first tried a rubber spatula. That did not work at all. Then I tried a knife. Better, but nope. Then I tried a pastry scraper, and that didn't work really either. So I went to my method of spreading out rice crispy treats - a big piece of wax paper. Smash down with the wax paper - it's quick and easy!

The verdict on this one - completely different than the first. It was more like a standard chocolate chip cookie dough than brownie batter. They were really good, and I think these were better!