Bits and Pieces

I must say that I make a pretty stellar vanilla milkshake. My chocolate ones aren't half bad either. I do tend to fail with strawberry. Mr. Lawyer says my vanilla milkshakes are some of the best ones he has ever had and I'm going to decide that it's not a boyfriend lie. My secret weapon?

Vanilla Bean Paste. It really does make a difference and it's so much better than vanilla extract. Not only is the flavor amazing but it adds little specks of vanilla bean that just up the game. Plus real vanilla beans are expensive unless they magically appear in your mailbox from some mystical tropical island (Hey Sandy!). Back to the milkshake. I have no exact recipe and wing it. It really depends on my mood. Sometimes you want a thick slurpy milkshake that requires a spoon and sometimes you want a smooth one that you can drink through a straw in 10 seconds so the milk to ice cream ratio varies. The good thing is that milkshakes are very forgiving you can add more milk/ice cream to fix it and not only do you reach your desired consistency but you also have more milkshake (and how is that a bad thing?!) I always add a good dollop of Vanilla Bean Paste. It's always awesome.

Vanilla Milkshakes

(the kitchen of Jenni)

Ingredients:
Vanilla Ice Cream
Milk
Vanilla Bean Paste
Directions:
1. Add your desired amount of ice cream and milk to blender and blend.
2. Blend in a good dollop of vanilla bean paste.
3. Enjoy one amazing milkshake.

I whipped up some vanilla milkshakes last night for our impromptu gathering and sous chef Amanda plated Nutella Graham Crackers (because Nutella is always a good idea). Now Nutella Graham Crackers tastes an awful lot like s'mores. Then Amanda made the amazing decision to dunk them into the milkshakes. S'more heaven.

And that's why we didn't have dinner last night.

SU and Birthdays and a Dinner Party oh my!

Happy Dinner Party/Birthday Amanda/Go SU! We certainly had lots to celebrate Friday night. For my birthday I couldn't decide which cupcakes to make: Irish or S'mores? Obviously I went with the Irish ones and had to wait for an opportunity to make the S'more ones...enter Amanda's birthday! They were a bit messy to eat but they certainly tasted like a S'more.

Ingredient/Technical Difficulties: Marshmallow Fluff is harder to find around here then I thought. The local stores had all sorts of peanut butter, jam and jellies but no fluff! Just as I was mentally preparing to make it from scratch Mr. Lawyer found some Ricemallow Fluff from Whole Foods. It tasted fine, a bit sweeter maybe but it did not hold it's shape which posed a problem with making the garnish. It oozed all over the place and didn't harden up. I charred up some mini marshmallows which worked wonderfully and looked more visually pleasing (you can see both toppings in the photo). I would recommend using fluff for the filling but going the normal marshmallow route for the topping. Either way prepare for a mess, I was very angry at marshmallows while making these (who on earth would ever make something so sticky and messy!! Grrr...). However I thought that the toasted marshmallow on top added some of the best flavor, nothing like nice toasty caramelized sugar to zing up a cupcake. Also, Cupcake Corer.  Best five dollars I ever spent.

S'more Cupcakes

(Bon Appétit Magazine)

Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups graham cracker crumbs (about 1 packet)
1/2 cup all purpose flour
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
3/4 cups sugar
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3/4 cup whole milk
8 ounces bittersweet chocolate chopped
1/2 cup heavy whipping cream
3/4 cup plus one 7-ounce jar marshmallow creme (Or 7oz of marshmallows)
Nonstick vegetable oil spray
12 1-inch pieces broken graham crackers (for garnish)
Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350°F. Line 12 standard muffin cups with paper liners. Whisk graham crumbs, flour, baking powder, and pinch of salt in medium bowl. Beat butter and sugar in large bowl until light and fluffy. Add eggs 1 at a time, beating to blend between additions. Beat in vanilla. Add graham-cracker mixture in 3 additions alternately with milk in 2 additions, beginning and ending with graham-cracker mixture. Divide batter among muffin cups.
2. Bake cupcakes until tester inserted into center come out clean, about 22 minutes. Transfer cupcakes to rack; cool completely.

3. Place chocolate in medium bowl. Bring cream just to boil in small saucepan; pour over chocolate. Let stand 1 minute; stir until smooth. Cool ganache until lukewarm.
4. Core cupcakes with a  cupcake corer, apple corer, spoon, etc. Spoon 3/4 cup marshmallow creme into resealable plastic bag, pushing into 1 bottom corner. Cut 1/2 inch off corner. Pipe into holes in cupcakes. Spread 2 teaspoons ganache over each cupcake.

5. Preheat broiler. Coat rimmed baking sheet with nonstick spray. Spoon dollops of marshmallow creme on sheet (or marshmallows!). Broil until slightly charred, 1 to 2 minutes. Spoon dollop of charred creme over each cupcake; garnish with piece of graham cracker.

Poorly behaving Ricemallow Fluff and well behaved but messy mini marshmallows.

Final Product? Amazing.

There's a bunch more so I will use a super obnoxious page break. Read on for the rest of our goodies!