chocolate chips | Just About Baked

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Magic Twist Bars (Gluten-Free!)

Today is my first day back at work. Ah, the good ol’ grind. A week from today, my now empty classroom will be full of sleepy teenagers wondering what in the heck happened to their freedom. I will be annoyingly perky and they will hate me. Heh heh heh.

This is year 15 for me as a teacher, and every year, I love it just a little bit more. Teaching is unpredictable and active and just so much fun. I laugh a lot at work. But then, I find people funny. Kids especially. I know that my own kids get really mad when they think I’m laughing at them (i.e., all the time), so I will do a better job of hiding my smiles at work. Maybe.

To make my esteemed colleagues feel a bit better about returning, I’ve made some treats. One of my teacher buddies can’t have gluten, and guess what? She’s been teaching for over 35 years. So I think she deserves these bars!

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Boardwalk Bark

August 11, 2014
Mir
Candyland
8 Comments

It’s Beach Week! This week, I’ll be making beach-themed treats in honor of my adopted east coast culture.

You see, out here, people spend weeks or even the entire summer at the beach with family and friends. I first did that ten years ago and it was a banner time. My friend told me to consider dating the man who is now my husband. And the rest is really and truly my history!

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Skinnier PB Oreo Mini-Cheesecakes

August 10, 2014
Mir
Cupcakes and Cheesecakes, Healthier Indulgences
14 Comments

I love riddles. Really, they’re fun!

What do you do with a drunken sailor early in the morning? Um…I’ll get back to you.

Why do men only eat one bite of dessert and leave the rest? Because they’re from another planet. I think there’s a book about that.

Why don’t I sound like Idina Menzel when I sing Let it Go? Because I was never married to Taye Diggs.

What do you do with leftover cheesecake batter? Make these!

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Chocolate Peanut Butter Cake

Why are Sundays so exhausting? Seriously. I’ve never liked Sunday. At best, it feels like a last gasp of freedom all day, and it’s also consumed by errands or playdates or birthday parties or other activities that make my feet hurt.

If Friday is the best day (which I believe it is, since anticipation is the key to all pleasure), Sunday is the worst for the same reason. So I try to have a nice Sunday treat to look forward to, or even a few. My husband and I do date night on Sundays because even though we’re too tired to go out, we get a second wind (or a fifteenth?), and I love that. And it’s always great to have a food treat around, too!

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Toffee Bars (Dairy-Free!)

Some recipes are more special than others, and there are always reasons behind that. Food ties in strongly to childhood and nostalgia, and that’s why these bars strike a particularly deep chord within me.

Along with Entenmann’s chocolate frosted donuts. Man, do I yearn for those on an almost daily basis. But we’ll get into that one another day!

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Kitchen Sink Ice Cream (No Machine Needed!)

Many of my friends in life have come and gone, and I guess it’s sad, but that’s the way the overbaked cookie crumbles. The very best ones stick around, though, and I express my appreciation the best way I know how: rampant consumerism.

Do I buy most of my friends? Heavens, no. But two of my pals, good old Ben and Jerry, like it when I spend my hard-earned cash on them. So I try to be a loyal buddy.

Over the years, Ben and Jerry’s flavors have gone through quite a rotation. They’ve taken away some of my absolute favorites, and I’ve been very vocal on their website about bringing those flavors back. But thank the powers above that my very favorite is still in existence. It’s known as Everything But The…

No, I didn’t cut off in the middle of the sentence. That’s the flavor. But we all know that expression ends with the words “kitchen sink.” In baking, that’s a term we use to describe the scientific process by which we take all the leftover crap in the house, dump it into a batch of whatever, and call it a night.

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Reese’s Oreo Fun Bars

Everybody has a different idea of fun, which explains skydiving. I’ve never felt the urge. Yeah, I get that the adrenaline pumps because you think you’re about to bite it and then you don’t and woohoo and all that, but I can get my thrills a lot cheaper.

Oh yeah, you challenge? You betcha. If I can find just ten minutes of uninterrupted reading time in my zoo of a household, that’s all the fun I can handle.

Wait. Now I sound boring. So to change your mind about me real quick, here are these bars! They are the essence of fun.

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Bakery-Sized Chocolate Chip Cookies

The first time I ever saw Superman (the good one, with Christopher Reeve), I got really confused when they showed the Kryptonite. See, it was glowing and green and all bright. It didn’t look remotely like a chocolate chip cookie.

If Superman were real, that’s what Kryptonite would be for him. Because I know that’s what chocolate chip cookies mean to me, and the rest of humankind as we know it. Nobody can resist them. Seriously. I’ve never met anyone (except my chocolate-hating son, but we’ve all agreed that he’s beyond understanding) who hates a chocolate chip cookie.

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Twix Cookies

Have you ever been to DC? You know, our nation’s capital? If you haven’t, get down here immediately! There is so much to see and do, and a lot of it is free!

Well, kind of. The National Zoo is free, and they have a cute baby panda named Bao Bao. But in exchange for watching all of the adorableness as he tumbles down hills while trying unsuccessfully to stand up, you have to pay a $22 flat fee to park in the zoo lot. So it’s not exactly free, unless you want to go with street parking. Which you could, if you find a free spot. Or take the subway. But that’s not free either.

Okay, I’ll stop griping. Really, the National Zoo is very nice. Even with the absence of giraffes. And the monuments are free, too. And the museums. But not all of them! That International Spy Museum is a tricky biscuit.

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Peanut Butter Oreo Pie

June 20, 2014
Mir
Pie Day
4 Comments

Every now and then, a dessert comes along that is so darn special that you cut all the garbage and get right to the point.

This, my friends, is one of those times.

I was messing around this morning and wound up with this miracle of a pie. This can’t-stop-eating, peanut buttery cookies and cream madness of a pie. And it’s so ridiculously easy to make that I’m smacking myself for all the wasted years!