Chocolate-Peanut Butter Birthday Cake
When my daughter said she and her boyfriend would be coming to the beach the weekend before her birthday and that “maybe we could celebrate my birthday early,” I jumped into planning mode. In my mind, her comment translated to “can you bake a cake?” In trying to decide what kind of cake to make, I ended up offering up a few flavor suggestions and when she reacted to “chocolate and peanut butter,” I knew it was time to make the Zoë Francois chocolate-peanut butter cake.
Easing Back into Baking
January and February in the Pacific Northwest are sluggish at best. The cold, windy, rainy start to the year grants a license to hibernate. While I typically find it difficult to “do nothing,” this year I’ve done a pretty good job of doing just that. I keep looking at the stack of cookbooks begging for my attention. But mostly I’ve been sauntering by that stack to the couch where I’ve been instead making my way through the Oscar-nominated movies and binging Great British Bake Off (GBBO) episodes. Luckily, those GBBO episodes motivated me to pick up my new copy of Small Batch Bakes from Edd Kimber and make three cookie recipes: Chocolate Peanut Butter Cookies, the Emergency Chocolate Chip Cookie, and Lime Coconut Macaroons.
Baking all the Christmas Cookies
Family and friends aside, Christmas isn’t Christmas without the decorating, gift buying/wrapping and cookie baking. I’m happy to say that my decorating and most of my shopping were done the first week of December. So while I waited for the supply chain to deliver (or “find” in the case of Fed Ex) my goods, I sorted through many a cookie recipe to distill my 2021 baking selection and make my list of ingredients in preparation for the Brandt family cookie party (aka fiasco or chaos depending on your perspective). A houseful of loud, apron-clad women (and a few men) gathered at one of my sister’s houses last weekend. A medley of Christmas carols, holiday movies and KitchenAid mixers competing in the background made for a crazy-fun day in the kitchen. We made and sampled Salted Chocolate Gingerbread Men, Lemon Sables, Peanut Butter Cup Cookies, Salted Chocolate Chunk Shortbread, Glazed Ginger Cookies and the obligatory Frosted Sugar Cookies.
Peanut-Butter Brownie Cookies from 100 Cookies
Move over pumpkin, the neighborhood kids want peanut butter and chocolate for Halloween. A recent article in USA Today shares data from CandyStore.com that says America’s favorite overall Halloween candy is Reese’s Peanut Buter Cups. What’s not clear is if all the Reese’s variations are included in this count. In case you haven’t noticed, Hershey’s couldn’t stop at peanut butter cups (available in mini, regular and king size). Anyone who’s ever seen the E.T. movie has a soft spot for Reese’s Pieces. Today, you can lure E.T. with peanut butter cups stuffed with Reese’s Pieces, pretzels, potato chips, and even crunchy cookie bits. I was always partial to the Nutrageous bar, which is hard to find in stores. All this to say that I’ve been craving some peanut butter and chocolate and so turned to my 100 Cookies book. There it was on page 45, Sarah Kieffer’s #9 cookie called Brownie-Cookie with the option of dolloping a spoonful of peanut butter on top before baking. I was hooked. All I needed now was some more peanut butter in my chocolate. I added Reese’s Pieces, M&M’s Peanut Butter candies and some googly eyes. And a fine Halloween cookie was born.