Chubby Bunny

Baking

What better way to put the newly remodeled (all done by my Dad) than to bake with a good friend? Hang came over and we spent hour after hour in the kitchen working on the chemistry known as baking.

He bought measuring cups. Don’t ask how, but I managed to do without any measuring cups since the beginning of time. Even for something as precise as baking.

So we started off with Peanut Butter cookies, which we were going to sandwich together with Frangelico-spiked chocolate ganache.

However, since the texture of the cookie was a very sandy, moist crumble, we decided not to. Also, thanks to the sugar, butter and peanut butter…and the Ghiradelli dark chocolate chips, this cookie stood wonderfully alone. So we left it alone.

I would highly reccomend a bittersweet or dark chocolate to use if you plan on adding any; it provides a very tasty contrast to the sweet, rich flavor of peanut butter.

We took a few smaller cookies and fitted them into the bottom of a lined muffin tin. Then, we attempted chocolate cheesecakes. Half of them were doused with raspberry jam before adding the cheesecake filling. These took a long while to set in the fridge later.

Next, we went ahead and tried banana bread. I fear making quick breads, because of leavening issues. We used mini loaf pans, since 4 mini loaf usually takes the same amount of batter was one regular-sized loaf pan.

Mini-loaf pans are useful for many reason. First of all, they’re a good size for gift-giving. Secondly, it makes it very easy to freeze portions that you don’t plan on eating in the immediate future. Finally, they’re really cute when you slice it up.

The bread came out just as I feared– rather dense rather than fluffy. My suspicious is not having beaten the eggs enough and not having enough baking soda in the batter. Perhaps, another time. On the upside, thanks to the mashed, ripened bananas, the loaves were moist and not dry.

After banana bread, we attacked chocolat brownies…doused in Frangelico. Because it’s the holidays and liquor can find its way in many places during the holidays.