Peanut Butter Middles

 

I saw these cookies over on the Tasty Kitchen Blog and thought they looked right up my alley. Peanut butter? Chocolate? Peanut butter in the middle of chocolate? Please and thanks. They were a big hit and fairly easy to make, though I will go into a couple issues I had along the way.

Ingredients:
Cookies:
1-½ cup All-purpose Flour
½ cups Cocoa Powder
½ teaspoons Baking Soda
½ cups White Sugar
½ cups Packed Brown Sugar
½ cups Butter
¼ cups Peanut Butter
1 teaspoon Vanilla Extract
1 whole Egg

Peanut Butter Filling:
¾ cups Powdered Sugar
¾ cups Peanut Butter

Preheat oven to 375°F.

In a small bowl, mix together the flour, cocoa powder, and baking soda. In a large bowl, beat together the sugars, butter, and 1/4 cup of peanut butter until light and fluffy. Beat in vanilla and egg. Slowly mix in the flour mixture. Set aside.

For the peanut butter filling, combine confectioners’ sugar and 3/4 cup peanut butter. Beat together well. Roll filling into 30 small balls. Try to keep the balls all the same size—around 1 inch.

For each cookie, use 1 tablespoon of chocolate dough and roll into a ball. It helps to flour your hands first. Squish the ball of chocolate dough flat and place a peanut butter ball in the center. Wrap the chocolate dough up and around the peanut butter ball to completely cover. Place 2 inches apart on a baking sheet. Dip the bottom of a glass into white sugar and use the cup to lightly flatten the cookie balls. Bake for 7-9 minutes.

First up, mix the flour, cocoa powder and baking soda together in a small bowl.

In a separate large bowl, beat together the sugars, butter and peanut butter.

Mix in the egg and vanilla until it's light and fluffy. Right now it looks like regular cookie dough. But then...

Mix in the flour mixture and boom - chocolate!

In another bowl (or the flour bowl you previously used, like me!), mix together the powdered sugar and peanut butter.

I didn't have a lot of time and it was too much of a hassle to take pictures in between steps, so here are the cookies ready to be baked. 

Please note, though, that I had some issue with the peanut butter filling being too sticky to roll into balls. I ended up making the chocolate balls first, flattened them out, then took a small spoonful of the peanut butter filling and plopped it in the middle, and then wrapped the chocolate stuff around. I also didn't care too much if there was peanut butter sticking out in places, so that's the little tan bits you see.

Baked. They don't look much different than before, so don't overbake. As you can see, I used parchment paper, but it's not a necessity.

If you've done things correctly, when you bite in, there is the surprise peanut butter filling in the middle. It makes people think you've done something amazingly complicated, when really it's not so hard!

Be careful, these are addictive.

...Set: Life Unexpected 1x08 "Bride Unbridled"

Alas, dear friends, this week features the return of the dreaded Lux acting like a wee baby sourpuss. I'm getting a bit ahead of myself, but she acts rather foolish and self-righteous quite a lot of the time. Actually, most of the characters do apart from Ryan and, so far, Jones. The teenage boy being one of the most mature people on the show? Unexpected, indeed.

Lux is still upset after the previous events of Bug leaving town and Tasha going off to another foster home an apparently inconceivable 3 hours away. She is in a slump, so when Jones stops by to "give her her homework" (yeah, sure), Baze decides to give Jones a little push in Lux's dateable direction. And with some advice from Lux's dear old so-and-so, he takes her on a 3 hour road trip to visit her bestie.

Meanwhile, Cate and Ryan - who have broken up after the revelation of Baze and Cate's more recent rompy roo - are being forced to take part in a Bridal Expo and keep up the happily engaged facade. Blah blah boring, really. Even once Baze and Math show up to shake things up, it didn't really get that much more engaging. Why did Baze and Math show up, you ask? Because Baze accidentally intercepted a text from Ryan to Lux, consoling her about Bug and talking about giving her a car. Baze, ever upset about anything related to Ryan giving Lux anything, but particularly a motor vehicle, he storms the Bridal Expo.

It all ends in Ryan, Baze and Math taking part in a Nearlywed Game, matching answers to Cate's. Wah wah. Baze and Ryan start getting testy with each other again, until Ryan storms out. They have a minor encounter backstage, in which Baze tells Ryan off for being so mad at him when he didn't even know he was in the picture when he slept with Cate. Math overhears the sleeping with Cate stuff and gets all huffy because, in case you forgot, he's been in love with Cate for ages. Better get over that Math, there are much prettier men vying for her affection at the moment. Ryan leaves, also in a huff.

Meanwhile, Jones brings Lux back home and fesses up to the fact that it was actually Baze's idea to take her to see Tasha. And for some ungodly reason, Lux flips the hell out and says some BS thing like, "If you don't know why it was wrong, then you don't know ME!" Bzuh? She proceeds to also get all stompy and pouty to Baze about it and... Pardone moi, but they were just trying to cheer you up, you little insouciant.

Anyway, she eventually gets some sense knocked into her by Ryan, after he has a little heart to heart apology time with Baze. Those two will probably be friends eventually, yeah. After she realizes she's been rather a dope, Lux goes over to Jones' and does the whole "let's start over with the lame-o handshake and hi my name is yada yada." Because we haven't seen that done a million times before! NEXT!

Previous Episode -- Next Episode

...Set: Chuck 3x09 "Chuck versus the Beard"

For those who don't know, Zachary Levi, our erstwhile Chuck, made his directing debut with this episode. And what an episode to debut with! The show was running on all cylinders - lots of spy stuff, lots of Buy More stuff, and we even had some Ellie and Awesome. Plus, spoiler alert - Morgan FINDS OUT! Yep. The big secret, he's in on it now.

The episode starts out with Shaw putting Chuck on the sidelines for their next mission because he hasn't flashed since the last one. So, while Shaw and Sarah go off to play newlyweds with Casey doing his favorite thing, sitting in the van doing surveillance, Chuck must wait it out at in the Buy More. As it turns out, the fight comes to him. Because, the spy crew finds out that the hotel mission they're on was purely a set up to get them away from Castle. Dun dun dun!

At the Buy More, some "potential buyers" show up to look over the place and interview all of the employees to decide who will stay and who will go. It's fairly obvious that they're more than they appear to be, which is confirmed in short shrift once they determine that Chuck is part of Shaw's spy team. And their mission now is to find the entrance to Castle so they can get all of the information the team has put together on them (the Ring).

But here's where things get interesting. One of the goons finds an entrance in the locker bank - and Morgan sees the whole thing and slips inside after them! He makes it out and tells Chuck of his discovery, much to Chuck's dismay. They try to get all of the Buy Morians out of the store because the Ring plans to blow up Castle once they've got the info they need, but the herders and green shirts have staged a revolution - a lockdown. They will not go if they are going to lose their jobs!

Morgan and Chuck end up getting nabbed by the bad guys and tied up in the training room. After the lead bad guy threatens Morgan, Chuck must fess up to the truth - he's a spy. Though Chuck thinks that Morgan is going to be all mad, it turns out that Morgan is actually very excited by learning all of this - it explains everything, and is super cool at that. While they bond, the spy crew tries to get access to Castle, but is repeatedly denied. Shaw says they're going to have to terminate it, with Chuck inside, but Sarah manages to get him to delay it for five more minutes.

Which is, of course, all that Chuck needs to get his head on straight. Which is really thanks to Morgan, who gets him to admit that he's in love with Sarah, despite trying to tell himself that he's not. That unlocks whatever block he had, and he busts into butt-kicking action, saving the day with a little help from the bearded one. You see, the beard of the title had more than one meaning. First meaning: Morgan, the small bearded man. Second meaning: Sarah was his "beard" - meaning they were in a fake relationship.

Anyway, Chuck and Morgan exit Castle just before Shaw was going to make the call. The Buy Morians get to keep their jobs (which they were never going to lose). And Devon decides that he and Ellie have got to get away from all of this, far far away - because I didn't mention it earlier, but the set up at the hotel was a fake Ring mission to kill Devon. So now Devon is freaked about their safety and wants to get Ellie to join Doctors Without Borders with him.

Then, we end things with a TWIST. The Ring phone they confiscated earlier, that gave them the clue that it was all a set up, rings down in Castle. Casey picks it up and we hear this mysterious voice say: "Hello, Colonel Casey. It's been awhile." I think maybe this has something to do with that little bit last week. I guess we'll find out next Monday!

Quotes:

"I'm not a machine! Okay I am a machine, but I'm also a person." - Chuck

"I'm saying, do not bet against the brown beauty and the snake. He can unhinge his jaw and he sheds skin." - Lester re: Jeff fitting a whole apple in his mouth

"When we get back I expect this place to be exactly as I left it." - Casey

"What are you two doing here? You're not supposed to be here. I just reclaimed my Awesomeness!" - Devon

"Mike, gentlemen, assorted ladies..." - Chuck

"Because the only thing I hate more than hippy neo fascist liberal anarchists? Are the hypocrite fat cat suits they eventually grow up to become." - Casey

"Wow. Wow. I don't.... My best friend is a SPY? This is unbelievable! This is the best news I've ever heard!" - Morgan

"Bag 'em and tag 'em, Sarah. Excuse me. Agent Walker." - Morgan

"Yeah, because Awesome's Awesome and Grimes is a moron." - Casey

"Colonel Casey. Always walking around so angry. Should've known you had a big secret." - Morgan
"God help us." - Casey

"Okay so am I like, officially part of the team or..?" - Morgan
"Let's um, let's walk before we run, huh, buddy? Maybe crawl before that." - Chuck

"VICTORY!" - Big Mike

"You did your flash thingy on it. You flashed on Duck Hunt." - Morgan

Previous Episode -- Next Episode

...Set: Life Unexpected 1x07 "Crisis Unaverted"

You guys, I think this is a momentous occasion for one Life Unexpected. How is that, you ask? Because I don't think I have a single SHLOCK ALERT for this episode! What?! I know. It's nuts. There was a moment where things could've gone schmaltzy, but thankfully they refrained from going too far this time. No "I'm not mad at you, I'm mad at me" speeches. Yay!

So there were two basic stories this episode. I'll start off with the more boring of the two - the Lux/Tasha drama-rama. It's becoming a trend where I like the adult stories better. I wonder if this is because of my age or because of the quality? Perhaps it is a combo of the two. At any rate, the drama for these besties arose when Tasha got picked for a new foster family that lived, gasp!, 3 hours away! They've apparently never been that far apart before! Lux promptly freaked out, and then had a rather very extremely unlikely coincidental moment in which she saw Tasha's real mom on the streets of Portland while Tasha was apparently stealing a dress.

Tasha's mom was a druggie who quit rehab, but now she's got a husband and two new kids and looks to be on the straight and narrow. After some reluctance from Tasha, Lux gets her to agree to go talk to her. And I must say the casting department did a rather bang up job in matching the mom's looks to Tasha's, because they really looked like they could be related. Anyway, it seemed like things were going to go well when Tasha was greeted with a big hug, but it turns out that she reminds her mommy too much of the bad times, so she can't take her in.

Lux, in a panic, decides that because Cate told her earlier on in the episode that she could come to her with anything, that clearly she meant it would be just fine and dandy to ask Cate to take Tasha into her home as well. This coincided right at the worst point in Cate's story (which I'll get to in a bit, do not despair), so Cate said no. Which was the sane thing to do, duh. Rather stupid of Lux to then go all "BUT YOU SAID! I HATE YOU!" and then go to Baze. Baze, trying to connect with Lux and be the dad, decided to try to take Tasha in, but was rejected by Vern, the case worker lady. But, on the plus side, she did grant him dual custody of Lux, so she is now allowed to live there as well. Which she promptly decides to do since she is all uppity toward Cate for no real good reason other than being kind of snippety.

Now for the Cate-Baze-Ryan drama. Baze feels like he is being frozen out of Dad time with Lux thanks to Ryan, and decides to take a stand. This comes in the form of competing in the Hand on a Hybrid competition that Cate and Ryan's radio station was holding, and in which Ryan was also competing. Now, if you remember, Ryan is especially mad at Baze at the moment because he believes that Baze tried to kiss Cate and she pushed him away. Which is a LIE, since they actually had sex and it was mutual. But Ryan doesn't know that, and Baze doesn't know that Cate told the lie. And when she gets sort of bitchy to him about not competing in the competition, I gotta say, I was on Baze's side.

AT ANY RATE. At the competition, things get heated between Baze and Ryan to the point where Ryan actually punches Baze in the face! But it wasn't because Baze even told him the truth. He sort of told the truth, then figured out that Cate had actually lied about the sex, and went along with it to a point. Ryan storms off, and Cate goes after him. Thinking Baze must have told him the truth, she starts babbling on about how sorry she is and how it was just sex the one time. Well. The Truth is out. And Ryan is pissed, as he should be. He says it's over and storms off, despite Cate's protestations.

In the end, Cate is left alone to wallow in ice cream and wine. But she sort of deserved it. Not so much from Lux, but definitely from Ryan. And Lux cried on Baze's shoulder about the departure of Tasha, who she apparently did not get to say goodbye to.

Next week, the show moves up to 8pm. Which totally ruins my DVR schedule, by the way. Now I can't record How I Met Your Mother! Dang it. It seems like everything is always on at the same time.

Previous Episode -- Next Episode

...Set: Chuck 3x08 "Chuck versus the Fake Name"

I feel like I've started to say this at the beginning of every Chuck recap, but shoot: what an episode! I must say that I thought the first two of this season were only okay, but things have certainly picked up in the last few. Some shows tend to struggle when introducing new characters to the mix, but I think the opposite is true with the addition of Shaw. I think I read that they extended Brandon Routh's contract longer than it was supposed to be initially, so it looks like he'll be around for a while longer at least! And hey, if we get to see him wet and shirtless again? Well. That's just a bonus.

The spy plot this week had to do with an assassin - Rafe Gruber (is it just me, or does anyone else only think of MacGruber when you hear that?) and his intended target. Chuck has to take on his identity to get in contact with the people behind the next hit so they can figure out who it is they're trying to kill. I'm guessing he has some connection with the Ring, but honestly I don't always listen to the down and dirty details of the assignments! So Chuck has to meet up with some Mafia-ish semi-lugheads, and Casey accompanies him as backup. But, one of the guys recognizes him from somewhere and, long story short, Chuck has to pull out Casey's tooth in order to stay in character! Gah! He also kicks Sarah and Shaw's butts. OH, yes, and we also hear this name which will probably come back into play later - Alex Coburn, which has something to do with Casey's past. Who is Alex Coburn? Good question.

Chuck is almost discovered at the Buy More, but is able to cover when the two Mafia-ish lugheads show up. They take him to the location where he will be taking out his intended target. At this point, I'd already figured out who the target was, but in case you didn't... dun dun dun - it's Shaw! And not only is Chuck aiming a special long-range sniper at him, Sarah happens to be in the room as well. It helps that he can hear their entire conversation, which is basically about how Chuck is turning into a spy and less and less like himself, which is conversely making Sarah want to remember who she used to be. And THEN, she reveals her real name - Sam. That's right, Sarah's real name is Sam. Though we don't know her real last name. Yet.

All of this pulls Chuck out of his assassin mode, but he's actually able to cover rather well, telling the Mafia-ish lugheads that he and "Sam" used to have a thing. They encourage him to take Shaw out all the more because of that, but he manages to make them believe he needs to do it face to face. He heads over there and starts fighting with Shaw to stay in character. But, meanwhile, the real Gruber has escaped from his handcuffs and storms the place. He gets the upper hand and has a gun to Sarah's head while Shaw and Chuck watch helplessly! But never fear, for Casey is here! Or, across the way. He uses the long-range sniper and takes out Gruber. Phew.

For the side plot of the night, Ellie confronts Chuck about Hannah. They have a double date which goes pretty well, and Hannah wants Chuck to meet her parents. But Chuck is so confused by this whole situation. He's gotten really good at lying and pretending to be someone else that he doesn't feel like himself anymore, so instead of trying to keep things going with Hannah, he breaks things off with her in an attempt to be the nice guy, even though she thinks this all makes him a terrible guy and ends with the gut-wrenching line: "I hope your lies keep you warm at night." Oh man, serious burn.

At the beginning of the episode, Sarah told Shaw that she couldn't go down the mixing of professional and personal roads again, but after her revelation of her real name and the revelation that Shaw now seems to be on the Ring's radar, so he'll have to stay in hiding, she apparently decides it's okay? Because she ends up kissing him again. Which, really, who can blame her?

There wasn't much of a Buy More story this week. There was something about crock pots, but really any time we saw the Buy More-ians, it was so they could comment on Chuck's apparent prowess with attractive ladies. Morgan was "out of town" for some such, and I didn't really miss him all that much.

And now for the...

Quotes:

"I think I know a thing or two about acting. I played Perchik in my high school production of Fiddler on the Roof and I was prrrretty good." - Chuck

Shaw's response? SLAP!

"Because I like cupcakes, that's why. Who doesn't like a good cupcake?" - Chuck, pretending to be Gruber

"Nice job, Bartowski." - Casey
"Who the hell is Bartowski?" - Chuck, still in Gruber mode

"Chuck's the greatest lady killer Burbank has ever seen." - Lester

"He's a real Chuck magnet." - Jeff

"Please, with the puns." - Lester

"I've narrowed it down: either mind control, LSD, or sorcery." - Jeff, on his guess as to Chuck's female prowess

Later... "Definitely a deal with the devil." - Jeff

"I'm so lonely." - Lester

"Is this stuff sterile?!" - Chuck, breaking character... quickly getting back into it, "I take pride in my work, all right? I wanna kill him, not some secondary infection."

"Lou. She was a fine, miniature piece of woman." - Big Mike

"Jeffrey. If you double dip, we all may die." - Lester

"Five people in the world can make that shot, huh? Guess I'm one of 'em." - Casey, awesome sniper

Previous Episode -- Next Episode