I love to bake, however, I don’t do it nearly often enough. Somehow days get away from me, or I don’t have any butter at room temp, or am missing an ingredient, or simply because I can’t always seem to fit it in.
However, the first few days of this week I did quite a bit of baking. Probably because I was about to start what would be 11 straight days of work and when I’m gone, I like my kids to have a little something warm, and cozy, and homemade to remind them of me. So this week, I baked.
First, I’ve been in a fall mood for days now so I made a pumpkin bread. I make a lot of banana bread (as talked about in this post), but when fall comes I like to switch it up and do pumpkin bread as well. I use a recipe from an old issue of Bon Appetit magazine and it’s divine.
But then, then, I baked something chocolate! I was actually going to make Ina Garten’s Peanut Butter and Jelly Bars (a family favorite) but my new Barefoot Contessa Foolproof cookbook was lying open on the table to a recipe titled Chocolate and Peanut Butter Globs (yes, Globs) and my daughter saw that, and man oh man, that was it! She begged and pleaded (not very much, mind you, because I too had spied the recipe and was already thinking of changing the aforementioned plan), and I acquiesced.
They were, in my husband’s words, ridiculous. They really were. Gooey, chocolate-y, with just a touch of peanut butter in the background and a little bit of flour to hold them together. They are perfect with an afternoon iced coffee, or as I prefer, with an ice cold glass of milk.
Chocolate Peanut Butter Globs (adapted from Barefoot Contessa)
6 Tbs. (3/4 stick) unsalted butter
8 oz. bittersweet or semi-sweet chocolate (I used bitter, about 70%)
2 large eggs
1 Tbls instant espresso powder (I used Medaglia d’Oro) – if you don’t already have this, get it! It’s at most markets and adds great depth to any chocolate dessert
2 tsp. vanilla extract
3/4 sugar
1/3 cup plus 1 Tbs. all-purpose flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. kosher salt
1/2 cup chopped or 1 cup whole walnuts (original recipe calls for whole nuts which I didn’t have, but I think it would be “glob-ier” that way – definitely a good thing)
1/2 cup chopped or 1 cup whole pecans (same as above)
1 cup peanut butter chips
Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Line a few sheet pans with parchment paper.
In a bowl set over simmering water, melt the butter and the chocolate until just melted. Remove from the heat and cool completely (about 15 minutes).
In the bowl of an electric mixer, beat the eggs, espresso powder, and vanilla until combined. Add the sugar and raise the speed to medium-high, and beat for 2 minutes, until the batter is thick and falls back on itself in a ribbon.
With the mixer on low, slowly add the chocolate mixture to the egg mixture. Whisk together the 1/3 cup flour, baking powder, and salt in a small bowl and fold it into the chocolate mixer with a rubber spatula. In another bowl, combine the walnuts, pecans, and peanut butter chips with the remaining tablespoon of flour and fold it into the chocolate mixture. Using two soup spoons, drop rounded tablespoon-sized mounds of batter about 2 inches apart onto the prepared pans. Bake for 15 minutes exactly. Cool on the baking sheets for 15 minutes before transferring to a cooling rack to cool entirely. Try not to eat them all in one sitting.
Makes about 20-22 cookies
Enjoy – but beware, I dare you to just have one!
Sheila
xo
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