Fat Jeremies

I have this friend. His name is Jeremy. The list of adjectives one might use to describe him would likely NOT include "fat." In fact, Jeremy wagered that not even I, with my propensity for butter-saturated cooking, could fatten him up.

Wagers like this cannot be left unanswered. Recipes began bouncing around my mind, each more deliciously fattening than the last. After a few days of bouncing, three recipes had collided into an idea for a cookie with incredible powers of fattening and deliciousness, a sort unhealthy hybrid of homemade oreos, s'mores, and Reese's peanut butter cups.

And so, Fat Jeremies were born.

I double-dog dare you to ditch your diet and try one...or a half dozen.

For the cookie dough
(as adapted from Smitten Kitchen)

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/3 cup cocoa powder(plus 1 tablespoon if you want a bit more chocolate kick)
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/3 cups sugar

1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons (1 1/4 sticks)softened unsalted butter

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 tablespoon water
1 large egg

For cookie filling 

1 1/4 cups chunky peanut butter

1/3 cup butter, melted

1 1/2 cups powdered sugar

1/2 cup Reese's peanut butter baking chips

2 teaspoons vanilla

2 tablespoons brown sugar

mini marshmallows, frozen

For caramel topping (optional)

1 can sweetened condensed milk
See this recipe for The Creamiest Caramel--In a Can

In a large mixing bowl, combine all dry ingredients & mix thoroughly with a spatula. Add butter, eggs, vanilla, and water. With a hand (or stand, if you're fancy) mixer, beat in wet ingredients until dough forms. (You could mix the dough by hand, but you'll probably need a mixer for the filling.) Refrigerate dough for at least 1/2 hour.

In a separate medium bowl, mix peanut butter, butter, vanilla, brown sugar, & peanut butter chips until well blended. Slowly stir in powdered sugar. With a hand mixer, blend until the consistency is even. The filling will still be chunky, since you've used chunky peanut butter & the peanut butter chips. Preheat oven to 350º F.



To build your Fat Jeremies, scoop out about pingpong-ball-sized ball of dough. Flatten the dough between the palms of your hands until the dough is about 1/8 of an inch thick. Place a scoop of peanut butter filling (about the size of a quarter & 1/4 inch thick) in the center of your round of dough. Add three or four mini marshmallows (we used a whole marshmallow, cut in half) on top of the pb filling. Fold up the edges of the dough so that all the filling is covered. (Freezing the marshmallows prevents them from melting entirely & disappearing during baking, so keep those 'mallows cold. When you've built one batch of Fat Jeremies, be sure to put your marshmallows back in the freezer.)



Bake marshmallow side up on a well-greased baking sheet for 8 to 10 minutes.



If you're going all out & adding the caramel, drizzle it on top of the cookies while they are still warm. These are fairly tender cookies, so let them cool for at least 8 minutes before removing from the baking sheet.

Fat Jeremies require a glass of milk. Enjoy!

Photo credit to Mr. Jeremy Penrod himself, for whom these cookies are named. 

A Dose of Hope

(with a short preface of grumbling)

This week has been at least 5 months long. And it's only Thursday. So much has been going on that I swear I must be nearing my 22nd birthday. I can feel the wrinkles coming. The fact that I have been eating at Taco Bell may not be helping this premature aging. But those dang crunchwraps are just so disgustingly delicious.

With multiple tests and assignments and design layouts to slog through, I was needing a bit of a boost.  I found this inspirational gem from Dieter F. Uchtdorf on lds.org.

Hope is one leg of a three-legged stool, together with faith and charity. These three stabilize our lives regardless of the rough or uneven surfaces we might encounter at the time. . ..

Hope has the power to fill our lives with happiness. Its absence—when this desire of our heart is delayed—can make 'the heart sick' (Proverbs 13:12).

Hope is a gift of the Spirit. It is a hope that through the Atonement of Jesus Christ and the power of His Resurrection, we shall be raised unto life eternal and this because of our faith in the Savior. This kind of hope is both a principle of promise as well as a commandment, and, as with all commandments, we have the responsibility to make it an active part of our lives and overcome the temptation to lose hope. Hope in our Heavenly Father's merciful plan of happiness leads to peace, mercy, rejoicing, and gladness. The hope of salvation is like a protective helmet; it is the foundation of our faith and an anchor to our souls.

You can read his entire address HERE – airplanes included.

Each of us go through stormy times in our life. And they say "It never rains but it pours."  They may be right. But what that knowledgeable conglomerate of "them" sometimes forgets to mention is this:

The clouds after the storm are lovely.

gameplan

1 semester in Jerusalem- 15 credits
1 Humanities core class- 3 credits
3 Advanced English lit courses- 9 credits
2 GE courses (Bio 100 & some social science)- 6 credits
1 Humanities capstone class- 3 credits
1 Honors Thesis- up to 6 credits & a lot of blood, sweat, & tears

Jerusalem + 21 credits of class + thesis = honors graduation, April 2012

That's simultaneously exhilarating and terrifying.