Valentine's Desserts

The best part of hallmark holidays is (obviously) the desserts! My coworker April and I decided to coordinate a Valentine's themed party for our team, so we whipped up some desserts to surprise everyone. I made some classic red velvet cupcakes topped with fluffy cream cheese frosting, and April made some amazing peanut butter cookies and "slutty blondies"!

No one seemed to know the term for these delicious creations, but here's a reference from the wonderful Benny's Baker blog. Her tame definition of a slutty brownie is "a baked good with an oreo between a cookie and a brownie". I suppose April's variation could have been called a cookie bar (her delicious bars were chock full of crush oreos, hershey drops, chocolate chips) but I thought the other title brought some humor into her creation. Wish I grabbed a photo of her bars but they were gone in minutes! Always a good sign ;)

After the weekend came around, I already had the kitchen cleared to make a Sesame Street themed baby birthday cake, so I decided to make one of my boyfriend's favorite desserts: chocolate covered strawberries! I was inspired by my friend Kim's blog post (she also made drool-worthy "Ultimate Chocolate Chip Cookie n' Oreo Fudge Brownie Bars" that reminded me of the above mentioned slutty blondies haha)!

First things first, I let the strawberries sit in a bowl of water for a few minutes then dried the off with a paper towel. I then laid them on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper and popped them in the fridge for half an hour uncovered to make sure they were completely dry before dipping. I used store bought dipping chocolate (on sale for $1.50 each at Wegman's!) in white chocolate and dark.

If you read Kim's post, you'll understand I'm completely in agreement about covering the strawberries with as much chocolate as possible! After the first coat of chocolate, I added a few drizzles (because you can never have too much chocolate).

I had originally crushed some oreos and had sprinkles prepared to dip these in, but the chocolate hardened too quickly. I'll have to try again next time!

Hope you all had a wonderful Valentine's weekend filled with plenty of love from good friends, family or significant others.

Until next time!

Stay hungry,
Jimin