Caramel Comatose Thunder Brownies Recipe

Caramel Comatose Thunder Brownies Recipe

This year I plan to focus on more meal-oriented recipes, but before I do, I’m going to start out with a dessert recipe that really steals your attention: Caramel Comatose Thunder Brownies (made with real canned thunder!—kidding). If desserts were people, this one would be Chuck Norris.

Here are a few things Chuck Norris and these “brownies” have in common:

  • You don’t find them, they find you.
  • Both can kill you with a simple stare.
  • Under their ‘beard’ lies another fist.
  • They’re both rugged at first, but are sweet once you get to know them (or so they say).
  • And so on and so forth…

In other words, make sure you’re wearing your big boy pants before digging in. On a more serious note, this dessert was born from my curiosity to play with opposites.

I wanted something that was chewy but crunchy, sweet but salty. After throwing a few ideas around and creating a few sketches, I decided on a brownie mixture that included caramel, extra chocolate, pretzels, and marshmallows.
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The Best Halloween Candy — No, Seriously.

The Best Halloween Candy — No, Seriously.

I’ve gotta’ say, Halloween is a dangerous holiday. It’s too easy to buy candy long before October 31st; it’s even easier to justify buying it early when you say to yourself, “Oh, I’ll stick it in the top cupboard and save it until then…”

Yeah right.

I don’t know of anybody who has ever successfully done that. Before too long, it just starts gnawing away at you because you know it’s there… eat me, eat me, eat me… *sigh* … Two years ago I bought my Halloween candy on October 31st, Halloween Day. I went to the store to find nearly empty shelves and ended up coming back with the stuff nobody wants: stale pumpkin peeps, Sunmaid raisins, and a mini-size candybar mix. Mini size. Really? Halloween is about packing in the goodies, not skimping on treats that you don’t even have to chew before swallowing.

So this year I decided to–yep, you guessed it–buy my goodies early. I bought them two weeks ago during a “weak moment” on aisle 5. Needless to say, I’m going to have to buy more. Dangit. At least there is one huge benefit to buying your Halloween candy early; besides having to buy and eat twice the amount of candy for Halloween, you get the best of the best. No stale pumpkin peeps for me this year.

So this year I’ve rounded up a list of the 10 best Halloween candies (I cheated and added more than one candy to some numbers), that if I had to buy twice this month, I wouldn’t complain.

In no particular order, behold the list…
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An Awesome Gift + Where I’ve Been

An Awesome Gift + Where I’ve Been

Hey folks, I can’t believe it’s been over a month since my last post. Wow! In blogging terms, 1 month or longer between posts is equivalent to shooting myself in the foot.

But before we get into that, and above all else, I wanted to send a grateful shout out to Maren, my friend from Seevetal, Germany (near Hamburg). Over Christmas Maren sent me a really really awesome Christmas package full of German delight!
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How to Make Girl Scout Thin Mint Cookies

How to Make Girl Scout Thin Mint Cookies

I’m not sure how they’ve done it, but somehow the Girl Scout organization has developed a bunch of extraordinarily delicious cookies–I’m a huge fan of the Thin Mints and Somoas®–and maybe it’s just me, but it seems that you can only buy them once a year. If you miss the opportunity, you’re hosed. I have a really hard time saying no to their cookies and about anybody else who comes around selling brownies, cookies, and treats. When I hear a knock at the door, I’m always afraid it’s going to be an elementary kid with those big puppy dog eyes looking up at me saying, “Hey mister, would you like to buy some cookies?” Ahhh! I’ve resisted the temptation to buy cookies and brownies from kids knocking at my door only once before… or at least I thought about it once. Yeah, that’s it. I’m sure there’s got to be some sort of self-help classes for adults like me who can’t say no to strangers.

Well for those of you who are Girl Scout Cookie addicts like myself, your once-a-year wait is over. The other day while reading an article at BakingBites.com, I stumbled across a recipe to make homemade Girl Scout Cookie Thin Mints. A few days later around 9:00 p.m. I decided to make the thin mints. I should have read the entire recipe first because they take a while to make and I was up pretty late, but it was worth it. The cookies are a pretty darn good replication of the original Girl Scout Thin Mints.
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Smore Recipe: Have Smore then Have Smore

I hope it’s not too late in the summer for a post about smores (or s’mores). It’s hard to imagine a campfire outing without the crunchy, gooey goodness of a soft marshmallow and melted chocolate surrounded by a crunchy graham cracker. Gotta’ love it. I’m not sure who invented smores, but to whoever you are, you’re a hero in my book. The art of smore making has been passed down from generation to generation, but somehow the art missed my family. Good thing it’s not too hard to figure out, and I’ve been practicing it since I was 3 years old, not kidding. The hardest part is getting the marshmallow to that perfect golden-brown stage. It requires patience, young grasshopper. Here are a few instructions and tips from my book.
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