It's Your Birthday Baby!

Today is one of my favorite days of the year! No. It is NOT my birthday but it IS the day one of my most favorite people on the planet was born. Aleza Marie Berube!

                      The puppy on her lap is the newest addition to the family: PENELOPE!!

In honor of her birthday, Justin made a lovely Ethiopian dinner with a couple dishes obtained from Aster's. Check out their website. I hope to make it over there soon to give you all a detailed look at their food.

Seriously though. This was delicious. The chicken was so tender that it was practically falling off the bone. The sweet potatoes were just divine. And there was a cheese based dip so I was in heaven. And you eat Ethiopian with your hands which for me is reminiscent of Indian food. And it was such a beautiful night so we ate outside on the deck with our meal highlighted by sweet twinkling lights.

My contribution was dessert. As you may know if you read this post, Aleza and I and our Carbondale girls have a tradition of indulging in dessert at Global Gourmet. Our weapon of choice? Peanut butter cups! So Aleza's dessert request was just that. I had made a peanut butter pie for Thanksgiving so I had an idea of what I'd need to do. I will say I'm pretty happy with the result.

Easy Delicious Peanut Butter Cups (for Grown ups!)

Peanut Butter Filling:
8 oz of cream cheese

1/2 cup of sugar
3/4 cup (estimated) of crunchy peanut butter
3/4 cup (estimated) of creamy peanut butter
1 cup of whipping cream
2 tablespoons of mexican vanilla extract

Chocolate Ganache
Ghiradelli semi sweet chocolate chips
whipping cream

For the peanut butter filling: Using an electric mixer, blend cream cheese, sugar, peanut butter (crunchy and cream) and vanilla in a large mixing bowl. In a smaller bowl, whip the heavy whipping cream till solid. Then in thirds, fold in the whipped cream into the peanut butter mixture. When completely blended, spoon the peanut butter mixture into individual bowls or ramekins. Refrigerate for minimum of 3 hours. I choose to refrigerate over night.


                                                                                                          




After the proper amount of refrigeration, it's time to add the ganache. On the stove, heat a medium saucepan. Now the amount of chocolate chips and cream you want to use is all relative in how thick you want your chocolate sauce. I prefer mine thicker so I used about of a bag of chocolate chips with about a 1/4 to 1/2 cup of cream. Melt  chocolate in saucepan and add cream gradually. Stir. When finished, spoon onto the individual peanut butter cups. Garnish with fruit of choice. I used raspberries. Refrigerate till ready to serve.

Happy birthday beautiful girl!