Pinch and a Palate: Chocolates, Flowers, Hugs and Kisses

Valentine's Day! A day to celebrate LOVE and AFFECTION; AKA a day to spend money on chocolates, candy, flowers, Hallmark cards and dinner out. But who is complaining?!

...My husband's wallet!

Let me back up a few weeks. Most of my weekends consist of sleeping in, a "long" run, chores around the house, and maybe an errand or two. Really it's a time to relax on the couch with a movie playing. It is two days to turn my mind off... it is a time to do NOTHING. But it isn't always like this, sometimes its BETTER.

My good friend Morgan had a Birthday celebration consisting of trampolines, dodgeball and sweat. Sounds fun, right? Morgan and 15 of his buddies (Greg being one) went to Sky High Sports. What could possibly be better than a full hour of competitive ball fondling? The girls decided not to play this time; it was 'guy time'(but really we just did not want to put the boys to shame again). So, while the boys played, Nicole (Morgan's wife) and I met up with some of her college friends for dessert and drinks.

Girls Dominated!
Is that Spider Man in the back?!

Bellevue was crazy that night. For some reason there were people everywhere. Not sure when Bellevue became an acceptable hang out spot, but we ended up in three different parking garages, looking for a spot, finally settling on a space deep below the Hyatt.

Now we had a decision to make. Where do we get dessert and drinks? Palomino? Earl's? Daniel's? Too many choices. Then we realized something... Nicole's sister, Mallory, was working at Joey's... I bet should could hook us up! We scored. TWO dollar drinks!!! If you ask anyone that lives in the surrounding Seattle area, this is unheard of. Along with our fruity and delicious drinks we ordered dessert to share. Well, ok, Nicole ordered dessert to share. In fact, she ordered something I have never eaten or sadly even heard of: MOLTEN LAVA CHOCOLATE SOUFFLE.

Okay, I've gotta say... it was orgasmic. It was probably one of the best chocolate desserts I have had in a long time. Soft on the outside and gooey in the middle, it was accompanied by a double scoop of vanilla ice cream and drizzled with warm chocolate syrup with sprinkled powdered sugar. I could not stop eating... I was in my element. Share? That didn't happen. I was tempted to lick the plate, but I refrained. Barely.

Seconds anyone? YES PLEASE.

This brings us back to Valentine's Day. Greg is in luck. Today I am buying chocolates and flour (not flowers), to attempt to bake him a treat: Molten Chocolate Cake.

Here are the ingredients:

6 ounces bittersweet, semi- sweet or dark chocolate
10 tablespoons salted butter
1 1/2 cups powdered sugar
1/2 cup flour
3 whole eggs
3 egg yolks

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Heavily grease and lightly flour 4-4 oz. ramekins. Seriously, heavy on the butter. (You don't want the cake to stick, it will create one big mess- trust me :)) Place ramekins on cookie sheet.

2. In a medium bowl, add whole eggs and egg yolks; beat until well blended. Set aside.

3. In the top half of a double boiler set over simmering water, heat the butter and the chocolate until both are completely melted. Remove from heat. Add powdered sugar (save a little for the end) and flour; mix well.

4. Slowly add 1/3 of the chocolate mixture to egg mixture and stir quickly. (You don't want to cook your eggs.) Add the remaining chocolate mixture; stirring constantly until well blended. Divide batter evenly into prepared ramekins.

5. Bake 10-11 minutes or until cakes are firm around the edges but soft in the centers. Let stand 1 minute. Run small knife around the cake to loosen Carefully invert cakes onto dessert dish.