You guys.

I’m currently on day four of my five-day sugar cleanse and all I want to do is stuff my face with these little homemade peanut butter cups.  I know that they are hidden (by me) in the back of the freezer and I can almost hear them taunting, “Eaaaaat me. Eeeeeaaaattt meee.”  And eat them I will.  Probably for breakfast on Tuesday morning to mark the end of Sugar Cleanse 2012.

You might be wondering why a sugaraholic such as myself would EVER give up sugar.  I KNOW.  It’s the worst.  But last Sunday, I ate cupcakes for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.  That’s it.  Just cupcakes, cupcakes, and more cupcakes.  No fruits.  No veggies.  Not even a bite of whole grains.

And do you know what?

I felt totally fine.

So then my hypochondriac WebMD-loving crazed alter ego hopped on the internet and fully convinced me that I was dying of some sugar-fueled disease.

And, now, here we are.  Sugar cleanse day four and I feel exactly the same.  Which leads me to believe (WebMD has not yet confirmed) that instead of some sugar monster eating my body from the inside out, I have a rare sugar immunity and I can therefore eat as much chocolate, cupcakes, and ice cream as I could ever want. (Kidding, of course.  Only as much chocolate and cupcakes as I could ever want.)

In true Melanie fashion, I made up my own sugar cleanse rules, which were:

1. No foods with added sugars (baked goods, chocolate, candy, ice cream, sweetened cereals, granola, etc) for five days.

2. No fruits for two days.

3. Lots of vegetables, chicken, and whole grains.

4. Plenty of water with lemon.

…and that’s pretty much it.  It’s all very scientific.

On cleanse day two, I had to take a bite of one of the peanut butter cups to get this picture.  And do you know what I did with the bite I took?

I SPIT IT IN THE GARBAGE.  Take that, sugar cleanse!  Do I have willpower, or what???

So, anywho, I’m glad I (mostly) cleansed myself of sugar, I’m glad it’s almost over, and I’m REALLY glad I have these homemade peanut butter cups waiting for me in the freezer.

They are so easy to make and taste like Reese’s PB cups, but better.  Hubbaaaa hubba.

Homemade Peanut Butter Cups (slightly adapted from Miss Make)

Ingredients

• 1 cup + 2 tablespoons peanut butter (I used creamy but I bet chunky would be good too!)
• 3 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
• 2 cups powdered sugar
• dash of vanilla
• pinch of salt
• 1 12-oz bag of semisweet chocolate chips
• 1 tablespoon vegetable shortening

Directions

1. In a medium bowl or the bowl of stand mixer, beat peanut butter and butter until smooth.  Add the powdered sugar, vanilla, and salt and mix on medium low until combined.
2. Roll out on a piece of waxed or parchment paper to about 1/2-inch thickness.  Cut using a small cookie cutter, or you could just cut into squares using a knife.  Place the cut pieces in the freezer for 15 minutes.
3. In a small bowl, melt the chocolate chips and shortening in the microwave at 30-second intervals until smooth.  Dip each peanut butter piece into the chocolate, then place on a piece of waxed paper or parchment paper to harden.

**My apologies for the yuck photos.  Best Buy says my camera will be fixed in 5-7 days!

Living sea monkeys in baking soda

W.h.a.t. Now I’m panicked that I’m going to open my box of baking soda and find a family of sea monkeys peering out at me.

What does a french bulldog love mike

Or, as I read it: “What does a french bulldog love? -Mike”.  Thanks for asking, Mike!  The answer is “Melanie.”

Cute baby dolls that look real

I can only imagine that this is referring to all the posts I write about my American girl doll collection.  Oh, wait…

Bye bye donuts

Seeeee ya!

Club cracker break up

????

Who makes the best peanut butter cookie

Duh, me.

Chocolate ravioli

Yes please.

Mouthful of chocolate

Otherwise known as “my life”.

When I’m in love

When I’m in love I make rainbow sprinkle cakes and blast Whitney Houston.  RIP girl.

All I want for Valentine’s Day is a cupcake

ME TOO!!!

How to make dough rise faster?

When you find the answer to this question, random internet friend, please contact me.

How are cheez its made

See above.

Shaving foam

?????

Winnie the pooh dying

Why.

Read part I here.

Happy Valentine’s Day, friends!

It’s carrot cake.

This is weird for a couple of reasons.

1. Carrot cake is made of (not surprisingly) lots of carrot.  Why would my new favorite thing be a VEGETABLE cake when there are things like peanut butter and chocolate in the world?  Seriously, like 6 (full-sized, not baby) carrots inside.

2. Usually carrot cake has raisins in it.  EW, ew, ew, EW.  Raisins baked into anything (especially a fluffy cake) makes my tongue itch.  Before you get all WebMD on me, no, this isn’t due to an allergy.  Rather, the texture of raisins gives me the heebie jeebies; they’re just so…plump.  Some things make people’s skin crawl, baked raisins make my tongue itch.  Judge me.

3. Cream cheese frosting.  Yeeuck.  I have a food aversion to cream cheese on anything except a bagel.

But, the stars aligned this weekend when I stumbled upon a raisinless carrot cake recipe AND discovered a perfect [not-too-cream-cheesy] frosting while doing my weekly cupcake research.  It’s a tough job, but someone’s gotta do it.

Carrot cake will make your whole apartment smell like pure heaven AND since there is like 1/2 carrot in every cupcake you can count it as a serving of vegetables.  Seriously, I checked with my nutritionist roomie.*  These cupcakes are SO moist and perfectly flavored.

ALSO I smooshed the extra carrot cake and cream cheese frosting together to make carrot cake cake balls and they were the BEST cake balls I’ve ever had.  Bonus points for zero cream cheese taste.

Pop on over to Pinch of Yum for the carrot cake cupcake recipe!  I used a slightly different cream cheese frosting recipe (see below).

Cream Cheese Frosting

(yield: enough for 12 cupcakes)

• 8 ounces of cream cheese, room temperature
• 6 tablespoons butter, room temperature
• 3 cups confectioners sugar
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract

*Another lie.  Sarah please don’t call me out.  1/2 a serving?

There is only one thing better than peanut butter blondies, and that is peanut butter blondies stuffed with peanut butter cups.

(Do I love stuffing peanut butter cups in baked goods, or what?)

I wanted to share this quick and easy blondie recipe in case you are looking for something scrumptious to make for your sweetie this Valentine’s Day.  It’s basically just a Valentinesified (word? no?) version of these peanut butter M&M blondies, amped up a bit with the addition of mini mini Reese’s peanut butter cups.  The blondies are sliiiightly underbaked to provide maximum peanut butter gooeyness.

Seriously, who could resist?

Peanut Butter-Peanut Butter Blondies (adapted from Handle the Heat)

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup unsalted butter
• 1 3/4 cup brown sugar, packed
• 3/4 cup peanut butter
• 2 eggs
• 2 teaspoons vanilla
• 2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup M&Ms (or chocolate chips)
• 3/4 cup mini mini peanut butter cups (or regular PB cups, roughly chopped)

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Line a 9×13 pan with tin foil; coat lightly with cooking spray.
2. In a medium pot, melt butter and brown sugar over medium heat, stirring constantly until smooth.  Remove from heat and stir in peanut butter.  Allow to cool for 10 minutes.
3. In a large bowl, combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.
4. After the peanut butter mixture has cooled slightly (it should still be warm but not hot – you don’t want it to cook the eggs!) add the vanilla; stir until combined.  Add the eggs one at a time, stirring until fully incorporated.
5. Pour the peanut butter mixture into the flour mixture.  Stir until ingredients are fully incorporated; fold in 1/2 cup M&Ms and 1/2 cup peanut butter cups.
6. Pour batter into prepared pan; smooth it out with a spatula (or your hands) until evenly distributed.  Top with remaining M&Ms and peanut butter cups and lightly press them into the batter.  Bake for 22 minutes or until edges are just barely golden brown.  The center will be slightly gooey but should set as it cools.
7. Allow blondies to cool completely, then cut and serve.

On Friday night I made the mistake of uttering this doom-filled sentence:

I haven’t had a good cry in awhile. 

(If that’s not straight out of Sh*t Girls Say, I don’t know what is.)

I may as well have shouted to the universe, MAKE SOMETHING BAD HAPPEN TO ME!  BE MEAN!  MAKE ME CRY!

Seriously, as soon as I said those words aloud, I knew I was in for it.

As a aside: I do have a theory; I believe that if I don’t have a good cry every couple of months or so, my tear ducts get filled and I accidentally start sobbing over every day events and YouTube videos like this one.*

Fast forward to Super Bowl Sunday, when I’m frosting The Rainbow Sprinkle Cake and prancing around the kitchen proclaiming “This is the best day ever!”

Doo-dee-doo-dee-doo! Sprinkles, happiness, rainbows, butterflies!  Nothin’s gonna get me down!

And then…smashBANGboomCRAAAAASH.

Just as I was gearing up to take this picture, skipping around the apartment in a rainbow-sprinkle haze…

I smacked my super-fancy too-expensive camera off of the counter and straight onto the wood floor.

Yeah…I bet you can guess what happened next.  Roughly four seconds of holding it together, hoping against hope that my camera just MIGHT turn on and then…

Waterworks.

First I called my sister and was like “My…my…my..c-c-c-CAAAAAAMERA. I dropped it. WAaaaaaaaahhhhh.”

Then I called Mike, increasingly hysterical, “I DROPPPPPPED MY CAMERAAAAA. WAAAAHHH!” (similar to the “I’m going to lose my TOOOOOOOOES” incident of Halloween ’11)

Finally, I called my mom, who was kind enough to ask, “Do you think it will be fixed in time for Paris?” to which I responded: “WAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!“

I sobbed it out for a couple more minutes until my roomie Sarah said, “Just think of what a great story this will be for your blog!”

Way to see the silver lining, Sar.

Luckily Little Miss Sunshine pulled me out of my tragic [totally non-dramatic] sobfest and I was taking thousands of [back-up camera] photos of this BEAUTIFUL rainbow sprinkle cake in no time.

Best day ever,  90% resumed.

Now my precious baby is in the capable hands of Best Buy’s oh-so-helpful Geek Squad and I’m crossing my fingers and toes that it will be fixed before Paris (which, btdubs, we leave for in ONE MONTH).

The moral of the story is that even if tragedy strikes, a rainbow sprinkle cake will 90% fix your problems and make 100% of everyone around you happy.  The end.

Rainbow Sprinkle Cake

serves: like, a lot of people

Ingredients

• 2 boxes white cake mix
• 6 eggs**
• 2/3 cup oil**
• 2 cups water**
• Food coloring
• 3 cans vanilla frosting
• 1 cup rainbow sprinkles

*Lie.  I just watched the video again and sobbed my eyes out again, despite the tear duct-emptying “good cry” of yesterday.

Molly over at Cheap Beets!  Hooray for a fellow Boston blogger!  I’ll be getting in touch soon

THANK YOU to everyone who voted – and keeps voting!  Reminder: the “Cupcake Crown” competition is open until Feb. 12th, and I am moving up on the “most votes” page.  You can vote once per computer and/or smartphone and/or iPad every day until the 12th.  Spread the word! Thank you, thank you, thank you!

It’s funny how one little {insanely delicious, absurdly fattening} cupcake can make you feel like you’ve really made it in life.  Since posting my Peanut Butter Oreo cupcake recipe, my blog traffic has skyrocketed, my turducken cupcake has popped up all over the internet (I’m pretty much a viral YouTube video, blog style. *brushes shoulder off*), and I’ve felt like a million bucks.

They like me, they really like me!

I recently entered my Peanut Butter Oreo Cupcake in the Cupcake Crown competition at Celebrations.com and I need your help.

I need you to click the button below, then click “Vote for this cupcake!” once a day, every day, until February 12.

And if you vote?  You just might get a Peanut Butter Oreo cupcake reward.  Thaaaat’s right!  I’m giving away a batch of these unbelievably delicious cupcakes (or a baked good of your choice, if you’re allergic to nuts, gluten-free, etc.) to one lucky voter  All you have to do is:

1. Vote here.  Seriously.  I’ll know if you didn’t really vote, and so will your karma

2. Comment on this post that you voted. (one entry)

And/or:

3. Tweet that you voted, with this link: http://www.celebrations.com/cupcakecrown/2012/cupcake/peanut-butter-cup-oreo-cupcake and the tag #pboreocupcakecrown (two entries)

4. Check back on Friday, Feb. 3 to see if you’re the winner!

You have until Feb 2 at midnight to enter.

Hubba hubba.

I tried to take a picture of myself 25 different ways today but I’m just not one of those gals who can rock a selfie, so here’s an oldie from the summer.  Go Red Sox!

And this officially concludes the Photo a Day Challenge.  I (and you) learned I like baked goods (duh), Cornell, Paris, and sprinkles (duh). Theeee end. It’s been real, #janphotoaday!

The most beautiful sunset I ever did see.