"willy wonka & the temple of doom"

   who ever thought the chocolate fountain was a good idea? i own one. a good one. an expensive one. (it was a gift)
it is consistently synonymous with disaster- every time we use it or loan it.
   it all SOUNDS so wonderful. gravity intervening to pull melty chocolatey tiers down into a heavenly pool of milk...or dark....or even white chocolate. yummy little tidbits to skewer or hold under the stream or dip into the stuff- things like: marshmallows & strawberries & angel food cake & bananas & pretzels & cookies & pineapple & brownies & chunks of pound cake & rice krispy treats.....ahhhh, heaven........or maybe purgatory..........no, definitely the "other" place.
   there's the problem of the chocolate. we use more than 5 pounds at football parties- that can be big bucks IF you can even find it. you cannot & must not use chocolate chips-unless you know a secret, in which case, you must tell. they do not do well in the fountain. the consistency is all wrong & you don't want to add a bunch of icky oil & you can't add cream or milk....especially with white chocolate chips.... because you get  g*l*o*p . ask mitzi. we tried it once for a big teacher event. disaster. we got 2 pounds of white oily glop that burbled out of the fountain like an anemic, sickly mount vesuvius. on occasion, sam's will have these wonderful 2 1/2 lb. bars of ghirardelli candy making chocolate, which is perfect...much better than almond bark (a random & deceiving name for totally hydrogenated cottonseed & palm kernal oil-eeeeew).  i tend to buy 4 or 5 whenever they appear. i also tend to hoard food. this i hate to admit for fear that i will find myself in a reality tv show like extreme couponing, but for the less thrifty & far less organized.
   the other problem can be the machine itself. a memorable mess that comes to mind & still haunts me in my dreams every now & again is the end-of-the-season/end-of the-era jenks black football party late last fall- yeah, you remember, the buffet night people. the plan was for something extra- special. the tragic reality was something extra-messy, extra-embarrassing & extra-gross. SEVEN & A HALF pounds of perfectly melted ghirardelli chocolate, which was no small task in & of itself.....FIFTEEN pounds of dippers, 300+ skewers & about 65 party-goers all primed for the chocolate event of the century. the machine was plugged in & running smoothly...now came the moment of pouring all that melty goodness into the top & then.......T H E N.......the nightmare began....the machine must have been too cold because it just froze up. the chocolate hardened & jammed the rotator thingy. not one to panic,(ok, i am totally one to panic) i calmly stabbed a skewer down the rotator thingy- fully expecting the rich, delicious chocolatey fabulousness to blurp out of the top & begin cascading gracefully down over the 3 tiers of stainless steel 1/2 domes into the little reservoir of glory. only it didn't go that way . at all.  it did , in fact, splurp a little, but hardly a flow & the the running motor sound grew faint & died. it was horrifying- crowds had gathered & people were offering assistance & comfort. only there was nothing we could do. we tried everything. unplugging & replugging. re-skewering. stabbing with knives. well, that was about all we tried, but it was an exercise in futility. the machine had failed us. not ones to take failure laying down, we poured it all into a big green flowery crock-pot & cranked the heat.....we did have 7 1/2 pounds & a banquet table brimming with dippers, but it kinda lost its appeal with all the splattered chocolate mess & unsightly serving piece & a flustered hostess with 3 1/2 oz. of hardening brown gook under her fingernails......thank goodness at just that moment the 400 pound jenks black ice sculpture stole the show & diverted everyone's attention so i could haul the giant gooey apparatus outta there in black trash bags & stash it in the garage......just before Christmas i finally worked up the courage to deal with reheating all that mess & cleaning the whole thing up- it took hours.......you can't buy memories like that...and who would want to? we do fondue now. the chocolate fountain has been banished to the attic- where it awaits final judgement.

"chocolate fountain recipe"
let's not & say we did


-the snackmom

"chocolate soup & the FAB 4"

   ok, this isn't about the beatles......and it's not actually about soup either.....but it's kind of about soup. chocolate soup. if God had intended us to be thin, He would not have invented these ingredients.....
it's also about ellen & sarah & jennifer & jane & their passion for chocolate & the night we invented chocolate soup.
it was a good & memorable night. chocolate soup is a wonderful thing....at least on a blustery winter night when four 16- year -old -best friends & a LOT of cocoa & bittersweet chocolate & butter & sugar & good vanilla & chocolate chips & cream & imagination are involved. these girls love chocolate- they ADORE chocolate- one of them whose name (jane) i will not mention is fanatical about chocolate.  it was a night when brownies or chocolate chip cookies or hot fudge sauce or fondue just would not do- it HAD to be something extra- especially chocolate. something ridiculous. and so, the idea of chocolate soup was invented. now, i have an extensive cookbook collection- maybe numbering in the hundreds....and not one of them had a recipe for chocolate soup, not that we looked or anything, but it was such a good idea-that didn't stop us.......
   basically, we made a wonderful buttery, chocolatey baked fudge (we may have added a big handful of bittersweet chocolate pieces- i don't remember due to the chocolate coma which clouded my memory) which we underbaked & then added a criminal amount of hot fudge sauce (recipe will get in the blog soon, i promise) & cream & it was just insane.....insane.
   here's the basic deal, if you want to give it a try.......i was reminded of this because i've been meaning to write a new snackmom blog entry for quite some time & the girls are all over at our house tonight so, ellen & i whipped up a big pan of baked fudge a couple of hours ago.....it's almost gone.....lock the door & give me a spoon.

*baked fudge*   (aka: chocolate soup)

4 eggs, well beaten
2 cups sugar
1/2 cup flour
1/2 cup cocoa
1 cup melted butter (yes, you read that right- not one, but TWO sticks of butter)
1/2 cup chopped pecans
2 tsp. vanilla
1/4 tsp. salt

beat eggs with the dry ingredients until well blended...mix in the butter...stir in the vanilla & pecans & mix thoroughly...pour into a 9x9 inch pan...create a waterbath by setting the pan in another ovenproof dish of boiling water...bake at 325* for 45 minutes-do not overbake- but do try underbaking to get the soup effect.....serve with an arterio-gram.....recipe is based on one taken from "Stir-Ups" , a wonderful cookbook published in 1982 by the junior welfare league of enid, ok....try to find a copy, though it may be out of print..... it's a good one, catchy name, too, for a western oklahoma cookbook:) yeehaw!

-the snackmom