Yesterday was a very lazy Saturday with lots of time spent on the couch catching up on "Tivoed" shows from the week. When 5:00 rolled around, it was time to decide how the night would be spent. I realized that a night with no plans was a great night to work on my first recipe for my blog.
My roommate Lindsey and I decided to go through one of our favorite and most useful (especially for college) cookbooks which only includes recipes with 5 ingredients or less. This cookbook has been so practical for a college kid who likes to bake but keep things simple. It also helps with keeping the price down when shopping at the grocery store. I always hate it when you want to bake some random dessert and it calls for something that you have to buy and never use again. I share a small pantry with 2 other girls...I don't have room for lots of random types of sugars, or spices.
As Lindsey and I flipped through the cookbook, we both made the same "ahhhh" noise as we flipped to the "Gooey Chocolate Pudding" page. Our mouths watered as we looked at the picture of the small piece of chocolate pudding with a baked outside and gooey inside. It looked like a chocolate volcano with hot, fudge like magma flowing inside it. We flipped through the rest of the dessert section already knowing that our minds were made up. We looked over the list of ingredients and skimmed over the recipe making sure everything it instructed we were capable of. It mentioned a term called "double boiler" which made us nervous. We knew we didn't have a double boiler so I "googled" the term to see how broke people like me created their own. We figured out that it was something we could improvise.
Our first stop was to Pier 1 Imports to buy some ramekins. The recipe called for four and after searching our kitchen we discovered that we had 1 lone ramekin. Being a dedicated baker, I decided that ramekins was a purchase that I wanted to make since I could use them for so many other recipes. At Pier 1 Imports, we walked the kitchen isles ooh-ing and ah-ing at all the neat kitchen gadgets that we desperately wanted. Mice salt and pepper shakers, cow creamers, and flower themed bowls called our names yet we remained strong and stayed focus on ramekins. While there were plenty to choose from, I decided on the simple, white classic ramekins that were not only the most heavy duty, but conveniently the cheapest.
After getting a set of 4, we headed to our next stop, Tom Thumb. Tom Thumb would have been a cheap trip if I had stuck to the handful of ingredients for the recipe, but soon my basket was filled with gorgeous sunflowers for the kitchen table along with all the ingredients to make a southern comfort, baked macaroni and cheese.
Once home, the first step was to clean the kitchen because this baker is only inspired and motivated by the smell of Fantastik sprayed counters. Lindsey decided to be my incredibly helpful assistant for making our Gooey Chocolate Pudding masterpiece.
We followed the directions religiously making sure not mess anything up. We chopped up chocolate, melted butter, and thickened milk on the stove. Eventually the ramekins were filled with gooey goodness and we played "SkipBo" for the long 10 minutes of baking. I was on the edge of my seat when the timer went off, already being tormented by the smells coming from the kitchen. Lindsey and her sister anxiously watched as I slowly, took the ramekins out of the stove trying with all my might not to mess any of the perfection up.
We let the ramekins cool for ten minutes as we filled our glasses of chilled milk. I purposely chose our smallest spoons so that we could get as many bites as possible out of the beautifully filled ramekins. I looked at the ramekins proudly, comparing the real finished product with the picture in the book seeing that they looked the exact same. Nothing is worse than when finishing baking and realizing that something isn't right, or it didn't come out as pretty as the picture shows.
After taking countless pictures of our pride and joy, we sat on the couch and slowly dug into the ramekins with a bit of hesitance to ruin the beauty. I was sad to ruin it until the chocolate hit my mouth. This was better than any lava cake at any bakery I have ever had. I wasn't sure if it was actually better or if it was all my hard work that made it taste better but I didn't honestly care.
