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lava rocks
I remember being small, standing on a stool to reach the stove, pouring things into a pot and stirring, under my sister’s direction. I remember one of these occasions we were both in our nightgowns because we were up early watching Saturday morning cartoons, and had not yet bothered to change when the brilliant decision was made to brave the kitchen.
I’ve never been afraid of the kitchen because I have been cooking for so long, with my sister and with my mother. I have burned myself so many times too, that I hardly notice it anymore.
“Lava rocks” stick out most clearly in my mind. They originally had another name, something normal and boring like “Drop Cookies”. They were quickly renamed by my family, I think by my sister, though no one is really sure who started it. Lava Rocks. Because when you are done, it looks like you have a pile of lava rocks.
This recipe is incredibly easy to make, and if you are like me, can do wonderful things to spark your imagination.
Ingredients:
2 cups sugar
1 stick butter
½ cup cocoa
½ cup milk
½ cup creamy peanut butter
1 tsp vanilla
¼ tsp salt
3 cups oatmeal (Do Not use Instant oats! Use regular
oatmeal)
Directions:
Put everything except the oatmeal into a large pot over medium low heat.
Cook, stirring constantly, until the peanut butter is melted .Whap your sister on the arm with a wooden spoon, but don’t get distracted, you don’t want it to burn. At this point I used to imagine everything melting down into crude oil; dinosaurs and tricycles, butterflies and palm trees, my homework, Darth Vader too, because he was scary.
When the peanut butter is melted in, add the oatmeal. Stir and cook until well-mixed, and you are sure the dinosaurs are thoroughly One with the oatmeal.
Remove from stove. Take cookie sheets and cover with wax paper. Use a tablespoon or large soup spoon to drop gobs onto the wax paper. Imagine Mount St. Helen’s lobbing tasty chocolate chunks into your yard.
Put the cookie sheet in the freezer, and let it sit until completely cold.
These should be eaten straight from the freezer, so your hands aren’t too covered in chocolate stickiness, and they go great with a large glass of milk. My parents have a large chest freezer in the garage: we used to make stealthy ninja raids at all hours of the day to rescue the chocolate from the evil freezing machine. We would hold the freezer open by balancing the lid on our heads, leaving both hands free to remove the lava rocks from their captivity. My parents eventually got another freezer, when the first one died, and have been teasing us ever since, because the new one requires no small heads; it stays open by itself.
COMMENTS
If you accidentaly bought quick oats (Oops, not paying attention at the grocery store; must have been the screaming baby!) and want to use them up because you don’t like their texture, you can use half regular oatmeal and half quick oats and it doesn’t really affect the cookies’ texture.
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on 08/27/06 at 02:26 PMCommenting is not available in this weblog entry.
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