July.

"Gimme S'More Cupcakes"


Ingredients

1 1/2 cups crushed graham crackers
1/4 cup brown sugar
5 Tbsp butter, melted

Bag of mini chocolate chips
Bag of mini marshmallows (optional)

1 box chocolate cake mix, batter prepared according to package directions

1/2 cup butter room temp
8 oz cream cheese (or one cup or one brick)
1 jar marshmallow fluff
2-3 cups powdered sugar
2 Tbsp heavy cream (or milk)


For the Cupcakes

Preheat oven to 350°

Line 2 muffin tins with cupcake liners, 24 cupcakes

In a medium bowl combine graham cracker crumbs, melted butter and brown sugar. Drop a tablespoon or two of graham cracker mixture into each liner and press down to form crust. Bake the crusts for 5 minutes and transfer to wire rack.

(Want an extra, drool-inducing dose of awesome? Once cool, sprinkle each crust with a mini chocolate chips and a pinch of sea salt before filling with cake batter).

Prepare cake mix according to package directions. (Folding in more chocolate chips is certainly not discouraged here). Fill liners 2/3 full. Bake 15-18 minutes, until cupcakes are set.

For the Frosting

Mix butter and cream cheese on medium speed. Slowly add in powdered sugar... Mix. Add heavy cream/milk... Turn up speed... Mix. Add entire jar of Fluff - it's going to be sticky - and mix (again) until smooth.

Last, But Never Least

After frosting the cooled cupcakes, make 'em pretty... 

Sprinkle with crushed grahams & chocolate chips. Let the people know they're about to partake in a ridiculously decadent cake version of the campfire favorite, for heaven's sake. If you have a kitchen torch - I'm a pyro, so I do not - you could even roast some mini marshmallows.

Also, refrigeration is a good call. Unless you want 'mallow fluff dripping down the sides. Either way, they're kind of impossible to nosh without making a spectacular mess. 

{Recipe adapted from Cookies & Cups}

This is how you play refrigerator Tetris after a handsome farmer's market haul. 

Bundle of summer squash - incoming. 

Bag of baby carrots - you gots to go. 

Into a tub of hummus? Nope. Cupcakes. (Don't act surprised).  

Grate 'em up. Dump 'em in. Question who ever thought root vegetables belonged in dessert.

I used Paula Deen's Best Ever recipe - the irony - but left out all traces of raisin, pecan and pineapple. (Sorry about it, traditionalists). What I'm saying is, even if you hate carrot cake... you won't hate this carrot cake. Especially after adding a dollop of Salted Caramel Cream Cheese Frosting. 

After the homemade caramel has cooled, add half a cup - more, less, more - to the cream cheese frosting. Give it a whirl in the KitchenAid. To thicken, add powdered sugar. To thin, heavy cream. Eyeball it. Go with your gut. If you can spread it on a cupcake, you're golden. 

Bonus points: You'll be seeing 20/20 in no time. 

                                  

Putting an immediate and insatiable need for caaawfee on hold, I shed my 'creature of habit' tendencies for a breakfast date down south.

La Boite. The Box, if my shaky French is to be trusted. (Which it's not. High five for translator apps). Named for the repurposed shipping container in which it's housed.

What this atypical cafe lacks in space - 160 itsy-bitsy square feet - it makes up for in ridiculously authentic pastries.

Macarons. Palmiers. Flaky chocolate croissants.

Pair them with a seat on the shaded lawn and an iced Americano. Lick buttery crumbs off your fingers while a vigilant bird guilt-trips you for not tossing a few his way. Or... drop by for a dozen to-go.

They swear by keeping it local. But you'll swear your taste buds are on Champs-Élysées.

It's like this speck of subculture, off a busy Burnet Road in the heart of central Austin.

The self-proclaimed "honkiest, tonkiest beer joint in town."

If you've driven past, you've seen the steeple. But what's inside... well, I wouldn't call it holy.

Through an old orange door, a wall-mount AC unit held together with duct-tape chugs. Yellowed pictures peel from the wall and hot dogs boil in a corner crockpot atop a card table. Free for those who show up on a Sunday afternoon. Tubs of chili and grated cheese. A stack of paper napkins.

People from all walks line the long bar that Ginny still mans. It is her namesake, after all. Ginny's Little Longhorn.

A genuine jukebox advertises Willie... George... Jimmy. Handwritten placards, housed together in loopy scrawl. Trapped behind dusty glass as the band sets up in the back.

Regulars say it's the two dollar Lone Star and live music.

"Have you seen the inside? The dance floor's about the size of a postage stamp."

But the growing crowd isn't piling in for cheap longnecks.

They're lining up for the winning ticket.

Out back, tucked past a pair of vintage Chevy pickups - the main attraction. In a chicken wire cage.

Ginny herself plucks Penny, the hen, from the coop and escorts her across the tiny parking lot, where the party has spilled outside. A grand procession for a one-in-fifty-seven shot atop a plywood-covered pool table.

Patrons clutch their numbered squares... the first few chords of a steel guitar wail... and off she goes. 

Pecking at feed on 17. Pausing at 9. Shuffling between the corner of 43 and 44.

The crowd gets louder and so does the band. 

Until Penny settles on 2... scratches... and squats. 

Bingo. Of the chicken shit variety. 

The jackpot? One hundred fourteen bucks. 

"If you win… it’s real nice if you buy everybody a beer." 

Longtime friend Rocky Slay doesn't play much anymore. He comes for the hot dogs. And the spectacle. ("Old cars, motorcycles, tattoos and piercings. Bizarre people.")

But one thing he's learned... "You cannot make chicken salad out of chicken shit. I've tried for years." 

Cookies are my currency. 

Nabbed an HBO GO subscription for a couple cups of flour, a bag of M&Ms and an hour in the kitchen. 

Either I've got really generous friends or these cookies are that good. 

Plowed through an entire season of Girls. (I don't care what you think about the show - love it, hate it, secretly love it but say you hate it - the music is spot on).  

Now I'm onto Newsroom. Kind of/sort of my (work) life in a nutshell. Minus the actual news part, a level of seriousness and obvious control room gaffes. (Producers aren't hand-typing graphics to smite talent ten seconds before hitting air. They just aren't). Either way, plugs the gaping Sunday night programming hole. 

YEAH BARTERING. 

{Recipe: Mini Rainbow M&M Cookie Sandwiches with Peanut Butter Buttercream Filling via Sally's Baking Addiction}

Evening exercisers often do so because they want to be “tired out” by the time they hit the sack. However, the thermal effect of exercise is the same at any time of day; body temperature rises during and after physical activity. So the body will be "alert" when you're trying to sleep. Working out close to three hours before your bedtime can disrupt the body's circadian clock and may affect your ability to fall asleep and stay asleep. 

THIS. This is how these cookies came to be. Thanks a ton, circadian clock.

And don't ask where I got that scientific nugget. (Cough. AskMen.com). Yep. Answers that sound factual enough to regurgitate, but I wouldn't put money on the factual part. Like, beef-cake Wikipedia.

Also. Can I just say... hiccups on the treadmill are deceptively hazardous.

And mini chocolate chips are adorable.

And if you know a chocolate fiend, it'd be a disservice not to mail them a batch. 

{Chewy Triple Chocolate Cookie Recipe via Annie's Eats}