National grilled cheese month + crunchy Easter peanut butter eggs

If there is one food that my friend Jenna likes, no no, loves it is cheese. Well, all cheese but ricotta that is. She loves it, by itself, melted, on nachos (another one of her crazy obsessions), in pasta, everything. Well, when the buzz was going around that it was National Grilled Cheese month, needless to say I asked her if she was hungry, and to my delight she was. Now, I've made this more than once now... and every time she sings with glee when she gets to bring each bite to her mouth.

This is a simple sandwich (as are all grilled cheeses' unless you're seriously trying to do some weird fancy-stuff, and if which case you are, puh-lease who you trying to impress?) ...regardless. Oh well, this is very simple, easy to do on a busy weekday and it's a teeny tiny healthy? ;)

Grilled Cheese Sandwich with Garlic Spinach

Recipe by me

Ingredients:

• Large handful of spinach
• 1 clove of garlic - minced finely
• Salt and pepper to taste
• Cheese to taste
• 2 slices of bread - buttered on the exterior
• Butter

Directions:

In a a medium sized skillet, melt your butter, once melted toss in your garlic, spinach, salt and pepper. Toss until wilted. While you wait for the spinach to wilt butter your pieces of bread. Arrange your cheese in the middle, once your spinach is wilted top onto your cheese. Squish the loaves together, return to the pan and continue as you would any regular grilled cheese sandwich ~ two minutes per side - of course you can veganize this with soy cheese/Earth balance, or cashew cheese, etc... up to you :)

Crunchy Easter Peanut Butter Eggs

Recipe by me

Ah, Easter is quickly approaching, and to be honest I wasn't planning on making any treats or anything regarding Easter this year. My mom left for Montreal, and my dad's girlfriend is planning Easter dinner for Monday night, and unfortunately... by the time I get there they will probably be eating. To me that's okay though, I've recently gone full-vegetarian, so no more fish for me, and I don't want a different dish to be prepared just for me. What I'm planning is on making some tofu, and marinating it the way my mom used to make our turkey (is that morbid? Maybe a bit so, but it always tasted so good, that I really don't think this could let me down, we shall see though!). Nevertheless, I really wasn't planning anything. However, my creative juices have been flowing, and I've just been feeling very... well, needing to bake.

A couple of weeks ago I bought soy-butter. I had planned on making a dish that required peanut butter, but because I had invited Jenna over who is severely allergic to nuts I figured why not try some soy butter. I had introduced it to her a while ago, but never actually tasted it myself. Well, now it's Easter, and for most people (other than Jesus) the other symbol of Easter is chocolate. Me it includes, fake white chocolate, or puffed rice cereal stuffed chocolate. However, when I was younger my mom always used to buy us chocolate bar mini eggs, usually being Reece's Peanut Butter Cups or Butterfinger. Seeing as I had half of a container left of soy butter, and my friend has never experienced a Peanut Butter Cup I figured I better introduce her to them.

Well, what I did was, take the original recipe I followed here, from back in the day when I first had my homemade bite of love, and adapted it. I wanted some crunch, I wanted some flavour, I wanted it to be good. I mean, this is her first introduction to this wonderful creation and all why not make it a good one?

... a good one is an understatement though. These are by far much, much, much better than... store-bought peanut butter cups. Seriously, I regret trying them. I had one, I had two, I had three... I might of had some more, then I had a big tummy ache. When making or buying peanut butter, crunchy is something I just don't do, yuck! I hate when nuts are apparent in my foods, especially peanut butter. I just think it's really gross and unnecessary. The crunch from the Panko crumbs/coconut is something that just screams perfection. Seriously, these taste so good, it really should be a sin for something this easy, to have such an amazing result. These would be perfect mini-sized so that... well you have a huge, huuuuge batch, and hopefully they'll last longer than mine did... Mine made 14 medium sized eggs. This is something I will definitely be making soon, and we all know how much I like chocolate... considering the chocolate bar that's been in my desk for three months only has two tiny squares taken off, what? Serious.

Ingredients:

• 1 1/4 cup of soy butter
• 1 cup icing sugar
• 3/4 cup graham crackers
• 1/2 cup Panko bread crumbs
• 1/4 cup unsweetened flakened coconut
• Milk/semi-sweet chocolate - as much as you need, I didn't measure it out since I was measuring by eye

Directions:

In a bowl mix together your soy butter, icing sugar, graham crackers, Panko bread xrumbs and unsweetened flakened coconut until everything sticks together and resembles the inside filling of a peanut butter cup.

Start by grabbing a handful of mixture and forming these bad boys into eggs, or mini balls would work too if you're not artistically inclined in shaping (which I am not, but thankfully I got Jenna to help me!)

In a microwave safe bowl, melt your chocolate. Dip your "peanut butter" filling into the chocolate. Set on wax paper/Silpat mat/parchment paper etc... garnish with sprinkles.

Either let them sit out and harden at room temperature or speed it up by setting them in the freezer for ten or so minutes if you're like us and just can't wait to bite into them!

Yum, homemade Peanut Butter Cup Eggs, how cute and tasty!

Enjoy :)

What kind of desserts will you be making for Easter?