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Dude Food: Chocolate Delight

Posted on February 7, 2010 at 12:01 am

by Richard

You’re really going to love this one, especially with Valentine’s Day coming up in a week. (Hint. Hint. HINT!) We all know the most clichéd gift for Valentine’s Day is chocolate and we still go out and buy it every year.

This year, however, why not do something a little different? Why not make your own chocolate confection creation? Oh, yeah. And it’s really quite easy.

When I first found this recipe, it was called Chocolate Balls and that’s what I called it when I made it. Well, I called it that once. Only once. At that point, the little dudes started laughing and laughing and laughing. “Chocolate. . . BALLS!” Apparently, the little dudes thought it was funny as all get out. I’ll leave it to you to decided whether it was juvenile garbage or the height of humor. Anyway, they’re now called Chocolate Delight. By me, at least. The little dudes still chortle Chocolate Balls.

So.

The great thing about this recipe is just how easy it is to make. Yeah, it does take a while, but it’s not hard at all. Even if you’re a novice cook, you’ll be able to do this quickly. Here’s what you need.

1 pkg Oreo cookies
1 8-oz package cream cheese (softened. Do this by letting it stand outside in the room for a couple of hours)
2 pkgs of semi-sweet baker’s chocolate. You’ll find this in the baking aisle. Normally it’ll be in the red package.

That’s it. Once you’ve got all the ingredients assembled, go get out a large food processor. Break up the Oreos into the food processor and grind them to a fine powder, or as close as you can get. Once that’s done, spoon the cream cheese into the cookie crumbles. Mix them all up until you’ve got a bit of a gooey mess inside the food processor.

Get out a large plate and cover it with wax paper. Using your fingers, take the Oreo mixture out of the food processor and mold it into little, um, balls. Put the balls of chocolate on the wax paper and then put the plate in the fridge for an hour or so. Just before your hour is up, get a large microwave-safe bowl and dump the baker’s chocolate into it. Microwave until melted. Get out a pair of tongs.

Use the tongs to dip the Oreo mix into the melted baker’s chocolate. Put the resultant mess back onto the wax paper. When all the chocolate is used and all the Oreo mix is covered, put them back in the fridge for several hours or, for best results, overnight.

Once you get those out of the fridge, stand back. You’ll be overwhelmed by folks wanting to eat them all up. Just be careful to keep them in the fridge until they’re eaten (as well as what’s left after the first attack) as the baker’s chocolate does best in cold temps.

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Freaky Friday: Chocolate’s Health Benefits

Posted on February 5, 2010 at 12:01 am

by Richard

‘Tis the season to start gulping down chocolates like they had been out of style for 63 years and you were trying to spark a revival, but no one was interested so you were downing chocolates by the handfull every second you were out of the house. Well, either that or it’s Valentine’s Day and chocolate is the traditional gift of the holiday.

I bring good news to those who don’t keep up with the science. Turns out that chocolate might actually be good for you.

Great news. Well, for the wives at least. I mean, sure, I like chocolate, but it’s not something I’ll go out of my way to buy or even ask for. If I really wanted something sweet to celebrate a holiday, I’d just as soon order a cookie bouquet. Still, let’s hear it for flavonoids. Yeah, I know. It sounds like the invading aliens from some horrible 1950’s SF epic. But, no. They’re actually naturally-occurring compounds found in plant-based foods recognized as exuding certain health benefits. And they’re what makes chocolate good-ish for you.

Flavonoids provide important protective benefits to plants, such as in repairing damage and shielding from environmental toxins. When we consume plant-based foods rich in flavonoids, it appears that we also benefit from this “antioxidant” power.Antioxidants are believed to help the body’s cells resist damage caused by free radicals, formed by normal bodily processes such as breathing or environmental contaminants like cigarette smoke. When the body lacks adequate levels of antioxidants, free radical damage ensues, leading to increases in LDL-cholesterol oxidation and plaque formation on arterial walls.

Well, in dark chocolate at least. That’s the — you should pardon the expression — skinny so far as we know it. Dark chocolate, having more flavonoids, is better at promoting good health. Not only is it good for reducing damage caused by free radicals, it also has other supposed benefits:

  • Lower Blood Pressure: Studies have shown that consuming a small bar of dark chocolate everyday can reduce blood pressure in individuals with high blood pressure.
  • Lower Cholesterol: Dark chocolate has also been shown to reduce LDL cholesterol (the bad cholesterol) by up to 10 percent.

All in all, not bad.

But what about all the fat? you ask. Well, it’s actually not that bad. See, the fat in dark chocolate is made up of three different kinds of fat and, it turns out, only 1/3 of the fat is the bad, saturated, kind of fat that hurts your arteries and heart.

So, let’s hear it for chocolate. In moderation of course. Like that ever works.

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Dude Review: Glee

Posted on February 3, 2010 at 12:01 am

by Richard

As I might have mentioned a time or two in the past, I hate musicals. Well, I might have to modify that a bit. Not only did I love the Bride & Prejudice movie, I also enjoyed a recent show of South Pacific at a local theater and I’ve become convinced that a musical is one of the best shows on television (along with Lost of course) right now.

I’m talking about Glee, on Fox. Now, understand I still have some sort of antipathy toward the form, but I actually bought the Glee DVD for myself for Christmas. I’d been talking to a couple of the moms down to Speed Racer’s elementary school and they were raving about the show. I figured since it was on a deep-discount sale at Amazon.com I might as well get it. And, boy, am I glad I did.

I popped the first DVD into the player a couple of days ago after I’d been subjected (read tortured by) to a few hours of my wife’s, known to me as She Who Likes Reality Shows Far, Far Too Much, choices. She settled back in her chair, prepared to go to sleep. I did not have high hopes.

Until about one minute into the show. Then I was riveted. I couldn’t look away. At the end of the pilot episode, from the chair next to me, I heard: “Do you have more of these?”

“Yes.”

“Now, please.”

“Yes.”

We haven’t been able to stop watching the first season. Fortunately, the show won a Golden Globe so that speaks well of it coming back for a second season.

Glee is the story of Will Schuster, played by Matthew Morrison, a high-school Spanish teacher who, once upon a time, was a big star in the glee club. But now, the glee club is home only to losers and outcasts who start the day with a Slurpee facial. Administered, of course, by the cool kids or the football players. Even worse, the cheerleaders, the Cheerios, are the stars of the school and their instructor basically gets whatever she wants, including uniforms dry cleaned in Europe. She’s out to destroy the glee club to get all of her budget back.

It’s a fantastic show, with laughs, fantastic musical numbers, and actual drama. You really don’t want to miss it. If you don’t want to buy the DVD, you can find full episodes at Fox.com. Even better news, new episodes start airing on April 13. I know where I’ll be that night.

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