book club grub

i was excited to attend book club this weekend, although i totally put off actually reading the book until literally the day before the GTG.  heh.  by the way, the book was john green's the fault in our stars.  not necessarily something i would've picked up on my own, but that's why i love book club - and it was fantastic.  i'm really glad i read it.

now, as for what to bring as my potluck contribution - well, that was easy.  i have a whole bunch of fabulous things pinned to my "stuff i wanna eat" board on pinterest, and i'm always excited to have an excuse to try one of them.  of course, i always stress a little when serving something brand new to my friends, but in the end it usually turns out just fine.

this time was no different.  although i'd had a couple of requests for a do-over of those biscoff snickerdoodles, i wanted something new.  so i perused my board and after rejecting a couple of other ideas (mostly due to lack of ingredients in the kitchen, and i was too lazy to go out), i settled on this recipe for no-bake nutella cheesecakes.  i had half a package of oreos in the pantry that i wanted to get rid of, and a huge jar of nutella that was begging to be used up.  and this recipe?  so easy.  check it out:


take those oreos for a spin in the food processor.  in my case, it was the baby food maker that still comes in handy on a regular basis.

melt some butter, mix it in, and pull out a handful of paper cups to make things easy on the lucky ducks who'll be indulging in this chocolatey goodness.  press about a tablespoon's worth of buttery crushed cookie into the bottom of each cup.

crack open that vat of nutella and bust out the mixer to combine it with a brick of cream cheese and a little vanilla extract.  because i actually do try to cut as much fat and/or calories as i can wherever possible, i used the lower-fat neufchatel.  and then take an entire container of lowfat cool whip and fold it in.

now, if you're an anal freak like me, you pour that entire bowl of fluffy heaven into a ziploc bag so that you can pipe it nicely into each cup.

optional:  scrape what's left of the mixture from the sides of the bowl and stick the spatula in your mouth (i.e., perform an important test, "to make sure it tastes a'ight").

now turn your entire kitchen upside-down in search of a container with a matching lid that the cups will fit into for their overnight stay in the fridge.

the next morning, open the container(s), take a big sniff, and sneak a few out so you have some for yourself.  then you can put some leftover cool whip into another ziploc, snip off the corner, and drop a dollop into each cup.  spend about ten minutes looking for that piece of chocolate you know you have somewhere in the kitchen, break out the microplane, and grate a bit on top.

voila:

the glass containers that the original blogger used for her treats made for a much prettier presentation, but i had neither the goods nor the desire to wash them afterwards.

besides, it didn't matter.  these ended up being so delicious that i doubt the girls even noticed that they were eating them out of crappy paper cups.  if i ever make these to serve at home, maybe for a nice dinner, i'm totally gonna make some of those cool-looking cups using melted chocolate and a balloon.

i can't make this shit up, people.