Have you ever had one of those cravings that you just can’t get out of your head, but you have no idea how you can satisfy it?  That happened to me recently and I almost ended up being institutionalized because of it.  I wanted something chocolate (which is not a normal craving of mine) and I wanted something crunchy.  Like, potato chip crunchy…but not potato chips.  I hit the kitchen hard and made countless batches of stuff (I say “stuff” because some were edible and some were not-by human or animal standards).  I finally came up with, what I like to think, is the ultimate crispy chocolate wafer.

It all started when I was watching this Cooking Channel show, called Unique Sweets.  They were going on and on about this cookie shop in San Francisco called Goody Goodie.  Apparently, they have a chocolate wafer there that’s the king of crispy chocolate cookies and is topped with cocoa nibs and Moroccan olives.  Yes, cookies and olives.  That wasn’t what got my craving started, it was the crispy, crunchy, chocolate thing that started me on my obsessive spiral.

I didn’t really feel like using cocoa nibs on my version of the crispy chocolate cookies (although I do really like using cocoa nibs in recipes) and I wasn’t too keen on the olives either (mostly because I didn’t have these and I was too lazy to trek out and buy them).  But I do really like espresso and almonds with chocolate.  And I did have a big bag of Jordan almonds (I’ve been on my “crunchy” tear for a while now) and a jar of espresso powder handy.  What a coinkydink.

No, I didn’t run around a wedding reception snagging the bags of Jordan almonds that were to be the guests favors.  I’ve always liked them, but had a renewed love affair with them when I went to Portugal last year.  Most of the time, Jordan almonds tend to be stale when I get them here (seems they aren’t quite as popular as say chocolate covered peanuts are).  But I found that OhNuts has really fresh, super crunchy stock of these…so I get my fix over there.

I got down to experimenting with tuiles and lace cookies, since those were thin and had the crunch factor I was looking for.  But try and tweak as I did, they just weren’t right.  So I watched the episode again and totally got it.  Instead of making the wafer cookies round, I needed to work outside of the box, errr circle.  I plopped the batter down and spread it into a big rectangle.  Super thin, super crunchy, chocolatey and seemingly never ending (because these are bigger than your usual wafer cookies).

I generously dusted the chocolate wafer with espresso powder and sprinkled chopped up Jordan almonds on the wafers.  By the way, I pulverized the almonds in my food processor, but you could bash them up by putting them into a zip top bag and banging them with a rolling pin.  Just make sure you put something like a cutting board between the almonds and your counter so you don’t crack up your counter too.

The cookie shop wraps them in parchment paper when they serve the wafer cookies.  And even though they are thin and seem to be fragile, they actually hold up quite well.  Although shipping them will more than likely result in broken pieces (they aren’t that sturdy).

 Relationship Advice

As science is want to do, they are again exposing woman’s most primitive side by revealing that we tend to choose men via the superficial rather than the deep metaphysical ways we claim to choose our partners.

If you never thought a man looked all that sexy stuffing his pie hole with pizza, beer and wings it seems that you didn’t so much learn that as it was inside you all along.  But then your basic instinct would also turn down the ever manly (and sexy) looking John Hamm for the likes of soccer star Christiano Rinaldo too.  Seem odd?  Considering that I wouldn’t kick either one of these men out of my bed for eating crackers, I was intrigued.

The researchers used photos of 34 Caucasian and 41 black African men’s faces and found that  women were more attracted to the men that had more “golden” in their faces.  This wasn’t referring to gold teeth or piercings, but the coloration of their skin.  That golden glow is due to the healthy nature of the person’s diet and is reflective in their skin tone, especially from the “colorful antioxidant carotenoid pigments we get from fruit and vegetables in our diet,” says lead Doc Ian Stephen.

“These carotenoids are also thought to be good for our immune and reproductive systems, making us healthy and increasing our fertility. The masculinity of the face had no effect on the attractiveness of the face.

“Our study shows that being healthy may be the best way for men to look attractive. We know that you can achieve a more healthy looking skin color by eating more fruit and vegetables, so that would be a good start,” he says.

As with all things there is a bit of a glitch in the system.  Apparently, this finding doesn’t hold true if the women are looking at men that have a different ethnicity than their own.  Your caveman instincts only work  when they are exposed to other members of your cave tribe because that’s what your brain knows.  Apparently, when you’re scoping out a man from a different ethnicity than your own, your brain doesn’t care about that “golden hue.”

Futurity.org

 

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