Fat Friday: Fudge Off

Forgive me. I am in a MOOD today. And, being the considerate, thoughtful friend I am, will proceed to poison your mood too I mean share the joy.

I've had blog posts rattling around in my brain for a week and I find myself dictating them in my head. Only to turn around and find I've been speaking out loud.

My kids are looking at me funny. Again. I should probably get used to that.

So anyway, about 342 years ago we had our dear friends over for dinner. (OK, it was only last weekend. If you haven't gotten used to my tendency to exaggerate, well . . . . buckle up.)

We had an awesome dinner - I made homemade bread and a new soup recipe from Paula Deen. It was a pumpkin bisque with shrimp. Sounds weird, huh? It was delicious. Maybe I'll blog about it when I'm in a better mood. Anyway, for some reason I struggled with dessert. What to make, what to make, what to make . . .

There are too many choices. Then - EUREKA! I'll make fudge!

I mean it's Christmas time and all, time to break out the things I only indulge in during December. Why is that anyway? Shouldn't I be able to eat fudge in the summer time, for crying out loud? WHY do I limit myself? Oh the humanity!

Anyway, I have three fudge recipes and couldn't decide between the three. So I made all of them.

Restraint isn't one of my gifts.

During dinner I told everyone, OK, here's the deal. I made a bunch of fudge and we get to decide the winner. It will be our first annual Fudge Off. (And you thought I was just being inappropriate with that title up there. Shame on you. You shouldn't believe the worst of me, even though most of the time you'd be right.). The bonus was that dessert went incredibly well with the wine. Amazing combo. Even better than straight-up chocolate or truffles. Red wine and fudge. My new favorite combination.

So today, I'm going to share some recipes with you! Fudge is extremely easy to make. I will prove it by making it so quickly that I won't have time for pictures. Nope. No pictures of the process today. Just the end result. Reason being, my photography skills have been rapidly declining. I'm just in a FUNK. All pictures of the Fudge Off were blurry.

Here's proof:

Glenn. Out of focus. Not to say that Glenn isn't focused. He's very focused - you just can't tell it here.

Dawn. Who manages to look awesome no matter what my lack of focusing capabilities may be.

I did manage to take a good picture of the wine.

Maybe I have a problem with priorities. My friends were out of focus but the wine wasn't. What does that say about me? WHAT DOES IT SAY?

Anyway, back to the fudge. Here are the three different kinds I made:

From the left: Oreo Fudge, Million Dollar Fudge and 7-Pound Fudge. The middle one, Million Dollar Fudge, is a recipe I've made since I was a kid. Mom used to make it, primarily at Christmas time (the travesty) and put it on goodie trays for people. It's a fabulous recipe - creamy and smooth and it tastes like you're eating pure chocolate. I put toasted walnuts in it this time and much to my dismay, I cooked it too long and it came out hard and a bit crumbly. Unsurprisingly, it didn't win.

We had a tie between the other two - Oreo Fudge and the 7 Pound Fudge. I'm not sure about the title of the last one. Maybe it's because you weigh an extra 7 pounds after eating it. I'll do the research and get back to you on that.

Both of these were creamy and smooth with amazing flavor. I'm a milk chocolate gal and so they really appeal to me, but they were both very sweet. I'm trying to find a good dark chocolate fudge recipe to try. Anybody have a good one? Anyone? Hello . . (knock, knock) is this thing on?

If I had a great dark chocolate fudge recipe, I'd experiment with add-ins like dried blueberries or candied ginger or orange peel or - yikes! - chili pepper. Livin' on the edge, man.

Here are the recipes:

Oreo Fudge

1 bag of white chocolate chips

2-14 oz. cans sweetened condensed milk (Eagle brand)

1 bag milk chocolate chips

1 c. chopped Oreos (in big pieces)

1 c. mini chocolate chips

1st Layer: Line an 8x8 pan with waxed paper. Melt the bag of white chips with one can of sw. condensed milk (I used the microwave). Stir til smooth then add oreos and mini chips. Pour into your prepared pan in a smooth layer.

2nd Layer: Melt the bag of milk chocolate chips with the 2nd can of sw. condensed milk. Pour evenly over the first layer.

Refrigerate til firm. Serve at room temperature.

(Click here for printable)

And . . .

7 Pound Fudge

24 oz. milk chocolate Hershey bars, cut in small pieces

2 bags milk chocolate chips

13 oz. jar marshmallow cream

4 c. sugar

13 oz. can evaporated milk (NOT Eagle brand)

2 sticks butter

2 t. vanilla

1 c. toasted nuts - optional

Mix chocolates and marshmallow cream in a large bowl. Mix sugar, milk and butter in a large saucepan on the stove. Heat and stir til bubbly then boil for 5 minutes. Pour hot mixture over chocolates and marshmallow. Beat til blended and smooth. Beat in vanilla and nuts. Put in a greased 9x13 pan. Refrigerate til firm. Serve at room temperature.

( Click here for printable)

Trust me, fudge is easy to make. Can you believe the sugar content, though? I have to confess, as I was making these recipes, I was twitching - thinking about how much sugar was in them. Then I read this (if you click on the picture you'll get a larger image and you can read the whole thing. It's a crack up):

This is an ad from the February, 1966, McCall's Magazine for Women. Dawn found it while antiquing one day. In the "Note to Mothers" in the box it says, "Play safe with your young ones - make sure they get sugar every day."

I found this immensely reassuring. I also feel a lot better about eating fudge for breakfast.