No-Bake Peanut Butter & Chocolate Oat Bars

I'm really getting into this no-bake dessert thing.

No, I'm not about to give up my oven. (I could if I wanted to, I just don't okay? Get off my back). But I love being able to prep a dessert without having to heat up the kitchen, or accomodate an extra dish while I'm making dinner. 

These no-bake peanut butter & chocolate oat bars only take about 15 minutes to prep, and the clean up is minimal as well. (I can't be the only person who cares more about clean up time than prep time?) They remind me of those omgtodiefor oat fudge bars at Starbucks. But surprisingly, these are less sweet and less dense, which I found pretty awesome. Because I could eat more of them.

If you aren't a peanut butter fan, I'm sure another nut butter would be just as tasty. Okay, I'm not actually sure because I've never been able to eat any, but it sounds nice from afar. What I'm trying to say is, there's hardly an excuse not to make these, so go on and no-bake a batch!

End of Summer BBQ Ribs

I think, just maybe, that summer has left us.

Or at least here in Vancouver, where it barely arrives to begin with. We all crawl out from our coffee shops in shorts, summer dresses, and sandals to behold any post-May sunshine, truly exemplifying the power of denial.

But there are those true summer days, when the sun is warm, and you can lay on the beach gazing at the still snow-capped mountains stretching down to the shores. And it makes all those months of rain - which I love just as much, but in a very different way - worth bearing.

So as the dew settles on the grass in the morning, my sweaters crawl out of hiding, and my coffee ditches its ice cubes, I bid our sweet Vancouver summers goodbye by barbecuing these baby back ribs, complete with a spicy-sweet rub and barbecue sauce.

The man says I'm an awkward picture poser. He is not incorrect.

Really Chocolate Cupcakes

I've said it before and I'll say it again: If you aren't going to have all of the chocolate, you might as well have none of the chocolate.

Okay, so that's not always true. Vanilla frosting on chocolate cake (or vice versa) is a pretty awesome pairing - but it's not this. No, nothing is quite this.

A rich chocolate cupcake, filled with chocolate pudding, and topped with a sweet chocolate buttercream. In case that sounds overwhelming, the pudding actually cuts down some of the sweetness and breaks up the texture nicely.

It's hard to think these are the favourite dessert of someone who once, as a little girl, politely declined all the chocolate bars as she trick-or-treated during her first Halloween. How far we've come.