Chocolate Shoofly Pie with Pecan Whole Wheat Crust-Stephie's Virtual Bridal Shower

Yay! Yay! YAYYY!!!

Today is super duper exciting: We're holding a SURPRISE virtual bridal shower for Stephie of Stephie Cooks! (Are you surprised, Stephie!!?) Myself, Stef, and Steph, teamed up with a bunch more of Stephie's bloggy buds to celebrate the amazingness that is Stephie and the excitement we all have for her and her soon-to-be hubby, Alex!

I LOVE LOVE Stephie-she's a fantastic baker, has the coolest mom, and she's just the sweetest gal. She's also been featured on this blog a couple times already. So I am thrilled to celebrate her happiness today with a bunch of her other friends!

Stephie's wedding is coming up SOON and--because I'm nosy and also because I was doing some espionage-style research for this shower--I asked Stephie to share some deets about the upcoming nuptials! And what I learned is so fitting and so perfect for them. They're having a beautiful rustic-elegance style wedding with turquoise and pinks: gorgeous. And for food? BBQ! (Which is perfect, esp. because Alex is a major carnivore) and cupcakes and pie instead of the standard cake--again...adorable and perfect! (And I wish I could be there to see-and taste-it all! But I'll settle for just drooling over wedding photos :D) Anyway, I really wanted to use their wedding as inspiration for what I was going to make!

And-in addition to the fact that they are having pie-when I think of that sort of country feeling...I think of pie. And shoofly pies and barns go together like....well....Stephie and Alex :)

But! Since they're doing that rustic-chic spin, I decided to get a little fancy with my shoofly pie as well. So I made it a chocolate shoofly pie. And I put pecans on top (which, although optional, you should 100% do because they toast when the pie bakes and they're maybe the best part of the pie). And I made a whole wheat pecan pie crust (which is the perfect accompaniment). But first of all...what is a shoofly pie?

Shoofly pies are traditional among the Pennsylvania Dutch and they're pretty much a molasses based pie. (The name shoofly comes because the scent of molasses attracts flies and they had to "shoo" them away). Now-in case you didn't know-molasses is what makes brown sugar different from granulated sugar. So-it's pretty much awesome. I made a wet bottomed version, which means that there is a crumb topping but the bottom is more sticky and...well..."wet". And, although it's not healthy, it's not terribly awful for you. There's very little butter and not a great deal of sugar either. It's pretty much just molasses and water and such. Oh...and in this case....chocolate. Which I think really helped make it a bit more sweet and rich. I loved how rustic it turned out! And the textures-you have that nutty earthy whole wheat pie crust, the gooey chocolatey/molasses-y filling, a slightly crisp crumb topping and then the toasted pecans and sea salt take it from being just an "Ok" dessert to a "Mmmmm give me another piece!" sort of pie. I loved it. I think Stephie & Alex would (even though chocolate isn't usually Stephie's biggest thing), and I know you will too!

Now check out all the other delicious things Stephie's blogger friends made for her virtual shower!

The Cooking Actress – Chocolate Shoofly Pie with Pecan Whole Wheat Crust
Girl Versus Dough – Mini Meyer Lemon Coconut Scones
Sarcastic Cooking – Mini Buffalo Blue Cheese Chicken Pot Pies
The Roasted Root – Sweet Potato Rounds with Guacamole and Bacon
A Cedar Spoon – Strawberry Mint Mascarpone Crostini with Lemon Honey Drizzle
Very Culinary – White Chocolate Raspberry Parfaits
Rachel Cooks – Broccoli and Bacon Beer Cheese Dip
Bluebonnet Baker – Maple Bourbon Balls
Nutmeg Nanny – Broccoli Bacon Salad
Laura’s Mess – Spiced Apple and Buttermilk Cake
Seaweed and Sassafras – Herband Cheese Scones
Stetted – Meyer Lemon Meringue Pie
All Day I Dream About Food – Chocolate Fudge Crumb Bars
Dessert for Two – Mini Lemon Cakes
Foodie with Family – Smoked Salmon Cucumber Pizza

Something Saturdays (3/28/15)

I felt so crazy lethargic all week. No real explanation for it-I just did. It didn't help that the weather could not figure out whether it was spring or still winter. It snowed yesterday-ugh.

On Sunday we got together with Michael's best man's family for dinner and that was really nice and we had fun. Monday night we had dinner with Michael's dad, stepmom, brother, and sister-in-law and then later we went to his brother's house to go over DJ stuff for the wedding (he's our DJ). So that was exciting. Tuesday I mailed out wedding invites and ran a couple other errands. Wednesday is my brother's day off so we hung out for a little bit. And yesterday Michael and I both were off so we went to see the new Cinderella movie (cute-very pretty visually!) and then got some dinner (which I hate doing when I can't eat meat. I NEED MEAT!)

And today we're both working. So...yepp!

{Healthy} Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Oat Bars- #ChocPBDay

Welcome to the 2nd annual Chocolate Peanut Butter Day!!! 

A group of bloggers (hosted by the amazing and talented Carla of Chocolate Moosey and Miriam of Overtime Cook) have declared March 25th the official day to celebrate the ultimate of flavor pairings: chocolate and peanut butter! We had so much fun last year that of course I was excited to celebrate again this year!

Chocolate and peanut butter are my absolute favorite. My favorite candies growing up all had that beautiful pairing and SO MANY of the desserts I've made are choc/pb-fied (last year I even did a round up of 35 chocolate and peanut butter recipes on the blog...and goodness knows I've made many many more over the course of the year!) I've even been known to melt together some chocolate and peanut butter for a quick and richly delicious treat when I have no other sweets around. That is the depth of my love. (In a perfect world I'd have chocolate cake with peanut butter filling for my wedding cake but...alas...I'm playing it safe in case there are allergies.)

As you can tell if you've visited this little blog-ette of mine in 2015--I'm on a bit of a "healthier" kick. Partly just because I want to get back to a better place physically and partly because my wedding is quickly approaching! So these bars that I decided to make are on the healthier side. But you know what's funny? Almost every healthy dessert I make involves chocolate and peanut butter. Why? Peanut butter is delicious BUT also full of protein and good stuff and oftentimes makes an excellent substitute for butter. And chocolate is an antioxidant and...well...I need it. So I throw it in nearly everything to keep me sane. The point is-it was definitely not difficult to find something to make for Chocolate Peanut Butter Day! 

Here is the beauty of healthy treats: they can be dessert, a snack, or breakfast! So these chewy, hearty, delicious bars (which have just the right amount of sweetness) may be consumed thrice a day. In fact...I think I'd recommend it. Good for the soul and all that.