Oh Fudge, Are We Out Of Black Tea Again?

 Sometimes, I just want to stab myself in the eye, with closest pointiest thing on hand, which nine times out of ten, is a baguette. Do you ever have those days when no matter, how many times you smile there is always someone that manages to wipe it right off your face? In the past I only worked in the kitchen, with the knuckleheads like myself, that were crazy enough to work in a kitchen.

          But now, I get to enjoy the real reason why every waitress I ever interacted with, I wanted to drown in a vat of ranch dressing. I get it now!!! Today, perfect example. "Don't you have any black tea, around here"?, was the first command she uttered. No smile, no please, or a screw you, attached to that sour face. I was alone, I looked around for my safety net, and she was chatting and doing dishes, I was on my own!!

     So my solution was to go look for Barb, and conveniently she was on the phone. The whole time the customer is eyeballing me, like the last cupcake at a baby shower. "What kinda place is this, tea everywhere, but you don't have no plain old black tea"? I think I heard her utter " Icccchhhhkkk". With disgust on her face, she told me emphatically that she could not drink no fruity, jibbed up tea. "Do you have any cocoa"? "Hmm, why yes we do, but we make our own cocoa, it is one size: large". One syllable "Fine". "Would you like whipped cream or marshmallow cream"?  "Just give me the cocoa".

     I was already gnawing on my arm to escape, my solution, early this morning was to pass it off to Jasmine the consummate Pollyanna. She is good with Grumpies, because the peeps have no idea she is even mad at all. So the whole point of this post, was to teach you the fine art of fudge making. But fudge, do you have to be that irritated, about tea?" I thought tea was a soothing beverage? Oh, I get it...after you drink the tea, you are able to act human.

    The first photo is all the ingredients that you need to make some rocking fudge, that you eat on a particularly taxing customer day. This photo represents the two points that bring the fudge to fruition. I have made a lot of different types of fudge and this one tastes the least, pleacchhh.

     The above photo is the actual technical part of the whole process. I have been schooled by the maiden sugar, a time or two. Just peruse prior escapes. Making penuche, I should have stabbed my eye with a baguette in the morning. Oh my Lanta, I must have read the procedure like 20 times and the whipping part, with the wooden spoon sounded alot easier on paper. But each time I attempted Penuche, I wanted to throw it out the back door, say "@#$%^%#" get in my Equinox and drive my sorry ____(fill in blank) home.

     But because sugar results in copious amounts of clean up, I decided to stick it out and make fudge. Here is the the recipe, that thankfully I was able to perfect.

Rich Chocolate Fudge (with none of the ick factor)

8 ozs butter

1 cup dark brown sugar

1 cup granulated sugar

3 ozs semi sweet chocolate chips

1 cup milk

1 pinch of salt

1 healthy squirt of vanilla extract

4 cups sifted powdered sugar

1/2 cup sifted good quality cocoa powder

pan spray

1 9x9 disposable pan

Spray the 9x9 pan with pan spray set aside. In a bowl sift the powdered sugar with the cocoa powder and whisk to mix. In a heavy bottomed saucepan mix all remaining ingredients and heat to boiling, boil for 6 minutes and pour into a standing mixer. Add the cocoa and powdered sugar mix, until all powdered sugar is dissolved. Pour into the prepared 9x9 pan and cool for 20 minutes under refrigeration. Turn out, and portion.

Venice is like eating an entire box of chocolate liqueurs in one go. ~Truman Capote