For Starters

This will be my first attempt at this craze of "blogging" that has been sweeping the country.  This will also be my way of avoiding the constant stream of "can I have that recipe?" comments that I get on my Facebook account every time I post a new food-related picture.

  So who am I, exactly? I'm the Juggernaut, B!tch!!!  (Sorry, I couldn't resist.)  As you can gather from my blog name, I'm a Navy Wife, and at the moment I am, in fact, bored.  That's not typical in my life, however, so it will probably bug me later to have such a misnomer.  Ah, well.  It was the best I could come up with on such short notice.

  So back to me :-D   As it says in my description I'm 22, and I have a two-year-old daughter.  I refer to her often as my "monkey", so just be aware of that so that there is no confusion later.  Monkey keeps me pretty busy.  She's two, after all, and she has her father's flair for adventure.  Unfortunately she also inherited her mother's grace (or lack thereof); so she gets scraped up on a regular bases.  She's surviving though.

  My husband....what shall we call him?  I'll try to be nice ;-)  Let's just call him "J" until I come up with something a bit more clever.  J is in the Navy, and is currently deployed.  I'm hoping to see him again soon.  In the meantime, however, I've been keeping busy with Monkey, cooking, volunteering at the local library, and reading books that I haven't made time for in years.  I'm also writing again, which is huge.

  Writing has always been a big love of mine, and although I haven't really done much other than the occasional journal entry, I would love to write a novel one day.  I must admit that my first English professor in college made a comment on one of my papers that truly went to my head.  She said that I have a charming story-telling voice.  This should not have inflated my ego at all, considering it was followed up with "that has no place in a research paper".   Oh well, I'll take what I can get.

    So, I guess I should get on with it and post a recipe.

   Recently I received my latest Paula Deen magazine (I love her, and I am a yearly subscriber to her magazine), and in it was a recipe for Whoopie Pies.  Apparently I was a deprived child because I had never even heard of a Whoopie Pie, much less tasted one, so I decided then and there that these would be placed at the top of my "must try" list.  I must say, the results were rather tasty, although a bit too sweet even for my sweet tooth.
  The recipe is as follows:

Vanilla Whoopie Pies (the cookie)
1 3/4  cups plus 2 TBS all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
10 TBS butter (this is Paula Deen after all, and what would it be without all that "love"?)
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 egg
1 egg yolk
1 TBS vanilla extract
1 cup buttermilk

Preheat oven to 350.  Line baking sheets with parchment paper.  In a medium bowl, stir together flour, baking powder, and salt.
In a large bowl, beat butter and sugar at medium speed until fluffy.  Add egg, egg yolk, and vanilla; beat until combined.  Gradually add flour mixture to butter mixture alternately with buttermilk, beginning and ending with flour mixture, beating just until dry ingredients are incorporated.
Using a 1/4 cup scoop, drop batter 3 inches apart onto prepared baking sheets.  Bake for 12-14 minutes or until a wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean.  Cool pan on wire racks.
*If batter starta to spread when you scoop it out onto the baking sheets, chill it in the fridge for about 10 minutes.

Filling:

Caramel
1 cup firmly packed dark brown sugar
6 TBS heavy whipping cream
1/2 teaspoon salt
11 TBS butter, softened
1/2 cup confectioners' sugar

In small saucepan, combine brown sugar, cream and salt.  Bring to a boil over medium heat; cook for 1 1/2 minutes, stirring constantly.  Remove from hear, and cool completely.
In medium bowl beat cooled brown sugar mixture and butter at med-high speed with a mixer until smooth.  Gradually add confectioners' sugar, 1/4 cup at a time; beat at medium speed until smooth.
*I actually used more confectioners' sugar, b/c mine didn't have the right consistency at first.  It should be  spreadable, but not too runny.  Just be careful not to make it too thick and dry, either.  As with most things in life, it's about finding the right balance.

Peanut Butter
3/4 cup creamy peanut butter
1/2 cup softened butter
1tsp vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups confectioners' sugar

In medium bowl, beat peanut butter, butter,  and vanilla at medium speed with a mixer until smooth.  Gradually add confectioners' sugar, 1/4 cup at a time; beat until smooth.
*Once again, play around with the amount of sugar added.  This one actually came out too thick.  Maybe I was a bit heavy-handed with my scoops.

I served these to a group of my girlfriends who came over for a games' night on Friday, and although they all said they were tasty, no one went back for seconds.  I'm fairly certain it's due to the fact that these are pretty decadent.  I will probably make these again for the next family get together.  I have a ton of family members with sweet tooths (sweet teeth?) who would (hopefully) devour these.  I'm going to try to add a photo, too.  They remind of something you'd see in a fifties diner.