SnB Extravaganza

It was a festive night at SnB tonight, with four birthdays to celebrate. Though Debbie and Gwen didn’t show up – naughty grrrls! We decided to draw names and give out their gifts. No, just kidding of course. But Margene and Anne had to hire pack mules to haul out their booty.

And of course, there was more food than you can believe. And Susan was the only one who brought something healthy – a nice plate of fruit. The rest of us all went for fat and sugar galore.*

Mim brought her copy of “The Natural Knitter” for us all to view and fondle (see her review on her blog). Eliza brought the cutest little baby cardigan – scroll down her post for “Ramona”. I want one of these in my size. Seriously.

And shhhhh… don’t tell anyone, but I heard a rumor that Blogless Karen will soon be losing the “Blogless”.

*Fat and Sugar Galore:

St Louis Gooey Bars
13×9 pan, or two 8″ square pans

1 box Golden Pound Cake mix
4 eggs
1 (8-oz) package cream cheese
1 ½ sticks melted butter (3/4 cup)
3 1/4 cup powdered sugar, divided

Preheat oven to 350F. Stir together the pound cake mix, melted butter, and two of the eggs until smooth. Pour into a 13″ x 9″ baking pan (or two 8″ square pans). Beat cream cheese, 3 cups of the powdered sugar, and the remaining 2 eggs until smooth. Pour on top of cake mix in pan. Bake for 35 minutes, or until edges begin to turn light brown. Do not overbake! When cake is partly cooled, sprinkle remaining 1/4 cup powdered sugar on top. Serve in small squares – it’s VERY rich.

If you can’t find pound cake mix (it seems to be a hard item to find these days, at least in Salt Lake City), you can probably use plain yellow cake mix, but I’d suggest not using the kind with pudding in the mix.

Harvest Pumpkin Bread
(Hey, it’s got pumpkin in it. Doesn’t that make it healthy?)

3 1/2 cups flour
2 tsp soda
1 tsp salt
1 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp ginger
1/2 tsp ground cloves
2 tsp cinnamon
2 cups sugar
1 cup margarine
4 eggs
1 1/2 cups chocolate chips (12 oz pkg)
1 1/2 cups chopped walnuts
1 (29-oz) can Libbby’s pumpkin (without spices)

Cream together sugar and margarine. Add eggs and spices. Alternate adding pumpkin and flour. Add chocolate chips and nuts. Makes 2 loaves. Bake at 350F for 60-70 minutes.