Fish-eyes and gauntlets

I was really excited yesterday because I was finally going to be getting new glasses.  Mine broke about a year and a half ago and I have been living in contacts ever since then, which has resulted in a lot of burning, angry eyes from having contacts in for too long.  So, yesterday, I went to get my new, stylish, sweet glasses and I was pumped to be able to have some non-contact time at home. (Only at home--I look dorky in glasses, so I almost never wear them out of the house). 


I get them home, whip out my contacts, pop on my glasses and realize instantly the prescription is wrong.  Everything looks like it's filmed in that stupid fish-eye lens that music videos love so much. 

Balls.  So, I have to take them back today and wait to get the correct prescription in there.  I don't know what happened--I had an eye exam last year and my contact prescription was right.  I had a contacts AND glasses exam, so they both should have been right.  But, apparently not.  My glasses prescription came out waaaay too strong.  Sigh...more eye burning for the time being. 

In other news, work was beyond horrible last week.  You may have surmised that from my post about crying.  I wasn't just crying--I was full-on sobbing like a crazy nutcase.  I was also kicking my office wall (better not break that state property!) and throwing my stuff around in my office and letting out a litany of swear words that would have made a sailor blush.  

Who knew deliciousness was so simple??

I love chocolate lava cake. LOVE IT. There's nothing that I could love more as far as desserts go. So delicious... But I always thought that it would be so complicated to make. Boy, was I wrong! Here's the recipe for them and who knew it was only 5 ingredients?!


Chocolate Lava Cake:
 4 oz bittersweet chocolate, finely chopped
4 oz (one stick) of butter
3 eggs
1/4 c. flour
3/4 c. sugar
cocoa powder


Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Grease 4 large ramekins and "flour" them w/ the cocoa powder.  Melt the chocolate and butter together in the microwave (watch carefully!) or a double boiler. Whisk eggs, sugar, and flour until just blended.  


Next (this is the trickiest part), gradually add a little bit of the hot chocolate/butter mix to the egg mix and whisk briskly. It is really important to tempter the egg mixture slowly this way--if you do this step too fast or toss too much of the chocolate into the eggs, then the heat of the chocolate will cook the eggs and you'll get scrambled eggs. So add a few tablespoons of the chocolate and whisk it in, then repeat, two or three times. Then the eggs should be up to the same temp and you can just add the rest of the chocolate mix in and whisk it all together. 


Once it's all mixed, pour into the ramekins. Put on a cookie sheet. Bake 10-12 minutes--the sides should be firm-ish and the tops should look done, but a toothpick in the center should NOT come out clean (otherwise you have no lava).  The cook time is a bit flexible. Depending on how lava-y you like it, you can cook it longer or shorter. I would recommend keeping an eye on it around the twelve minute mark and go a minute at a time. They will continue to cook for a few minutes after you take them out of the oven, so keep that in mind. They might look a little too undercooked, but then you let them sit and they are good to go after a few minutes. 


Serve warm for most deliciousness. Mmmm...