*where are my dalmations?

Dear readers, you are witnesses to history. Today marks my 101st post, and as such is to be entirely concerned with 101 Cookbooks. Because I totally planned it, as opposed to stumbling upon the coincidence and figuring it was better to call that momentous than to admit that I overlooked that yesterday's post was my 100th, which it would have made far more sense to commemorate.

I'm a PLANNER, I tell you.

Anyhoodle. Big thanks to all of you—the tens and tens of you who return to read my ramblings every day and purport to be upset when I don't post. I love you all, you big liars.

The Js are at the haunted house, an endeavor I choose not to be a part of only because I have a moral objection to people jumping out of dark corners at me. It has nothing in the least to do with my being a huge, debilitating wuss.

While those gold-medal parents drag their wee children through a chamber of horrors, I put my housewife hat on: I made a pie. (It wasn't so much that I put any sort of hat on—this wonky head of mine can't support a hat of any kind without making me look like a Cabbage Patch Kid—as it was that JLB begged, pleaded, and otherwise coerced me into making a pie. It was baking under duress. She even plied me with French fries. She is SO MEAN.)

Tears on my keyboard, friends.

But I plucked up some courage and gathered some in-greeds: graham crackers, honey, silken tofu, cream cheese, chocolate chips, vanilla, butter, and an egg.

This was really an exercise in using up silken tofu, as a recent recipe I made at JLB's called for 4 ounces. She came home from the grocery store with 32. JLB is dog lover, fire maker, and ear lender, but she is not math major.



Graham crackers were smushed with a rolling pin, then put into the processor with melted butter and honey.



Heidi (of 101 Cookbooks) recommends the processor method for getting a uniform grind on the crackers, and it really does make a difference. People of the world, do not fear the Cuisinart—it is your friend.

Then those golden crumbs get pressed into a pie plate to form a lovely crust.



Then I melted the chocolate chips over a tiny (adorable!) makeshift double boiler.



Remaining ingredients—tofu, cream cheese, egg, vanilla, and melted chocolate. Hmm. App ... e ... tizing?



A quick swirl in the mixer, and into the prepared crust.



It goes in the oven at 350 for 30 minutes. In the immortal words of Big Bro's ex-girlfriend, who used to tell endless, inappropriate, unfunny, pointless, no-end-in-sight stories: TA-DA!



It's chillin' in the fridge now, the perfect prize for AJ, who just came in the door and announced she MADE IT THROUGH THE ENTIRE HAUNTED HOUSE FOR THE FIRST. TIME. EVER. She has coolness I have not managed to accumulate myself in the two decades longer than her that I have been alive. Halloween is sadistic.

Galvanized by my possible success (there were some suspicious cream cheesy lumps I'm not sure about), I decided to put more tofu in an appetizer: baked artichoke dip.

This is probably the ideal moment to mention that I am having a love affair with 101 Cookbooks. It's a new relationship, and I don't want to jinx it, but so far we're very happy together.

I whisked together fat-free plain yogurt, cayenne, parmesan, and salt.



Then I blended the artichoke hearts, tofu, and garlic, and combined it with the yogurt mixture.



Topped with more parmesan, and baked at 350 for 45 minutes.



Deliciousness. AND good for you. It will absolutely replace any existing artichoke dip you have in your repertoire.

If it hadn't had garlic in it, we could have served it to L and J on their date. But we later discovered them in bed together. Dirty pups.



In other news, it seems the Js followed a crowd of boys through the haunted house who were roughly two to three years older than the soon-to-be-11 EJ. Number of times she has started a story with "Oh, and those boys ... ": approximately 101.