May 6, 2020
Tomorrow is Kevin’s birthday. To celebrate, I have been making him some of his favorite foods throughout the week for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Like many of the occasions during the last few months, we have been celebrating together indoors. Kevin’s idea of the perfect birthday is one where he gets to relax at home, enjoy some good food, and catch up on gaming. This year, his birthday landed on a week day. This means he will likely be glued to his work laptop for the entire day. I had already anticipated the upcoming busy week and prepared celebratory treats all week long. Sunday brunch included some roasted cauliflower tossed in an orange soy glaze, a rustic blueberry galette, toasted bread with butter, raspberry kale smoothies, and confetti pistachio chocolate balls. Sunday dinner featured sausage, mushroom, and arugula pizza, homemade granola, and confetti shakes. Monday dinner included more confetti pistachio chocolate balls, and a whole roasted chicken. I saved the bones from the roasted chicken to make a concentrated stock for chicken noodle soup the following day. Tuesday dinner featured a confetti version of my sweet bread and confetti waffles. Today, we enjoyed some calzones using leftover pizza dough,, from Sunday dinner and of course more confetti pistachio chocolate balls. By this point of the week, I’m all confetti-ed out.
My confetti pistachio chocolate balls were so good, I just had to share the recipe. Kevin isn’t huge on cakes or heavy desserts, so confetti pistachio chocolate balls were the perfect birthday treat for him. As we were enjoying all of the celebratory treats this week, we reminisced on all of the adventures we’ve had over the years. We’ve explored the warm tropics of several Southeast Asian countries, spent countless holidays in New York visiting my family, jetted to Hong Kong every other year to visit his family, cruised through the Bahamas for our mini-moon, flew to Italy to celebrate our honeymoon, and traveled to see some of the best parts of the United States. Although we probably won’t be able to travel in the immediate future with everything going on in the world, we still made some tentative plans to see other parts of the world as soon as we can. In the meantime, we will just participate in virtual tours to see some of the best sites throughout the world.
For the confetti pistachio chocolate dessert balls:
· 2-3 ounces pistachios, shells removed
· 2-3 ounces semisweet chocolate chips
· 1 tablespoon cocoa powder
· ¼ cup rainbow sprinkles
Directions:
1) In a food processor, pulse the pistachios, chocolate chips, and cocoa powder for about 1-2 minutes. Use a spatula to stir the mixture occasionally between pulses for even blending.
2) Use your hands to roll the mixture into about ½-inch to 1-inch balls. Roll the pistachio chocolate dessert balls in rainbow sprinkles.
Takeaways: For another variation of these chocolate dessert balls, swap out the semisweet chocolate chips and cocoa powder and replace with 2-3 ounces of white chocolate chips. Blend for 1-2 minutes and enjoy the most delicious and festive confetti pistachio white chocolate balls.
