Sweet Cravings and Some Inspiration

For the past few weeks (okay, maybe decades) I've been having some sweet cravings that need to be satisfied. Along with needing to fulfill an insatiable need for red meat I am also wanting sweets. Granted, I have kept the binging to a minimum, and, thankfully, I am able to satisfy the cravings without overindulging in any single sitting for the most part, but nonetheless still keep wanting some sweets. Sunday's night's dinner was an example of such a day where I wanted the sweet tastes to keep coming.

Dinner was a recreation from the meal I had at McCormick and Schmick's a few weekends ago. The seabass I ate that night was fantastic and it inspired to me to attempt to recreate it at home. I was fairly certain I had the miso broth flavoring nailed, and sure enough, I got it. Small victory for my "refined" palate identifying all of the flavors! Miso paste (of course), green onion, ginger, shittake mushroom, and sugar. I didn't make mine quite as sweet as the one I had at McCormick and Schmick's but that flavor was spot on otherwise. So I pan grilled the seabass, sauteed some veggies in toasted sesame oil, and put everything on top of some udon noodles. I am still humming over the buttery taste of the seabass marinated in the sweet miso broth. It was a match made in heaven!

From the saltiness of the miso broth my husband and I both craved something sweet to balance it out. I hadn't planned on doing dessert because the dinner was so substantial, so I got a little creative. Earlier in the week I found a dark chocolate peanut butter while shopping at Whole Foods and wanted to use it in a sweet application. The PB itself is surprisingly not sweet, but does have a mild chocolate flavoring too it. One of my favorite things to do with peanut butter is to warm it up so it's melty and buttery and this particular peanut butter needed something done to it. So I melted it, smeared it on some warm toasted bread, and sprinkled it with honey and a little bit of brown sugar. It was soooooo good! As you can see, I took a bite of it first to make sure it was as good as I thought it would be before taking a picture!

Now I just need the sweet cravings to start subsiding so I can get back to eating a little healthier. Still struggling on rekicking the caffeine habit (darn you Starbucks!), but I'm sure by the end of the week I will make some progress. I would have to imagine the sweet cravings will go away once I detox myself from the caffeine again. Perhaps I will switch to black coffee... that should get me started in the right direction. Still get the caffeine for energy but without the sugar. Hmmm, I will have to try that method out.