Hurricane Microwave Smores

When the talk of hurricane Irene actually impacting New York City reached my ears a couple of weeks ago, I immediately thought camping.  Something about braving the elements while barricading yourself in your home feels kind of like indoor camping (my kind of camping).  And you can't go camping without smores.

So while everyone else was cleaning out the bread and canned goods aisles at my nearby grocery store, I stocked up on graham crackers, marshmallows and Hershey's chocolate (surprisingly, the woman behind me in line also had Hershey's and marshmallows in her basket, which means I'm not that off with the whole camping thing).

Now I didn't have an indoor campfire.  I don't even have a gas stove.  So to make my hurricane smores, I had to rely on the microwave.  Now before you cringe at the thought, let me show you the results.

Now you could choose to follow the recipe on the back of the marshmallow bag for microwave smores, or you can do it my (better) way.  

For awhile back in high school, I worked at a chocolate store.  One of the items we sold was a smore made in the microwave.  Instead of sandwiching the marshmallow and chocolate between the grahams, we made an all marshmallow sandwich and then coated the outside with chocolate (it was a chocolate store after all).  I feel like this makes for a more fun presentation, so I used it in my hurricane smores.

To make these delicious treats, I split one full graham cracker sheet in half.  Then I place HALF (yes half) a marshmallow on one cracker.  A full marshmallow is just too much and ultimately makes for a messy smore (which I realize some will argue is the point of a smore, but I beg to differ).

Next, microwave the marshmallow and cracker on a microwave-safe plate for 10-15 seconds.  The marshmallow will puff up.

Place the graham crackers on top of each other, sandwiching the marshmallow between.

Melt down the Hershey's chocolate in the microwave (I usually use about 30 sec increments, stirring in between, until it's completely melted).  Luckily, Hershey's chocolate has enough preservatives and fillers that you really don't have to worry about tempering (I've never seen anything dipped in Hershey's chocolate bloom).

Normally, I would completely submerge the graham sandwich in the chocolate, but I wanted to leave the edge exposed in the photo so the marshmallow was visible.  I also sprinkled the chocolate with some rainbow non-pareils to give it a little something extra.

The hurricane ultimately wasn't such a big deal in Manhattan, but I still enjoyed my hurricane smores.

Daily Monku:  During my indoor camping experience that was Hurricane Irene, I watched a lot of movies including Die Hard: With a Vengence (aka Die Hard 3).  And all I can say is, I wish I lived in the world where Alan Rickman and Jeremy Irons are brothers (albeit German terrorist brothers).  I think that world's gotta be a lot cooler than this one.  This isn't really a monku, but I don't care.