Surviving Narcissism Exploring life after marriage to a narcissist. Learning and thriving by sharing our story. – Jesse Blayne

So it’s one o’clock in the morning and I am sitting in front of my laptop, in my cat hair covered robe, with an Ocean Breeze scented candle burning, eating the best fudgy brownie cookies I’ve ever tasted.

I’m not really a scented candle person.  I get tired of the same  smell by the time the candle burns down.  But, I’m on a very tight budget, and I wanted something, in addition to coffee and chocolate, to cheer me up.  So we went to Pier 1 and I picked out some candles – Ocean Breeze, Patchouli (to remind me of my college days), Asian something or other, Vanilla and yada yada, and one other.  I picture these folks in lab coats, in some white room full of beakers over burners with little flames mixing scents and one of them actually thinks they have put together the right chemicals to smell like an Ocean Breeze?  I also bought this little round ceramic ball with my lucky number on it.  It can’t hurt.  Between the candles and the number four, and my cooperation with the rest of the universe, I’m sure to get my train headed in the right direction again.  Maybe.

Jenny came in my bed again and then, as usual, I couldn’t get back to sleep.  My head fills with thoughts of John.  How is it that some people (mostly men) are so good at turning their brains off?  I try to make myself think of things that I don’t like about him, but since that’s fruitless, I switched to thinking about Phyllis and Annie and this blog.  Phyllis sent a comment that I want to write about, so I figured now is as good a time as any.  Only I came out to write about her comment, and grabbed a cookie, and after one bite, I forgot what I was going to write, so I’ll share this recipe with you all instead.  I changed the name of these cookies.  Will was craving some kind of dark, fudgy brownie/cookie combo (he’s his mother’s son) and we discovered this recipe and tweaked it a bit.  I’m calling them Survivor Crownies because we all deserve a crown for surviving, and because the ‘c’ is for cookies and the ‘rownies’ is for ….    Nevermind.  I think you get it.

Survivor Crownies

• 2/3 C butter – softened
• 1 1/2 C brown sugar – packed (have you ever come across a recipe where the brown sugar isn’t packed?)
• 1 T vanilla – it seems like a lot, but it’s right
• 2 eggs – room temperature
• 1 1/2 C flour
• 1/3 C cocoa powder
• 1/2 t salt
• 1/4 t soda
• 1 1/2 C semi-sweet chocolate chips

Heat the oven to 375 degrees.  (Isn’t there a key on the keyboard for the degrees symbol?)  You don’t have to get out the heavy Kitchen Aid mixer for this.  Just cream the butter and brown sugar with a wooden spoon.  Add the vanilla and eggs.  Measure the flour, cocoa powder, salt and soda on to a piece of waxed paper and gently stir them together with a whisk.  (By using the waxed paper, you won’t dirty another bowl.  I hate doing dishes.)  Stir the dry stuff into the wet stuff until you don’t see any dry flour.  Add the chocolate chips.  Drop the dough by the teaspoon full onto an ungreased cookie sheet.  I took a narrow rubber spatula to scrape the batter off the spoon.  I know I dirtied another utensil, but I figured that was better than continually licking my fingers.  Bake them for between 6 and 7 minutes.  Take them out when they are still a little shiny in the center.  Slightly under-baked is better because then they will be more like a fudgy brownie in the center.

Jenny likes the dough better than the cookies.  Will takes two cookies and spreads vanilla frosting between.  That is way too sweet for me.  The Crownies are very rich, so I can’t really get carried away by having more than 1 or 2.  I’m thinking they would be perfect to pack in case I end up on the roof again.  So far my pack includes Survivor Crownies, a thermos of hot coffee (Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Coffee is my fav), a cheap bottle of cabernet and a bag of Lay’s Potato Chips.  What would you pack?

p.s.  I blew out the candle right after I took the picture.  Ocean Breeze does not go with chocolate.

p.p.s.  Phyllis, I’ll write about your comment tomorrow.