Sep. 10, 2008 - Issue #673: Sex in the City 2008
Some guilty sex
Sex in a Pan comes with strings attached
Years ago, back in the days when I had utter disregard for the substances I was burdening my system with, I would have actually been crazy enough to eat such a concoction (had it actually even remotely appealed to me). But it didn’t. Not even when my closest, dearest friend raved endlessly about how absolutely amazing it was. And it still doesn’t appeal. At all. Just a quick look at the ingredient list sends shivers up my spine. Cool Whip and Jell-o Instant Pudding—what could be so great about that?
Well, it was time to find out. I did a quick internet search and found multiple variations of the recipe, all with their own individual quirks. I narrowed it down to the one I thought would be the least offensive (cherry pie filling in anything is not a good thing) and had to go shopping—my cupboards were shockingly lacking in the highly processed, food-like product department.
At the grocery store I grabbed my little hand basket and went in search of the ingredients. Graham wafer crumbs and cream cheese (things I actually use on a semi-regular basis) were easy enough to find, but the Jell-o Instant Pudding required a bit more thought—it didn’t fit any of the categories so nicely identified on the signs above the aisles. But my biggest challenge proved to be the Cool Whip. Where would it be if not in the refrigerated dairy section, and what food group is it anyway? Stumped, I flagged down a wandering employee who directed me to the oh-so-obvious freezer section. There I yanked open the big glass door and grabbed a large plastic tub of the stuff.
I knew I shouldn’t have but I just couldn’t resist inspecting the ingredient list and, much to my dismay, it was even worse than I had anticipated: water, corn syrup, hydrogenated coconut and palm kernel oils, high fructose corn syrup, sodium caseinate, natural and artificial flavourings, xanthan and guar gums, polysorbate 60, sorbitan monostearate and beta carotene. Oh dear. I just couldn’t do it. Back into the freezer case it went and over to the dairy case I went.
I decided to use the real stuff instead—whipped cream. It probably wouldn’t hold its shape quite as well as the artificial goop, and the end result might not look quite so neat and tidy, but it would taste so much better—if the instant pudding didn’t completely overwhelm it and ruin the dessert all by itself.
I hauled my assorted groceries home and tackled the base layer first, essentially a graham wafer crust kicked up a notch by the addition of ground pecans. It was quick and simple to put together—melt the butter, stir it together with the pecans and graham wafer crumbs, pack it into a 13 x 9 inch pan and bake it for about 13 minutes at 350°.
At this point one of my daughters strolled through the kitchen and asked what I was making.
“A gourmet dessert,” I announced confidently.
After noticing the Jell-O packs on the counter, she came back with her wise and wordly response: “Ewwww—how could a gourmet dessert be made with cheap pudding?” Especially sharp considering most kids her age would happily devour sugar in any form at every opportunity.
Deflated but not defeated, I persevered. After all, with a name like “Sex in a Pan,” it had to be good, didn’t it?
The next step was a bit more complicated than the first one, but only because I had to dig out my mixer and plug it in. Beat the cream cheese, add the icing sugar and then stir in the Cool Whip—except I didn’t have Cool Whip.
That meant I had to do a little bit of extra work—I actually had to whip the cream I bought instead of simply plopping in a mound of Cool Whip. So I dumped the cream in a bowl and turned on my mixer. I did have to add a bit of vanilla and a couple of spoonfuls of icing sugar but, other than that, it was quick and painless.
So once I had whipped cream, I folded about half of it into the cream cheese mixture (the recipe said to fold in half of the Cool Whip). Then I spread that over the graham wafer crust and made the pudding.
All that involved was dumping 1 1/2 cups of milk into a bowl, adding the pudding mix and then beating it for a minute or two. So I made the vanilla (a rather gummy, foreboding entity), spread that over the cream cheese mixture and then made the chocolate pudding. I didn’t even bother washing the bowl or beaters between puddings—bonus. Then I spread the chocolate pudding over the vanilla and slathered the rest of the whipped cream over that.
The final step was to sprinkle it with grated chocolate. My oh-so-lovely Callebaut stash stayed neatly tucked away in my cupboard for a more worthy occasion, but I did grate a lovely dark chocolate Lindt bar. After liberally scattering that over the top, I tucked the whole thing away in the fridge for the flavours to meld and mingle together.
Time for the taste test. It came out of the pan as a rather wiggly, wobbly mass. And it smelled sweet—very, very sweet. And it tasted sweet—very, very sweet. And kind of artificial, thanks to the Jell-o pudding. It was actually okay though, and even my skeptical daughter deemed it “pretty good”—but definitely not gourmet.
I forced my husband to lug the rest of the pan to work with him so I could get some impartial, unbiased opinions (unfortunately, I couldn’t seem to move past the Jell-o). Too sweet, nice and light, yummy and not too sweet, and tiramisu-ish were some of the comments. But sex in a pan? Not so much. V
(from Kitchenlink.com)
1/2 cups butter; melted
1 cup pecans; chopped
1 1/2 cups graham wafer crumbs
8 oz cream cheese
1 tub Cool Whip; divided, thawed
1 pkg chocolate instant pudding
1 pkg vanilla instant pudding
3 cups milk
Grated chocolate
1 cup icing sugar
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