For my 100th post, a letter

Dear Mom -

Do you remember when you baked Peeps for us last Easter? Did you place them on a rack on the pan? For some odd reason, that's what I remembered this year when I baked my own Peeps.

See, here they are, ready for the oven. (I had to sample one line of the purple bunnies to be sure they were of high enough quality to perform. I learned that I don't like raw Peeps - only frozen or baked Peeps for me.)



Fast forward 150-200 degrees and about 4-6 hours. This is the mess I made as I tried to re-create the perfect Peep.





They baked into and around the racks that I had so carefully placed on the pan to ensure even heat distribution. They were still crunchy, chewy, sugary, and yummy after I pried them off the rack with a crow bar (almost), but they no longer looked like Peeps, just a bunch of mangled sugar.

I noticed also, that after I had removed them from the oven and had eaten a few crunchy Peeps, the humidity began to affect them. The edges became soft and gummy while the centers stayed crispy. Interesting dynamic I found.

The morals of the story are:
1 - Line the pan with parchment paper, not metal racks when cooking Peeps.
2 - Cook them long enough to remove every last molecule of moisture for best results.
3 - Eat them fast so they don't get all soggy.
4 - Enlist help because eating three packages of Peeps by yourself is not good for the tummy or the waistline.