Childhood Memories & Love for Some Good Old Peanut Butter

I am eating the most delicious panini! Bet you've never thought of this combination, let alone pressing it in a panini-maker...It's peanut butter...on Wonderbread...double decker! Yummm :)

Yes, I know, you're thinking that I'm the type of person who loves to eat things like paninis made with chicken, freshly roasted red peppers, pesto, pine nuts, and fontina cheese...or coq au vin...or roasted garlic and tomato pasta with ooey-gooey fresh mozzarella...so what on earth am I doing eating a peanut butter sandwich? Well, I'm low on groceries!

It takes me back too, though. I think what's gotten me so far from everyday sweets like peanut butter, Little Debbie snacks, and candy is probably the fact that I ate these things every...single...day since I was probably physically able to! No exaggeration, every year since elementary school, my lunch consisted of at least a peanut butter sandwich and a package of swiss cake rolls (eaten in the intricate manner of first peeling off the outer layer of chocolate, then unrolling the entire treat, scraping off and eating the frosting, and finally eating the sheet of chocolate cake. It's the only way!). My body clearly could only tolerate so many hundreds of pounds of sugar before deciding our relationship had to end, haha.

A peanut butter sandwich on white bread, though, was really my favorite meal. In third grade, I discovered the best way to eat it too. My favorite teacher of all time, Mr. Noble, would walk around the cafeteria, jokingly harassing us about eating our sandwiches before our dessert. I usually went for my dessert first (of course!), so one day, when he got to my table before I'd started my sandwich, I quickly hid it (inside the sealed plastic sandwich bag, I promise) beneath me. Yes...I sat on it. And when I finally ate that sandwich...oh...my god! It was so much better than ever before! Something about the pressed white bread just took it to a new level. Obviously I was onto something considering the common use of panini makers today!

At home, when I was much younger, we had a sandwich maker, which is a lot like a panini maker, but I think, when the lid was lowered, it cut the sandwich in half (into triangles) and the border sealed. Then, when you bit into your sandwich, the flattened border was super crisp and the melted filling oozed out all over the place. It was my absolute favorite, possibly my brother's too. I mean, how can you top a freshly pressed, warm, peanut butter sandwich?

I haven't eaten anything like that in years, though! Since, like I said, we're running low on groceries, I figured I'd just have myself a peanut butter sandwich (double decker, since I can fit a bit more in than I used to), but then I thought "Ooooh, grilled peanut butter," which lead to "Oooooooh, PRESSED peanut butter!" It really did take me back. I should have taken a photo of the oozy warm peanut butter, but I devoured it too quickly. Next is dessert: sesame cookies with dark chocolate spread :) Which reminds me that I have yet to post the cookie recipe and promise to do it this weekend!