Lovelihood

I decided to get a little fancy with the marshmallows this year. Which gives me license to make them half the size as previous years' and package them in smaller batches. So there are the peppermint candy-topped ones (which, frankly, came out odd-looking), and then these babies, painted with a bit of melted chocolate and sprinkled with crushed graham crackers. A perfect, no-fuss s'more. www.lovelihood.com

For the past week, I've been parading through the kitchen all manner of baked and otherwise sweet goods, off limits to The Boy both for their Christmas giftiness and their highly allergenic qualities. He has expressed his unhappiness. Today's marshmallow preparations yielded a beaterful of the good stuff, sticky and gooey enough to satisfy this treat-deprived rock star.

A by-product of those s'mores cupcakes was a half-mixing-bowl batch of unformed marshmallow that, instead of folding into a pan to set and cube, I piped into albino snakes that I later snipped into hot-cocoa appropriate nubbins. Perfect for storing in mason jars until an appropriate hot-cocoa occasion arises.

From-scratch marshmallows and vegan chocolate cake. Went with a store-bought graham cracker, crushed with some margarine, although, I'm thinking next time I might just put my graham cracker recipe for the crusty bottoms. www.lovelihood.com

Graham cracker crust, chocolate cake and a torched marshmallow top. Two bites of gooey love, complete with that aroma of burnt sugar. www.lovelihood.com

Torched to crispy golden perfection. Non-dairy, non-eggy to satisfy our allergenic needs, but the marshmallow's gelatine make this a vegan no-no. www.lovelihood.com

Gave the piped marshmallow topping a couple hours to set before subjecting them to the torch. www.lovelihood.com