Every week we round up our favorite good eats from our friends at Serious Eats. This week there's cute chocolate bowls made from balloons, plus the Girlfriend-On-Vacation Food Pyramid, pigs' ears, and a taste test of cheap (but good) olive oils.
• Serious Chocolate: Balloon Bowls (Not a Hoax) - Make cute little chocolate bowls with nothing more than some meltable chocolate and a cheap balloon.
• The Nasty Bits: Crisp Fried Pig's Ears - Just like pancetta, apparently.
• Girlfriend-On-Vacation Food Pyramid - What your boyfriend eats when you're not around. One guess, anyway.
• Dinner Tonight: Okra Curry - Give okra a little love!
• Taste Test: Cheap But Good Olive Oils - Looking for some cheapish but still good olive oils? Start here.
Previous Good Eats: Duck Tongues and Pumpkin Gooey Butter Cakes
(Image: Melody Kramer/Serious Eats)
How to Make Easy 3-Ingredient Energy Bars at Home
How to Make Fresh Pasta Dough in the Food Processor
Good Food to Share 
The Big Book of Small, Cool Spaces 
Apartment Therapy Presents 
The Eight-Step Home Cure 
TW Salt Mill by Wil...
Small Cool Lessons: Discovering Small Space Design Ideas That Really Work
Marisa and Peter's Playfully Eclectic Home
I just thought of something...can you believe blue m&ms weren't always around??
I hear you, syrupandhoney. I miss tan m&ms.
Whatever you do, use water and do not use air to inflate the balloon. Speaking from personal experience: Hot chocolate air trapped in balloon = exploding chocolate covered balloon. I can't tell you how long it took to find all the tiny bits of chocolate that traveled to the most remote corners of the kitchen courtesy of the balloon.
To get smooth tops on the bowls (which I've always done with air-filled balloons, never had one explode before, hope it stays that way) put a cookie sheet in the oven to get it hot, hold the bowl upside down over it and rub the edges of the bowl on it to melt them smooth. You can also pipe little handles on waxed paper and attach them with a bit more chocolate to make chocolate tea cups.
@sdblondie - Ha, I was just going to reference the blog on "Your Messiest Kitchen Accident"! I recall someone discussing the finer points of cleaning up after a "chocolate balloon bowl".
Are the bowls ever a problem for people with latex allergies?