The Peeple’s Brownies

Tags

brownies, marshmallows, peeps

Along with some of my leftovers in the freezer, I have an abundance of photos from projects I didn’t get to post right away. So, back around Easter… yeah… EASTER, I raided the drug store candy aisles for cheap peeps. I bought some clearance easter candies and when a week passed without consumption, I thought I would attempt to make use out of them in a dessert.

At First I decided on cookies…but then I had more easter candy to get rid of and saved the other candy for the disaster cookies. So, staring at the peeps the first thing that came to mind were brownies. I sought my favorite brownie recipe and just added the peeps to the brownies.

Ingredients

10 tablespoons (1 1/4 sticks) unsalted butter
1 1/4 cups sugar
3/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder (natural or Dutch-process)
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
2 cold large eggs
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 1/2 packages Peeps

So, melt the butter and beat with the sugar on medium in a stand mixer for 1 minute. Set the mixer on low and slowly add in cocoa powder, salt, vanilla, eggs, and flour.

Once the ingredients are well blended, after about 5 minutes or so, turn off the mixer and fold in the peeps that have been cut up.

Place the batter in a square pan sprayed with non stick cooking spray. Bake for 20-25 minutes at 350*.

Its done when a toothpick inserted comes out clean.

After it has cooled, cut into 16 pieces.

The coworkers were recipients of the Peeple’s Brownies and from what I hear, were quite good. I seem to have lost my touch in the kitchen these days… must be all the packing I am doing.

Stay tuned for the worst batch of cookies I have ever seen.

McCormick Fudgy Peppermint Brownies

Tags

brownies, dessert, peppermint brownies, recipes

Another one of those awesome St. Patty’s Day posts that I had meant to post that were stuck in the limbo between my camera and my PC.

The lovely people at McCormick had reached out to me in honor of St. Patty’s Day with some fun recipes to try out.

Every year, I look forward to my coworkers cupcakes on St. Patrick’s Day. She makes chocolate cupcakes with guiness cake batter, baileys frosting and a whiskey chocolate ganache in the center. Its an overall drunken snack and the real kicker is the ganache. Now, that’s how I wanna take my whiskey from now on! In CAKE FORM!

Aside from those cupcakes, I had never had anything sweet for St. Patrick’s Day.

While looking through the recipes and the goods inside, I came upon a bottle of Peppermint Extract. My first thought were thin mint cookies and when I realized that time was NOT on my side, I opted to make the next best thing:

Peppermint Brownies.

And not the elaborate kind with mint green cream on top, but rustic, fudgy, pepperminty brownies.

My tried and true Brownie Recipe was the perfect vehicle for the peppermint extract.

Ingredients:

1 1/2 sticks butter

1 1/4 cups sugar

3/4 cup cocoa

1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract peppermint extract

2 eggs

1/2 cup flour

Preheat an oven to 325*.

In a stand mixer, mix together the melted butter, sugar, and cocoa on low speed for about 2 minutes. Or until the mixture is well combined (will look like wet sand). Next add in the extract, eggs and flour, one  at a time and mix well. The batter should be thick but free of lumps.

Bake in a non stick brownie pan (8 inches) for 20- 25 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean.

Allow the brownies to cool and slice into small, decadent, fudgy, pepperminty brownies.

The brownies were rich and delicious and satisfied my peppermint fiends just fine. I would definitely make these again but take the time to make the green frosting in order to differentiate from the regular old brownies from the not so regular.