Tuesday, September 8, 2009

Peanut Butter Brownies

Jen requested the recipe for these so I'm sharing it. I can't say they are the best culinary treat but they were tasty enough for us to be down to 1/2 a brownie as I'm writing right now. D wanted chocolate cake with peanut butter frosting for his birthday but I had a box of brownie mix I wanted to use up so I was improvising.

I took a box of brownie mix and added on the top a peanut butter cheesecake mixture. (Beat 6 ounces cream cheese, add 1/3 cup peanut butter, 1/4 cup white sugar, 1 egg, and 2 T. milk.) I used a pan that was a bit smaller than 9 x 13 so the brownies would be thicker. My original goal was to swirl the cream cheese mixture through the brownies. But for some reason, it wouldn't swirl. It just sat on top of the brownie batter. So if I did these again, I would probably use half the brownie batter, top it with the cream cheese mixture, and then the remaining brownie batter. I did top them with a chocolate frosting but they turned out really sweet and chocolatey, almost too much so I'll spare you the frosting recipe. I think some chopped up Reese's Peanut Butter Cups would be a great topping to add before you baked the brownies. (Or to put on right after you took them out of the oven so that the chocolate would melt against the warm brownies and then set up again once they cooled.)