Peanut Butter Brownies

Two weekends in a row of baking and I have to say I feel really charged! I also watched Moana, caught up to Riverdale and fit in an early morning walk with my dad. All in all, I'd say I had a pretty amazing weekend. Work is pretty full on, but relatively OK compared to some busier periods we've had in the past two years.

Anyway, funny thing is... I started baking again when I definitely need to cut back and get fit again. I kind of let myself go in the past two years, and am paying for it with my slipped disc. So maybe I should feature some healthy, clean eating type recipes on here, huh? We'll see... it's good enough I'm getting round to doing this. I always told myself it's all about self discipline - the health, managing my work, etc - but it's really a lot easier to say than do.

Anyway, here's a really quick recipe that will give you a BIG payoff even if you only allow yourself half a bite.

Peanut Butter Brownies

• 250g dark chocolate
• 250g butter
• 2 cups light brown sugar
• 3 eggs
• 1 cup all purpose flour
• 1/3 cup cocoa powder
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1/4 cup creamy peanut butter

1. Preheat the oven to 175C, and line an 8x8 inch baking tin
2. Melt the chocolate and butter in a double boiler, then remove from the heat and beat in the sugar. Add the eggs one at a time and beat well after each addition.
3. Sift in the flour, cocoa powder and baking powder and fold until just combined. Pour the batter in the tin, then drop the peanut butter evenly across the surface. Swirl the peanut butter around with a butter knife, then bake for 60 minutes

Reese's Peanut Buttercup Cupcakes

As we all know by now, I'm a fan of putting things in other things (lol...that's... what... she said? I don't know. There's a joke here). My brother wants me to create an Inception series, and while I like this idea, I have to brainstorm to get some inspiration for this.

I had a Reese's Peanut Buttercup for the first time recently, and I thought "... I'm sure I could make this a full sized dessert." Even then I knew that it had probably already been done, cause there's nothing original about pairing chocolate and peanut butter, but so what, eh?

My favourite cupcake shop is Bisou, in KLCC, and my favourite cupcake from there was the Love Me Tender, which is chocolate with peanut butter frosting. However, they stopped selling this a couple of months back, and I've had a void ever since.

Until the Reesepiration! No? Okay, we'll forget I ever said that word. For a moment, it sounded cool in my head.

Gaze upon my frosting, ye mighty, and despair!

The recipe is simple enough, and I admit that I cheated here! Was rushing to meet my cousins at their place for lunch, and considering I slept in, I took the easy way out and used cake mix. Whoops. Whatever.

Chocolate Cupcake

• 1 box devils food cake mix
• 3 whole eggs
• 1 1/2 cups water
• 1/2 cup butter, melted
• 3-4 generous scoops of chocolate ice-cream, softened
• Reese's peanut buttercups (in hindsight, I should have used mini cups...)

1. Preheat oven at 180 degrees
2. Combine cake mix, water and butter
3. Beat in eggs one at a time
4. Mix in ice-cream
5. Drop a Reese's peanut buttercup at the bottom of each cupcake liner, and pour batter on top. Fill to about 3/4 of the lining.
6. Bake for 10-20 minutes at 180 degrees Celsius

Peanut Butter Frosting

• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 1 cup creamy (Skippy, omnomnom) peanut butter
• 3 tbsp milk, or as needed
• 2 cups of sifted icing sugar

1. Cream butter and peanut butter until fluffy
2. Incorporate sugar in 1/2 cup at a time, beat for 2-3 minutes after each addition
3. Add milk when it starts to get thick, and stop when you have your desired consistency

I could eat ten of these!

x Nabs