351: Thick Mint Brownies

We had another cookie exchange party this year, and luckily for me, our friend Amanda hosted it at her house. I’m not a big fan of mint, but since other people would eat them I decided to make Thick Mint Brownies to take to it. The picture on the website looked pretty good, and I thought it would be fun to make.

First, you make a mint filling layer of powdered sugar, butter and shortening, peppermint extract (2 teaspoons worth), flour, and cream. I used my electric mixer to mix all the ingredients together. On plastic wrap on the bottom of a 9×13 pan, I patted the mixture into an 8×12 rectangle. [As a side note, I measured all of my 9×13 pans, and they all are 9×13 at the top but narrow to 8×12 (or 8.5×12.5 inches) at the bottom. It makes sense, but I really didn’t expect that for some reason.] I covered the filling and put it, pan and all, into the fridge to chill until I made the brownies, 8 hours later.

The brownie batter was very dark. I melted butter in the microwave and added the brown sugar. I added cocoa, salt, baking powder, and vanilla, and then mixed in the eggs. After adding chocolate chips, I poured half of the batter into a greased 9×13 pan. I slid the mint layer onto the bottom brownie layer, and topped it with the rest of the brownie batter. I spread the brownie batter to the edges and tried to pat some of it over the edges of the mint filling. I decided to skip the ganache because it seemed like overkill.

As you can see, these brownies didn’t turn out quite as expected. I had to bake them about 55 minutes before a toothpick came out clean, instead of the 40 minutes that they should have been baked. Also, the filling started overflowing sometime before the 40 minutes was up. Not only did it bubble up from the pan – it flowed onto the bottom of my oven. Very disappointing. With all of the extra baking, the edges burnt. I was able to cut the center brownies out and they were edible enough. Alex enjoyed the center ones, and they were apparently pretty tasty. They were definitely very minty. I think the chocolate chips in this recipe were too much.

It’s possible that I should have chilled the mint layer longer. The recipe said to chill overnight, which I usually interpret to be 8 hours – as in, I make the mint layer at night and decide to bake the brownies in morning when I wake up. However, it might work better if I chilled it for 24 hours. Also, I should have sealed the brownie batter around the edges of the mint layer by patting it down well along the sides to make sure there aren’t air bubbles trapped there. Maybe the recipe would have worked if I’d done those things, but I doubt I’ll make this recipe again.