Peanut Butter Brownie Bites

Steve loves brownies and I was thinking about making some for him this week while he is recovering from his appendectomy. I stumbled across something on the Internet that informed me that today is national peanut butter day. What better way to spruce up a batch of plain, old chocolate brownies then to throw in some peanut butter? So, in honor of national peanut butter day (and a healing husband's love for chocolate/peanut butter things), I give you...

                                                          Peanut Butter Brownie Bites!




I got the basic recipe from here, then I decided I wanted to make them smaller to try to get more of the edge pieces Steve (and I) love! I chose to make them in a mini muffin pan and adjust the cook time a little.

Classic Peanut Butter Brownies

3/4 C. (11/2 sticks) butter
3/4 C. creamy peanut butter (I only had crunchy and they turned out great!)
13/4 C. sugar
2 tsp. vanilla
4 eggs
11/4 C. flour
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
1/4 C. cocoa

Preheat oven to 350.

Grease mini muffin pan or line with silicone or paper liners. (I greased the pan the first time and had a little bit of a problem getting them out. I used silicone liners for the next round and had great results.)

• In saucepan, melt together the butter and peanut butter. 
• Stir in sugar and vanilla.
• Add eggs; beat well. 

• Add flour, baking powder and salt; beat well.
• Remove 13/4 C. batter and stir cocoa powder into this part. 
• --------------This is where they turn into bites---------------------- 

• Pour chocolate batter to fill mini muffin cups about 1/2 way. 
• Top with peanut butter batter until a little more than 3/4 of the way full. 
• Bake 12-15min. or until you can smell the goodness coming from your oven. 

I immediately gave away 1/2 of these and put the other 1/2 away to give to Steve after dinner. I was afraid that if I left them out on the counter all day they would be taunting me to eat them! That's the last thing I need. I mean, come on, who has the willpower to pass up peanut butter brownie bites when they've been sitting in front of you for hours? NOT ME!

Enjoy!