Scraps and Snippets ~ Peanut Butter Brownies

Peanut Butter Brownies

5 TBSP coconut oil or Earth Balance butter substitute

5 TBSP peanut butter

1 1/3 Cup sugar
2 TBSP egg replacer (I usedEner-G DIY homemade)
6 TBSP water or non-dairy milk
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 teaspoon salt
2/3 Cup cocoa
1 2/3 Cup flour
1/3 chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350. Grease a 9 x 13. Mix butter substitute or coconut oil, peanut butter and sugar until blended. Add cocoa, egg replacer and water/milk, vanilla and mix well, add salt, baking powder and vanilla and stir. Pour in flour and mix. It will be thick and more like cookie dough. Press into pan.

CARAMEL TOPPING LAYER

4 TBSP Earth Balance or coconut oil

4 heaping TBSP peanut butter
1 1/3 Cup sugar
2 TBSP egg replacer (I used Ener-G DIY recipe)
6 TBSP non-dairy milk
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 /3 Cup flour
2/3 Cup chocolate chips

1 Cup Oatmeal
1 Cup chopped salted peanuts


Cream the sugar, coconut oil, peanut butter, milk and egg replacer. Add baking powder and salt and mix well. Add vanilla and stir. Stir in flour until blended and finally add the chocolate chips, peanuts and oatmeal.

Plop caramel/chocolate chip layer on top of brownies.

Bake 35-38 minutes.

Scraps and Snippets ~ Smore Surprise Brownie Bites

Smore Surprise Brownie Bites


1 and 1/2 sticks Earth Balance (3/4 Cup or 3/4 Cup coconut oil)
1 1/3 Cup sugar
2 TBSP egg replacer (I used homemade EnerG)
6 TBSP water or non-dairy milk
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 teaspoon salt
2/3 Cup cocoa
1 2/3 Cup flour
1/3 chocolate chips
Approx 2 vegan friendly graham crackers broken into about 1 inch squares/sections

These aren't the brownies, just wanted to show you what they looked like.
We ate them...oops

Approx 4-5 large Dandies marshmallows cut (scissors worked well) each marshmallow into 6 to 8 pieces.

Cream the sugar, coconut oil, milk and egg replacer. Add baking powder and salt and mix well. Add vanilla and stir. Stir in cocoa and then flour until blended.

Preheat oven to 350. 

Using one of those brownie pans with the dividers, mini cupcake tins or a silicone pan with 20 squares in it, or a large cookie sheet lightly grease which ever item or combination you choose to use. 

I made mine in a 20 count silicone pan and baked them for 14-16 minutes which would be about right for mini-muffin tins. Here's what I did. I pressed a walnut sized piece of dough into my little squares. Then I placed a chunk of graham cracker and marshmallow on top of dough. Another walnut sized section of dough pressed over the top.

If using  a cookie sheet for bake for about 12 minutes. I would roll out a walnut sized ball of dough flat, then top with the graham cracker and marshmallow and fold dough over to cover the amore treats. If using the sectioned brownie pan you might need 30 minutes.

Makes about 3 dozen.

Scraps and Snippets ~ Peanut Butter Brownies (Warning: Jack Kryptonite)

 Peanut Butter Protein Brownies

1 Cup coconut oil

1 Cup peanut butter

1 Cup brown sugar
2 Flax eggs (2 TBSP ground flax, 6 TBSPS water, combined and set aside to gel)
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 Cup whole wheat pastry flour (or flour of your choice)

3/4 Cup Arbonne vanilla protein powder (use a protein powder that is palatable on it's own, and vegan, if you don't have Arbonne's...or contact me and I can hook you up.)
2 Cups old fashioned oatmeal
1 Cup chocolate chips
1  Cup of dried fruit, sunflower seeds, nuts, chia seed, etc.

Preheat oven to 350. Very lightly spray a 9 x 13 pan.

Cream the oil, peanut butter, and sugar together. (it's best that you use everything at room temperature)

Add the flax eggs, salt, soda and stir. Add vanilla and mix well. Blend in flour and protein powder and add oatmeal and chocolate chips and mix until incorporated.

Bake for 45 mins. Remove from oven and let rest for 10. Cut into 24 squares. Refrigerate for chewy deliciousness.

Scraps and Snippets ~ Gravy and Biscuits to Ya.

Biscuits and Gravy

I can't say I'm a big fan of biscuits and gravy. Actually I've always considered them a little peppery and heavy.

Imagine my surprise when I had a sudden urge for biscuits and gravy.

I also had the deep desire to avoid a trip to the grocery store. I hadn't even stepped out the door all day.

So with what I had on hand. I got to work.

I found a biscuit recipe, used Vegan ingredients and even cut it into squares to avoid the rerolling thing. Nice.

Then I got to work on the gravy.

3 TBSP flour

3 TBSP Earth Balance

1/2 Cup fine dice celery

1/2 Cup chopped mushrooms

1/2 Cup crushed cashew bits

1/2 tsp garlic powder

1/4 tsp sage

1/2 tsp salt

Fresh ground pepper, 6-8 cranks.

2 Cups Unflavored non-dairy milk.

Place cashew pieces in milk and let them soak a half hour or so. Melt Earth Balance, toss celery and mushrooms in and cook til tender. Add the flour and make a decent paste, add spices. Then slowly pour in milk and cashews. Stir and simmer until this reaches the consistency you want.

About 3-5 minutes. If it gets too thick, add a bit more milk.

Poor gravy over the biscuits and yum. Yum. Enjoy.

Scraps and Snippets ~ VEGAN "CHEF BUTTAH" BROWNIES

This is a picture of 3 Flax eggs. I.E. 3 TBSP ground flax seed and 9 TBSP water.

Applesauce, sugar and fat blend.

• If you have followed my various attempts at making THE brownie...one that is not horribly life suckingly bad for you and yet, still delicious, you know I've had some moderate success. Not total, not complete brownie Nirvana that caused me to scream SCORE!!! so loud that you could hear me wherever you happen to be. 

My quest has been to replace the go-to brownie from the bad days of eating. The measuring stick is tough to compete with....this particular brownie has been my recipe for when I needed to make THE ultimate smack-down taste sensation. It's been tweaked over the twenty years I've used it. Not much though, just a bit. The original recipe called for butter, eggs, melted bittersweet chocolate, vanilla and resulted in a crusty brownie so gooey in the middle, so chocolatey, so delicious in all it's buttery chocolate goodness that no one even CARED how awful it was for the circulatory system. 

 

This weekend required a little flexibility in the Vegan eating routine, and I've noticed that the more I eat less than clean, the more I want to eat less than clean. I do pay for it. I feel like a slug... UGH when I eat dairy. But there are just times I make that choice. 

So Monday hit hard. And the craving for Chef Buttah Brownies resurrected and started following me around like an annoying zombie. 

Then it occurred to me to take a look at THE recipe and see if I could Veganize it. 

And by golly. I think it worked. Rob says it's a keeper.

He said he couldn't tell they'd been tweaked or messed with. And, well, they weren't the full of BUTTAH brownies I remember from the past, but they are close. Close enough that I may consider this quest closed and I almost feel like screaming "SCORE!!!!!!!"

VEGAN "CHEF BUTTAH" BROWNIES

Lightly grease 8 x 8 pan.

3/4 Cup cocoa

1/2 Cup applesauce

1/2 Cup plus 1 TBSP water

3 TBSP ground flax seed

3/4 Cup Vegan fat source. (I used 1/2 cup coconut oil and 1/4 Earth Balance, if you don't like the faint taste of coconut you might want to reverse that ratio or use all Earth Balance.)

2 tsp vanilla

1 and 1/2 Cup Vegan sugar (yeah. And that's reduced...maybe could be tweaked a bit more.)

1 Cup Flour (I used whole wheat pastry flour).

Optional 1 Cup chopped nuts or you could add chocolate chips and go for the complete and total chocolate overkill.

In small container mix water and flax seed. Set aside. In bigger bowl mix Earth Balance/Coconut oil and sugar together until creamed together. Add vanilla and applesauce. Mix well. Add the Flax mixture and cocoa. Mix well. Stir in flour.

Scrape mixture into greased 8 x 8 pan. Bake at 350 for approx 30-35 minutes. These will be gooey, but they will continue to set up after you take them out of the oven. (You can double the recipe and bake it in a 9 x 13 but will need to bake it for about an hour or so.