Brownie Bites - why haven't I done this before?

After inheriting a mini muffin pan, I put it in the cupboard and forgot about it for a while. Then, while spring cleaning, I found it like the little treasure it is. First I made regular muffins in it and the kids thought they were super. So I decided to try making brownie bites, because, well why the heck not?

I just used a brownie mix. No sense melting my good baking chocolate if I was going to burn the dickens out of something. I don’t know if you’ve had the same problem, but with Pillsbury mixes, I think the box is wrong. They always call for a half cup of oil and then my brownies end up holy and not in the good way. I still buy the Pillsbury brand, but I half the oil and they turn out great.

There isn’t a time on the box for mini brownies. Inconvenient to say the lest. I set the timer for 15 minutes; checked the brownies with a wooden skewer which is a fancy name for a toothpick; and pulled them out when the stick had only a few crumbs on it. With brownies, I’ve found, you have to leave them a little crumby or they are too hard.

Once cooled. I doll-uped a bit of cream cheese frosting before turning my munchers loose.

It's from a mix -- and it's okay

My mother-in-law told me a story one day. She said she was rushing around, getting kids ready for school, when her oldest (my husband) looked up with his huge green eyes and told her he needed a dozen cookies for the bake sale that afternoon. Oh, what’s a mother to do? She rushed them out the door, stopped at the supermarket, and bought a package of cookies. The guilt plagued her throughout the work day. Sending store-bought cookies instead of homemade had her questioning her abilities as a mother. When she picked the kids up from school she asked, with sinking stomach, how the bake sale went.

“Awful,” came the reply.

It’s my fault. If I’d called in a sick day I could have made the cookies and brought them to the school. My poor child...

Shaking his curl-covered head in disgust he elaborated, “All the store-bought cookies were gone and I had to buy a home-made one.”

It was a lesson she never forgot.

So I slept in this morning. And I slept good, knowing that these chocolate chip muffins waited in the pantry, 99% ready to throw into the oven. As the kids pounded them, I smiled, mentally embracing my shelf full of mixes.