This is all a bit of a cheat…

To start with, these mini cakes are not even really brownie bites but rather little brownie based mini cupcakes. Furthermore, even I wouldn’t really eat these kind of sweet treats for breakfast or brunch – they are just too small! No, of course not. In fact, they are this small for a reason – if they were any bigger, their sweet, rich and gooey taste would just be too much.

So, to be honest, I made them as little afternoon treats for my office but they turned out so well that I wanted to share the recipe on my brunch blog with you.

The recipe is also a bit of a cheat’s recipe, as it requires you to use a packet brownie mix. I know it’s not the proper way, using a packet mix, but it was quicker and cheaper to grab a ready mixed brownie box from the supermarket shelf rather than picking up the separate ingredients.

If you really can’t bring yourself to get a little help from Betty Crocker, I’d suggest using the brownie recipe from Mary Berry, which is my trusty go-to for brownies and which I will feature here in due time (in the meantime you may have to do a Google search).

For the topping I used a smooth peanut butter with a hint of chocolate, suitably called ‘YUM YUM’, which I brought over from South Africa. I’m sure any smooth peanut butter will work but it may be best to stick with plain ones as any more than a hint of chocolate will be too sweet – you want the salty peanut taste to balance the sweet brownie mix.

If you like peanut butter, you have to try these…

This recipe is adapted from Baked Perfection http://www.bakedperfection.com/2009/07/peanut-butter-cup-brownies.html

For 24 mini brownie bites/ cupcakes you need:

• 1 box of store bought brownie mix, such as Betty Crocker’s and the ingredients required on the box (usually an egg, some oil and some water)
• 1/3 cup peanut butter chips
• 1/3 cup dark chocolate chips
• 1/3 cup creamy peanut butter

Preheat the oven to gas mark 4 and line a mini muffin tray with mini muffin cases (I tried just oiling a supposedly non-stick tray and would highly recommend using muffin liners instead for these are sticky little things!).

Prepare the boxed brownie mix as directed and spoon the batter evenly into the muffin cups, each will take about 1½ teaspoons.

Bake the cakes for 13-15 minutes or until they have risen and the top is set but the inside is still ever so slightly moist.

Get the tray out of the oven and wait 3-5 minutes before pushing a little dent into the centre of the muffin tops – either with back of a teaspoon – or if you’re not too heat sensitive, with your fingers. You want a little, shallow dent for the peanut butter to go in to.

Place the peanut butter in a small microwave-safe dish and warm it up in the microwave for circa 30 seconds, so it becomes more spreadable. Then, while the cakes are still warm, add about half a teaspoon of peanut butter on each cake and sprinkle on a mix of the peanut butter and the dark chocolate chips. They will start to melt but only ever so slightly,  just enough to keep everything together when they are fully cooled down.

Leave to cool completely and enjoy!