MollyMia Aspire to Inspire before we Expire

Sunday 24 March 2019

Mia Bakes: Cheesecake Brownie

Wow, it's been quite a while, people! I know I should be continuing with my New Zealand travelogue, but it's really hard trying to organise the thousand over photographs taken with 3+1 devices. Just... give it a little more time, yeah?
Well, frankly speaking I've been baking a lot less too. I've been a little bit busy with some other commitment, and perhaps I will blog about that in time to come.
But let's get back to baking, shall we? This time, it's a really simple "two-bowls" recipe by mashing up two extremely no-brainer one-bowl recipes together.
Cheesecake Brownies!

Let's get over the ingredients so we can get started!

For the cheesecake:
250g cream cheese, soften
(block cream cheese, not the spread) 
50g castor sugar
1 egg

For the brownie:
1 bag of Betty Crocker Fudge Pouch Brownie Mix
75g semi-sweet chocolate chips
1 egg
2 tbsp strong coffee
75g melted butter
I heated up 85g of unsalted butter and let it simmer down to 75g, which made it slightly browned and more flavourful

In a clean bowl, beat the soften cream cheese with sugar until well combined. Add in the egg and mix further until smooth and set aside.
In another clean bowl, pour in the brownie mix along with egg, strong coffee and melted butter and mix until just combined. Throw in the chocolate chips and give it a couple of folds to distribute it evenly in the batter.

Line your 8x8 baking pan with baking paper and spray it down with some cooking spray so nothing sticks. Pour in the brownie batter and even it out with a spatula. Then, using a spoon, drop dollops of the cheesecake batter on top of the brownie batter. With a chopstick, give the mixture a few swirls to marble up the two batters. Tap the pan on the counter to even out the surface. You may add a bit more chocolate chips on top of the cheesecake batter if you fancy.

Send the cheesecake brownie to bake in the oven that's pre-heated to 175 degree Celsius for about 25 minutes. You may want to start checking for the doneness with a toothpick at 20 minutes, especially if you want your brownie to be fudgey instead of being cakey. If a fudgey brownie is what you're looking for, your toothpick should have a few wet crumbs on it. At this point, also check for the doneness of the cheesecake by lightly pressing down on the surface to make sure that it has "set".

Take the pan out of the oven and wait for it to cool down slightly for around 10 minutes before attempting to lift the entire brownie out of the pan. Then, leave it on a wire rack to cool COMPLETELY before cutting into it.

If you would love a more marbled looking effect, I suggest you can alternate the brownie and cheesecake batter layers into 4 layers such that you can get some cheesecake right in the middle of the brownie layer as well. 

I know, Betty Crocker brownie mix isn't the best tasting ones you can find, but by switching up the water and oil with strong coffee and melted butter, along with a handful of chocolate chips really do make a difference. The coffee brought out the richness of the chocolate and the (browned) butter added a lot more decadent flavour to the brownie.
TRY IT!

Till then,
Mia Foo