Chocolate-Peanut Butter Cup Brownies with Whipped Peanut Butter Mousse (gluten free)

A while back, I was sent a lovely selection of Delicious Alchemy gluten free bread, cake and porridge mixes to try. The box included a lovely Vanilla Sponge Mix, which was put through its paces making a Vanilla-Blueberry Cake with Meringue Cream and a Brown Bread Mix which was enjoyed as a batch of Walnut & Sultana Rolls.

There were still a couple of mixes left, and my daughter had been nagging me for a while to test the Chocolate Brownies. We’ve been a bit chocolated-out on account of Easter, but as she had a friend round for a sleepover, I thought it would be a good opportunity to give in to the badgering and bring out the mixing bowl.

As with the previous Delicious Alchemy mixes, the Brownie blend was very straight forward to use…… Clear instructions and requiring only the addition of some butter/spread and a couple of large eggs. It was good to hear the clonk of a goodly portion of chocolate chips landing in the bowl as I tipped out the contents, which lead to the hopeful promise of an appropriately chocolatey end result!

I had been hankering to make a brownie with some sort of peanutty addition for a while, so used the opportunity to throw in a handful of mini Reece’s Peanut Butter Cups for good measure. I chopped and froze the PBC’s in advance of adding them to the mix as this can help to retain the structure of the sweet a little better, rather than have it completely melt and blend in as it cooks.

The Brownie mix produced a bake with a good texture…… firm, but sticky, with (as hoped) a good chocolate hit. My gripe is that it was incredibly sweet……… way too sweet for me. If anything, the sugar high was quite sickly, which seemed unnecessary in what was otherwise a great bake. My daughter and her friend on the other hand were grateful recipients and announced that they really liked it, although it was notable that once the slices with the peanut mousse had gone (I kept a few back without it), it sat for a quite a while in the tin.

The PBC’s were a great addition and gave the brownie a lovely peanut, slightly salty ‘kick’. I made sure they were well distributed through the tray so that all brownies received an equal surprise….

I was quite glad that I had decided to make the Peanut Butter Mousse to accompany the brownie, as its creaminess and mildly savoury peanut element tempered the sweetness of the brownie slightly. It was scarily moreish on its own however and the extra portions which I held aside (rather than use on all the brownies), somehow kept finding themselves on a spoon heading for my mouth, each time I passed the fridge. Needless to say, I think another time, the mousse might become the dessert in itself!

Although I made the brownie with a Delicious Alchemy mix, there is no reason why you couldn’t make the bake with your favourite brownie recipe and add some chopped Reece’s PBC’s before baking. Or try using my recipe for Toblerone Brownie, substituting straight plain chocolate instead of Toblerone in the main mix and leaving out the addition of chopped Toblerone as this will be replaced by the PBC’s.

I am sharing some of my Peanut Mousse topped Brownies with the following :

Simply Eggcellent with Dom of Belleau Kitchen fame. Crucially, the brownie mix that I was testing required 2 eggs….. large ones….. free range of course…. April’s theme for the challenge is ‘chocolate’, so the boxes are happily ticked!

April’s Biscuit Barrel Challenge with The Lass In The Apron on behalf of I’d Much Rather Bake Than… This month’s theme is ‘candy’…… It must have been a very candy-filled month in our house, because this is my second entry! The Reece’s PBC’s definitely add something extra to the bake.

Chocolate-Peanut Butter Cup Brownies with Whipped Peanut Butter Mousse

Ingredients

Method