Dia de la Abby: #6 - Skull Brownies (Skullnies?)

This was inspired by a craving for brownies...Cheesecake Brownies!

Unbaked

Baked

I blended both the brownie and cheesecake topping according to instructions. The part I deviated on, in order to make the skull, was the application of the cheesecake topping. You are supposed to spread it all over the top and then swirl it into the brownie batter with a knife, fork or toothpick. I used a fork to carefully put all of the cheesecake topping into a skull shape. It's really thick, but it worked out well because after baking, the face is sunken in the cheeks, which gives a nice effect to the skull. I tried to "draw" teeth in the mouth portion using a tooth pick, but it no longer shows in the baked area. I think using some of the brownie batter to draw teeth, would have shown better before and after baking. This was a great excuse to "play with my food"...which means, I'll probably make more food skulls.

No additional tutorial today, as above is basically that. However, if you don't like cheesecake brownies, you can really use any topping (mini marshmallows, small candies, crushed candies, sprinkles, peanut butter, nuts...you get the idea) to make a design on your brownies of any type. From experience, if you want to use marshmallows, I do recommend waiting until the brownies are almost done to add them. If added before baking, they can cause the brownies to not bake correctly and they also are burned by the time the brownies are done...which isn't very yummy.

My daughter and I like to eat our brownies in a mug with ice cream on top. This works for any type of cake. You can add whipped cream, grated chocolate and a fruit on top if you want to be fancy.

Every week in the 4.0 year, I will be post my own Dia de la Abby posts as well as a tutorial with instructions on how I made my piece. Hopefully you feel inspired by my posts just as I was by Noah's Skull-A-Day 1.0 daily project.