Dessert of the Week-- Brownie Bites

Ah, Fridays--how I love you! 

Although, not nearly as much as I love these new Brownie Bites! :)

    The days leading up to Valentine's Day, the holiday stuff goes on sale. I found one out-of-place package of mini silicone baking cups that turned out to be the last one. On sale and heart shaped, how could I not get these???

I know I wanted to do something with these, but I didn't know what. Then I was at the grocery store and found these:

    Y'all remember those cinnamon chips my mother-in-law brought back from New York last year? I had never seen them before, and had yet to run across them around here. Until last week. Hershey's Cinnamon Chips!! I was beside myself with excitement, so I grabbed a couple bags. :)

I had fun playing with angles with the camera and ingredients.

Here I am, in the kitchen again, looking at the heart silicone cups and cinnamon chips and baking chocolate and then it hit me like a mac truck--Chili Brownie Bites!!!! I've also been wanting to make an "adult" icing of some sort. See, Nate and I went to the liquor store the Saturday before Valentine's Day as part of our 'kids free' night courtesy of Nate's parents (a HUGE thanks again go out to them!!!!). I picked up Raspberry Vodka and have been dying to incorporate it into a sweet something. So I got to work on the new brownies.

Oh yea, Nate was at work and Abby was napping in her crib. Kyleigh didn't actually sleep during naptime so she fell asleep on the couch watching one of her shows. :) Since I was alone, I took a lot of pictures--I've tried to keep what shows up on the blog to a minimum though. :)

One stick of softened butter went into the bowl of my stand mixer with one cup of sugar.

These were beaten together until creamy and then I added one large egg.

Beat until creamier.

Now it's time to beat in one cup of unsweetened cocoa powder.

Also beat in was the flour mixture (1 cup all-purpose flour, 1 tsp salt, 1 tsp baking soda, 3/4 tsp chili powder, 1/2 tsp ground allspice).

It turned out a little dry, so I beat in 3 Tbsp of milk.

Once the milk was added in, it was a good consistency for forming dough balls.

I made them about 1/2 an inch or so.

     I wanted to incorporate the cinnamon chips, so I found something to make a hole in the center of the balls. Please pardon the chipping nail polish--it is not as Xtreme Wear as it advertises. haha

I shoved in about 6 cinnamon chips into each one. Huh? Oh, the fondue fork. Yeah, well, I was looking for something to create the holes with and that was the only thing I could find that wasn't too big. Hay, it works. :)

 

After closing up the holes, I placed the dough balls into the baking cups.

They baked at 350 degrees F for only 10 minutes. When you open the oven door, the fragrance of chili powder and chocolate wafts into your face. Aaaahh.

They cooled in the cups on the baking sheet for a couple minutes and then I turned them out onto my red plate. Valentine's Day may be over, but love is something that should be shared always, right? :)

 

While they were cooling, it was time to treat my self to an over-21-indulgence.

A Raspberry Vodka Cream Cheese Frosting.

(pictured below)

On a side note: I do mention being over 21 for this delectable morsel, and I have adhered to this being atop only some of the Brownie Bites that are for the adults.

So that the underage ones, or those that just want a frosting without alcohol, can have a sweet topping I topped the rest of the brownies with the Strawberry Butter Frosting leftover from the Lil' Devils. 'Course I couldn't go without topping them off with red sugar sprinkles!

Yumm!!