Thursday, May 26, 2016

Kit Kat Brownies, Super Simple!

This was super easy, and it was because we had a gazillion little Kit Kat bars and I love Kit Kat bars, so the way to get rid of them was to make them disappear, and not onto my waistline....

ENTER: AFTER SCHOOL KIDS!!!!!

I've done this before with giant Symphony bars, with the toffee bits, and it's to die for, so I thought.... if I set the Kit Kats in straight lines, then I can cut the brownies and everyone has a crunchy surprise....

AND IT WORKED!!!!

(Hallelujah chorus inserted here!!!!!)

So basically you follow the box recipe for fudgie brownies.... X 2 boxes.

Grease bottom of pan (or spray lightly with baking spray).

Spread one half into pan. (I used my big 15 X 11" pan so the brownie part would be thinner)


Unwrap a lot of little Kit Kat bars, or about 8-10 full size bars.

Set unwrapped Kit Kats onto brownie batter in pan, lining them up to make cutting easier.


Spoon remainder of brownie mix over the Kit Kats....

Bake at 350° for about 40 minutes. (oven times vary, and I was using a bigger pan, so if you use a thicker brownie/smaller pan, baking time might be longer.)


Remove from oven, fully cool, then frost (because why wouldn't you????? THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS TOO MUCH CHOCOLATE!!!!).... I thought cutting the candy bars would be tough, but it wasn't. I used a serrated knife and they came out great....

I prefer the Symphony bar version myself. The kids loved these, though, and they disappeared really quickly.

LIKE INSTANTLY!!!!!

And somehow I managed to not get a shot of the cut bars with the "square" of Kit Kat inside. My bad!!!

This is our go-to chocolate frosting, from the Hershey's website:

Perfect Chocolate Frosting:

1/2 cup butter (melted)
2/3 cup Hershey's cocoa
3 cups confectioners/powdered/10X sugar
1 tsp. vanilla
1/2 teaspoon salt (my addition)
1/3 cup milk

Melt chocolate. Whisk in cocoa. Add rest of ingredients and whisk until smooth. Frosting thickens as it cools. If it's too thick, add a little more milk. Too thin? More sugar!

This is our favorite frosting, we love it, it's a crowd-pleaser and beginner simple!

But life is busy here on the farm right now! With Dave retired there are a bunch of acres of tillable land being done up for our roadside produce cart.

And hundreds of blight resistant tomato plants in my side yard, getting TLC from me and Seth...

And doesn't everyone use their spare bed to sort out big and small envelopes of seed for planting?  :)

We had 5 grandkids over on Saturday and they spent the night. Then church in the morning, bagels and a soccer tournament for ten-year-old Emma....

And gorgeous weather.

Oh my stars, we get so excited over good weather up here!

And Mr. Snapping Turtle came to visit us on Sunday. We formed an animal relocation committee to move her to the creek up the road, citing how much we value children's small limbs... this is in a big garbage tote, and it's the biggest snapper we've ever found crossing the farm... Maybe attracted to the softly tilled soil to lay eggs? Or to the pond to visit a friend?


And I won't mention Snakey-Von-Snake-a-lot who slithered through the yard... One of many in our sandy loam, rocky soil.

I did not grab a picture of the snake.

But they're all innocent snakes, until they try to get inside the house. Then they're not so innocent!

Bullfrog in our side pond:

Oops, bullfrog is shy.... but if I get a pic of him, I'll post it, his favorite spot is green mossy stuff and he turns Prada Green.

And spring continues with pretty colors!!!


This small red Japanese maple wasn't happy in my friend Sara's apartment six years ago... but it is very happy here in the front garden, just beyond the little waterfall! Happy tree!!!

And Lunaria pops up here and there every year.... the "silver dollar" plant:


And these pretty tulips are my late-bloomers on the north side, and that flash of rosy-red is a smile starter!!!

This weekend is Memorial Day weekend.... and our tradition is to grab every little child we can and herd them down to the village for the annual Memorial Day parade.... We like to show the military our love and respect.

And then we go to the cemetery and we plant flowers and spread mulch and post a flag near Uncle Charles Blodgett's grave. Uncle Chuck served in Korea.... And then we go home and plant flowers and eat hots and hamburgers and talk about the past while we plan for the future with little kids running around, scraping knees, drinking lemonade or fruit punch and climbing big old farm trees.

And it's good.


Ruth Logan Herne loves God, her family, her country, dogs, chocolate and coffee and she can be seen waving a flag on Memorial Day in her little village and wiping stuff off kids' faces most any day of the year.

With 3/4 million books in print, Ruthy is living her dream and can't believe folks are paying her for a job she'd do for free.... but she will admit that she does like getting paid!

Find her at her website ruthloganherne.com, in Seekerville or on facebook/RuthLoganherne  where she loves to make new friends and chat about faith, family, fun and fiction!

16 comments:

  1. Do these evil brownies need frosting? OMGOSH.

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    1. Need is such a strong word, LOL! I love frosted brownies, it's like mega-chocolate "fix" and if I add the frosting, I feel like I'm doing my Yankee best to level the playing field with our healthy eaters over here!

      (Laughing!!!)

      And Hershey's Perfectly Chocolate frosting is my favorite chocolate icing ever.... so easy and so amazing.

      The kids loved these. Loved might be too mild a word!!!

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  2. Ohhhh -- something new and chocolately to try. I'm participating in my church's Alpha program right now. We meet every Tuesday evening and, while dinner is provided we've signed up to provide dessert. And oh my goodness are we a bunch of chocloholics. I think we've had some version of decadent brownie each week. My turn is coming up again on June 7 so I'll give these a whirl and see what everyone thinks.

    You have a bed of seed packets and I have a couch of tomato and summer squash seedlings. LOL They spend the morning basking in the sun there and then I move them to the backroom's daybed to catch the afternoon sun. The things gardeners will do for their plant babies.

    As much as I think I'd love to live in the country the snakes just plain ol' scare me enough that I think I'll be a city girl for life. So thanks for not taking pictures.

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    1. I wanted to spare everyone the snake!!!! I have transplanted our 700 baby plants into sleds filled with soil Seth created by churning wood mulch for years... They seem to like it! Isn't that a funny way of doing farm stuff? I'll take a pic so you can see it. This way I can move them into full sun, and then pull the sled back into the shade if needed.

      I don't have a greenhouse, so we're incorporating our own "hardening" system. And I hope it works!!!

      Glynna, these were good, but I really liked the ones with the toffee chip Symphony bars better... The big bars, and you lay them between the brownie mix just like this, and then you've sandwiched the candy bar... those were ridiculously wonderful!!! But the kids went ballistic for these, so they're a keeper, too!

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    2. Glynna???? Hahahahaha! I had just answered an e-mail from Glynna Kaye!!!! OOOPs! KAV!!!!! Oy, I need more coffee!

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    3. LOL -- I'll answer to pretty much anything. We don't have Symphony bars here...we have caramilk or rolos...would those do?

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    4. No Symphony bars.... Hmm.... Then do the Kit Kats, they were wonderful. Rolo caramel burns to the bottom of the pan and I think they'll love the "surprise" inside each brownie!

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  3. Innocent snakes? Okay, Gardener snakes I can handle. Unfortunately, those are not the variety I usually end up encountering at the ranch. Only the nasty poisonous varieties. Shudder.

    These brownies look divine. I love Kit Kat bars. I love brownies, so I'm thinking this looks like a match made in heaven, with or without frosting.

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    1. Amen to that! When we were at the Phoenix Zoo (which was absolutely amazing, by the way....) a King Snake slithered by us, and Zach was ready to save my life! And we saw one rattlesnake while we were taking a train tour...(Probably a decoy to scare the passengers to keep their hands inside, LOL!)

      The King Snake gave us a start, and he was big.

      He made my big garter snake here look like the little brother..... but big for upstate!

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  4. First of all, I just gained 10 pounds reading about the brownies. But you are SO right - you can never have too much chocolate.

    Case in point: I have a Lindt 85% chocolate bar waiting for me to finish my revision goals today.

    Second, I love your descriptions of your gardens! I wish I lived close enough to frequent your produce stand!

    Third, don't go dissin' those snakes! At least the non-venomous ones. We have beautiful garter snakes around here. I surprised one in the back yard this morning - dark green with bright orange and yellow stripes. Gorgeous! And they eat those bugs I hate so much. :)

    Rattlesnakes, however, are not welcome. Ever.

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    1. I will be kind to snakes.

      I will be kind to snakes.

      I will be kind to non-venomous, non-strangling snakes.

      And I will eat chocolate!!!!

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  5. Kit Kats inside brownies, then iced with chocolate??? Oh, my goodness! The only thing I've added to brownies is chocolate chips and I thought that was sinful! This sounds positively decadent. Must try!

    Although we have one rectangular garden bed beside the house that has been used for veggies in the past, our soil is so acidic and so shady under all the evergreen trees, that nothing ever does very well, so we've given up on veggies altogether. Well, all except a very few easy salad things -- lettuce, green onions, and assorted herbs. The rest of the bed has transitioned into a shade-lovin' shrub garden.

    I'm sure there are lots of snakes here, but fortunately they stay out of my sight. I've encountered one garter snake slithering through the grass towards the gardens, and my hubby says he has seen just one as well. As far as I'm concerned, that's plenty in twenty years. I'm not afraid of snakes (once had a 9' one draped across my shoulders when I was a playground supervisor in training and we visited the zoo -- can't remember if it was a python or boa constrictor, but it was huge) but I hate how they startle me. ::shudder:: That's enough talk about snakes. Time to go make those brownies!

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    1. I prefer brownies to snake convos anytime, Carol!!!! :)

      And I still am working on a series proposal you inspired with a video you posted on facebook.... I love the way your mind works!!!

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    2. Sometimes I'm not sure how my mind works, but I'm delighted the video sparked a creative idea for you.

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  6. What a fun weekend in Ruthyland!

    Hope you got the turtle relocated okay! And then enjoyed the brownies for your effort. :)

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  7. Oh my! You should have been in my science class last week when we were measuring out the grams of sugar in our food!

    Sure does look good though!

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