Pumpkin Brownies

Can I take a minute and just tell you how much I love fall? Seriously. It’s my favorite season. I can’t get enough of the cool, crisp weather and the falling leaves, and I love, love, love pumpkins. I like carving pumpkins, I like decorating the house with pumpkins, and I like pretty much any recipe that involves pumpkin.

So, I was really craving some kind of pumpkin dessert, but we didn’t have that many ingredients at the house. We had a can of pumpkin, of course, and then some brownie mix and cream cheese. “I can work with that!” I yelled, triumphantly. My husband has long since stopped asking me why I randomly yell stuff in the kitchen, so I moved on to making these yummy, fudgy pumpkin brownies.

I know, I know…it’s totally cheating that I used brownie mix, but honestly, when a 9-months pregnant woman is craving dessert: Ain’t Nobody Got Time for That! Mmmmkay? Even if I did have all the ingredients to make the brownies from scratch, I wouldn’t have gone that route. I wanted something fast and easy and delicious.

And that’s what these pumpkin brownies are. They take about 45 minutes to make (including baking time), they’re super easy to whip up, and they’re sinfully delicious!

Ingredients:

• 1 box brownie mix
• Ingredients required to make brownie mix (generally some combination of oil, water, and eggs
• 1 cup pumpkin
• 3 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice
• 6 tablespoons all-purpose white flour
• 1/4 cup + 2 tablespoons white sugar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 2 eggs
• 4 ounces cream cheese

Directions:

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees
• Prepare brownie mix according to box and pour half of the batter into a lined, greased pan (you could probably get away with just spraying some cooking oil into the dish, but I was being overly cautious. I lined the pan with tin foil and then oiled the foil. [Oil the Foil is a great name for a band, by the way])
• Bake brownies for 15 minutes until the top is firm, but the brownies aren’t all the way cooked. Be very careful not to over-bake the bottom layer or you’re going to have some very tough pumpkin brownies)
• While bottom layer of brownies are baking, combine remaining ingredients in a large bowl. You can thoroughly combine the pumpkin mixture or you can leave some cream cheese streaks if you’re into that.
• Remove brownie layer from oven and pour pumpkin mixture on top.
• Add the remaining brownie mix on top of the pumpkin in dollops.
• Now’s the fun part – swirl around the pumpkin and brownie mixtures for a marbelized effect.
• Bake pumpkin brownies an additional 25 – 30 minutes. You can’t really use the toothpick trick for this because the pumpkin is still going to be a bit sticky. I just eyeballed it and took them out once the top of the brownies were no longer shiny.
• Enjoy!