Baby Bear Brownies

I am not a natural-born baker. All I've learned has been by trial and error. Mostly error. I am, however, my parents' daughter. My papa taught me by example to keep my word and he valiantly modeled contributing to the necessity of the saints, especially if that necessity involved some sort of pot-luck (or as he chided, "pot-blessing because we don't believe in luck"). My mama taught me life lessons as well. Among the most useful was an art lesson: the art of making do.

You never know as a kid how those life lessons might come into play when you're all grown up and begin making huge life decisions such as where to live, how to handle money, and what munchies to sign up to make for meetings of the PTA variety.

So you sign up to take a tray of brownies to the new Christian school's first all-parent prayer meeting because you know that you have a box of brownie mix on hand and everyone likes brownies.

Besides, it's pretty hard to mess up brownies. Right? Easy "A" in Baking 101.

So here comes the day of the prayer meeting. You open the box of Betty Crocker Ultimate Fudge Brownie mix and begin prepping your 9x13 pan and, in a matter of about 90 seconds, have the batter made and poured. Then you realize the mix is only supposed to be for an 8x8 or 9x9. Nowhere on the front of the box does it say that. Nowhere. It's only on the baking chart that you're consulting after spreading the chocolate blanket over the glass bed.

Making do, you spread it out anyway and shorten the bake time to compensate. Ergh! Your first batch comes out too moist. Underbaked, shall we say, in the middle, but pulling away from the sides. These are your Papa Bear brownies.


















So you pull out the Ghirardelli cocoa, the flour, the sugar, the baking powder, the salt, the oil, the chocolate chips, the walnuts, and a second 9x13 pan which you have to grease (and wash later) and you proceed to do a batch from scratch. You hope that all your efforts at homemade goodness won't backfire when all these new school acquaintances bite in.

The Ghirardelli batch disappoints. Too dry, and a bit grainy. These are your Mama Bear brownies.

















Then, because it's in your DNA and your upbringing, you say to yourself, "Hey! I've got an idea! Why don't I combine the two? And make it look like that was my intention from the get-go?"

So you scrape some Papa Bear brownie with your right hand hand, and scoop some Mama Bear brownie with your left hand, and you pronounce them married. The two become one.

Then, as fast as you can say "Goldilocks," you have Baby Bear brownies. Lots of them.
I think Mama and Papa Bear have been watching too many episodes of "19 Kids and Counting."

Meet the new arrivals.

Bearly out of the oven.