Hershey's Best Fudgey Brownies

I have a problem. Her name is Daisy. She has four legs and she's a bloodhound. I've given this is a great deal of consideration and I can say with a reasonable degree of certainty that 70% of my stress and frustration can be attributed to her. My kids are responsible for a large portion of the other 30%, but there's two of them. 


Daisy is a very, very bad dog. She's also very, very cute, and therein lies the dilemma. How do you stay mad at face like that?

I made brownies the other day from my newly acquired Hershey's cookbook. I love the Hershey's recipe for chocolate cake so it stands to reason that they might know a thing or two about brownies. Typically, I prefer a brownie naked. If it is as decadent and fudgey as my taste demands, then it shouldn't need a frosting. However, this particular recipe had a chocolate glaze that is poured onto the brownies while they are still hot from the oven. Knowing that it would take some time for the brownies to cool enough to be sliced, and that I could not be trusted to wait the alloted time, I made the brownies right before I had to leave the house to drive my kids to school. 


I'm not a complete idiot, I do know that Daisy is not to be trusted. I don't let her run free in the house while I'm out, there's simply no telling what she'd get into. However, after I got home, I let her out of her kennel and then left the kitchen for about 30 seconds. When I returned, I found Daisy standing on her two hind legs, eating my brownies off the counter. This is what was left of them.

I managed to salvage the last row. All that work and I'm left with four lousy pieces from the entire batch. But all four of them were good. Very, very good.  I know this because I ate them all. It was my consolation prize. Besides, it was the prudent thing to do, not knowing how much of her saliva had contaminated the batch. Right? Well, that's what I told myself anyways. I did have some explaining to do  when my kids came home from school and there were no brownies for them. I told them that Daisy ate them all. They totally believed me. Foolish kids. 

"Best Fudgey Brownies"

(Source: Adapted from Hershey's Chocolate Cookbook)

1/2 cup butter, melted

1 cup sugar

1 tsp. vanilla

2 eggs

1/2 cup flour

1/3 cup Hershey's cocoa

1/4 tsp. baking powder

1/4 tsp. salt

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly grease 8 or 9 inch square baking pan. Beat butter, sugar and vanilla with spoon in large bowl. Add eggs, beat well. Stir together flour, cocoa, baking powder and salt; gradually add to egg mixture, beating until well-blended. Spread in prepared pan.

Bake 20 to 25 minutes or until brownies begin to pull away from the sides of pan. Meanwhile, prepare the frosting. Spread the warm frosting over the warm brownies. Cool completely, cut into squares.

Chocolate Frosting

1 1/3 cups powdered sugar

2 Tbsp. Hershey's cocoa

3 Tbsp. butter

2 Tbsp. milk

1/4 tsp. vanilla

Place the powdered sugar and cocoa in a medium bowl. Heat butter and milk in small saucepan over low heat until butter is melted. Gradually beat in cocoa mixture, beating until smooth. Stir in vanilla.