Cheese-Marbled Brownies, Page 124, Column 2, 2nd Recipe Down

This week the recipe from my 1976 Better Homes and Gardens New Cook Book is Cheese-Marbled Brownies.  My first bar cookie for this journey through my old cook book. 

The stars of the show

It’s another one of those recipes with all the ingredients in-line as you work through it rather than fulling listed up top.  I find these very annoying since I always feel like I’m going to miss something.

But first my archeology through my other 5 versions of the cook book.  As it turns out, this recipe is only present in my 1976 and 1981 versions and is substantially different between the two.  I looked to see if it was listed a Cream Cheese Brownies or something else in the other books, but it wasn’t there at all.  

My 1976 version uses honey, where the 1981 one uses sugar, the 1981 only calls for 3 ounces of cream cheese, which I now think is a typo.  And there is actually a step in the preparation that the 1981 version skips altogether.  Each uses semi-sweet morsels as the chocolate.

I could find no equivalent to this recipe online, but there are many cream cheese brownie recipes out there.  So I recommend trying one of these, even the ones where they have you use a brownie mix and your own cream cheese topping like this one: Philadelphia Marble Brownie

Chocolate chips with the butter in the pot

This recipe is has lots of steps. The first is to melt the chocolate with some butter.  (Less butter in the 1981 version.) Then blend it into the eggs and honey I’ve prepared in the mixer and then stir in the flour and other dry ingredients.  I also had to prepare the cream cheese topping and use a 2nd hand mixer I had.  All in all, many things used to create this.  I can totally understand why folks use brownie mixes now!

Cream cheese topping

Interestingly the recipe has you put half (what’s the best way to measure half?) in the 9x9 inch pan and bake it for 10 minutes.  Then top with the cream cheese topping and pour remaining brownie batter on top and swirl together if desired.

The topping and remaining brownie mix swirled together and ready to bake

The brownie batter seemed very thick, and I almost think piping it onto the cheese topping might have worked better.  Also I think it might work better to put it all along the edge as well.

Cheese-Marbled Brownies fresh from the oven

Still the result was quite pretty.  But the brownies overall were good but not great.  I suspect the changes in the 1981 version of the recipe were to improve the recipe, but the reduction of the cream cheese from 8 to 3 ounces seems like a mistake, a transcription error.  I made the 1981 recipe the next weekend and the cream cheese topping was very runny, fluffy.  It wanted to float above the brownie mixture I put on top of it and so the swirling of it was less effective.  

I brought in the 1976 version to work and they went over there better than they did at home as it would turn out. I may experiment with the 1981 recipe again, upping the cream cheese to 8 ounces to see what happens, but otherwise, just doesn’t seem worth the effort.  My preference will be for the fudge type brownies

Lessons Learned:

Get Cream Cheese to room temperature before using.

Get the brownie batter for top layer to the edges.