Pinterest Fail or Win: Swirled Cheesecake Brownies

Pinterest: a site practically dedicated to Do-It-Yourself projects. A few brave souls, myself included, try to recreate these amazing projects and either fall short or proudly post our beautiful creations on Instagram and/or other major social media outlets. In my last article, I successfully completed a fleece no-sew blanket. This time, however, I wanted to dive in the most failure-prone type of D.I.Y. Pinterest projects: food. So follow me on my emotional journey of recreating the Pinterest Swirl Cheesecake Brownies.

Round 2, let’s go!

My journey begins in my decently sized kitchen. Recently, I have been cooking up a storm, making all kinds of food to create a mental recipe book for myself. I realized I need to perfect a dessert dish and the delicious offspring of cheesecake and brownies sounded perfect.

The Original Pinterest Recipe is below and fairly simple for a baked good recipe.

Ingredients

Original recipe makes 1 – 9×13 inch pan

1 (19.8 ounce) package brownie mix

1 (8 ounce) package cream cheese

1 egg

1/3 cup white sugar

I stepped up my game by using brand names like Ghirardelli Chocolate and Philadelphia Cream Cheese.

Directions

1.    Prepare the brownie mix as directed by manufacturer. Preheat oven to temperature indicated on box. Grease a 9×13 inch pan.

2.    Spread the brownie batter evenly into the prepared pan. Using an electric mixer beat together the cream cheese, egg and sugar until smooth. Dollop the cream cheese mixture on top of the brownie batter. Swirl together using a knife or skewer.

Mm mm if only I could just eat the batter!

If you are a broke a college student, you probably don’t have an electric mixer. My ingrained “Learn by Doing” attitude helped me solve this problem by using my mini blender to mix the cheesecake ingredients. I’m beyond proud of this genius idea.

Hands down the most fun part of this process: swirling the cheesecake with the brownies!

3.    Bake according to manufacturer’s instructions. Brownies will be done when a toothpick inserted comes out clean. Cool in the pan, then cut into bars and serve.

Success! Pinterest Fails: 0, Pinterest wins: 2. I’m 2-0!

Thanks for coming along for the journey and please try this at home!