I enjoy brownies and I enjoy cheesecake but I don’t feel that brownies need any toppings, for me it is a case of leaving good enough alone. However I feel like a chocolate cheesecake with a thin brownie crust could be amazing so I ignored my personal beliefs regarding plain brownies and took this box mix home.
The package comes with brownie mix and cheesecake mix. You add oil, water, and an egg to the brownie mix and pour it into the pan. I went with an 8×8. Then you add water and an egg to the cheesecake mix and plop it onto the brownie batter by the spoonful and swirl it.
The brownie batter looked and tasted exactly as it should. Definitely good enough to lick the bowl. The cheesecake batter however, I had one taste and that was it. The consistency was thicker than the brownie batter and the taste had a strong artificial cream cheese flavor (it tasted exactly like a cream cheese emulsion liquid I have previously used in baking) and then once that tangy flavor went away, a chemically flavor came in that immediately makes you think “this shouldn’t be consumed”. I don’t recommend eating the cheesecake batter.
I cooked the batter for 34 minutes, less than they recommended and it was ready to come out. On the packaging they don’t tell you how you know this mixture is ready to come out, so I went with the tried and true and used a toothpick that came out clean. The cheesecake swirl didn’t seem to affect this technique so it worked perfectly. I let the brownies cool a little bit and then cut them into 16 as I typically do (cutting halves is really easy and what can I say, I like to take the easy route). The consistency when cutting seemed off and was definitely not like a normal brownie and I feared this was going to affect the eating quality, not just the cutting process.
I took a bite from a middle brownie to get the full cheesecake swirl. I’ll start with the positives. The flavor was good. The sweet chocolatey brownie really outweighed the cheesecake, you could hardly taste the cheesecake flavor. But the smell was all that artificial cream cheese, none of the brownie. The consistency was not it. I had to take a few bites to figure out what it reminded me of. The cheesecake swirl was like a spongey consistency and reminded me of a mix between a cheese souffle and an omelette, absolutely not the vibe to go with a brownie. It did not flow well into the fudgeyness of the brownie. In fact, I could peel the two layers apart which was great because then I could peacefully enjoy my tasty brownie.
Overall, the cheesecake swirl did not add anything to these brownies and honestly, brought them down in quality. The final product didn’t even taste enough like cheesecake to make it worth it. These are really solidifying my thoughts on plain brownies. Lets agree to leave them alone.
This mixture came out to 2560 calories as prepared. If cut into 16, each brownie is 160 calories.
Here are the links to products used today:
Rubber Spatulas – https://amzn.to/3JWDtAA
Other spatulas https://amzn.to/4dAelNI
Oven Mitts – https://amzn.to/3JYq5Mg
8×8 baking pan – https://amzn.to/4dyO2Yb
Plastic Measuring Cup – https://amzn.to/4bDJIoV
*These are affiliate links meaning if you click on the link and buy the product, I will earn a small commission, but you will not be charged a penny more.