Red Velvet Brownies
As I warned you on Facebook, I’ve got a few fun dessert recipes to share with you this week! With Valentine’s Day approaching, I couldn’t resist making some fun treats for the occasion. These red velvet brownies not only taste amazing, but definitely look the part of a Valentine’s Day dessert. They’re soft and dense and fudgy, with the great flavor you’d get from a traditional red velvet cake. The brownies taste great on their own, but the cream cheese icing really puts them over the top. Everyone seemed to really like these, and Mike and I both discovered that they taste even better straight out of the refrigerator. Give these fun red velvet brownies a try for Valentine’s Day this year – you’ll be glad you did! 🙂
*Note: looking for a more traditional red velvet recipe? Try these red velvet cupcakes!
Red Velvet Brownies
Ingredients:
Brownies:
1/2 c. (1 stick) unsalted butter
3 oz. bittersweet chocolate, chopped
1-1/2 c. sugar
3 large eggs
1 tsp. vanilla
1/4 tsp. salt
1 oz. liquid red food coloring
1 c. flour
1/2 tsp. baking powder
Cream Cheese Frosting:
8 oz. cream cheese, at room temperature
4 T. butter, at room temperature
1 tsp. vanilla
1-1/2 c. sifted powdered sugar
Directions:
Preheat oven to 325°. Line a 9x9 baking pan with aluminum foil, leaving an overhang so you can lift out the brownies when they're done. Spray foil with nonstick spray.
In a large saucepan over low heat, stir together butter and chocolate until chocolate is melted. Remove from heat and whisk in the sugar and eggs. Stir in the vanilla, salt, and food coloring. Sift flour and baking powder over mixture and stir to blend well. Transfer batter to prepared pan.
Bake 35 to 40 minutes, or until the top springs back when touched and a tester inserted into center comes out with moist crumbs. Cool completely in pan on rack.
For the frosting: In a large bowl, beat the cream cheese and butter until light and fluffy. Beat in the vanilla and powdered sugar. Remove the brownies from the pan using the foil and cover with the frosting. Cut into bite size squares to serve.
These look absolutely decadent. I can’t wait to make them. I’m pretty sure I even have all the ingredients in my pantry, score!
I love that you piled that frosting up high! Yum! Gorgeous colors!
That thick layer of cream cheese icing is right up my alley! These look wonderful.
OMG, I want. This is seriously making me regret my decision to eat in a paleo fashion. ream cheese frosting needs to be paleo.
OMG these look amazing! And perfect for Valentine’s day. i wonder if I could substitute semi-sweet baking chocolate for the bittersweet and just use less sugar? What do you think?
I would think it would work fine. I’ve never done it, but I don’t see why it wouldn’t work! Let me know if you try it and how it turns out 🙂
Oh my goodness! I MUST make these! I obsessed with all things red velvet. Just saw your comment on Caitlin’s blog and I couldn’t stop thinking about this recipe!
Can you tell me what size baking pan you used? I’m assuming a smaller one because of the baking time, but I wanted to make sure. I cannot wait to make these and I don’t want to mess them up!
I used a 9×9 pan. I just updated the recipe because somehow I left that part out – sorry! Thanks for catching that! 🙂
Love the brownie-to-frosting ratio here! 🙂
i love the sound of these!
These look amazing! I made red velvet brownies also but I didn’t do a frosting, I swirled it in the batter instead.
I made these the yesterday and they are the MOST AMAZING THING I’VE EVER BAKED! I used semi-sweet chocolate and cut the sugar to only 1.25 c. I also only have .25 oz. of red food coloring, but I think its still a beautiful deep red color, I can’t imagine using too much more. My secret to chewy, rich brownies is to not cut into them until the next day. Works every time!
I’m so glad you liked them!! 🙂
sounds delish!
I vowed to lay off the sugar this week after indulging last week, however, these look amazing! And I love cream cheese frosting. So tempting…
These are SO GOOD! I made these last night and just frosted and sampled one (or two..) and they are, by far, the most delicious brownie I’ve ever made.
I’m so glad you liked them!!:)
I made these this morning for a ladies gathering. They were very yummy! I was disappointed in the frosting though. Mine turned out runny — not thick or fluffy like the picture. Any ideas what I might have done wrong? I followed the icing recipe exactly.
I’m not sure why it would have turned out runny…maybe your cream cheese or butter was too soft? Or try adding some heavy whipping cream while you’re mixing? I’ve done that before and it can make the frosting more fluffy. I’m glad you liked the brownies though!
How many servings is the recipe for? We have a huge gathering and this seems perfect for it.
This recipe makes a 9×9 pan of brownies. You probably want to cut them small since they’re rich, but how many you gets depends on how small you cut them. 🙂 I hope you like them!
These look great! I have been wanting to try red velvet brownies for so long and with that healthy dose of frosting these look amazing 🙂
Yum! Yum! Yum! I made these ‘red carpet brownies’ for an Oscar party last night! They were delicious! Lets not discuss how many squares I ate!
I did want to say though that I had to cook them a bit longer. I went about 43 minutes and then took them out. They didn’t seem quite done, but I’m famous for over baking things like this so I decided to err on the side if caution. (And quite frankly I didn’t think undercooked brownies would be THAT bad!) They were definitely chewy . . .but awesome!
I should note that I modified a tad – I used semi-sweet choc. (its what I had) and I used Pamela’s gluten free all purpose flour mix. My new gluten-free, allergic-to-everything diet has really been missing something sweet & this hit the spot!
Thanks for another great one!
I’m so glad you liked them! Thanks for the feedback on the baking time, that’s good to know. Glad to know they worked out gluten free as well! 🙂
A comment to Valerie saying the secret to the brownies is not to cut them till the next day. LIKE THAT WILL HAPPEN!!! lol.
Pingback: Friday Favorites…2013: Week 6 « Okay, Kaye?
Well I tried making them. Mind you my first attempt at red velvet anything and also homemade brownies.. I think they turned out quite nicely. I used semi sweet chocolate instead and like someone else I also only had .25 fl oz coloring but it was still red just darker. For some reason my frosting wasn’t as “whipped” or as white either. It looked more like the cream cheese frosting I’ve seen before, an off white tint… They tasted good to me. We’ll see what the recipient thinks 🙂 Thanks for this and so many other interesting ideas!
I’m glad you liked them, and I hope your recipient did as well. 🙂 Thanks for including your modifications and outcome – that is always so helpful for people to read. Also, my white balance in pictures isn’t always all that great, so that might be why my frosting looks so white. 🙂
Pingback: Red Velvet Brownies | rebeckasKÖK
Do you think these could be made into mini cupcakes ?
Pingback: 18 Delicious Valentine Dessert Recipes for Two | coco29
I made these for a bake sale recently for fundraising – they came out PERFECTLY! Thank you