#SRC Bonus: Lunch Lady Brownies

So.
Today is my first day back at work after being off for the summer.
I'm not exactly sure how I feel about this, seeing as it's my 7th school in the past 10 years.  While there are no students until next week after Labour Day, I need to finish unpacking and get my head around what is to come.  For me, this is not a great thing.
What is good, however, is that there are 5 Mondays in August, and we're celebrating with a special edition of The Secret Recipe Club that's all about back to school.  What's even more fun about this reveal day is that it's cross-group, so I'm not paired with someone in my regular group A for this week.  Next week, I'll be back with my Group A on Monday's reveal.
There are so many options when you consider back to school.  Around here, it means soups that I can take for lunch, or something I can pull out of my freezer for a quick meal, or something that I can make for a hearty breakfast.  I had so much fun looking through Ashley's blog, Cheese Curd in Paradise for something that might fit one of these catagories, and I wasn't disappointed.
Ashley had a ton of things that I pinned while browsing, including these Strawberry Cream Muffins to use up the strawberries that came in my produce box this week; I also thought about this Chicken Bacon Ranch Tot Casserole because come on...all in one dish?  Sign me up!
I finally opted for a dessert that can easily be frozen, and is even nut free, so totally work-takeable (as opposed to my regular SRC choice for next week).  The name even screams school - even though I work in an elementary school and there's no cafeteria.
I present to you now a Cheese Curd in Paradise's Lunch Lady Brownies:

Ingredients:
For the Brownies:
1 c butter, melted
1/2 c cocoa powder
2 c sugar
2 c flour
4 eggs
4 tsp vanilla

For the Icing:
1/4 c butter, softened
1/4 c milk
1/4 c cocoa powder
3 c icing sugar

Method:
1.  Preheat oven to 350F.  Grease a 9x13" pan and set aside.
2.  In a bowl, beat together butter and cocoa until smooth with an electric beater.  Add flour and sugar.  Beat until incorporated before beating in eggs, one at a time, and vanilla.  Spread batter in prepared pan. Bake brownies at 350F for 30-35 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the centre comes out clean.  Remove and let sit 10 minutes.
3.  While the brownies are baking, make the icing.  Beat all icing ingredients together until smooth.  Spread over warm brownies, and then cool completely.

From Cheese Curd in Paradise

 The first thing I can say about both the batter and the icing is that they're pretty stiff.  I used hand beaters to make both, but the stand mixer would have been perfectly appropriate, especially for the batter.  Both were dark and chocolatey.  All good.

I probably could have spread the icing over the brownies a little sooner.  It melts on the warm baked brownies, and mine did around the edges...less so in the middle.  It didn't matter for taste, though.

They were delicious!  J says they are exactly what he thinks of when he thinks of a brownie.  We kept half the pan out to eat, and put half in the freezer for later.  Thanks Ashley!  We'll make these again!

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