Testing Secret Ingredients on My Family by Mary

Challenger Mcoram70 takes the sneaky approach to cooking, and the result is healthier treats for friends an family.

Ok…So I bought a box of pre-packaged brownie mix since my family was wanting brownies and they love my cooking. Normally, I don’t bake brownies; I make homemade cakes from scratch with homemade frostings, like buttercream, peanut butter, etc. and I always replace the oil with an equal amount of applesauce or mayonnaise. My family doesn’t know about the replacements….yet. Anyway….

I absolutely detest oil of any kind to cook with…hate the mess and the splatters, especially on the clothes, not to mention all the fat ingested! Since the directions called for a half-cup of oil, I decided to do a little experimenting. I made the brownies with a half-cup of low fat cream cheese, since I’ve never used it before in a recipe, and only on a bagel or cracker. When they came out of the oven, they were more of the fudgier variety instead of cake-like. Cool. I tried one….really awesome; in fact I didn’t think none of the flavor was lost at all.

I asked my family and a few of my friends to try them, and told them that they could be honest with me about my brownies since I put an ingredient in there because I was experimenting, so they wouldn’t hurt my feelings if they didn’t like them. THEY ALL LOVED THEM AND ASKED WHAT THE EXPERIMENT WAS! I told them and they told me to always make them like this….woo hoo! I am happy to have made others that are high-fat eaters happy! One of them even hates cream cheese, but she said she couldn’t taste it!

By the way, should I tell them about the cakes?