Easy Homemade Brownies

Recipe:

1/2 cup Earth Balance (melted)

1 cup white sugar

2 eggs

2 tsp vanilla extract

1/3 cup cocoa powder

1/2 cup flour

A pinch of salt

1/2 tsp baking powder

Preheat oven to 350F. Grease 9-inch square pan and dust with flour. (Optional: cover pan with parchment paper. This makes removing the brownies - and doing the dishes! - far easier.)

Microwave Earth Balance for appx. 1 minute, or until melted. Mix in the sugar (this can be done simply, with a spoon). Break eggs in large bowl and add appx. 1/3 of the Earth Balance-sugar mixture. Mix well. Add the remaining Earth Balance-sugar mixture and blend.

Add vanilla, cocoa, flour, salt, and baking powder, making sure to mix after each addition. Pour brownie batter into pan.

Bake for 25 - 25mins, or until toothpick comes out clean.

Let sit about 20mins before cutting.

Sprinkle with powdered sugar if you wish.

Optional additions:

As you can tell from my photo, I added a couple extra touches. To achieve my exact brownies, you will need:

1 box of Jello chocolate pudding mix

Strawberries

The strawberries are simple; just wash them, cut off the tops, and chop the strawberries into quarters. As for the pudding, follow the instructions on the box. According to the box, the pudding has to sit for a mere 5mins before solidifying. I disagree; I think it takes about 1hr of refrigeration for the pudding to reach its prime.

Then just lop a couple spoonfuls of pudding on the brownies, and pile a few strawberry quarters on top of that. And voila! It'll be just like in the above photo.

Other common additions include nuts, marshmallows, and chocolate chips.