Tuxedo Brownie Cups

Brownies stuffed with a creamy white chocolate cream cheese filling and a big juicy strawberry on top. These tuxedo brownie cups are elegant and delicious!

Brownies are delicious and they go with just about any occasion or meal so they are the perfect “go to” dessert when you’ve got a lot going on, but it’s time to give brownies a little dressing up. We made it a black tie affair with these tuxedo brownie bites and I’m so glad we did!

The cream cheese filling is absolutely divine, but really can you EVER go wrong with cream cheese filling? It’s creamy and perfect along with that bold chocolate and the fresh, sweet berry.

Recommended Equipment

• Mini Muffin Pan
• Small Cookie Scoop

Ingredients for Tuxedo Brownie Bites

• Fudge Brownie Mix: Make the brownies following the cake like instructions. You will need eggs, water and vegetable oil.
• White Chocolate: adds a delicious rich flavor to the filling
• Milk: thins out the filling a little and adds creaminess
• Cream Cheese: use full fat cream cheese and make sure it is at room temperature (see section below for avoiding lumps)
• Powdered Sugar: adds sweetness
• Frozen Whipped Topping: adds structure to the filling
• Strawberries: adds flavor and freshness and pairs so well with chocolate
• Orange Zest: This is totally optional but it adds a beautiful depth of flavor. Mint or chocolate could also be used to garnish.

The measurements for all the ingredients can be found in the recipe card at the end of the post.

Lumps in Cream Cheese

Remember, when cooking or baking with cream cheese you need to either set it out for a bit so that you can soften the brick, making a smooth spread, or fill a sink with warm water and let it sit, still in its foil until soft. There’s nothing worse than lumpy cream cheese filling and no amount of beating will smooth out those pieces.

How to Make Tuxedo Brownie Bites

The beautiful thing about these brownie bites (besides how good they taste) is that they seem so decadent and fancy but they couldn’t be easier to make! Here are the basic steps:

1. Prep: Preheat the oven and spray all the muffin cups with cooking spray.
2. Brownie Mix: Prepare the brownie mix according to the cake like directions.
3. Bake: Using a small cookie scoop, fill the cups 2/3 full with brownie batter and bake.
4. Create: When the brownies are done baking, use the back of the small scoop the indent the middle of each brownie to create a “brownie cup”.
5. Filling: While the brownies cool, make the filling (see section below for more details).
6. Assemble: Add the filling to the brownie cups (more details below)

The Best Apple Crisp Recipe [+ Video]

We’ve tried a lot of recipes out there but this is hands down the best apple crisp recipe we’ve found and it can totally be made ahead or frozen.

The apples are coated in a heavy cream and flour mixture to make them all saucy and caramel-y (no, that’s not a word but go with it) and then the oat topping is like a giant, cinnamon oatmeal cookie. It’s wonderful — this is seriously the BEST apple crisp recipe. 

Creating This Apple Crisp Recipe

There are probably 5 million recipes out there for apple crisp and this is certainly the season for all of those recipes to be all over Pinterest. Maybe we are a tad crazy to be posting this, but I happen to absolutely love hot apple crisp with a scoop of creamy, melty vanilla ice cream. Cade likes to drizzle a little caramel sauce or dulce de leche over the top of his ice cream but I’m a classics girl so I like it just how I grew up with it. 

My family loved crisps and cobblers growing up almost as much as we loved our musicals. Tell me you love them too. What’s your favorite? If you haven’t watched any, well you better get on that or I’m going to be knocking at your door. Seriously. And while you watch them make this homemade apple crisp.

Homemade Apple Crisp Ingredients

This apple crisp has two main parts: the apple filling and the crisp topping.

For the filling, you’ll need:

• Apples
• Butter
• Flour
• Lemon Juice
• Heavy Cream
• Vanilla
• Brown Sugar
• Granulated Sugar
• Cinnamon
• Nutmeg
• Salt

For the crisp topping, you’ll need…

• Flour
• Old-Fashioned Oats
• Brown Sugar
• Cinnamon
• Salt
• Unsalted Butter

We didn’t want to deviate too far from the classic apple crisp recipe, because why mess with a good thing, right? The measurements for each ingredient can be found in the recipe card at the end of the post.

Key Lime Bars-Torta De Limão

These key lime bars hail from the beautiful country of Brazil! They are light, tangy and I adore that graham cracker crust.

Known as torta de limão in Portuguese (pronounced tor-ta gee lee-mow, “mow” like “cow”, not “mow” like “mow” the lawn, English is so dumb), these key lime bars are truly delicious. They are like a lime cheesecake or a key lime pie in bar form. I was re-shooting our photos for our blackberry lime bars and thought I should update these photos too. After all, they are the inspo for the blackberry version!

Torta de limão is a favorite that my husband had when living in Brazil from a sweet lady named, Vania. (Thank you for taking such great care of Cade!! You all meant so much to him!) So, here’s Cade and his thoughts on the dessert. Love you B. *I know his name is Cade, and B doesn’t make sense. Don’t worry about it! *

“I lived in Brazil for awhile and toward the end of my stay I was introduced to this amazing, sweet and tart dessert. At first I thought it was just a lemon meringue pie. As I took my first bite I was taken back by the flavor and texture of it all. It was creamy like banana pudding, but had the crisp peaks of the meringue and graham cracker-like crust. The lime flavor combined with the sweetened condensed milk was an immediate party with my taste buds. This is still one of my all time favorite desserts and brings back many great memories.  I think that’s what food does for us a lot. I cannot remember the names of all the people I enjoyed this dessert with but I made sure I came home with the recipe in hand and the name of this awesome treat!”

Recommended Equipment

• Zester (or Microplane)
• Juicer

Before You Begin…

You are going to need about 18-20 key limes (10 regular limes) for this recipe to get enough key lime juice so start by first zesting 5-6 of them and juicing all 18-20 limes. It’s a lot easier to remove the zest before a lime is juiced.

Ingredients for Torta de Limão

Now is this going to sound crazy, but you’re only going to need 9 ingredients for these key lime pie bars – 4 ingredients for the crust and 5 ingredients for the filling. It is that simple and so incredibly delicious! Here is your shopping list…

For the Crust

• Graham Crackers: You will need about 21 full graham crackers to get the amount of crumbs you’ll need.
• Melted Butter: Binds the ingredients together and creates a rich flavor in the crust.
• Sugar: Adds sweetness to the crust.
• Salt: Enhances the flavors in the crust.

For the Bars

• La Lechera Leche Condensada: You’ll find this on the baking aisle by the sweetened condensed milk. It’s a little different than just sweetened condensed milk, so be sure to grab the right thing. It will look similar (and probably be right next to) to the La Lechera Dulce de Leche.

Peach Coffee Cake with Streusel Topping

This Peach Coffee Cake with streusel topping is the perfect recipe for late summer. Moist vanilla cake, juicy peaches and crunchy cinnamon streusel. Make it with fresh or canned peaches – either way, you’ll love this easy coffee cake recipe.

Late summer is one of my favorite times of the year. The weather is hot, the sun is shining, and grocery stores are full of fresh summer produce. As a child, my parents would typically plan our family vacations in late summer – so it always meant that we’d get a little extra spoiled too.

Of course, nowadays summer is a lot busier than it was back then. But in late summer I always try to make it home for a visit. We’ll sit on the back deck reading and relaxing, and it’s always good to have a perfect summer treat to enjoy at the same time.

And that’s exactly what this Peach Coffee Cake is for. It’s a moist, perfectly soft, buttery vanilla cake. Then there’s a layer of juicy peaches, cinnamon streusel topping, and a drizzle of vanilla glaze.

Recommended Equipment

• 9x13in Pan
• KitchenAid Stand Mixer

Before You Begin…

As always with baking, get your oven preheating and then pull out the butter to start softening and the buttermilk to come to room temperature. Then get started on the cinnamon streusel topping first.

What Do I Need for Peach Coffee Cake?

All of the ingredients for this recipe are straightforward, pantry and fridge staples except for the peaches. Grab those fresh juicy peaches, and here is what else you will need…

The Most Luscious Pear Crisp Recipe

Warm gently spiced pears topped with a crunchy buttery oat topping, this pear crisp recipe is my new favorite way to fruit crisp!

Whenever I run into our readers at grocery stores or even at event bathrooms, haha, I often get asked what my favorite recipe is.

I don’t have an answer.

It depends on my mood and the time of year and life to be honest. If life is feeling heavy or stressful versus fun and alive then I’ll probably give you a different answer. However, 9/10 times a fruit crisp is one of my absolute, cannot resist, please-scoop-me-more favorites. I am especially loving the delicate sweetness of pears under a pile of crunchy, chewy, cinnamon-y goodness that is a crisp.

There’s something forever about a crisp recipe.

It never goes out of style.

It is good with and without ice cream.

It’s craved from fall (apple crisp) through summer (marionberry crisp or peach crisp). An all year dessert that will always make you feel at home, my home. Where Mom is lifting the lid off a dutch oven with steam billowing out as we all sit anxiously in our tents waiting for the ultimate camping moment, dessert under the stars.

So, let’s make our houses smell amazing, remember yesterdays full of safety and happiness and savor every single bite together.