Brownie Lady Brownies (good enough to eat in church!)

These are the BEST brownies in the world. At least I think so. Stacy found the recipe on an online discussion board. The story goes that a lady walked into church with a 9x13 pan of brownies and a knife. She sat down in the pew, cut the brownies, and proceeded to consume the entire tray by herself. Everybody watched this woman hoover the brownies but nobody was brave enough to ask her about the incident.

Sometime after the second time this happened with the same woman in the same chapel, one soul was brave enough to approach the Brownie Lady as she became known behind her back. Turns out that the Brownie Lady was a pregnant lady and was succumbing to cravings. Now these are the kind of cravings I can get behind! Obviously a recipe for brownies that cause cravings so severe as to break a pile of rules of etiquette needs to be shared. So the Brownie Lady shared her recipe and it has been passed around along with the legend until it arrived at our appreciative home.

After hearing the story I immediately decided that I wanted to eat those brownies but I also dismissed the idea just as quickly because brownies have wheat flour in them. And gluten free brownies usually taste terrible.

Until now. Since this brownie recipe only contained 1 1/2 cup of flour, Stacy decided to substitute with our mix of gluten free flours. I almost literally held my breath while this thing baked. And the fudgey yumminess that came out of that warm little box became my favorite brownie of all time. Even better than the good stuff I had eaten before the family went gluten-free.

Here's the recipe in all of it's glory:

Brownie Lady Brownies
(good enough to eat in church)

2/3 C Cocoa
2/3 C Shortening, Melted (Not butter flavored)
4 Eggs
2 C Sugar
1 tsp Vanilla
1 1/2 C Flour (Gluten free mix below)
1 tsp Baking Powder
1 tsp Salt
1 1/2 C Miniature Marshmallows
1 C Chopped Nuts (we substitute chocolate chips here)

Mix cocoa and melted shortening in bowl. In seperate bowl beat eggs, sugar and vanilla. Add to cocoa mix. Add dry ingredients EXCLUDING marshmallows to cocoa mixture. Mix well. Stir in marshmallows. Pour into 9x13 pan and bake @ 350 for 25-35 minutes. Your fork or toothpick won't come out super clean because of the marshmallows.

Gluten Free Flour Substitution
1 1/2 C Flour =
1/2 C Rice flour
1/2 C Tapioca starch
1/2 C Corn starch
1 1/2 tsp potato flour (not starch)
3/4 tsp Xanthan gum

OK, so that' s a little more than 1 1/2 cups, but it works.


Once you have this recipe perfected, you can start to improvise. As good as the brownie is, I like to use it as a platform for flavor. These are great with ice cream, fudge, and caramel. I have made two 9" rounds and sandwiched a peanut butter and chocolate filling between them making an incredibly huge Reese's Peanut Butter Cup concoction that is still referred to at work.

Oh the things you can do!

It's Finally Happened

Some may say that it happened a long time ago, but I am only beginning to admit it myself. I have become my father and joined the ranks of the education world.

I have recently developed, proposed, and started a new position at work. I have moved from Regional Sales Director to a position yet to be titled in the Learning & Organizational Development department. Same company, no move required except my desk, and I still get to work very closely with the same people.

My new job responsibilities will primarily revolve around education and training as well as being the Clinical Director for the company.

I will be in charge of new employee training and developing an ongoing on the job training for current employees. I am also developing a program to train and prepare employees to pass the accreditation test required by Medicare to sell the type of custom chairs I have been working with for the past 10 years. On top of all of that, I will be heading up an effort to gain accreditation for the entire company so that we can provide industry recognized Continuing Education Units to our employees as well as use them as a marketing tool with our referral sources. The goal is to create a world class rehab education program that will be the envy of the industry.

Since I like to bite off more than I can chew, I will also be putting together our policies and procedures for clinical applications. The object of that is to make sure that our customers are sold the right equipment every time. I am also the person that our medical review nurses, inside and outside sales people, and operations people look to when they have questions about equipment, disease states, or customer interaction.

It sounds like a lot of work, but since I was doing most of it already in addition to my sales responsibilities, this will allow me to focus on just a couple of projects at a time. I will not have to travel as much for a while and will eventually create and manage a team of field based trainers. Hopefully my travel will be limited to attending trade shows and seminars that I am either presenting papers or classes at or learning from. Either way, I will be able to spend more time at home with the family.

I am very excited about my new position and working with a new team of people. I get to work with a world class group of experienced educators. I have no formal training on education theory, but I have a group of people around me that are more than willing to help my gain those skills. I have also been informed on the best place to buy discount tweed jackets with leather elbow patches. Now I just need to find a bubble pipe!

German Dancing

New Braunfels is a town rich in German heritage. There is a fair ground AND there is Wursthalle for the annual Wurstfest. The community education program offers "Kids German Folk Dancing" starting at age 4. We were excited to sign Alayna up, and she was excited to learn.

Here she is at her first practice with the other children in her age group.

• Clap, clap, clap
• Turn a round
• Bow 2 3 4

In addition to the $5 class fee she needed a dirndl. We pulled this little number together in time for her first recital yesterday as entertainment for the Meals On Wheels Conference.


Alayna said that she was "slightly nervous" to dance at her first recital. Mostly, she seemed very excited.

Here she is lining up with her partner to go in. Her group danced the Dance of Greeting and the Herr Schmidt. Peeking thru the window (I know, not very professional but I didn't want to crowd/block the doorway with the other parents) I saw Alayna look around at her audience with a smile as she began to dance. After watching the older groups dance, all the children made a circle for the Chicken Dance! After one chorus all of the attendees were invited to make a circle outside of the children's and join in. Following hearty applause the children exited to go home with their parents.

I took Alayna to Dairy Queen for a sundae with chocolate sauce and a cherry on top afterward in celebration of a job well done. Now she is excited for her next chance to dance.

Shoe Laces

Alayna tied her own shoe today. She had a little trouble with the right shoe. After letting me show her how . . .

. . . she tied her left shoe all by herself!

Happy Birthday, Alayna!

I can not believe that this little girl

is 5 today.

Look at our beautiful birthday girl now.

She said it was a very, very, very, very, especially good birthday; including her Pony Party yesterday. We love you, Alayna.

Hair

Cavell had his hair cut this past week. I cannot get over the amount of hair he has. There was more hair on the floor from the first half of his haircut than I leave after getting my hair cut short.

before after

Books

I love our new library. Mostly because it has a children's room. They have train tables set up and computers with child sized chairs and learning games that the children can play with. The librarian doesn't even mind if I let Cavell play on the computer while I look around for books. We were just there this week. Alayna picked out her own books. I never know what to look for at the library. She picked out GOOD books! A Pipkin of Pepper, Best Friends, and The World God Made.

When we got home and while I was making lunch, Alayna READ this book, BY HERSELF!! When she finished, she starting reading the Charlie and Lola book I had found for her, only needing help with the word, "photograph." She only got about half way through before lunch was ready, so I finished it for her for her quiet time story. I have noticed all of the signs she had been reading and I have heard her reading before, but I thought she was mostly remembering what I had read to her. I now realize she has been reading for awhile. I just haven't wanted to admit it, because that means my little girl is growing up.

Little Helper

Sometimes it is hard to remember how long Alayna has helped me in the kitchen. Because of our gluten free diet there are a lot of opportunities to make something from scratch that most people would just pick up at the store. I think she started helping before she was two!

Every week we make a double batch of waffles to use as sandwich bread, for birthdays (including some of yours) we make cake or cupcakes and for a random weekend treat we will make brownies or cookies. Alayna loves to pick which kind of cookie: chocolate chip, chocolate-chocolate chip, peanut butter, peanut butter with chocolate chips, macaroons, or snicker-doodles. For the first time ever, we made cutout cookies. We bought a heart cookie cutter just for the occasion (Valentine's Day).


But, Alayna wasn't the only one who wanted to help this time. When it was time to roll out and cut the dough, Cavell pulled his chair up to the counter as well. He made sure our surface was properly floured (with rice flour) at ALL times. He also wanted to help transfer the cookies to the cookie sheet, but didn't understand that the turner was meant to go under the cookie, not thru it.

We have four other cut out cookie recipes to try. We will be making cookies for St. Patrick's Day, Easter, Memorial Day, and Independence Day to try each one and pick our favourite. I think my new little helper will have plenty of opportunities to learn.

Hair

Lately, Alayna and I have been following a few hair blogs. She loves to look at the pictures with me and then we choose what hairdo we will do. I thought I could share a couple we have done.

From this page

Can you tell this is a heart? Alayna let me do it for my birthday. Paul had the camera in Cancun, and the pics from my phone were not very good. The heart was really cute, but I didn't like how Alayna's hair went into the piggys (I didn't do the messy buns). This time we left off the piggys for Joy School. I was teaching the letter H, and the kids were passing out Valentines.

Alayna wants this different heart hair do for her birthday party.

We also did this hair do. The first day we did this I, again, did not like how Alayna's hair looked in the piggys, especially how they were pulled back together. This is probably why I didn't take pictures that day. But, I loved how the first two braids looked on the front. The next time, when her hair naturally parted in the back, I just added the other two braids in those spaces. Which worked out well, since I didn't know what else to do with the rest of her hair.





Even with all the fun we have been having with Alayna's hair, I still love when she wants to leave it curly.

self portrait

Mmm Mmm Good

Friday night, Cavell would have nothing to do with dinner (home made chicken enchiladas). He almost ate a black bean, but once a drop of juice landed on his lips, he clammed back up.

Immediately after dinner he got down from the chair, ran to the open windows, ran his fingers inside the window casing and licked them with abandon.

Yum.