Valentine's day

Anthony's is in a family daycare which means that he's with kids all different ages. He has two girlfriends his age, but the majority of the kids are older. I came home from school a few weeks ago with his Valentines list.

In the spirit of overkill, Anthony's Valentines for all his friends** were homemade brownies. I made my standard brownie recipe (off the Nestle package) and cut out heart shapes after the brownies were baked. I then decorated them with pink buttercream and finished them with tags I'd made the previous week. I think they turned out pretty good.

That was actually plan B. Plan A was square brownies with a small heart cut out, then filled in with buttercream. Unfortunately, the brownie shell was not strong enough to hold its shape. Fortunately I knew to make a protype before I committed a whole pan-full. (Bob took the leftover brownie bits to work with him.) If I were to do something like this again I would use a royal icing or something that dried hard as the buttercream was a little fragile.

**When I was telling Janet about my plans, her response was, "These are the Valentines for the kids who tattle on him?". Yes, the very same.