Gifts you can make in an afternoon...

Only 3 days til Christmas.... running running running to get everything done. Decided to take an afternoon off to make a few treats for the neighbours, teachers & the generally nice people in my life. As it was only an afternoon there was no time for experiments. So my tried and tested brownies were the way to go.. I gave them a christmassy spin with some fresh rasberries. So easy and so yummy!

The trick with these is to get them out of the oven before they start to go too hard as you want to retain some of the gooeyness. Once they cool they become harder ... but still keep their lovely moist chocolatey goodness.

While the brownies rested on my counter.. I tried to come up with some pretty packaging ideas. I found a couple of pretty vintage china bowls.. which were perfect. But still needed more so decided to use egg cartons. Cutting them in half and using the flat side. I peeled off any stickers and covered the egg carton with simple butcher's paper. Putting some baking paper on the bottom for absorption, I layed the cut up brownies inside. Now all they needed was some clear cellophane and christmassy ribbon! 

This cost under $15 and took only one afternoon, but the receivers were suitably impressed & I was left feeling rather satisfied.