Santa Hat Brownies

santa hat broniws on stacked plates with ornaments

Course: Dessert

Cuisine: Holidays

Keyword: brownie bites, christmas dessert ideas, easy christmas desserts

Prep Time: 30

Cook Time: 10

Total Time: 40

Servings: brownie bites

Calories: 183kcal

Author: Ashley

Santa Hat Brownies are the perfect healthy holiday treat! Just a few steps to make these vegan and gluten free brownie bites, then frosting and strawberries for the santa hats. A fun recipe to get the kids involved too. Vegan and gluten free friendly.

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Ingredients

Brownies

2 tablespoons flaxseed meal + ⅓ cup water
½ cup dark chocolate chips
¾ cup creamy cashew butter make sure it's well mixed + smooth
¼ cup avocado oil or light olive oil
½ cup coconut sugar or granulated sugar
½ teaspoon vanilla extract
⅓ cup all-purpose 1:1 gluten free baking flour
¼ cup + 1 teaspoon unsweetened cocoa powder
¼ teaspoon baking soda
¼ teaspoon fine sea salt
2 tablespoons non-dairy milk

Strawberry Hats

2 (16 ounce) containers California Giant Strawberries

Frosting

½ cup unsalted plant-based butter vegan friendly
1 ½ - 2 cups powdered sugar

Instructions

Preheat oven to 325ºF and lightly grease 24-cup mini muffin pan; set aside.
Make Flax Egg: In a small bowl combine flaxseed meal with water and set aside for 5 minutes.
Melt chocolate: In a small saucepan over low heat, melt chocolate chips, stirring until smooth. Or melt on 50% power in 30 second increments, stirring until smooth. Set aside and let cool slightly.
Mix wet ingredients: In a large bowl, mix together cashew butter with oil and sugar until fully combined. Add in melted chocolate and vanilla extract until smooth. Add in flaxseed "eggs" until combined – mixture will get thicker at this point.
Add dry ingredients: Gently add in flour, cocoa powder, baking soda and salt, stirring until smooth, adding milk at the end until batter is thick and fudge-y.
Scoop dough: Using small cookie scoop, evenly distribute batter into mini muffin pan, filling 3/4 way full (any more and you'll over flow the tops).
Bake brownie bites for 8-10 minutes (mine took 9 – test for wet batter with toothpick). Allow brownies to cool completely before carefully removing from pan (I used a butter knife to gently lift).
Prepare strawberries: While the brownies are cooling, wash and dry strawberries, then cut off green tops.
You'll need 24 large strawberries.
Make the frosting: In a medium bowl using electric mixer, cream butter until smooth then carefully add powdered sugar, mixing on low speed until combined. Taste test for desired sweetness after 1 cup.
Assemble Santa Hat Brownies: Using piping bag, pipe the frosting around the edge of brownie (option to pipe the entire brownie). Place strawberry on top of frosting, top down, then pipe a dot of frosting on tip of strawberry to create the top of the hat. Continue this process until all of the santa hats have been created.

Video

Notes

This recipe doesn't require a ton of frosting, especially if you only pipe the edge of the brownie, so feel free to use store-bought if you'd like!

Tip: While selecting strawberries, try to select medium-larger ones so they fill up more of the brownie bite.

Nutrition