Earl Grey Brownie Balls...

For the Steampunk Party tonight, I made a batch of Earl Grey Brownies.  Of course, I was too impatient to let them cool before I cut into them.  The knife got all gummy and even though I was careful, the pan of brownies looked like I tried to use a dull hatchet to divide them up instead of a sharp knife.

So what was I supposed to do?  Throw them out and waste all that delicious chocolate and start all over?

Nope!  I chopped and mixed everything in the baking pan together, and formed little balls from the massacred brownies.  While I had solved one problem, looking down at the platter presented a new one... my brownie balls looked like balls of poop!

I quickly thought of ways that I could salvage the already salvaged brownies.  There are lots of things that are chocolate brown and round and they don't look like potty.  Truffles, for instance, could... in theory... look pretty awful, but they have a nice powdery coating that keeps them getting stuck together.  Aha!  I needed to roll them in cocoa powder.

Unfortunately for me, the cocoa powder I had was unsweetened and it was ungodly bitter.  I knew that I had to cut it down with some nice powdered sugar.  But... as I reached for the bag of powdered sugar, my hand grasped at an empty space in the cupboard. Oh no!  I forgot to replace the bag when I ran out.  All was not lost!  I had my espresso grinder, granulated sugar and a bit of corn starch.  So I powdered my own sugar and then while I was at it, I finely ground some Earl Grey tea as well.  I sifted the Earl Grey powder, powdered sugar, and cocoa powder together and saved the day!

After rolling the brownie balls around in the mixture and "dusting" them with my saving trinity, I was quite pleased with the results.  In fact, I liked them better!  Each bite of the brownie balls had a little bit of the caky center and crispier edge.  The shape and size were perfect for easy serving and portion control.  And best of all, the coating helped reinforce and bring out the Earl Grey flavors already in the brownies!  (And as an added bonus, the powdered coating helped keep from sticking together!)

Now, why didn't I think of that before?  I guess necessity is the mother of invention after all.  If you don't give up, sometimes things turn out better than expected.