Salted Caramel Brownies

May 26th

Last night Michael went to bed and I stayed up to watch Below Deck Mediterranean. Is anyone else watching this? It’s on Bravo and follows the crew of a charter yacht during a season. The crazy rich people combined with staff drama makes for some good tv. If you are watching, let’s chat about Danny. Sweet or just beyond stupid?

Anyway. The show ended and I went to get in bed, around midnight. All of a sudden I hear lots of noise coming from the street. Since our room faces a busy street this isn’t abnormal (someone had been blasting Bad Blood from their car earlier), but normally it goes away quickly as the people drive/walk away. But this yelling was not going away. So I got out of bed to see what was going on.

I see that at the apartment complex across from us there are three people standing there. One is a small guy who keeps getting in and out of a car, moving it back and forth and angling it. The other two guys were seriously double the first guys height and triple his weight, and they are all over little guy. None of them were happy. There was also a second car and a tow truck that were basically parked in the street, and they seemed to belong to the big boys.

There are parking issues all the time at the two apartment complexes across from us. The parking there is beyond minimal, and since they are small complexes there is no valet guarding the spots like we have. So residents and their guests are on their honor to not take other people spots. And let me tell you, their honor sucks. I can’t even keep track of the number of times we have heard someone laying on their horn from those complexes, cause the driver has just arrived home to find someone in their parking spot and they want them out. And there had been honking last night.

So I assume that little guy had parked in one of the big guys spots and big guy had called the tow truck to come get the car, as the signage there says they can. And I assumed that little guy had come out before tow truck attached and he was trying to stop his car from being towed, and he was moving it to make it harder for the tow truck. I admired little guy for standing up to the two big guys, although I also assumed he was an idiot who did it to himself by parking where he shouldn’t.

After around 10 minutes of yelling one of the big guys gets in the tow truck and leaves. But then, weirdly, the other big guy gets in the car that had been in the street and leaves too. I had been expecting little guy to leave and big guy to take his parking spot. Instead, little guy stays with his car and all of a sudden a bunch of ladies and teen boys stream out of the complex. They are waving arms and seemed to be examining a parked truck that didnt seem like it had anything to do with the evening. Little guy seems to be waiting for something, and I wonder if someone had called the cops, and that’s why big guy #2 had left.

At this point I tear myself away from the window long enough to grab my iPad so I can take pics. Sorry I missed pics of the big guys, but I was afraid to leave my spot and miss something good. 🙂

After just a couple minutes someone did appear. But it wasn’t a cop. It was another tow truck! And little dude moved his car, which I then realized he had moved to block in the van next to him. The van he was now letting be towed. While he jumped around and reenacted his fight for the benefit of the new driver. It ended with the tow truck driver pulling away with van attached and yelling back to little guy “good job standing your ground!”. Unfortunately out of all the yelling, that was the only thing I really understood. Although little dudes reenactment made me think that tow truck #1 wasn’t properly securing the van so he made them stop and they were mad about that.

littledudecars

The blue arrow is pointing to little dudes car and the red arrow is pointing to the van he had been blocking in. The purple square is at the apartment building next door. And it shows the spot where a couple weeks ago a visitor had left their car while they visited. Causing someone else who wanted to park in their now blocked spot to sit on his horn for like 30 minutes until the car owner finally came out. This also occurred late night. Because it is always late at night.

All in all, this lasted half hour. So I didn’t get back into bed till 12:30, making me le tired today. And we are going to a friend’s for a BBQ tonight and I need to make dessert. Easy it is! Salted caramel brownies. This has the added benefit of not only being easy, but of all the ingredients being in my pantry. I had gone crazy buying caramels at Christmas time, and then did nothing with them. The recipe called for a 14 oz bag of caramels, and mine was only 11 oz (less after I sampled one or two of them – ha!) so I used the caramel bits I had too. Two packages gone. Score!

bowlofcaramels

The original recipe, which I found at ThisnThatwithOlivia, also gave the option of using sea salt to enhance the salted flavor. But I used the salted caramel sugar I still had. So not only enhanced salt, but enhanced caramel and sugar. Double score!

saltedcaramelsugarw:brownie

They turned out great. Yummy, buttery crust. Gooey, salty, caramel filling. Nice little crunch from the sugar. So good that I’m hoping everyone eats to much of the main food and is too stuffed for dessert. Is it rude if I don’t leave the leftovers with the hostess? 🙂

 

Salted Caramel Brownies

Ingredients

  • 4 sticks salted butter, room temp
  • 1 1/2 cups powdered sugar
  • 1 cup sugar
  • 2 tbsp vanilla
  • 4 cups flour
  • 14 oz caramels
  • 1/3 cup milk
  • 1/2 tsp vanilla
  • 1 tbsp sea salt, or salted caramel sugar

Instructions

  1. Preheat oven to 325.
  2. Mix the butter and sugars in kitchen aid, until creamed. Add vanilla and combine. Slowly sift in flour, one cup at time, until smooth.
  3. Press 1/3 of the dough into a greased 9x13 pan, to form bottom layer. Wrap rest of dough into plastic wrap and place in fridge.
  4. Bake for 20-25 minutes, until firm and light brown. Let rest for 15 minutes.
  5. While the crust is cooling, place the caramels in a microwave safe bowl. Pour in the milk.
  6. Microwave for 1 minute, then stir. Continue to microwave at 30 seconds a time, until caramel is all melted and the mixture is smooth. Then add the 1/2 tsp vanilla and stir in.
  7. Pour the caramel over the crust. Sprinkle with either the sea salt or the salted caramel sugar.
  8. Remove the chilled dough and crumble over the top, completely covering.
  9. Bake for 25-30 minutes, until top is firm and light brown.
  10. Let cool then enjoy!
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