Friday, October 5, 2018

Raspberry Cayenne Brownies

This recipe is from a family friend. It's a popular favorite at the hot food themed parties they host. I once brought them into the office at a former job. I sliced them up and carefully labeled them "Raspberry Cayenne Brownies." I later learned that one of my coworkers had taken a bite, spat it out, and thrown the rest of the brownie across the kitchen.

"That's disgusting," I'm told she yelled. "Did someone put pepper in those brownies?"

"Yes," came the reply. "That would be the 'Cayenne' on the label."

"I thought that was a joke. Who the **** puts Cayenne in a brownie?"

I do. I put Cayenne in a brownie.

The Cayenne will start losing its bite after a couple days. As a result the brownies are best eaten within two days.

Ingredients:
  • 2 packages Betty Crocker Fudge Brownie Mix
  • 4 eggs
  • 1c Corn Oil
  • 1/2 c Water
  • 2 packages Ghirardelli Double Chocolate Chips
  • 10 oz     seedless raspberry preserves
  • 1/2 c Dark Rum
  • 2 tsp Cayenne Pepper

Directions:
  1. Pour Rum and Preserves into a Pyrex dish and Microwave for 8 minutes. Vent and stir every 30 seconds.   
  2. Mix in Cayenne and allow to cool   
  3. Mix Batter per recipe on box.
  4. Add 1 bag of chocolate chips
  5. Grease 13x9 pan and pour 2/3 of the batter into the pan.
  6. Pour Raspberry Sauce on top
  7. Add remaining batter on top and swirl.
  8. Sprinkle 2nd bag of chips on top.
  9. Bake at 325ยบ for 50 minutes or until a skewer comes out mostly clean.

Wednesday, August 15, 2018

It was her "Moist."


We recently had a bit of a kerfuffle at work over a projector having technical difficulties. This reminded me of a past job where the comptroller got the word “dongle” banned from the office. You couldn't say it. You couldn't email it. She said it “sounded dirty.”

This caused a problem for the sales staff when she refused to process purchase orders for anything with the word “dongle” on it. The sales guys ended up purchasing dongles for their equipment on their own dime and then burying the cost in expense reports for business trips.

The network administrator we had at the time realized he could use this to push through all sorts of purchases by claiming that “All the cheaper options use, well, THOSE things.” 

This went on for a few months until the owner found out that computer equipment he considered "excessive" was being approved by his drinking buddy comptroller. Once the details came to light, he ordered her to "Stop clutching your pearls and get used to the word." After that the ban on "dongle" was lifted.

Sadly, this also meant hardware purchases returned to being approved based on being the cheapest possible option that meets at least one of the criteria on the "Minimum System Requirements" instead of something that would actually work.