Award-Winning Brownies (Really!)

By Cindy
If you bought a container of Ovaltine from 2004 to 2006, you might have seen the recipe that earned me (most of) a ticket to Hawaii.

"Ovaltine Aloha Brownies" were born in my daughter Megan's apartment kitchen in Maui, in 2003. I had gone to visit her for her 20th birthday, spending $800 for the roundtrip ticket from Baltimore. As we stood talking in her kitchen, I picked up a container of Ovaltine - curious, since no one in our family had ever liked it. It was her roommate's.

I saw the notice of a contest on the label for new and innovative recipes featuring Ovaltine. The top prize was $500. Well, I thought, that would pay off more than half my credit card bill for the ticket.

So I got to work. I reasoned that the more Ovaltine the recipe used, the better. And I know that lots of chocolate chips make anything taste better. And macadamia nuts and coconut would just scream"Hawaii." I made up a recipe as I put ingredients in the bowl. What resulted looked pretty good, and I made chocolate frosting using the rest of the can of Ovaltine.

A few months later I got a nice letter and a check for $500 in the mail. Now, you might say that my field of competitors was small: how many people even read Ovaltine labels, much less enter a contest? But I like to think I won because they're so delicious. You decide.

Ovaltine Aloha Brownies
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

1 cup flour
1 cup margarine
2 eggs
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 cup Rich Chocolate Ovaltine (I bolded and italicized the name everywhere in the recipe)
1/3 cup macadamia nuts
2 tbsp sugar
4 ox semi-sweet chocolate chips

Frosting:
1 cup Rich Chocolate Ovaltine
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter
3 cups confectioners sugar
1/4 cup milk
1 tsp vanilla
1-1/2 cups shredded coconut

Combine margarine, eggs and Ovaltine until creamy. In a separate bowl, combine dry ingredients. Add Ovaltine mixture and beat together. Stir in chocolate chips. Spread batter in a greased 8 x 8-inch baking pan and bake for 25 minutes. Cool brownies for 45 minutes in the pan. Mix up all frosting ingredients and spread over the pan of brownies.