So on Instagram, I ran a poll asking you to help me rename the recipe: I agree with Bettina’s finer points that there’s something weirdly misogynistic, sexist, and shaming about the name “slutty” brownies.
Bettina rounds up some of the craziest ones: “like a full blown, bending over in front of your boyfriend with no underwear on, biggest slut ever brownies” and “ brownies are the equivalent of Christina Aguilera in her Xtina Dirrty days.” Renaming Slutty Browniesīut I’m here to ruin the fun. I mean, there’s just so much to unpack: the weird sexualization of the brownie, the implied shaming of the enjoyment of said brownie, and finally, just the inherent misogyny and sexist history of the word “slut.” Bettina Makalintal, one of my favorite food writers, does a great breakdown of all these issues in her Vice article, “How and Why Did Brownies Become Slutty?”īut the TL/DR is this: “slutty” brownies were first invented by a blogger named Amanda in 2011 however, she christened them with the more wholesome name of “Cookie Dough Oreo Brownies.” But they really took off when Rosie of The Londoner reposted a version of the recipe on her blog, this time with the new name of “Slutty Brownies.” How did she land on that new name? According to her post, the brownies are “oh so easy, and more than a little bit filthy.” Okkkkay.įrom there, it’s been a weird competition of bloggers one-upping each other with more sexualized names and descriptions for the recipe. Hold the phone-before we get to the recipe, can we talk about its problematic name, first? Because truth be told, I avoided making this recipe for so long because of its truly terrible name: “slutty” brownies. It’s a LOT, I know-but that’s why the recipe is small batch! It makes only 8 brownies, enough for a small household of 2 to 4 people. Think of it as a cross between your favorite chocolate chip cookie and cocoa brownie, but with a layer of Oreos, too. These small batch slutty brownies are a small batch version of the internet-famous recipe: brownies made with layers of chocolate chip cookie dough and chocolaty brownies, stuffed with Oreo cookies in its center.