Peanut Butter Cheesecake Chocolate Chunk Brownies

Last weekend we were invited to a party and, of course, I wanted to bring a dessert. :) I wasn't in the mood for making a cake, plus I thought something more like finger food sized portions would be more appropriate, so, I decided to make these decadent brownies. There have been quite a lot of versions for "brownies with a twist" hovering around on Pinterest lately, but I sort of came up with this recipe on my own, combining bits and pieces of others out there. The final result did not disappoint. I made a big batch and took about 2/3 to the party,  saved some for home and brought the rest to my co-workers. Everybody raved about them! Within a day, they were all GONE! What I love about this recipe is the fact that it starts off with a boxed mix of brownies (since I was a little short on time at 11PM when I started baking :)) but then quickly gets transformed into something way, way better than regular boring brownies out of a box. Check this out:

Recipe:

Brownie layer:
1 box brownie mix, your favorite brand, mixed according to package instructions
(in this particular case, I had to add 2 eggs to the mix but I only had 1 left, so I substituted 1 egg  for 1 tbsp flax seed mill and 3 tbsps water- it worked great and I will be doing this on a regular basis from now on!)

Cheesecake layer: 
1 (8oz) pkg cream cheese, at room temperature, I used 1/3 less fat cream cheese
1 egg
1/3 cup sugar
1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract
 Mix everything until creamy and smooth (I actually used my little Kitchen Bullet for that and it worked great)

Peanut Butter Layer:
1 cup peanut butter, melted for about 1 minute in the microwave (I stir it a little after the first 30 seconds), I used natural chunky peanut butter because I like the texture it gives the brownies but creamy will do just fine

And last but certainly not least,
about 2-3 oz of your favorite chocolate, broken up in small chunks (I used milk chocolate in this case)

Directions:

Preheat oven to 400F.
Cover a 9x13 inch baking pan with foil. Grease well.

Pour 2/3 of the prepared brownie mix batter on the bottom. Next, drop the melted peanut butter by spoonfuls on top of the brownie batter. Pour the cheesecake mixture. Spread the chocolate chunks. Pour the rest of the brownie batter on top. Using a fork, swirl around the batter to create a marbleized look.
Bake for 30 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in center comes out almost dry (it may still stick a little bit because of the cheesecake batter but that's okay; as long as it doesn't jiggle in the center, it's done).
Cool in pan. Cut and serve. They won't last long, trust me! :)