Mint Cream Cheese Brownies

Name: Mint Cream Cheese Brownies
Prep time: 30 min
Cook time: 30 min
Total time: 180 min
Ingredients: 1/2 cup salted butter (*); 1/4 cup semisweet chocolate chips; 1 cup white sugar; 2 eggs; 1/2 teaspoon peppermint extract; 1/2 cup all-purpose flour; 1/4 cup Dutch-processed cocoa powder; 8 ounces full-fat cream cheese (softened); 1/2 cup powdered sugar ((confectioners sugar)); 1 egg; 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract; 1 teaspoon peppermint extract; 4 drops green food coloring (*); 2 drops blue food coloring (*); 1/2 cup mini semisweet chocolate chips

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These Mint Cream Cheese Brownies feature an incredibly decadent chocolate brownie swirled with a creamy mint chocolate chip cheesecake layer.

Stacked mint chip cream cheese brownies.

Looking for a minty green dessert to make this St. Patrick's Day? Look no further, these delicious and festive mint chocolate chip cheesecake brownies are just the one! Like my Mint Nanaimo Bars and Chocolate Mint Sandwich Cookies, they combine mint and chocolate for a delicious dessert that is perfect for St. Paddy's Day!

With a layer of thick and fudgy brownie batter on the bottom, followed by a perfectly minty cream cheese mixture with mini chocolate chips, finished with a swirl of the last bit of brownie batter through the cheesecake, these brownies (or should I say cheesecake bars?) are impressive and yummy! Be sure to try my Baked Pumpkin Cheesecake Bars at Thanksgiving if you love cheesecake bars or my Peanut Butter Brownies if you love a decadent homemade brownie.

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⭐️ Why You Need to Make This Recipe
🧈 Ingredients
📃 Instructions
💡 Top Tip
❓ Recipe FAQs
💚 More Mint Chocolate Recipes
📖 Recipe

Mint cheesecake swirled chocolate brownie on a white plate.

⭐️ Why You Need to Make This Recipe

Best of both worlds. No need to choose between brownies and cheesecake when you can have BOTH!
Festive for St. Patrick's Day or Christmas. These bars would be great for either holiday or any day of the year.
Easy, fun, and quick. You can whip these bars up and have them baking in 30 minutes!

🧈 Ingredients

Here are the ingredients needed to make these mint cream cheese brownies.

Salted Butter - You may use unsalted butter instead with ¼ teaspoon of salt added to the recipe.
Eggs - You will need three eggs for this recipe; two for the brownie batter and one for the cream cheese layer.
Cream Cheese - Be sure to start with cream cheese that is softened to room temperature.
Food Coloring - If you are trying to avoid synthetic food coloring, use this natural food coloring instead or omit the coloring entirely.

See the recipe card for the full list of ingredients with measurements.

📃 Instructions

Butter and chocolate melted together in a glass measuring cup.

Step 1: Melt the butter and chocolate together in 15-second increments in the microwave, stirring between each increment.

Wet ingredients combined in a glass mixing bowl.

Step 2: Add the sugar, eggs, and peppermint extract. Whisk until smooth.

Flour and cocoa powder added to bowl of combined ingredients.

Step 3: Add the flour and cocoa powder. Whisk until smooth. Set aside.

Cream cheese, powdered sugar, egg, extract, and food coloring in a mixing bowl.

Step 4: Mix the softened cream cheese, eggs, powdered sugar, vanilla, peppermint extract, and food coloring with an electric mixer until smooth.

Mini chocolate chips folded into green mint cheesecake filling.

Step 5: Fold in the mini chocolate chips.

Brownie batter in a square metal baking pan lined with parchment paper.

Step 6: Pour most of the brownie batter into a baking pan lined with parchment paper, reserving ½ cup of batter.

Cheesecake filling on top of brownie batter in baking pan.

Step 7: Spread all the cheesecake batter on top of the brownie batter.

Spoonfuls of brownie batter dropped on top of cheesecake filling.

Step 8: Drop spoonfuls of the reserved batter on top of the cheesecake filling.

Brownie batter swirled through cheesecake batter.

Step 9: Swirl the brownie batter gently through the cheesecake batter with a butter knife.

Step 10: Bake for 25-30 minutes or until no longer jiggly.

Let the bars cool in the baking pan on a wire rack to room temperature before removing from the pan using the parchment paper to lift. Transfer to the refrigerator to finish chilling for at least 2 hours before slicing to serve.

💡 Top Tip

Be super careful not to overmix the brownie batter into the cheesecake batter on top of the bars. Very gently run a butter knife through to create swirls throughout the top.

❓ Recipe FAQs

Can you leave cream cheese brownies out overnight?

Baked goods with cream cheese should be refrigerated to store to prevent harmful bacteria from growing.

Why does cream cheese need to be softened?

Softened cream cheese will incorporate into a recipe completely and smoothly. Cold cream cheese will leave unpleasant lumps of cream cheese throughout.

Can I make these cheesecake brownies gluten-free?

While I have not tested it, I think you could make the brownie batter with gluten-free flour to make these bars GF.

Can I make this recipe ahead of time?

Yes! These bars actually need at least 2 hours or more to chill before serving making them a great recipe to make earlier in the day or the day before you would like to serve them.

💚 More Mint Chocolate Recipes

Looking for other mint chocolate desserts? Try these next:

If you tried these Mint Cheesecake Brownies or any other recipe on my website, please leave a ⭐️ star rating and write a little note telling me how it went in the comments below. Thank you!!