These slutty protein brownies sandwich real Oreo cookies between a sugar cookie base and a soft, fudgy brownie layer. Basically, they’re what dreams are made of. They’re not the lowest calorie dessert you’ll find on my blog, but each brownie has 10 grams of protein and just 21 grams of carbs.
Since this is technically two recipes in one, it may seem like a complicated recipe at first glance. But don’t let the longer recipe scare you away—it’s an easy one. I’ll walk you through all the steps below, and you can find the printable recipe card at the bottom of the post.
Slutty Protein Brownies Recipe Walkthrough
You can split this recipe into two main parts:
- making the protein cookie base and topping with Oreos
- making the protein brownie batter to pour over the top
We’ll zoom through this part, and I’ll touch on ingredient modifications next.
Step 1: Making the Protein Sugar Cookie Base
The cookie base is essentially my vanilla bean protein sugar cookies recipe cut in half. So if you’ve made that, you’ve got a leg up. If not, you’ll start out by creaming light butter and Swerve (or another sugar substitute) together.
Then add some protein powder, flour, baking powder, and vanilla bean paste or extract, mix it up, and boom—cookie dough.
You can see in the far left photo that you don’t want to completely pulverize the dough in the food processor. Crumble everything together and then you can form the dough with a spatula or by hand. Over mixing will create a tough or chewy cookie base for your slutty protein brownies.
Side note: If you remember the original slutty protein brownies recipe I made for an old cookbook, the cookie base included chocolate chips. I decided to pull those out and use them inside the brownie batter to make them extra soft and fudgy. This was inspired by my white chocolate raspberry protein cheesecake that uses white chocolate chips instead of eggs.
And that’s it for the cookie base. Spread it out evenly across the bottom of an 8×8 baking dish with a parchment paper sling. The sling will make it easier to remove the brownies from the baking dish after baking for faster cooling.
Don’t forget to top with Oreos. I know I didn’t have to tell you that, but still. Oh, and by the way, if you’re wondering what to do with extra Oreos, check out my Oreo Protein Cake!
Step 2: Making the Protein Brownie Layer
It’s all downhill from here. Begin by mixing some protein powder, flour, and cocoa powder together and adding milk and Greek yogurt. Then microwave some chocolate chips, add butter to them, stir, and add to the dry ingredients.
Stir everything together until smooth and pour over the cookie base and Oreos. Spread it out evenly and you’re ready to bake!
P.S. Don’t forget to spray the exposed sides of the baking dish or you’ll need to use a knife to separate the brownies from the baking dish before cooling.
Slutty Protein Brownies Ingredient Modifications
I’ve made enough protein powder desserts to know the most commonly asked questions. If I miss something, feel free to drop a comment at the bottom of this post and I’ll try to help ya out!
Side note: For a deeper dive on healthy brownie ingredients, check out my low calorie brownie bake-off.
What is Swerve? Can I use any sugar substitute?
Swerve is an erythritol-based sweetener that measures and tastes just like sugar.
In most recipes, other sugar substitutes that measure 1:1 for sugar usually work just fine. Similar to the protein powder notes below, however, cookie dough can be tricky. The good news is that you don’t need much for these slutty protein brownies so I’m betting you can get away with it.
That said, I’d encourage you to pick up some Swerve to be safe! You can find Swerve, vanilla bean paste, the food processor, and all the other kitchen tools and staple ingredients I use on my Amazon storefront.
Can I use a different protein powder for these slutty protein brownies?
I’d advise against it if at all possible. No protein powder is the same and using different products can be tricky with protein baked goods. Substitute protein powder at your own risk!
The recipe calls for PEScience Select, a blend of whey and casein protein. It’s quite a bit thicker in consistency and difficult to match with whey-only protein powder. Usually, adding a bit more protein powder or reducing the wet ingredients fix things. But in a recipe like this with the cookie dough, that might take a bit more tinkering.
You can buy as little as a 5-scoop serving of PEScience Select on their website. That would be enough to try these brownies! And if you decide to pick up a larger tub, you can use my affiliate discount code mason to save 15%.
Can I use real butter?
Yep. You may want to let it soften to room temp or cut into cubes for starting, though. Light butter is super soft at room temp and even straight out of the refrigerator.
All purpose flour substitutes
Similar to protein powder, the cookie dough makes it a little tricky but since you don’t have to handle the dough, you can get away with more. I bet almond flour would work fine, and I’ve others have used Bob’s Red Mill GF 1:1 flour successfully in recipes like my Greek yogurt biscuits.
That should cover it! If you have a question about these slutty protein brownies, drop a comment below or join my Facebook group with more than 10k healthy home cooks that would love to help you out!
Slutty Protein Brownies
Ingredients
Protein Cookie Base
- 1/4 C 56g Light Butter
- 1/4 C 48g Swerve Granular
- 1 scoop, 31g Vanilla Protein Powder*
- 1/4 C 30g All Purpose Flour
- 1/4 tsp Baking Powder
- 1/2 tsp Vanilla Bean Paste, or vanilla extract
- 9 Oreos
Protein Brownie Layer
- 2 scoops, 62g Vanilla Protein Powder
- 1/2 C 60g All Purpose Flour
- 3 Tbsp 15g Unsweetened Dark Cocoa Powder
- 3/4 C 180mL Unsweetened Cashew Milk (or your choice of milk)
- 3 Tbsp 42g Vanilla Fat Free Greek Yogurt
- 3 Tbsp 42g Dark Chocolate Chips
- 3 Tbsp 42g Light Butter
Instructions
- Preheat an oven to 350F and line an 8x8 baking dish with parchment paper sling. Spray the edges with nonstick spray and set aside.
- For the Protein Cookie Base
- Using a food processor, stand mixer, or whisk, cream the 1/4 C of butter and 1/4 C of Swerve together until light and fluffy.
- Add the 1 scoop of protein powder, 1/4 C of flour, baking powder, and vanilla bean paste and mix until a the mixture is crumbly and can be shaped into a dough. (I used 5-6 pulses in a food processor.)
- Spread the cookie dough across the bottom of the baking dish in a thin layer and top with the Oreos.
- For the Protein Brownie Layers
- Mix the 2 scoops of protein powder, 1/2 C of flour, and cocoa powder together in a large bowl.
- Add the milk and Greek yogurt, stirring to fully incorporate.
- In a small bowl, microwave the chocolate chips for 45-60 seconds until melted. Add the butter and stir until smooth before adding to the batter. Stir well.
- Pour the brownie batter on top of the cookie base and Oreos, spreading it to the edges.
- Bake for 20-25 minutes or until there's little wiggle when shaken. (You want the brownies slightly gooey in the center as they'll firm up a bit once out of the oven.)
- Let the brownies cool for a few minutes before transferring them to a cooling rack using the parchment paper sling. The brownies will be easier to cut when cooled for at least 30 minutes.
Notes
Nutrition
More Protein Powder Recipes You Might Like
These are by far some of the best brownies I have ever tasted. I used oreo thins instead of a ‘real’ oreo and they came out perfect the first time I made these. I also tried a girl scout shortbread cookie instead of the oreo the second time and they came out just as good. So it looks like it doesn’t matter what cookie you use. I highly recommend giving this recipe a try. I made them for myself and my mom and she loved them just as much!
I had given up baking with protein before I found Mason. I felt like I was always taking chances with sub par results and wasting expensive protein powders. Now that I have discovered Mason I never even give it a second thought, I have never had a bad result baking with his recipes. For the slutty brownies I used dark chocolate oreos, real butter, 3 scoops of BN PHC for the brownie layer and 2 scoops BN PFC for the cookie layers, 1/3 cup greek yogurt and replaced the milk with Fairlife. These were really yummy and not dry at all. Family approved!
So delicious! The cookie layer was super thin which I found a little weird and thought i didn’t make enough/the correct amount but it came out so good! I use whole wheat flour instead of all purpose and I know whole wheat tends to weigh more so I may add a bit more next time
My boyfriend and I attempted these twice – well I should say I made the first attempt and somewhat failed and he made the second attempt and they came out amazing! (Go figure) my biggest mistake: the butter I was using. I normally buy the land o lakes light butter with canola that Mason suggests, I only had about half the amount required left and was too lazy to go back to the store so I substituted I can’t believe it’s not butter (light version) – BIG mistake. This made the brownie mix way less fudgy and instead of the 20-25 minute time it should have taken to bake, took 45 minutes, even then I was questioning baking a tad longer. The next day my boyfriend picked up the land o lakes and re made and it only took 25 minutes and they came out excellent! Sometimes you can sub things and sometimes it’s better not to!! 🙂 I’ve used the land o lakes light with canola for other recipes of Masons or twists of my own and never gone wrong! Overall I highly recommend:)
These are awesome! I used a dairy free coconut yogurt and dairy free chocolate chips as a replacement, and they turned out perfect!
I use to make slutty brownies for my coworkers all the time throughout college. I’ve missed eating them so much so this recipe was a pleasant surprise! I had all of the ingredients on hand but I used plain greek yogurt, unsweetened cocoa powder (not dark), and mini chocolate chips. I think I over mixed my butter and sugar at the beginning because it was a bit tricky to spread at the bottom of the pan. I was able to get it in the right spot. I also only had Oreo thins- if you go this route, I highly recommend stacking 2 on top of one another or else the cookie seems non existent. Overall, this slutty brownie was pretty amazing!
I made these and didn’t tell my family they were made mainly with protein powder and lets just say didn’t have a dang clue! I used double stuft Oreos instead of reg, so higher in cals but insanely good.
Just made these yesterday! Amazing, very moist bars. Definitely will make these again. I used Trader Joe’s thin oreo cookies