Another Plea for Brownie Mix

Ever wonder how we make American foods we crave whose ingredients traditionally cannot be found in Bulgaria? Often, we use material mailed to us from the States (like when we make tuna-mac), but sometimes we attempt to do the best we can with what we can find here. Last night I attempted to make brownies from scratch. Brownie mix is not available here in Bulgaria, but I did find what I thought looked like a nice recipe online using cocoa powder, sugar, butter, and flour. I was cooking pumpkin soup for dinner - since it is delicious, there are lots of funny shaped pumpkins at the bazaar, and I rather enjoy enjoy making it (a note for would-be followers of this same recipe - I usually double it since Jess often eats about 6 bowls and I also don't add the water the recipe calls for because we like the soup thick!)
So last night, while I was making the soup I also began to make the brownies. I wanted to surprise Jess so every time she entered the kitchen I chased her out with a ladle. She worried that I might try to change the soup recipe because I have a tendency to try and 'improve' recipes that often don't need improving, but in fact, I was doing a test run on making brownies because we were out of mix from America and we are holding a Thanksgiving dinner at our apartment Thursday night and wanted to have some for dessert. (Most Bulgarians have never eaten a brownie!) So the mix started well enough. The cocoa and sugar and butter mix was chocolate looking, the eggs turned the mix slimy, but the flour turned the mix more into a cookie dough consistency. I thought perhaps I should add some oil or water, but having already heard a few admonitions to stick to the recipe regarding the soup, I thought it best to shrug it off and just put it in the oven. This is when things got weird. Every time I opened the oven door to check on the brownies they were sizzling. A lot. Especially in the low spots (the dough was very thick and even though I spread it out as best I could, there were a few valleys in the pan.) So I would think to myself, 'that's odd,' shut the door, and hope when I returned they would look normal. Eventually, I thought, 'sizzling or no sizzling, I should take them out, they must be done!!!' I now believe the sizzling was the butter in the mix, evaporating like water in the desert and taking all the flavor with it. For when I cut the concoction and tasted it, it was indeed dry, desolate, and in need of много moisture. Since I spent so many hours in preparation, I felt obligated to eat one or two, but in the end, my home-made brownies ended up in the trash, not in my belly. Ah well, it was fun, but I think we will stick to home-made chocolate chip cookies in the future and wait to make brownies only we after receive boxes from home!