Tag: brownies

Best ever fudgy chocolate brownies

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Dense, fudgy chocolate brownies have to be one of my all time favourite things to bake – simple, cheap and so goddam good they beg to be made as frequently as you can justify.

Joel has a pretty insatiable sweet tooth in comparison to me and so these were requested a few days ago as we have no treats in the cottage, and these are certainly a treat. Baked until just cracking on the surface yet still quivering in the centre, these are so rich and fudgy you don’t need to eat much at all to feel sated. Eat as they are or serve warm with vanilla ice cream or some indulgent chocolate custard.

These brownies are cheap to make as well as being really easy. I use the 40p 100g bars of dark chocolate from Sainsburys or Tescos (they were just 30p not long ago and I’m still grumpy about the increase). They are decent quality and a good cocoa content, no need to spend lots on expensive bars and never use cooking chocolate, that stuff is vile.

You can easily customise these by adding 100g chocolate chips/nuts/marshmallows after you’ve folded in the flour and cocoa. I usually add milk chocolate chips or big dollops of Biscoff spread or dulche du leche, in fact I cannot recommend this enough!

Ingredients:

  • 100g butter
  • 200g plain dark chocolate
  • 4 eggs
  • 250g caster sugar (use golden if you wish)
  • pinch salt
  • 100g plain flour
  • 30g cocoa powder
  • 1 tsp baking powder

Method:

  1. Heat oven to 180C. Scrunch up some baking parchment then unfurl and line a 20cm x 20cm baking pan.
  2. Smash up the chocolate, I just hit the packet hard against the worktop several times. Melt together the butter and the chocolate either gently in the microwave or over a simmering pan of water in a glass bowl. Leave the chocolate mix to cool down so it feels lukewarm to the touch.
  3. Beat together the eggs and sugar until light and fluffy then use a spatula to fold in the cooled chocolate mixture. I use an electric whisk to beat the eggs and sugar as I’m all for lazy baking but you could use a stand mixer or hand whisk. Add the salt.
  4. Gently fold in the flour, cocoa and baking powder, trying not to knock out the air. Don’t overmix as it’s this gentle folding that means your brownies will have such a glorious texture.
  5. Pour into your prepared tin and bake for 25-27 minutes. The top will be set as will the edges but the centre will still be quivering. This is what makes them so fudgy. Allow to cool then slice and devour.

Black Forest chocolate brownies

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Gooey, fudgy awesome.

Gooey, fudgy, awesome.

So yesterday was my first day back doing BBC Radio Leicester’s Food Friday show with Ben Jackson since my knee operation last month. I’m still wobbly and having to use a crutch or two but by far the most agonising thing has been not being able to stand up to cook. It still hurts but my body feels completely out of kilter and my mind suffers if I can’t spend at least a small amount of time each day creating stuff in my kitchen.

One of the positives of being on crutches is that I’ve had to get a cleaner to come and help me around the house, she’s all kinds of ace and as it turns out an awesome cake maker who was telling me about a Black Forest cheesecake she made recently, a lightbulb flashed on in my mind and these rather kickass fudgy brownies were created.

You can hear me making this, it’s only 11 minutes long, by clicking on this link where you will also find the recipe. We always have a blast in my kitchen and yesterday was no different, although he did edit out my “only special people get to drink out of Lady Diana’s cup” line….

What I also forgot about was the “surprise” that I mentioned in the clip, this is simply to swap the cherries for Cadburys mini eggs, perfect for Easter 🙂

Black Forest Chocolate Brownies (makes 12)

  • 300g unsalted butter, cubed
  • 250g dark chocolate broken into small pieces
  • 1 handful dried cherries
  • 2 handfuls walnut pieces
  • 1 capful vanilla extract
  • Pinch sea salt flakes
  • 80g plain flour
  • 360g caster sugar
  • 80g cocoa powder
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • 4 eggs, lightly beaten
  • 1 x 400g can dark cherries in syrup, drained

For the glaze: (optional not essential)

  • 2 heaped spoonfuls morello cherry jam
  • 50ml kirsch or other alcohol such as dark rum

For the topping:

  • 300ml whipping cream
  • 3 heaped tablespoons mascarpone
  • 1 teaspoon cocoa
Method:

  1. Heat oven to 180C. Put the butter and chocolate in a bowl set over simmering water and melt until silky and thoroughly combined then add the dried cherries and nuts.
  2. Combine the flour, cocoa, sugar and baking powder in a separate bowl and stir to mix.
  3.  Add the flour mx to the melted chocolate and gently stir to combine then add the eggs and continue to mix gently with a spatula until it is all thoroughly combined.
  4.  Line a 25cm x 25cm baking tray with greased baking paper that overhangs by a few cm to make it easy to remove the brownie later, and pour in the brownie mix, scatter over half of the cherries and push them into the mix.
  5. Bake for 25-30 minutes (it will be quite wobbly, it will harden on cooling) then remove from oven and leave to cool completely in the baking tray.
  6. Put the glaze ingredients in a small saucepan and cook over a medium heat for 4 minutes. Brush over the cold brownie.
  7. Remove the brownie from the tin.
  8. Beat the whipping cream until firm then ad the mascarpone and mix well, put it in a piping bag and pipe over the top of the brownie to cover. Decorate with the remaining cherries and a dusting of coca.

 

Beetroot, Chocolate and Cardamom Brownies

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squidgy, fudgy brownies that count towards your 5 a day…

Oh brownies how I love you and your squidgy, gooey wonderment. Yesterday I headed into the BBC Radio Leicester studio to see presenter Ben Jackson with whom I do the Food friday radio cooking sessions with and gardening guru, chilli head and all round ace guy Ady Dayman. I decided to bake them something using goodies from my tiny garden and despite managing to set fire to the baking parchment TWICE during cooking the brownies turned out pretty damn awesome.

Ben and Ady enjoying the brownies during the phone in…

I managed to get to the studio whilst they were still warm and joined Ben and Ady for the Gardening phone-in, you can listen to us giving seasonal gardening and food tips by clicking here. It was a fab afternoon and the brownies went down a storm, even with Ben’s producer Nam who is somewhat vegetable averse! That’s the secret to people who don’t like vegetables, cover them in CHOCOLATE 🙂

They are really easy to make too:

Ingredients:

I use a mug to measure everything out in, my mug holds 350ml water.

  • 4 eggs
  • 1 mug caster sugar
  • 1 heaped teaspoon cardamom powder (or 8 crushed cardamom seed pods)
  • 1/2 mug  good rapeseed oil (or olive oil would be nice also)
  • 1 capful good vanilla extract
  • 2 beetroot (about tennis ball size)
  • 1 mug plain flour
  • 3/4 mug cocoa powder
  • pinch salt
Method:
  1. Preheat your oven to 180C. Put some gloves on or you will get very purple hands from handling the beetroot. Peel the raw beetroot, chop roughly and put into a food processor until chopped finely. If you don’t have a processor just grate the beetroot.
  2.  In a large bowl whisk the eggs, sugar and cardamom powder until quite creamy (I use an electric whisk but a hand whisk will be fine) then whilst still whisking pour in your oil in a steady stream.
  3.  Tip in your beetroot and stir in until fully mixed together.
  4. Sift in your flour, salt and cocoa and fold into the mixture completely.
  5.  Line and grease a 20cmX30cm tin, pour in your brownie mix and bake for about 25-35 minutes or until you can insert a skewer into the centre and just a few crumbs are stuck to it.  Leave to cool for at least 10 minutes before eating if you can manage to resist, sprinkle with a dusting of icing sugar and serve warm with some good vanilla ice cream.
If you find that your brownies are still too squidgy for you just pop them back in the oven for a little bit longer.