Finally! We Bring You Brownies!

How have we possibly been so remiss?  We’ve been posting for more than a year and have shared more than 100 recipes, but not one of them was for brownies!  How is that even possible?  Well, in an effort to make amends for this egregious oversight, I bring you not just plain old brownies, but rich, chocolaty, chewy, gooey, caramel covered, pecan studded, turtle brownies.  You’ve waited long enough, so let’s get started. 

Here’s what you’ll need for the brownies:

⅓ cup cocoa
⅓ cup boiling water
¼ cup vegetable oil
6 Tablespoons butter
2 cups sugar
4 oz. chopped dark chocolate
½ teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons vanilla
3 eggs
1 ½ cups flour
You’ll also need about ½ cup of chopped pecans, but they don’t go inside the brownies.  Just set them aside for much later. 

Before you start with the food, line a 9x13 pan with parchment and preheat your oven to 350°

When that’s done, sift the cocoa into a sauce pan and pour over the boiling water.

Whisk over low heat until it becomes smooth.

Whisk in the sugar, oil, salt, and butter. 

Continue whisking over low heat until a good part of the sugar is dissolved and the mixture becomes very shiny.  Turn off the heat and add the chopped chocolate. 

Stir that in until it’s completely melted and incorporated.  In a separate bowl, crack your 3 eggs and beat them. 

Now, before adding them to your chocolate mixture, you need to make sure it’s not too hot.  Your finger will make the perfect thermometer for this.  Bathwater warm or cooler is fine.  If it feels hot, give it a few minutes to cool down before adding the eggs.  When it’s ready, go ahead and pour them in along with the vanilla. 

Whisk the mixture until the eggs are completely incorporated.

Sift the flour over the top.

Lose the whisk for this part and carefully fold or stir the flour in with a spatula.  You don’t want to over mix at this point.  When the flour is incorporated, pour the batter into your prepared pan.

Spread it to the edges and level it out as best you can. 

Now, into the oven for 30 – 35 minutes.  A toothpick inserted 1 inch from the edge should come out clean, and it’ll be shiny and crackly on top. 

Put those aside to cool completely.  I know, your whole house smells like brownies and it’s almost impossible, but you can do eet.  Once they’ve finished cooling, it’s time to start on the caramel.

Here’s what you’ll need:

¾ cups half & half, divided
3 Tablespoons syrup
¾ cups sugar
2 Tablespoons butter
½ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla

 (this caramel is on the salty side, which I like, but feel free to reduce the salt to 1/4 teaspoon if you prefer.)

Place everything but the vanilla and ¼ cup of the half & half into a pan over medium low heat.

Stir until the sugar is mostly dissolved, then increase the heat to medium and continue stirring until it comes to a boil.  Put the lid on and set a timer for 3 minutes.  During that time, get a little dish of ice water and wash your spoon, or get a clean one out.  When the time’s up, remove the lid.  It’ll probably look something like this. 

When it’s closer to ready, it will look more like this, though. 

Drip a little of the hot syrup into the water. 

It should come together into a ball that will mostly hold its shape, but is easily molded with your fingers. 

When you get to that point, turn off the heat and add the vanilla and half & half. 

It’ll hiss and sputter, but just stir, and it will calm down.  When the boiling has stopped, pour the caramel into a heatproof container set atop a hot pad or dish towel. 

As you can see, my caramel has little brown specks in it.  That just means it got a little dark in a spot on the bottom.  I had thought to toss it and start over, but it tasted so amazing, I decided to keep it.  Once it’s on the brownies, you’ll never even know.  Give the caramel a while to cool.  You want it to be a soft, spreadable consistency, but not runny.  I got impatient and put mine in the fridge for a bit.  While it cools, back to the brownies.  Remove them from the pan and cut them down to fit snuggly into a square pan. 

If you have a 9x9, that would be ideal.  Mine was 8x8, but I made it work. 

You should have a piece something like this leftover.  See those edges there?  Those are for you to eat. 

Remove the rest of the edges, and cut the remaining chunk into little squares.  About ¾ of an inch or so. 

I know, you think I’ve surely gone over the cliff, but stay with me.  I promise I don’t need a padded cell just yet.  So, back to the brownies that are in the square pan.  Pour the cooled caramel over the top, reserving about 2 Tablespoons. 

As you can see, I decided to line the pan with parchment for easy removal and cutting when they’re done.  Spread the caramel to the edges and sprinkle ⅓ cup or so of the chopped pecans over the top. 

Now, take your little brownie cubes and arrange them sort of haphazardly across the surface.  Press them gently into the caramel.

Heat the remaining caramel for 5 – 10 seconds in the microwave, just to thin it a little.  Then drizzle it all over the top. 

Last, but not least, sprinkle on the remaining chopped pecans. 

Could you just leave the whole thing in one pan and spread the caramel and pecans over the top?  Sure, but why would you when you can create a masterpiece like this?

I hope this has gained your forgiveness for our brownie blunder.  Is there something you’d really like to see that we’ve somehow overlooked? 

VD

Extreme close up food porn.

So, I totally don't do the VD thing, and I have a wicked cake-fail that I thought would have made a fabulous post for today, but it's probably going to end up nearly as long as Taneasha's fucking awesome birthday cake post, and I've got a house guest and a mid-term tomorrow.

I've also got amaretti cookies that are amazing on their own, but a fabulous ingredient to use in other things. If you don't have time to make a batch of your own, check in your grocery store for them. Most of the larger chains will have them (probably either on the top or bottom shelf), but if not, an Italian deli or grocery will definitely have them.

Chocolate Terrine

What you need:

• 1 tin sweetened condensed milk
• 1/2 c butter
• 6 oz semisweet or bittersweet chocolate (chips work)
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 3/4 c dried cherries
• 3/4 chopped dried apricots
• 1-1/2 c chopped or crumbled amaretti cookies

What you gotta do:

Half fill a medium pot of water and put it on the stove to boil. Once it's boiled, turn the heat down to medium low, and cover the pot with a large heatproof bowl. Double boilers used to be quite common and every cookware set came with one, but they seem to have fallen out of fashion. Meh, the bowl on the pot works just fine. Just make sure it's glass or metal, and that you have a heating pad and / or oven mitt handy.

In the large bowl, combine the sweetened condensed milk, butter, chocolate, and cinnamon.

Stir gently as it all melts together.

Once it's nice and smooth, you can take it off the heat.

Stir in the fruit and cookies.

You can also add chopped almonds here if you want. They'd be tasty. So would hazelnuts, I think. Walnuts are not acceptable. Absolutely not. They don't have the smooth interior that almonds and hazelnuts do, and they don't have the same sweetness either. Walnuts are a savoury nut in my kitchen and go in things like salads and sauces.

The description "terrine" is not usually applied to dessert type foods, but really there's no other way to describe this dish based on what we're about to do next.

Line a loaf pan with foil, and then with plastic wrap. Yes, you need both. Yes, I have tried with only one and it doesn't work. While I will admit to pantsing in the kitchen on a regular basis and then subjecting you to the outcome, this isn't one of those times, I've made this dish on many occasions and believe it or not I actually know what I'm doing.

For a change.

Pour the chocolate-cookie-fruit(-nut) mixture into your double lined pan. Looks lovely doesn't it. Perfect for VD.

Tap the pan on the counter a few times to get any air bubbles out then smooth the top with a spatula.

Fold over the plastic wrap so that the chocolatey goodness is sealed in, then cover the top of the pan with foil.

Let this chill in the fridge for a few hours. I'm sure you can find something to do while it sets; I mean, this is the socially constructed day where once a year we have no choice but to show our romantic partners some kind of attention that should include large expenditures of money, right?

Or you could just get naked and fuck. Like every other day. Whatever.

After a few hours you can unmold the tasty loaf. It should be good to go after about 3, but 6 is ideal.

If you didn't make reservations 3 months ago for dinner at some expensive restaurant that serves food you could probably just make yourself anyway, and are now panicking to make some food, this dessert is something you should make in the morning. Or yesterday. I'm so helpful, I know.

As you try to unwrap it, if the chocolate is sticking to the plastic and you're pulling the chocolate pate out of it's lovely prismic shape, it's too soon. Re-wrap and give it another hour.

There will be a bit of sticking, but you shouldn't be pulling off chunks of chocolate with the plastic.

Since this is a lovely loaf shape, cut it with a sharp knife into slices.

Perfect dessert. Rich, smooth chocolate with chewey friut and crispy cookies. It is rich though, and a small slice is all you need. But you'll probably want more. It's okay, you can burn off the calories by fucking.

What's your favourite way to burn calories?