D293: A brownie by any other name...

There must be as many brownie recipes as there are types of chocolate.  This one is quite simple and from CTAW.  I didn't have walnuts so chucked in some choc chips.

It's meant for a 18cm pan, and mine is larger, but I'm pretty sure that the shorter cake, plus 25°F less on the dial, helped this be nicely done.

Last piece... Almost missed it...

D227: Happy New Year's Day

After a shoddy and wet start to the day, it turned out pretty well.  Bub and Hub got out in the rain and I had a few moments to myself to stitch some squares together.  I even got a brownie cake done and hopefully I'll cut these puppies into half-triangle squares before the night is done.  It was very rewarding after so many days of not getting into any project work :D

D174: Moosehead Brownies

All the brownie recipes I've tried thus far have melted the butter and chocolate together in the pan.  This one, however, using the creaming method.

Sometimes, when I can't be bothered (or haven't time) to wait for our frozen butter to melt I've zapped it a bit to speed things up.  Done too fast and you get melted butter, not softened butter, which separates the oil and translates to a shine in the cake of final product.  This shine is something I've realised I expect to see in brownies, but it's not in this one.  So it felt a bit more like a chocolate slice, but that essentially semantics: 

This

Is

A 

Great 

Brownie

Recipe

I made it for a grand final BBQ and none of it came home.

Apologies for not catching a snap of the cut brownies.  Pretty sure I can fix that soon.

Here is a typed version of the recipe, including a few extra weights.  Photo of a photocopy of the recipe is below, taken from The Age back in 2005 (!) who got it from Mollie Katzen's The Moosewood Cookbook.

Moosewood Fudge Brownies

Preheat oven 180°C/390°F

Need

• 155g dark chocolate
• 250g softened butter (not melted)
• 1 cup (180g) brown sugar
• 5 eggs
• 1 tsp vanilla essence
• 1 cup (150g) plain flour
• Buttered or lined 23x33cm pan

To make

1. Melt chocolate* and set aside
2. Cream butter and sugar and add eggs
3. Add vanilla
4. Beat in chocolate, then flour
5. Pour into pan
6. Bake for 20-30mins (mine was 25mins)
7. Let sit in pan for five mins before putting on rack to cool. Leave the cutting until serving time.

*To melt chocolate:

In microwave: Heat chocolate on medium/50% in 1min bursts, stirring after each.  Mine took three goes and then it stirred smooth. Chocolate holds it heat, as do many glass microwave, so use stirring when melting chocolate to avoid burning.

On stovetop: put some water in a small/medium saucepan and find a glass bowl that will sit in it's rim, without touching the water.  Put the chocolate in the glass bowl and bring the water to the boil. Stir the chocolate with the water simmering/boiling beneath it until it's smooth.   
Do not get any water in your chocolate - it'll seize up and become useless (except for sulky-spoon-licking on the couch coz you ruined your chocolate).

D152: Little Awesomenesses

For Bub's birthday party cake I used Nigella Lawson's Awesome Vanilla Cake recipe.

Tonight I tried out my idea for a chocolate cupcake variation.  The CTAW chocolate variation for butter cake is done by substituting 2tbsp of flour for cocoa.  This being quite a large recipe, I substituted 3tbsp of the plain flour with cocoa.  

After 25 mins at 180°C/350°F the skewer came out clean. 

I filled the cupcake patties a skinny cm short of the rim and got 24 from one batch.

I shall ice them in the morning when they've cooled and use a milk/butter frosting :D

--------

Ed note: I couldn't wait...

That there is two batches of glacé icing with some cocoa and shaved dark chocolate added.  Oh yeah!

Day 39: Chocolate Almond Bread Part 2 - for the road!

The slicing was tricky and Hub helped a bit.  We got 44 slices, not including the stumpy ends.

I was a bit 'clever' with the baking too.  It says to do them in a single layer for 20 mins. I do have two trays and they probably would've all fit, but I wasn't sure so I used a wire rack to arrange them and turned them over half way through baking. That way I was sure to only have one baking batch.

In other news, we're off down the coast today for a week.  I've decided the blog will take a holiday too.  I've got stuff to do but I won't be doing a daily thing if I don't feel like it. I may collect pics along the way to post on our return.

See you next week lovies!

Day 38: Chocolate Almond Bread part 1

Back when I made the two-tone brownies, I thought I might use that cookbook to make the chocolate almond bread. It said 'makes 70'.  Only if I'm Jesus! I've used a shorter pan than required, which is why my batch will be a different count. If I can manage to stick to the 3mm thickness I should get a fair few, but still not that many. I'm really not sure about the cutting though - its very hard!

This mix doesn't rise or melt to cook so it's turned out exactly as I'd laid it, which was messy.  It's a very sticky dough.

So very appetising, yes?

On initial taste tests though it is very yummy so I'm looking forward to slicing (hopefully) and toasting it tomorrow.

Day 34: I've nothing indoors

We needed a square pan when we made Turkish Delight the other week.  Now that I've bought one I felt should find reasons to use it, and I just happened to have some white chocolate lying around...  First World problems hey.

I let Hub put in a request, which for was a slice, and I got a bit stuck.  I realised then that I'd grown up with slices including a fruit of some kind - usually apple or a jam, not chocolate - and that I expected them to have layers and a short pastry of some kind.  However Hub includes brownies and fudge in that group and my mum never made those.  Considering my family's penchant for chocolate I have no idea how that whole genre was skipped*.

These Two-tone Fudge Brownies were rather persuasive.  They're from the small AWW cookbook series, this one being biscuits brownies & biscotti.  I've made the Orange Polenta Biscuits before, but didn't love them enough to do that again.  The Melting Moments we pretty good too - definitely butter-based and melty, slightly coma inducing.

These brownies, as it turns out, are
 pretty full on.  Six eggs, three for each layer, and a whole quarter pound of butter make for a rich cake, which is what makes it brownies, I suppose, and not just a slice.  They're much easier to knock up than I expected - essentially a melt and mix recipe but you have to do it twice.  (Do I call it 'brownies' before it's cut? Or 'the cake'? Or 'brownie cake'? My plurals are getting confused!)
It recommends to put foil over the cake if it looks like it's going to burn.  After 40mins in the oven it was rather 'golden', so I covered it and spent the remaining 40mins a little nervous because I now couldn't see if it was burning.
Also, this book uses 'terms' for temps and not degrees (i.e. 'moderate oven') which have a 25° range in Fahrenheit.  In an effort to figure out my forever-singed baking, I reduced the temp from the mid to the lower end of the range, with 20mins to go, even though the cake is on the second-lowest tier again.  I also left the foil over the cake as it cooled in the pan, to discourage sinking (not completely successfully).

Moist! It says makes 25, but I'll cut 36 since its so rich.

Having discovered this book again, I'm thinking of making the chocolate almond bread (a biscotti-style thing) because it says it 'makes 70' and that's my kinda of effort-to-quantity ratio.  It would be a good stash to take with us on our week-long holiday on Thursday.

(Speaking of, I'm not sure what's going to happen with the blog during that time...)





*This may have been a strategic move on Mum's part. For some reason, having a baked good in the house was the norm (a tradition I'm fast emulating).  There was always a cake, a slice or biscuits in the tin, and as soon as the supply got low more would usually be made, a job usually left to Mum (until I started joining in).  I remember many an arvo tea before Dad would go the shed for milking, he'd ask in a hopeful voice "Got any bikkies?" Mum would often make Anzacs.  They are a traditional Aussie recipe, full of rolled oats and golden syrup.  They sound lovely yet for some reason we didn't really like Anzacs.   So while we wouldn't eat them we also couldn't complain that there weren't any bikkies in the house. Considering she baked for CWA and the Red Cross too, I could totally see how she'd want to reduce the load at home. Well played, Mum, well played.

Day 17: Give me some Base!

Buoyed by my completion of the protein strands, I began the base pairs today.

I used 4ply for this project because that's what I had, and using a baby yarn (Shepherd Baby Wool Merino) seemed pretty appropriate for a toy. I didn't double it to make 8ply as the pattern required because gauge was unimportant.

However, now I kinda wish I'd used 8ply because these base pairs are really fiddly! Only 9 stitches to work in the round makes it so easy to fumble at the start. Only now, at row 5, am I sure I haven't twisted the work. It's very hard to get started on them. There'll be three in pink/green and three in blue/orange. Part of me wishes they were stronger colours, but I suspect it will all look better once put together.

In other creations, I made a self-saucing chocolate pudding for supper. It's from the marvellous Cookery the Australian Way. I love the mild and fluffy cake part and the rich sauce. Lots of puddings are rich all over, but this one is lighter, with a lovely chocolate flavour that doesn't overwhelm you. It's not a new recipe for me, but I reckon it counts. My sister is coming to collect her daughter / our guest and will be here for dinner tomorrow night. What's left is what I'd call enough for me... Awkward.

Maybe I'll make something more...

Day 13: Unnatural food

Today I made Turkish Delight from this marvellous cookbook.

I think I've been looking sideways at this recipe for 18 years, ever since I started making toffees in high school.  So, I finally remembered some rosewater and tartaric acid and got to it.


It uses a surprising amount of cornflower and icing sugar. Well, not that surprising when you think of what the stuff is, but I still forgot to check my stash and almost ran out of both.

Needs lots of icing sugar and cornflower to coat it.

I also forgot to take a pic of the most interesting part, which is the last 30mins of 'boiling'.  It's boiling, technically, but really it is gloriously viscous and blops away like the bog of eternal stench. I suspect it was actually the corporeal form of an evil soul monologuing about my doom. Either way, quite yum.



I also made a chocolate mud cake, from the Donna Hay Chocolate Essentials cookbook. I accidentally made it with milk chocolate instead of dark. By the time I realised the buds had already been melted, so I figured we'd see how that turns out.

Still cooling in the tin.

Both these things are for my sister's 50th arvo tea tomorrow.

So we have the uncomfortable experience of having a whole fresh yummy cake in the house that we will not cut tonight.
Unnatural.

I might have to make another before I go to bed.

Day 2: Double Choc chip cookies

I was always disappointed with bikkies. They're never as good as the bought Monte Carlos or Tim Tams. But this recipe changed me. It's the first one where I've used melted chocolate in the dough, and by George Clooney it makes a difference. It's from the Chocolate book of the Donna Hay Essentials range.

I don't make them as big as they ask. You get huge cookies when you only make 16 - I've always gotten about 20 even when I used the amount per cookie I think I should. Today I doubled the recipe and made 70 so they'll go further. I don't need that much in a cookie this rich anyway. Husband has other ideas and would prefer seven enormous cookies - enough to last him a week. Yes, my love, when you expect *all* the cookies you will need big ones so you can share them with me :|

Double Chocolate Cookies

• 110g unsalted buter, softened
• 130g (3/4 cup) brown sugar
• 1 egg
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 150g (1 cup) lain flour, sifted
• 30g (1/4 cup) cocoa powder, sifted
• 1tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 125g dark chocate, melted
• 280g dark chocolate, extra, roughly chopped (this is heaps, I just use what's left in a pack of melts - about 100g)

Preheat oven to 160C (320F).

Place butter and sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer and beat for 8-10 minutes of until light and creamy.

Add the egg and vanilla and beat for a further 3-4 minutes.

Stir through the flour, cocoa, bicarbonate of soda and melted chocolate. Add the extra chopped chocolate and stir to combine.

Roll tablespoons of the mixture into rounds. Place on baking trays lined with non-stick baking paper, allowing room for the cookies to spread (they're about 3" across), and flatten slightly.

Bake for 10-12 minutes or until slight cracks have formed.

Cool on wire racks. Makes at least 7.