I doubt you remember me asking in a previous post for ideas and recipes for homemade brownies that are as good as my favorite store-bought mix.  I say that I doubt you remembering it because I got no replies on it.  *giggle* oh the pain of being a pee-on blogger!

Well screw you guys because I found the answer on my own!  Boy did I ever!

When I first set out to find a perfect homemade brownie, I turned to Ina Garten because I almost always love her recipes.  They are decadent and gorgeous and I really thought she could knock my socks off with a good brownie recipe.  For the most part, I was really wrong.  Only for the most part.  It only took a little imagination, a few tweaks to the recipe and I got an “OMG THIS IS EFFING AMAZING” brownie made from scratch in my own tiny kitchen.  You can find the recipe that I used here, but I’ll give you the recipe containing the changes that I made to it.

Ina’s Peanut Swirl Brownies à la Somer

An Ina Garten (Barefoot Contessa) Recipe Slightly Changed By Me

1 pound unsalted butter (butter and margarine are NOT interchangeable here.  It has to be BUTTER)

1 pound plus 12 oz. semisweet chocolate chips, divided

6 oz. unsweetened chocolate

6 eggs (Ina always specifies extra large, but I always just use large and it’s FINE, I promise)

1 teaspoon instant coffee granules (Ina’s recipe calls for 3 Tablespoons, but it’s just too much.  A little dab will do ya)

2 Tablespoons pure vanilla extract

2-1/4 cups sugar

1-1/4 cups AP flour, divided

1 Tablespoon baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

Preheat oven to 375 degreen F.    Butter and flour a rectangular 9X13 cake pan (Ina’s recipe calls for a shallow sheet pan, but these brownies need to be THICK!  They’re about 1-1/2 inches thick and moist and dense and wonderful).

Melt together the butter, 1 pound of chocolate chips, and the unsweetened chocolate in a medium bowl over simmering water.  Allow to cool slightly.

In a large bowl stir, don’t beat, together the eggs, coffee granules, vanilla and sugar.  Stir the warm chocolate mixture into the egg mixture and allow to cool to room temperature.

In a medium bowl sift together 1 cup of flour, the baking powder and salt.  Add to the cooled chocolate mixture. Toss the remaining 12 ounces of chocolate chips in a medium bowl with 1/4 cup of flour, then add them to the chocolate batter. Pour into the prepared pan.

Bake for 20 minutes, then rap the baking sheet against the oven shelf to force the air to escape from between the pan and the brownie dough.  Bake for another 20 minutes and then start checking every 5 minutes until the toothpick comes out clean.  I have to be honest, I haven’t got the time down 100% yet as I’ve only made it twice, but just keep checking and it does eventually get done and the brownies are SO worth it.

In Ina’s original recipe she swirls peanut butter through the brownies.  It’s good this way but I didn’t want the peanut butter with the Icing I’m going to add.  It wouldn’t have been a good match, but feel free to try the recipe with the peanut butter because it really is quite delightful.

As if these dense, fudgy lumps of chocolate orgasm weren’t enough, I iced them with a rocky road cake icing.  The recipe comes from an older cookbook that I took from my mother and I always thought that this particular icing would be awesome on brownies…more so than if it were on a cake.  I was right.  Really right.

Rocky Road Frosting

The Illustrated Encyclopedia of American Cooking (1986)

1 6-oz. package semisweet chocolate morsels

¼ cup butter

2-1/2 cups sifted confectioners’ sugar

3 Tblsp. scalded milk

1 tsp. vanilla

1 egg

1 cup chopped walnuts (I used almonds.  My husband is allergic to walnuts.  Pecans would work too.)

1-1/2 cup miniature marshmallows

Melt chocolate over hot, not boiling water.  Combine butter, sugar, milk and vanilla in mixing bowl; beat in egg.  (Here I put the bowl containing the butter sugar and egg over the double boiler and just got it warm so that the egg isn’t totally raw.  You can take the chance, but I suggest you get that egg warm and stir CONSTANTLY so it doesn’t curdle.)  Add chocolate, stirring until blended.  Stir in walnuts and marshmallows.  YIELD:  frosting for two 8 or 9-inch layer cakes.

Just ice the brownies with this lumpy, bumpy, gooey mess of sugar and enjoy.  These are so freaking good you will not want to buy boxed brownies anymore….until you see the mess in your kitchen from making this.  Seriously, it’s messy.  But worth it, I promise.

Enjoy!

Related posts:

1. Chocolate Cupcakes with Peanut Butter Icing
2. A “Holy Crap” Dessert
3. My Brownie Conundrum

The first fudge that I made is fudge in name only.  It’s really melted chocolate and condensed milk with peanut butter swirled through it.  It’s entirely too soft and doesn’t set up into anything more substantial than goo.  This is the fault of the recipe, not me.  It’s good…smooth and melt-in-your-mouth, it’s just not really fudge.  Here’s the recipe.

Easy Chocolate Peanut Butter Fudge

Kraft

1 package (8 oz.) semi-sweet chocolate (this recipe calls for a name brand [I HATE THAT] chocolate, but you can use 1 oz. blocks of chips.  Doesn’t matter.)

1 can (14 oz.) sweet condensed milk

2 tsp. vanilla

1/2 cup peanut butter

Line 8-inch square pan with foil, with ends of foil extending over the sides.

Microwave chocolate and milk in bowl on high for 2-3 minutes or until chocolate is almost melted, stirring after 2 minutes.  Stir until chocolate is melted, using pot holders on hot bowl.  Blend in vanilla.  Drop peanut butter by tsp. over fudge after you spread chocolate into pan.  Cut through peanut butter with a knife several times for marble effect.  If you want it to be cut into squares, freeze it.

That one was done and in the freezer in no time.  It was the next batch of fudge that caused me the most trouble and the near-heart attack.  REAL fudge requires a bit of candy making.  You have to melt down some sugar and cook it until it reaches a “soft ball” stage which is achieved when the sugar reaches about 235 degrees F or thereabouts.  I had my candy thermometer ready and was itching to have my first go at it.

I wish I had a mentor who could have warned me.  I wish some of the articles I read online had the warning that I needed.  When the sugar comes to a boil, it foams up…..a lot.  If the pan you are using looks big enough, think again.  You need to be using a pan that looks much bigger than what you need so that you can avoid what happened to me.  Lucky for you, I am here to tell you about my massive fail so that you can learn from my stupidity.

It started out fine.  The sugar was at a slow bubble as the recipe told me to do.  Then as it got hotter, it foamed up and started overflowing from my pot.  I stared at it for a minute, mildly annoyed until it occurred to me that this was not hot water I was watching pool at the bottom of my electric stove’s drip pan.  It was molten sugar and I had better freaking do something about it!  So I yelled a few obscenities, lowered the heat and let the sugar mixture get to it’s intended temperature before mixing it with the other ingredients and setting it aside to harden.  I looked at the metal heating coil on my stove coated in a thick layer of molten sugar.  The drip pan below was positively filled with the stuff.  There was no way I was going to be able to clean it any time soon..so I did what I have done a million other times when I get goop on my heating coil.  I turned that sucker up to high to let it burn off.  That was going great until the mess in the drip pan got overheated and burst into flames.  Tall flames.  You read that right, I caught my freaking stove on fire.  I hopped from one foot to the other screaming, “OH SHIT!” looking anxiously at my handy dandy kitchen fire extinguisher wondering if I should use it or not.  Then the little voice in my head that has kept my butt in one piece so far screamed at me, “TURN THE HEAT OFF, STUPID!”  I listened and the flames died down and the mess in the drip pan that was once molten sugar was now a pile of burnt sugar ash.  No real damage was done and I was left slightly shaken, but ok.

The bad thing is, the fudge that I was making was a beloved recipe from my grandmother.  Peanut Butter Candy it’s called.  Although the candy itself turned out great and I ate my first bite of the stuff with relish, I will always remember it being my first foray into candy-making….and I almost burned my house down doing it.  Here’s the recipe.

Peanut Butter Candy

My Grandma Ross

4-1/2 cups white sugar

1 stick butter

1 can evaporated milk

Boil to soft ball stage.

Mix the following:

1 cup peanut butter

2 tsp. vanilla

1 (13 oz.) jar marshmallow creme

Do not heat.  Pour into 9X13 inch pan.  Set aside to harden.

It’s easy and it’s the BEST peanut butter fudge ever.  I’m not biased there.  Ok, well maybe a little.

The third fudge that I tried was the fudge recipe provided to me on the back of a jar of marshmallow fluff.  I’m not going to share a recipe.  I messed it up and the mistake was a STUPID mistake.

Being a bit gun shy from my first attempt at candy making, I decided to play it safe and use an enormous pan to melt the sugar this time.  Well, the pan has a very wide bottom so there was a lot of direct heat contact with the sugar.  In hindsight I know now that I should have lessened the cooking time…and maybe used the damned candy thermometer.  I know that in hindsight.  What happened was I cooked the sugar too long, and when I added the chocolate to it, the sugar seized up and turned rock hard on me.  It got thrown in the garbage with a fare thee well and my middle finger waving it goodbye.

At least after all of that I DID manage to get some actual fudge from the experience.

This just goes to show you that we all make mistakes.  And sometimes they are massively huge mistakes that are embarrassing and stupid.  This is my gift to you.

Enjoy!

Related posts:

1. Triple Chocolate Ice Cream
2. Chocolate Cupcakes with Peanut Butter Icing
3. Banana Pancakes Smothered in Peanut Butter

I love thick, dense, fudgy, and soft brownies.  I don’t like light and fluffy or cakey brownies.  I don’t really love nuts in my brownies and I’m not crazy about coffee flavoring.  I want a straight forward brick of chocolate goodness when I am going to eat a brownie.

Here’s my problem:  I have yet to find a homemade brownie recipe that measures up to the boxed brand that really gets my engine roaring.  I keep getting dry, cakey, light brownies.  Some call for “just a teaspoon of coffee because it brings out the chocolate flavoring” which is bull because, as someone who rarely drinks coffee, it makes the brownies taste like COFFEE!  I get recipes the rely heavily on the addition of nuts to help with flavoring and texture, and I get recipes that just taste bad.

I don’t want my brownies to taste like cake or cookies…I prefer something that is akin to what would happen if chocolate cake and fudge had a baby…that baby would be the perfect brownie.  Actually, the closest homemade thing that I have found to my perfect brownie is a molten chocolate cake.  That was close.

I’m writing this to let you all know that I’m frustrated.  I’m going to keep looking, but I don’t want to have to keep buying my perfect brownie from a box.  I want to make it from scratch.  If you have any recipes that you think are what I might be looking for, please submit them to me (my email is located to the left under the contact tag).

If you have a recipe conundrum like me, don’t get discouraged.  With the internet at our fingertips, it is both a curse and a blessing in our search for food perfection.  Don’t be afraid to use it, or the book store, or your local library.

VANILLA EXTRACT:  WEEK 3

It’s getting great color.  It still smells like rum, but it’s looking great!  We’re about half way there.

No related posts.

I could sit here and try to make excuses as to why I love junk food.  I grew up poor and these kinds of foods were the only indulgences my family could afford;  Some of the only family bonding my brother and I did with our mom was with us staying up late on Saturday nights watching scary movies and pigging out on potato chips;  I use food for comfort and the sweets tend to provide the most comfort for me.  Those are all excuses and I don’t firmly stand behind a single one of them.  The one golden fact that I can offer is that I just love them.  Just because.

-White Cheddar Popcorn:  This is something that I don’t get very often…..because I will actually sit and eat the entire bag.  I pop my own popcorn every now and then and sprinkle a white cheddar flavoring over the top, but it’s not as sinful as the stuff in a bag.  It’s just soo good.

-Puffed Corn Cheese Snacks:  I love Cheese Balls.  I love Cheese Curls.  I love Cheese Puffs.  I can restrain myself and eat a handful or so at a time, but I still love them.  I have such warm and fuzzy memories from my childhood of eating bologna sandwiches with a side of cheese puffs.

-Lay’s Sour Cream and Onion Potato Chips:  This is probably my all time favorite snack.  I really like potato chips of all different flavors, but this particular brand has been my unchallenged favorite since I was a child.  I still like to buy a bag every now and then and see if I can make it last the whole month.  These go great crunched into a turkey sandwich.  That’s not weird!

-Animal Crackers:  As you know, these are more like a cookie.  When I was little, every now and then one of my attending grown ups (parent, grandparent, etc.) would buy me one of those tiny boxes of Barnum’s Animal Crackers.  It was a treat I had maybe a handful of times in my entire childhood.  Well, when I was pregnant with my son, I was at a Costco and saw a huge tub of Organic Disney animal crackers.  I ate the entire tub in about 2 months.  Now I always have one of those huge tubs in my pantry so that I can snag a couple when I need a little pick me up.  I love them!

-Donuts (or Doughnuts, if you prefer):  I love donuts!  My favorite are the original Krispy Kremes.  I also love chocolate glazed, powder sugared, cream (not custard) filled, jelly filled, fruit filled, cheese filled…..oh I could go on and on.  Again, this isn’t something that I allow myself to indulge too often, but when I do I really enjoy it.

-Soda:  Yes.  I love soda.  I drink diet soda so as not to completely destroy what little bit of a figure I have, but I cannot go through my life without soda.  I’ve tried quitting.  I’ve gone a year before without soda, but then I went to a party where there was only soda to drink and immediately after I was at the grocery store buying soda for my home.

-Vanilla Wafers:  When a get strong hunger pangs late at night, I come downstairs and eat 4 of these babies and drink a small glass of milk and it’s always enough to kill the hunger.  My great grandmother was very very poor, but she always had ‘Nilla Wafers to offer me when I would visit her home and I always think of her when I eat them.

-Cookies:  Any kind.  I love them all.  Oreo are great, but I love baking homemade.

-Candy Bars:  I almost never eat these, but I love them.  I love Snickers, Baby Ruth, Hershey with Almonds, Twix, Kit Kat, and Mr. Goodbar.  YUM.

-Little Debbie Snacks:  Name one and I’ll tell you that I love it.

This is only the snack part.  Tomorrow I will share with you my shameful and passionate love for the McDonald’s Big Mac.  I hope you don’t think less of me for indulging in junk every now and then.  If you do, then I blow a raspberry in your general direction!

No related posts.

Buy the bags of popcorn that look like this.  This is a 1-pound bag and I paid less than $2 for it.  Ha!  That got your attention, didn’t it?  This bag will last months in my house (my husband and I are piggies and love popcorn).  For a serving of popcorn that will satisfy two piggies such as us, you only need about 1/3 cup of the popcorn.  The bags come with cooking directions but you basically need a pot, vegetable oil, and the popcorn.

I know the microwavable atrocities only take like 4 minutes to make but to make it this way is seriously not much longer.  It’s not even 10 minutes.  And this way you can control salt content and flavorings.

Personally, I’m a nut for white cheddar anything and this flavoring can be purchased right in my regular supermarket.  If I want just a tiny sprinkling of salt, I can do that.  There are lots of different flavorings for popcorn in the supermarket.  It’s a better selection than what the microwavable atrocities offer.

Also, this popcorn just tastes better.  There’s a sweetness to it that you won’t find with the microwavable atrocities.  And best of all?  You need this kind of popcorn to make Popcorn Balls.  If you’ve never had Popcorn Balls, you have my deepest sympathies because you have missed out on a lovely part of life.  I’ll post a recipe in due time.  For right now, just enjoy a regular bowl cuddled on the couch or in bed.

No related posts.