The chocolate brownie problem
I have a more than healthy interest in cake. I like making it, decorating it, eating it, giving it to other people, sharing recipes for it, inventing recipes for it, and smearing it all over my body before diving into swimming pools filled with whipped cream (I've never actually done that last one).
As a result I spend a lot of time worrying about cake as well. Would Italian butter be better than French butter? Is it wrong to use non-Fairtrade chocolate because it tastes better? Will gooseberries sink in polenta batter? So a while ago I started keeping a cake diary/ handbook to help me keep tabs on recipes which worked, experiments which failed, techniques that improve and ingredients that enhance.
Which is how I came to the chocolate brownie problem. A lot of people love brownies, they are easy to make, don't need icing and keep fairly well so I often make them as gifts or for parties. For a long time I have used the following recipe, which I adapted from a number of different sources...
Really good chocolate brownies
40g plain flour (can obviously be gluten free since is only a very small quantity, I have used both Doves Farm and plain old-fashioned corn flour and both have worked)
55g cocoa powder
5g ground cinnamon (the cinnamon flavour isn't strong - but leave it out if you don't like it/are allergic)
4 eggs
1 tsp vanilla essence
250g unsalted butter
250g good quality plain chocolate
500g sugar (yes you did read that right)
Optional: 125g chopped walnuts or pecans (this is a matter of taste, I often leave them out when taking this recipe to parties in case any of the guests are nut sensitive)
Line an 18cm by 24cm tin with baking parchment or a silicon sheet. Preheat the oven to 170 degrees centigrade.
Melt the butter. Beat the 4 eggs together.
Chop the chocolate into very small chunks (about 1/2cm by 1/2cm). Sift the flour, cocoa powder and cinnamon into a bowl. Stir in the sugar and chocolate chunks. Fold in the melted butter followed by the beaten eggs and vanilla essence. Stir until thoroughly combined. Pour into the lined tin and bake for 35-40 minutes. The mixture should still be gooey in the middle. Leave the brownies to cool in the pan for as long as possible (i.e. as long as will power will allow) since they will be much easier to chop up once cool. Tip them out on to a flat chopping board and use a long bread knife to chop into pieces, the top of the brownies should be crisp and it will crack as you do this.
One gluttonous friend tells me this is his favourite chocolate brownie recipe of all and he considers himself an expert on the topic.
My problem is this...
From time to time I flirt with other brownie recipes. None have ever turned out as good as this. The brownie world is riven with internal disputes about whether one is looking for cakiness or fudginess, purity of chocolate flavour or an attempt to short circuit all your brains taste sensors at once, whether icing is desirable etc. These hideous battles for the soul of the true brownie have resulted in an array of recipes so diverse that defining them as all belonging to the category 'brownie' seems a gross over-simplification. We really need at least four distinct names to denote the different qualities of different brownie types.
I'm a simple sort of person so my parameters are fudginess, purity of chocolate flavour and the avoidance of unnecessary icing experiences at all times. As a result the following are the basic criteria an alternative recipe must meet...
It must not use requires raising agents of any sort. I want to achieve a dense squidgy centre and a crisp chewy topping. Raising agents make the brownies more like cakes, in which case you might as well make cake.
It must not be trying to be clever with fancy additions like dried cherries, peppermint flavouring (very nasty) or orange cheesecake icing (superfluous).
Blondies (brownies made with white chocolate) are only worth making for people who really like white chocolate. Common or garden brownies are much more effective crowdpleasers.
But the thing that is bugging me is that in all the other recipes I've come across you have to melt the chocolate. And the brownies are never as good (when assessed in light of the parameters defined above). I don't know why. But its true - try making the above in two tins, one 1/2 with melted chocolate and one without if you don't believe me. I have ransacked food science books for the explanation for this and have not found it anywhere.
There is much that is mysterious in the world of food science - I know a woman who spent a year researching whether it is better to add oil to the potatoes in potato salad when they are warm or when they are cold and concluded that it made no discernible difference (type of potato makes a difference, but not the temperature the potato is at). Every cookery book you check will tell you to add the oil whilst warm despite the absence of any empirical evidence for this method. Incidentally she isn’r actually an eccentric tuber fetishist, she’s a food scientist.
But I don't want to spend a year doing research into the chocolate brownie conundrum. I want to know now. Any wisdom on this matter gratefully received.
As a result I spend a lot of time worrying about cake as well. Would Italian butter be better than French butter? Is it wrong to use non-Fairtrade chocolate because it tastes better? Will gooseberries sink in polenta batter? So a while ago I started keeping a cake diary/ handbook to help me keep tabs on recipes which worked, experiments which failed, techniques that improve and ingredients that enhance.
Which is how I came to the chocolate brownie problem. A lot of people love brownies, they are easy to make, don't need icing and keep fairly well so I often make them as gifts or for parties. For a long time I have used the following recipe, which I adapted from a number of different sources...
Really good chocolate brownies
40g plain flour (can obviously be gluten free since is only a very small quantity, I have used both Doves Farm and plain old-fashioned corn flour and both have worked)
55g cocoa powder
5g ground cinnamon (the cinnamon flavour isn't strong - but leave it out if you don't like it/are allergic)
4 eggs
1 tsp vanilla essence
250g unsalted butter
250g good quality plain chocolate
500g sugar (yes you did read that right)
Optional: 125g chopped walnuts or pecans (this is a matter of taste, I often leave them out when taking this recipe to parties in case any of the guests are nut sensitive)
Line an 18cm by 24cm tin with baking parchment or a silicon sheet. Preheat the oven to 170 degrees centigrade.
Melt the butter. Beat the 4 eggs together.
Chop the chocolate into very small chunks (about 1/2cm by 1/2cm). Sift the flour, cocoa powder and cinnamon into a bowl. Stir in the sugar and chocolate chunks. Fold in the melted butter followed by the beaten eggs and vanilla essence. Stir until thoroughly combined. Pour into the lined tin and bake for 35-40 minutes. The mixture should still be gooey in the middle. Leave the brownies to cool in the pan for as long as possible (i.e. as long as will power will allow) since they will be much easier to chop up once cool. Tip them out on to a flat chopping board and use a long bread knife to chop into pieces, the top of the brownies should be crisp and it will crack as you do this.
One gluttonous friend tells me this is his favourite chocolate brownie recipe of all and he considers himself an expert on the topic.
My problem is this...
From time to time I flirt with other brownie recipes. None have ever turned out as good as this. The brownie world is riven with internal disputes about whether one is looking for cakiness or fudginess, purity of chocolate flavour or an attempt to short circuit all your brains taste sensors at once, whether icing is desirable etc. These hideous battles for the soul of the true brownie have resulted in an array of recipes so diverse that defining them as all belonging to the category 'brownie' seems a gross over-simplification. We really need at least four distinct names to denote the different qualities of different brownie types.
I'm a simple sort of person so my parameters are fudginess, purity of chocolate flavour and the avoidance of unnecessary icing experiences at all times. As a result the following are the basic criteria an alternative recipe must meet...
It must not use requires raising agents of any sort. I want to achieve a dense squidgy centre and a crisp chewy topping. Raising agents make the brownies more like cakes, in which case you might as well make cake.
It must not be trying to be clever with fancy additions like dried cherries, peppermint flavouring (very nasty) or orange cheesecake icing (superfluous).
Blondies (brownies made with white chocolate) are only worth making for people who really like white chocolate. Common or garden brownies are much more effective crowdpleasers.
But the thing that is bugging me is that in all the other recipes I've come across you have to melt the chocolate. And the brownies are never as good (when assessed in light of the parameters defined above). I don't know why. But its true - try making the above in two tins, one 1/2 with melted chocolate and one without if you don't believe me. I have ransacked food science books for the explanation for this and have not found it anywhere.
There is much that is mysterious in the world of food science - I know a woman who spent a year researching whether it is better to add oil to the potatoes in potato salad when they are warm or when they are cold and concluded that it made no discernible difference (type of potato makes a difference, but not the temperature the potato is at). Every cookery book you check will tell you to add the oil whilst warm despite the absence of any empirical evidence for this method. Incidentally she isn’r actually an eccentric tuber fetishist, she’s a food scientist.
But I don't want to spend a year doing research into the chocolate brownie conundrum. I want to know now. Any wisdom on this matter gratefully received.