1/2 cup plus 2 Tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp espresso powder (optional)
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter
1 cup plus 2 Tbsp sugar
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup chocolate chips
1. Preheat oven to 350. Lightly grease a 8 x 8 inch pan.
2. Crack the 2 eggs into a bowl, then beat them with the cocoa, salt, baking powder, espresso powder, and vanilla until smooth.
3. In a separate bowl, melt the butter in the microwave. Add the sugar and mix well. Alternatively, combine the butter and sugar and heat on the stove over low heat, stirring, until the butter is melted. Continue to heat briefly (in microwave or on stove), just until the mixture is hot, but not bubbling; it'll become shiny looking as you stir it. Heat the mixture to this point will dissolve more of the sugar, which will yield a shiny top crust on your brownies.
4. Add the butter/sugar mixture to the egg/cocoa mixture, stirring until smooth.
5. Add the flour and chocolate chips, again stirring until smooth. If you want the chips to remain intact in the baked brownies, rather than melting in, let the batter cool in the bowl for about 20 minutes before stirring in the chips.
6. Spoon the batter into lightly greased 8 x 8 pan.
7. Bake the brownies for about 30 minutes, until a knife inserted into the center comes out clean. Remove them from the oven and cool on a rack before cutting and serving.
Note: You could double this recipe and put it into a 9 x 13 pan, same baking time (30 minutes).
Source: adapted from www.kingarthurflour.com/recipes/fudge-brownies-recipe
Try #1 - September 29, 2014
I wanted brownies today. We had no box mixes. But we did have cocoa and chocolate chips, so I went searching for a brownie-from-scratch recipe and came up with this. Not bad, especially for my first ever brownies not from a box! Not as sweet as the box mix, but that's ok. I didn't heat the sugar with the butter as recommended in step 3, so my brownies did not have the shiny top crust. I will try this in the future. The smaller 8x8 pan was a more reasonable size for our family. If we were having guests or I were making this for small group I would double it and use the 9x13 pan.
Try #2 - October 9, 2014
Good news! These can be made by mixing the dry ingredients separately and adding them to the wet ingredients. The only caution is not to accidentally scramble your eggs when you add the melted butter. I avoided it by making sure the melted butter was not scalding and adding it a little bit at a time while continually whisking the egg mixture. It might be my imagination, but this batch seemed even better than my first try - I also had them warm and ooey gooey out of the oven so that always helps.
Try #3 - November 2014
Can also make these with whole wheat flour. Also tried it with heating the butter and sugar together in the microwave and the top did come out shinier!
