Super Fudge Brownies

An Easter treat that doesn't really have any ties to Easter other than the fact that it's chocolate.

()_()
(**)
(___)()

It's a recipe I based on Mrs. Fields brownies, but mine are a bit more chocolaty and not quite as sweet.  They are sweet enough though, trust me on that!

Recipe

• 6oz of unsweetened chocolate (six Baker's Unsweetened Baking Chocolate Squares)
• 1/4 cup of dark unsweetened cocoa powder (Hershey's Special Dark)
• 1 cup of salted butter (2 sticks)
• 4 large eggs (near room temperature)
• 1 3/4 cups of granulated sugar
• 1/2 tablespoon of pure vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup of flour, plus one tablespoon
• Optional toppings (e.g. mini semi-sweet chocolate chips, coconut flakes, crushed cookies, mini peanut butter cups, candy pieces, etc.) You could also make some serious mocha brownies by adding instant coffee to the batter.  There are many ways to customize these for any occasion requiring delicious brownies.

1. Preheat the oven to 300 degrees
2. Grease  9x9 (or 8x8) pan 
3. Cut butter into small chunks and put into a saucepan on the stove-top on the lowest heat setting and then throw the chocolate squares on top
4. Stir until smooth and remove pan from heat
5. Mix eggs into a large bowl on low/med setting until they are frothy and light yellow (4-5 minutes)
6. Slowly pour sugar into eggs and mix on low speed 1-2 minutes
7. Stir vanilla into mixture
8. Slowly pour melted chocolate/butter mixture into the bowl while mixing on low speed
9. Stir flour and cocoa powder into mixture.  Stir until well blended, but do not over stir
10. Pour batter into pan and spread it out evenly
11. Sprinkle with toppings
12. Bake approx. 35-40 minutes for 9x9 pan; 40-45 minutes for 8x8 pan
13. Allow to cool in pan for 10 minutes
14. Chill brownies in refrigerator for 45-60 minutes
15. Enjoy your delicious brownies!

 

 

A Birthday Cake

I made this birthday cake for my brother who is a bad-ass bass player (hence the chocolate bass shaped like the one he actually plays). 

It's a two layer dark chocolate cake with boozed up vanilla amaretto almond frosting and a generous amount of toasted coconut.  I think I'm finally done with the toasted coconut theme that I've had going on all week.  I hadn't baked for a few months and now I've had three baking projects this week all with amaretto/almond/toasted coconut.  I guess I am all caught up for a little while. :-)

Almond Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies

I have been wondering for some time now what almond butter would taste like in chocolate chip cookie dough.  I decided a while ago that almond butter is better than peanut butter and since I have baked many peanut butter chocolate chip cookies in my life, I would have to find out what almond butter chocolate chip cookies taste like.

In my previous post, I mentioned that I made toasted coconut for the first time.  I then wondered what toasted coconut flakes would be like in cookies.  I decided to bake two thoughts into one cookie when I made almond butter chocolate chip with toasted coconut flakes tonight.

Recipe (makes approx 3.5 dozen)

• 2 cups of all purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon of baking soda
• 1 teaspoon of salt

• 1/2 cup of butter (1 stick)
• 3/4 cup of dry roasted almond butter [unsalted]
• 3/4 cup of white sugar
• 3/4 cup of packed brown sugar
• 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
• 1/2 teaspoon of almond extract
• 2 large eggs

• 1 cup of semi-sweet chocolate chips
• 1 cup of dark chocolate chips
• 1 cup of toasted coconut flakes

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Mix flour, baking soda, and salt together in a bowl.
3. Cream butter and almond butter in a separate bowl.
4. Mix both sugars and extracts into the butter mixture.
5. Beat one egg into the mixture at a time.  Eggs should be room temperature.
6. Blend the flour mixture into the bowl, about 1/2 a cup at a time.
7. Fold the chocolate chips and coconut flakes into the cookie dough.
8. Drop onto a cookie sheet, one tablespoon at a time
9. Bake 8-10 minutes and enjoy.

I think they came out fine, but the almond flavor is not as strong as I would like it to be.  If I make these again I will double or triple the almond extract.  I just really like almond flavor with chocolate. :-D

Chocolate Amaretto Coconut Cake Pops

Well it has certainly been some time since I last posted (or baked).  A couple of months ago Binky, a fellow baker and blogger (Cakeb0t) was kind enough to give a copy of her wonderful cake pop course eBook to me (How to make Cake Pops by Cakeb0t).  I had never made cake pops before, but I was interested in making them.

I initially wanted to make pink heart shaped cake pops for Valentine's Day, but unfortunately, I did not have a chance to do that.  Binky recently posted a great video on how to make heart shaped cake pops (Kawaii Heart Tutorial).  I am definitely going to attempt making shaped cake pops in the future.  I finally got around to making my first batch of cake pops last week and ended up going with the standard round shape.

For these cake pops, I used Binky's recipe for yellow cake, but I replaced half of the butter with coconut oil and used a blend of milk and coconut milk instead of just cow's milk.  I wanted a yellow cake with a bit of coconut flavor.

 

The frosting that I mixed in was an amaretto butter cream.  Normally I make a fancy butter cream frosting for my cakes and cupcakes (my secret recipe for fluffy frosting), but with cake pops I did not need to worry about making the frosting light and fluffy.  It just needed to moisten the cake and form the cake pop.  I mixed together butter, confectioners' sugar, a generous splash or two of amaretto liqueur, and a few drops of almond extract.  

[A side note about amaretto:  not all amaretto is the same, the higher the alcohol content the better (Disaronno is best (28% abv) , E'Dolce (21% abv) is about 4x cheaper and will do just fine for baking).  The alcohol provides a nice warmth depth to these sweet treats.]

 

Once I had the cake pops formed, I dipped them in melted dark chocolate and then covered them in toasted coconut flakes.  One of the reasons I made these cake pops was so that I could try toasting coconut (two firsts in one). :-)  I originally planned to dip the pops and then place them into mini gold cupcake liners (an idea I got from Binky's book!).  My cake pops however, were too large for the liners, oops!  I made the cake pops the "right size" before dipping them in chocolate.  I used a thick dark chocolate too (instead of candy melts) and after coating them, they were too big for the liners (and too small for full cupcake liners, but that would have been funny).  I stumbled into a problem because I did not make a cake pop stand for them to dry on.  I ended up letting the chocolate harden with them upside down in the toasted coconut.  This allowed them to harden without sticking to anything and making more of a mess. :-)

 

Despite my small mishap with the size of them, they actually came out quite well and were super delicious!  Amaretto and chocolate has become one of my favorite flavor combinations and the addition of the toasted coconut was perfect!  The thick dark chocolate coating added a satisfying bite of chocolate to the cake and the toasted coconut provided some nice crunch.

If you are interested in making cake pops for the first time or getting new ideas for cake pops, please check out Binky's website:  http://www.cakeb0t.com/