Midnight Brownies

Midnight Brownies - October 19, 2009

These brownies probably got their name because they're both a dark chocolate brownie as well as the add-ins are Midnight Milky Way bars. But you can add almost any kind of candy to them as they're pretty versatile. This is one of my favorite brownies because of their taste, texture and how thick they come out of the pan.

The recipe is from The Good Cookie by Tish Boyle and I've gotten some consistently great recipes from this cookbook. Sometimes Midnight Milky Way bars are hard to come by so I substitute regular Milky Ways (for the nutless version) and/or Snickers bars. Around Halloween, these are great to make since those candies are abundantly available and often go on sale. After Halloween, I'm always stocking up on bags of Halloween candy that I can bake with.

This brownie also travels well. I cut them into individual portions, wrap them in plastic wrap, stick them in the freezer then pull them out when I'm packing my suitcase. Same goes if I ship them somewhere.

1 cup all-purpose flour
1/3 cup cake flour
1/3 cup Dutch-processed cocoa powder
¼ teaspoon baking powder
¼ teaspoon salt
Five 1.76-ounce Milky Way Midnight Bars, chilled and cut into large dice
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, cut into tablespoons
5 ounces unsweetened chocolate
5 large eggs
2 cups superfine sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla extract

1. Position a rack in the center of the oven and preheat the oven to 325˚F. Line a 9-inch square pan with aluminum foil so that the foil extends 2 inches beyond 2 opposites sides of the pan. Lightly grease the foil.
2. Sift together the flours, cocoa powder, baking powder and salt into a medium bowl. Stir until combined. In a small bowl, toss the candy bar chunks with 1 ½ teaspoons of the sifted mixture.
3. In the top of a double boiler over barely simmering water, heat the butter and unsweetened chocolate, stirring occasionally until melted. Remove the pan from the heat and let the mixture cool to tepid.
4. In a large bowl, whisk the eggs for 1 minute to blend, then add the sugar and whisk for 45 seconds, or until just incorporated. Whisk in the chocolate mixture, then the vanilla extract. Sift the flour mixture over the top and slowly whisk it in, mixing until just blended. Stir in the candy.
5. Scrape the batter into the prepared pan, spreading it evenly, and smooth the top, using a rubber spatula. Bake the brownies for 45 to 50 minutes, or until puffed and set. A toothpick inserted into the center of the brownies should come out with a few moist crumbs clinging to it.
6. Cool the brownies completely in the pan on a rack. Using the ends of the foil as handles, lift the brownies out of the pan. Refrigerate for 2 hours or until firm enough to cut.
7. Cut the brownies into 16 squares.

Store in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 5 days.

Molten Lava Cakes

Molten Lava Cakes - first made 12.24.08 for Christmas Eve dessert

One of my sister's favorite desserts is lava cake. In fact I think it's her only favorite dessert because no matter what I bake, whenever we have family get togethers and I ask her what she wants me to make for dessert, her answer is invariably the same: "lava cake!"

Lava cakes were the rage some years back and you'd be hard-pressed to find a restaurant that hadn't had it on their menu at some time or another - they're basically individual-sized chocolate cakes baked at high temperatures and taken out before the center has fully baked, creating a "lava" of molten chocolate in the middle. Ideally, they're served warm (not hot) with vanilla ice cream. Some recipes call for making a ball of truffle or fudge that's frozen then dropped in the center of the batter so when the cake is baked, the chocolate is still liquid in the middle. You can do it either way but the simplest is the first way.

Essentials of a good lava cake and lava cake recipe: high quality chocolate, high temps so the outside of the cake bakes quickly and baking just the right amount of time. You want the outer edges of the cakes to be baked while leaving the center a liquidy pool of chocolate, but not so underbaked that it's simply raw batter. To this day I remember one of our chef instructors at CIA demonstrating lava cakes and he took it out too soon so the middle was literally raw batter instead of liquid chocolate. Trust me, there's a difference and it's usually a couple minutes' worth of baking time in the oven. You should also bake lava cakes in small individual-sized ramekins. They're so rich that you don't want large portions. Plus it's easier to control the ability to bake it just right with smaller ramekins.

I'm a ramekin freak and went through a period of haunting Crate & Barrel, Sur La Table, and Williams-Sonoma, buying any kind of ramekin(s) that caught my eye. Thankfully, I've managed to control myself in recent years but I still have an inordinate amount of ramekins. The more to bake lava cakes in, I say.

I got this recipe from foodnetwork.com and it's Paula Deen's recipe. Hers calls for orange liqueur but since I'm diametrically opposed to ruining good chocolate with a fruity flavor, I substitute either Kahlua or Godiva chocolate liqueur. The only problem with lava cakes is because they're meant to be served soon after baking and eaten warm, I don't get the chance to experiment with different recipes all year, unless I'm going to be the one to eat all of them. Which I'm not. So every year, when my sister asks without fail for me to make lava cake for dessert, I try out a new recipe for it. This was last year's version.

6 ounces bittersweet chocolate
2 ounces semisweet chocolate
10 tablespoons butter
½ cup all-purpose flour
1 ½ cups confectioners’ sugar
3 large eggs
3 large egg yolks
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 tablespoons orange liqueur

1. Grease six 6-ounce custard cups. Melt the chocolates and butter in the microwave or in a double boiler.
2. Add the flour and sugar to chocolate mixture. Stir in the eggs and yolks until smooth. Stir in the vanilla and orange liqueur. Divide the batter evenly amongst the custard cups.
3. Place in the oven and bake for 14 minutes. The edges should be firm but the center will be runny. Run a knife around the edges to loosen and invert onto dessert plates.

Macadamia Shortbread Brownies

Macadamia Shortbread Brownies - October 17, 2009

This is one of my exceptions of no nuts in brownies. You make a shortbread crust, sprinkle the top with chopped macadamias and bake until golden before pouring the brownie batter on top and baking the whole thing. What makes the nuts in these brownies work is they're part of the crisp crust, not the fudgy brownie itself so they provide a texture contrast against the rich fudginess of the brownie. It wouldn't work as well if you actually added nuts to the brownie batter. Plus, these are macadamia nuts, a step up from the more plebian walnuts and pecans.

This recipe is from Alice Medrich's Bittersweet cookbook. I met Alice Medrich when she did a cooking class demo at Sur La Table some years ago and she autographed my copy of Bittersweet for me. She's the one I learned the trick of lining baking pans with foil - you turn the pan bottom side up, shape a sheet of foil over it, turn the pan over and drop in the foil that's now shaped like the inside of the pan. Nothing could be easier. Your pans last longer this way too since all you have to do once you bake something is lift the whole thing out of the pan with the foil and cut it on a cutting board instead of the pan. Prior to this, my baking pans had knife marks in them. Not anymore.

I like this recipe because the shortbread crust is crisp and buttery and provides both a texture and taste contrast to the rich, smooth fudginess of the brownie itself. Plus they look pretty. The same advice as in earlier posts - use the best quality chocolate you can find. It'll make the brownie much more worthwhile. I use Lindt, Valrhona or Ghirardelli.

Bittersweet Chocolate Brownies
6 ½ ounces bittersweet chocolate (66% - 72%)
7 tablespoons butter
1 cup sugar
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
¼ teaspoon salt
2 cold large eggs
½ cup all-purpose flour
2/3 cup walnut or pecan pieces (optional)

Macadamia Shortbread Crust
6 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
2 tablespoons sugar
¼ teaspoon pure vanilla extract
Pinch of salt
¾ cup all-purpose flour
½ cup untoasted, unsalted macadamia nuts, chopped medium-fine

1. Position a rack in the lower third of the oven and preheat the oven to 350˚F.
2. To make the crust, combine the melted butter, sugar, vanilla and salt in a bowl. Stir in the flour to make the dough.
3. On a square of foil or wax paper, pat or roll out the dough to a square slightly smaller than the bottom of a 9-inch square baking pan. Sprinkle the dough evenly with the nuts and press them in. Cover with a 12-inch square of foil and then a tray or piece of cardboard. Slide your hand under the bottom piece of foil or paper and invert the dough onto the tray. Remove the top sheet of foil or paper. Lift the foil and dough off the tray and into the pan. Press the dough, on the foil, evenly into the bottom and press the foil up the sides of the pan.
4. Bake until the crust is nicely brown all over, 15 to 20 minutes.
Make the brownies
5. Combine the chocolate and butter in a medium heatproof bowl set in a wide skillet of barely simmering water. Stir frequently until the chocolate is melted and the mixture is smooth and hot enough that you want to remove your finger fairly quickly after dipping it in to test.
6. Remove the bowl from the skillet. Stir in the sugar, vanilla and salt with a wooden spoon. Add the eggs one at a time, stirring until the first one is incorporated before adding the next. Stir in the flour and beat with a wooden spoon or rubber spatula until the batter is smooth, glossy and beginning to come away from the sides of the bowl, 1 to 2 minutes. Stir in the nuts, if using.
7. Spread the brownie batter evenly over the hot crust and bake until the edges puff and begin to show fine cracks, 20 to 25 minutes. Let cool completely in the pan on a rack.
8. Remove the brownies from the pan by lifting up the ends of the foil and transfer to a cutting board. Cut into 25 squares with a heavy knife.

Peanut Butter and Chocolate Kisses

Peanut Butter and Chocolate Kisses - first made long ago but most recent documented date November 26, 2008

This is a perennial favorite if you like peanut butter and chocolate together. The peanut butter cookie dough is super easy to make and easy to handle. Roll them into balls, bake them then top them with a Hershey kiss as soon as they come out of the oven. During the busy holiday baking season (or at any other time), make them into dough balls, put them in freezer bags and keep in the freezer until you’re ready to bake them.

For this recipe, you just have to be organized. I make the dough first, roll them into balls and while the first batch is baking, I’m unwrapping the Hershey kisses so they’re ready to push into the cookies as soon as they’re out of the oven. Don’t make the dough balls too big. You don’t want a big peanut butter cookie with a (comparatively) little Hershey kiss in the middle. Make them proportional. These don’t spread much which is good. And be sure you push the Hershey kiss into the center of the cookie as soon as you take the cookie sheet out of the oven. The point is to have the Hershey kiss melt slightly into the hot cookie so it adheres to the cookie when the cookie cools. Don’t move these around a lot either once you push the Hershey kiss in. Both the chocolate kiss and the cookie will be soft while they’re still warm. It’s important to let them cool completely before moving them around.

This recipe is from an old "Cookies" baking book from so long ago that I don’t even remember buying it. In fact, my mom might have bought it for me when I was a kid and I’ve been baking from it ever since. This is another one of those recipes where I’ve liked this so much, I don’t try a lot of similar recipes because I’ve already found the one I like. If you’re a real peanut butter fiend, you can substitute Reese’s peanut butter cups for the Hershey kisses but I like to use the pure chocolate kiss myself.

½ cup butter, room temperature
½ cup smooth or crunchy peanut butter
¾ cup packed brown sugar
¼ cup granulated sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
¼ teaspoon salt
1 ¾ cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
3 tablespoons granulated sugar
48 milk chocolate candy kisses, unwrapped

1. Preheat oven to 375˚F.
2. In a medium bowl, beat together butter, peanut butter, brown sugar, ¼ cup granulated sugar, egg, vanilla and salt until light and fluffy.
3. Add flour and baking soda, beating until thoroughly blended.
4. Shape dough into 48 balls, using a rounded teaspoon for each. Roll balls into 3 tablespoons granulated sugar.
5. Place 2 inches apart on ungreased baking sheets. Bake 8-10 minutes or until light golden. Immediately top each cookie with a candy kiss, carefully pressing down firmly.
6. Remove cooks from baking sheets, cool on racks. Makes 48 (1 ¾”) cookies.

Peanut Butter and Milk Chocolate Brownies

Peanut Butter and Milk Chocolate Brownies - first made July 3, 2007 from Fearless Baking by Elinor Klivans

This brownie has been described as an inside out peanut butter cup. I think it’s even better than that. You make the peanut butter brownie batter, spread half in the bottom of the baking pan, sprinkle a layer of milk chocolate over it then top that with the remaining batter to cover the milk chocolate completely. When it’s baked, you literally have a layer of chocolate between two peanut butter layers. The original recipe calls for chopped up milk chocolate to be sprinkled over the bottom layer and that's what I did with my first attempt, pictured here. Now I buy the plain Hershey chocolate bars (the regular size, not the minis or the thick, king-size bars) and fit them like puzzle pieces over the bottom peanut butter brownie layer to make a near-solid layer of chocolate. Once you bake them, cool and cut them, you have a nice even milk chocolate layer in the middle as opposed to the erratic chunks of chopped up chocolate. Plus, it’s less time-consuming to go with the whole chocolate bars.

When I first made this recipe, I had a taste test piece like I always do. Usually when I try a new recipe, I’ll have one piece, judge it, make notes about how the recipe turned out and whether I would change anything then I don’t eat anymore and instead take the rest into work. With this recipe, I enjoyed it so much, I’m sorry to say I think I ate 3 pieces. Oink.

1 cup unbleached all-purpose flour
½ teaspoon baking powder
¼ teaspoon salt
¼ pound (1 stick) soft unsalted butter
1 cup smooth peanut butter, room temperature
½ cup packed light brown sugar
¾ cup granulated sugar
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
6 ounces milk chocolate, such as Lindt or Dove Bar, broken into about ½” pieces

9” square baking pan

1. Position a rack in the middle of the oven. Preheat the oven to 325˚F. Butter the bottom and sides of a 9 x 9 x 2” or 11 x 7 x 2” baking pan.
2. Sift the flour, baking powder and salt onto a piece of wax paper or into a small bowl and set aside.
3. Put the butter and peanut butter in a large bowl and stir with a large spoon until they are blended together. You may see a few specks of butter. Stir in the brown sugar and granulated sugar, mixing until they are incorporated and there is no loose sugar. Stirring vigorously, beat in the eggs and vanilla until the mixture looks smooth. Add the flour mixture and stir just until it is incorporated and there is no loose flour. Spread about two thirds of the batter into the pan, spreading it evenly with a thin metal spatula or a nonsharp table knife. Scatter the milk chocolate pieces evenly over the batter. Drop spoonfuls of the remaining batter over the milk chocolate, using a rubber spatula to scrape all of the batter from the bowl. Use a thin metal spatula or the table knife to spread the batter evenly over the chocolate. The chocolate will be covered, but may show through the batter.
4. Bake for about 35 minutes until the top feels firm when gently touched and the edges are light brown. Inserting a toothpick as a test doesn’t work because the warm milk chocolate clings to the toothpick. Cool the brownies thoroughly in the pan for about 1 hour. Cut the brownies into pieces and use a thin metal spatula to remove them from the pan. Wrap individual brownies in plastic wrap and store at room temperature up to 3 days. Wrapped brownies are ready to pack in lunch boxes or picnic baskets. These brownies can be served with a scoop of chocolate or peanut butter fudge ice cream.
5. Individual brownies can be wrapped in plastic wrap then heavy aluminum foil and stored in the freezer for up to 3 months. Defrost the wrapped brownies as needed.

Hot Milk Cake

Grandma Lilly's Hot Milk Cake - October 11, 2009

(I may seem like I'm going out of chronological order with the postings but I baked this cake on October 11 then froze it and brought it into work today.)

The name of this recipe is Grandma Lilly’s Hot Milk Cake and is from the Treasury of Country Baking by Lisa Yockelson. I had blogged earlier about her Best Vanilla Pound Cake recipe being one of my favorite pound cake recipes for its simplicity and taste. What makes this particular recipe unusual is the way it’s made. I’ve never boiled milk and butter then added it to the batter but it does make for a smooth, shiny batter. Follow the instructions exactly so you get the result the author intends you to get. It was easy to make and for the most part, I liked it. Texture-wise, it felt like a cake that couldn’t make up its mind to be a light pound cake or a dense sponge cake. There were elements of both which is a bit unusual. Taste-wise it was similar to the Best Vanilla Pound Cake so I liked it but if I had to make a vanilla cake, I’d probably go with the true pound cake recipe.

Grandma Lilly's Hot Milk Cake

½ cup (1 stick) unsalted butter
1 cup milk
2 cups unsifted cake flour
¼ teaspoon salt
4 extra-large eggs, at room temperature
2 cups granulated sugar
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 teaspoon baking powder
Confectioners’ sugar for dusting, optional

1. Lightly butter and flour a plain 9” tube pan. (Do not use a tube pan with a removable bottom; the cake batter will seep out.) Set aside. Preheat the oven to 350˚F.
2. Place the butter and milk in a large saucepan and bring to the boil over moderate heat. Sift the cake flour with the salt onto a large sheet of waxed paper. Beat the eggs in the large bowl of an electric mixer on moderately high speed for 2 to 3 minutes. With the mixer on moderate speed, beat in the sugar in 3 additions, beating well after each portion is added. With the mixer on low speed, blend in the vanilla. Beat in the flour in 2 additions. When the butter and milk mixture has reached a full, rolling boil, remove it from the heat and pour it into the flour mixture as it revolves in the mixture. The beaters must be turning and the bowl moving while the milk is being added. Scrape down the sides of the mixing bowl to make an even-textured batter. Lastly, add the baking powder and beat for 1 minute at moderate speed. Quickly pour and scrape the batter into the prepared pan.
3. Bake the cake on the lower-third level rack of the preheated oven for 1 hour, or until nicely risen and golden on top; a wooden pick inserted into the center of the cake should come out clean and dry.
4. Let cool in the pan on a wire rack for 5 to 6 minutes, then invert onto a second cooling rack. Invert again to cool right side up. Dust the top of the cake with sifted confectioners’ sugar, if you like.
5. Serve the cake cut in medium thick slices.

Chocolate Brownies with Cream Cheese Icing

Chocolate Brownies with Cream Cheese Icing - October 13, 2009

There are many brownie recipes out there and I feel like I’ve tried them all or at least most of the variations. Most people have pretty strong preferences for their brownies and I’m no exception. A “good” brownie is moist, fudgy, chocolatey, and nutless (unless they’re on top and caramelized in some fashion). I don’t like cakey brownies and dry brownies aren’t worth a tooth mark in them.

I had high hopes for this recipe from Magnolia Bakery because when I was in New York , I had a fantastic brownie from Magnolia. It was moist, fudgy and covered with a white chocolate layer sprinkled with nuts on top. I’m not excessively fond of white chocolate but it worked as a great contrast to the fudgy “true” chocolate of the brownie itself. This is a different brownie since it’s covered with cream cheese frosting instead of white chocolate but I figured Magnolia would know how to make good brownies and have good brownie recipes. Hmmm. There may be an exception to every rule. My first hesitation with this recipe was when I saw cake flour being used instead of all-purpose flour. Cake flour is great when you want soft or light-textured cakes. In a brownie? For the kind of texture I like in my brownies, maybe not. But I’ll try any new recipe at least once and will give it a fair shake. I’m an equal opportunity baker after all.

The second off-putting aspect of this recipe was the size of pan it required. Most brownies are made in a 9 x 13 pan at the largest. This called for a 12 x 18 jelly roll pan. They mean serious volume with this brownie. Conceivably, I could have cut the recipe in half and adjusted the pan size but to be truly accurate with the recipe, I would’ve needed a 6” x 9” pan or a pan that totaled to 54” in its dimensions. I don’t have such a pan so I decided to make the recipe as is. I had a bunch of meetings the next day and coworkers I could give it to anyway so I figured none of the brownies would go to waste. But I did “cheat” anyway and baked the brownies in a 9 x 13 pan and an 8” square pan, eyeballing the amount of batter I spread in each pan so they’d each have the same level of thickness. I also cut the frosting in half since I only had 8 ounces of cream cheese on hand, not the full pound the frosting recipe called for. I had mocha frosting left over from the devil’s food cake recipe I’d made the night before so I used that to frost the 8” pan and used the cream cheese frosting for the 9 x 13” pan.

So how’d they turn out? I can’t say I’d give them a glowing review. The texture was kind of funny to me – not the typical denseness of my preferred fudgy brownie but it was both dense and light at the same time, more like a cross between a flourless chocolate cake and a cakey brownie. Kinda weird. Of course, it could also be due to the fact that I’ve been baking (and eating) a lot of sweets lately and I’m getting pretty jaded. If it isn’t absolutely fabulous, then it’s just “okay” to me. To other people, it was great. I had people fighting over the ones I handed out today and I got several emails and IMs thanking me and telling me they liked it. But I’m my own worst critic on many things, including what I bake. This recipe didn’t pass muster with me and I’m not likely to make it again. They are too many other brownie recipes to try or too many good ones to re-make.

Brownie
3 cups cake flour (not self-rising flour)
1 ½ teaspoons baking powder
1 ½ teaspoons salt
1 ½ cups (3 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
3 cups sugar
6 large eggs, at room temperature
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
9 ounces unsweetened chocolate, melted

Icing
1 pound (2 eight-ounce packages) cream cheese, softened
6 tablespoons (¾ stick) unsalted butter, softened
1 ½ teaspoons vanilla extract
6 cups confectioners’ sugar

1. Preheat oven to 350°F.
2. Grease a 12 x 18-inch jelly roll pan.
3. To make the brownie: In a large bowl, sift together the flour, the baking powder and the salt. Set aside.
4. In a large bowl, cream the butter and the sugar until fluffy, about 3 minutes. Lightly beat the eggs, then add to the creamed mixture and mix well. Add the vanilla extract. Add the chocolate and mix until well incorporated. Add the dry ingredients. Pour the batter into prepared pan. Bake 25 to 30 minutes or until a cake tester inserted into center of pan comes out with moist crumbs attached.
5. To make the icing: In a medium-size bowl, on the medium speed of an electric mixer, beat together the cream cheese and the butter until smooth, about 3 minutes. Add the vanilla extract. Gradually add the sugar and beat until well incorporated.
6. Let the brownies cool completely, then ice with cream cheese icing.
7. As an optional icing, try this fudge frosting: In a small saucepan, combine ¾ cup heavy cream and 12 ounces semisweet chocolate and place over very low heat. Stir constantly until smooth. Remove from heat and stir in ¾ cup confectioners’ sugar until dissolved. Allow to stand until firm.