Cocoa Brownies

This week was a bit of fail week in the DiniBlini kitchen.

I tried to make carrot cake and it looked amazing.

 

It tasted? Not so amazing. Think too cheesy frosting, like BAD cheesy.

Then there was this lemon-blackberry cake which was awesome in theory, but exploded and had a faint aftertaste of oil. TASTY.

I needed a win.

These brownies made it happen.

10 Tbsps / 1 1/4 sticks / 140 gms unsalted butter
1 1/4 cups sugar
3/4 cups plus 2 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 tsp instant espresso powder
1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract
2 cold large eggs
1/2 cup all-purpose flour

Position a rack in the lower third of the oven and preheat the oven to 165C/325F.

Line the bottom and sides of an 8-inch square baking pan with parchment paper or foil and butter.

Combine the butter, sugar, cocoa, and salt in a medium heatproof bowl and set the bowl in a wide pan of barely simmering water. Stir from time to time until the butter is melted and the mixture is well combined.

Remove the bowl from the pan and set aside briefly until the mixture is only warm, not hot. Stir in espresso powder and vanilla.

Add the eggs one at a time, stirring vigorously after each one.

When the batter well blended add the flour and stir until you cannot see it any longer. At this point the original recipe tells you to beat it 40 times. So you know. Do that.

Spread in the lined pan.

Bake until a skewer plunged into the center emerges slightly moist with batter, 25 to 30 minutes. But honestly just watch these brownies. Original recipe said 5 minutes less.

Let cool completely before cutting.

*Adapted from Alice Medrich’s Best Cocoa Brownies on Food52.
** Photography for this blog post was courtesy of my very talented friend Hoi Yee – you can see more of her work on Instagram.