Avoid 6 Common Mistakes While Baking Brownies
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Whenever I get a craving for something sweet, it’s usually for something chocolate. And ultimately, there’s nothing you can make with chocolate that’s better than a brownie. Not even chocolate cake. There, I said it.
While visiting my massi in Ottawa, I – a proclaimed “I hate dark chocolate” 10 year old – found a bag of bittersweet dark chocolate brownies stashed away in the kitchen cabinet. I still recall the joy of biting into it, a simple moist crumb with a slightly crisp crust, cracked top and a fudgy center. Slightly bitter, and not too sweet.
Back on Indian soil, my mom and I discovered brownies – almost as fudgy – at a bakery 5 minutes away from the house. A few years later, the bakery shut down and I began experimenting in the kitchen. “Everything happens for the best”, no doubt.
Kainaz Messman, Chef and co-owner of Theobroma says, “The secret of a good brownie is in the baking, not the making. The difference between a moist gooey brownie and a dry crumbly brownie-biscuit can be just a few minutes or a few degrees.”
6 Common Mistakes to Avoid While Baking Brownies
These chocolate treats are trickier to nail than they seem. There are numerous mistakes to be made along the way, from under baking the brownies to indulging too soon. No, seriously.
1. Using Any Recipe
There are two schools of thought when it comes to brownies. One holds that they should be fudgy, dense, and infinitely rich – like a cross between a truffle and a fudge. To make the brownies of your dreams, you’ve got to first know how your prefer your brownie… Cakey or fudgy? If you like fudgy brownies, choose a recipe that has a higher chocolate and butter-to-dry ingredient ratio. If you’re into cakey brownies, go for a recipe that is reminiscent of, well, cake. Look for a recipe asks you to cream the butter and sugar together. So the recipe you use matters. While the ingredients in both recipes may not be all that different, it’s the ratios that differ just enough to totally change the texture of the final product. I prefer my brownie to be dense and fudgy — the way they’re meant to be. If it’s cakey you’re after, you might as well have a slice of real chocolate cake.
2. Baking with Poor-Quality Chocolate
Baking brownies just requires a handful of ingredients, so the ones you should be really great. “Good quality chocolate is a must”, says Food Blogger Kalyan Karmakar of Finely Chopped fame. Skip the ubiquitous cooking chocolate, and grab a bar of chocolate you’d want to eat on its own. Don’t cut corners or make due with an inferior product. Chop the bar of chocolate into big chunks. It will melt slowly, making “hot, fudgy, melt in your mouth, pillows of chocolate” – as Creator of Petite Sweet Eats, Jia Singh, describes it. You can even use a mix of dark chocolate (around 72%) and semisweet chocolate to shake things up.
3. Burning the Chocolate and Scrambling the Eggs
I get it, you need to melt your chocolate. But don’t combine screaming-hot-just-melted chocolate to your eggs or sugar. You’ll end up cooking and scrambling the eggs, and potentially scorch the chocolate. Also, bring your ingredients to room temperature before combining. It may take a little extra planning to remove the eggs and butter from the fridge in advance, but they’ll combine much better yielding a smoother, creamier batter……………..
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Fudgy Chocolate Brownie Recipe
These heavenly brownies are pure chocolate overload, featuring a fudgy center, slightly crusty top and layers of decadence. The recipe calls for both cocoa and dark chocolate, and its bitterness is accented by espresso powder. It is made sans the baking powder, mixed entirely by hand to prevent a cakey texture (aka the nemesis of a great brownie) and errs on the side of fudgy.
Ingredients:
1 cup salted butter
3 cups dark chocolate
¾ cup cocoa powder
½ cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla essence (optional)
3 eggs
⅓ cup flour
1 tsp espresso powder
Confectioner’s sugar for sprinkling (optional)
Check Out This Recipe
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