Basic Brownies

My sister received a clever "edges only" brownie pan for Christmas and kindly offered to let me use it first. But I needed to find a good recipe.

In my search for  brownie recipes, I was discouraged to discover that many of them called for twice the amount of sugar as flour and expensive specialty chocolate.

I wanted a brownie that could be made with everyday ingredients, wouldn't be sickly sweet and was still rich, moist and chocolatey.

One recipe absolutely shocked me by calling for three different kinds of chocolate, 8 eggs, 3 cups of sugar and only 1 1/2 cups of flour. Yikes! That's too rich for my blood.

In the past, I've splurged on high end chocolate for baking and have come to the conclusion that it's rarely worth the extra cost. Actually one of the best tasting brands I've found that also happens to be inexpensive is the Fred Meyer Private Selection dark chocolate chunks.

The result of my brownie research is this simple recipe. The batter can be made in under 10 minutes and the ingredients are basic and inexpensive.

Brownies
(makes one 9-inch pan)
3/4 cup flour
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup unsalted butter
1/2 cup sugar
2 tablespoons water
7 oz. chocolate chips
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 eggs
1/2 cup chopped nuts (optional)

Preheat oven to 325 degrees and grease and flour a 9-inch baking pan.

In a small bowl, combine the flour, baking soda and salt.

In a medium saucepan, combine the butter, sugar and water and bring just to a boil. Remove the pan from heat and add the chocolate chips and vanilla.

Add the eggs, one at a time to the chocolate mixture, whisking well after each addition. Add the flour mixture and blend until just combined. Don't over mix the batter. Stir in the nuts if desired.

Spread the batter into the prepared baking pan.

My brownies in the special "edges only" baking pan. If you use a pan like this, reduce the baking time by 10 minutes.

Bake for 30 to 35 minutes or until the brownies are just done. Be careful not to over bake them.

Let the brownies cool in the pan before cutting into squares.

Note: If you use a special "no edge" brownie pan, reduce the baking time to 20 to 25 minutes.