Chocolate Brownie

Some friends moved into a new place not too far from where we live, invited us over for dinner and we were on dessert. I just happened to have most of a leftover Reese's Peanut Butter Egg hanging around the house post Easter, that looked a little something like this:

www.candyblog.net

Drool. I love the combination of peanut butter and chocolate - so sweet, but so salty - but this egg was a little full on, like American-candy full on. So rather than giving myself one hell of a serious sugar high, I thought this would be great in brownie. Because this egg is so intense and sweet, I was looking for a slightly healthier recipe, but one that would still be fudgy. Hello www.healthyfood.co.nz!

Chocolate Brownie

1 cup unsweetened apple puree or sauce

1/3 cup cocoa powder

3/4 cup self-raising flour

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 cup sugar

1/2 teaspoon of salt

1/2 cup dark chocolate chips

3/4 cup (70g) walnuts (optional)

Now before you start getting any kind of healthy idea from this, remember I said healthier. The apple puree I used was sweetened, so I used a little less sugar, as I didn't want the brownie to be overly sweet. Aaaaand instead of using nuts, I just used the chopped up Reese's egg - which made about a cup total.

Preheat the oven to 175 degrees celsius. I used regular bake, not fan bake, as I wanted the brownie to cook slowly so it would stay fudgy and not dry out. Lightly oil a 20cm x 20cm baking dish. I used an enamel dish that was about 20 x 15, and 5 cm deep as I planned on cutting it into more bite size pieces, rather then squares. 

Put the apple puree in a bowl and sift in the cocoa, flour and baking soda. Add the sugar and salt and mix until just combined - over mixing will toughen the brownie. Gently fold in the chocolate chips and nuts (or the excess amounts of chopped up Easter egg) and transfer to your baking dish. Bake for 25-30 minutes until the centre is still fudgy when you stick a skewer in it. As mine was in a deeper pan, 30 minutes was about right. Let's just say 'fudgy' one more time.

You're meant to cool the brownie in the dish for 5-10 minutes before turning it out and then slice it when it's cold, but I made these not long before we had to leave so I just cut them into small pieces in the pan, and put them into a plastic container. Dust them with icing sugar, or serve them with cream or yoghurt. I usually prefer the tartness of yoghurt with something sweet like this, but surprisingly, this wasn't as sickly sweet as I thought it would be and the chunks of the peanut butter centre from the egg were just amazingly good. Small pieces were definitely a good call though! I'm totally sold on using apple puree in brownies now - it results in a really nice (all together now) fudgyness and help it to not be overly rich in sweetness.  

If I made this again, I'd probably still omit the nuts (just because I don't want nuts taking up any room chocolate could be taking up), and cut up some Whittakers chocolate, rather than using chocolate chips. I consider myself a bit of a brownie connoisseur- in the eating rather than the making - and it's hard to get that soft chewy texture, with the crunch of chocolate chunks and the crispy top, but this is a pretty good go to recipe.