Fudge Brownies

Hello Everyone! So basically, this is Kiran from Kays House of Treats and today I am doing a guest post on these absolutely delicious fudge brownies - why I am posting here is well going to be explained in the next few paragraphs :). 

 About a few months I started seeing a few posts from this blog named Mama, Baby & Diapers on my newsfeed. Basically a few mutual friends were sharing them and first I didn’t really pay attention because well, I am not married so obviously the blog wasn’t really for ‘me’. But then I just randomly read a post and well, I am happy to say I was completely wrong because the blog is hilarious. Not really the ‘desi totkas’ I was expecting but a modern new generation mom highlighting her experiences with her new born son, giving very relevant advice & tips, and poking a bit fun on all those ‘desi totkas’ & ‘mashwara’s. Also, she shares these cartoons on a regular basis (I would like to know where she finds them ;)) on a regular basis and they are just so funny – and relevant for anyone having experienced life with children – just as relevant for your own kids or for your little siblings or nieces/nephews.

A few days later, I get a message in my inbox from the author of the blog who actually turned out to be a friend of mine (that’s when I put the two and two together from the newsfeed sharing) who tried out one of my recipes and asked me to write a guest post for her blog for a special occasion. Here I was, like wow, still working out the kinks in my blog and getting used to people actually trying out my recipes and then I get a message for someone who wants me to write a guest post - quite thrilling.

And writing a guest post for the holiday termed as Mother’s Day for her blog is quite exciting. Personally, I am not much into celebrating Mother’s Day only becacuse its just one day and I think that even we had hundreds of days, we couldn’t even begin to celebrate Motherhood in its absolute sense or do justice to what our mothers have done for us. It’s like the moment a girl becomes a Mother she becomes this superhuman person with loads of energy & stamina & passion & love where she manages to do hundreds of tasks in a day more or less perfectly without having it show on her face. So yes - while the West has labelled this holiday as Mother's Day, we don't need a specific day to be appreciative of our mothers and do something nice for them - in fact, we should make sure that keep celebrating "Mother's Day" in the true meaning to show our Mother's how much we care.

I was actually thinking of another recipe to feature but then I changed my mind.  Mom's deserves a better recipe than the one I was thinking – they deserve something absolutely absolutely delicious but yet comforting and simple to make. The simple part comes from the fact that the recipe can actually be made in a relatively short amount of time and well, if you are spending 4-6 hours in the kitchen with your mother having to ‘probably’ clean up the mess or at least put things right, then there’s really no point.

So in honor of Mother's I present the best brownies I have ever made – they have the right amount of fudgey texture combined with just the right amount of chocolate flavor and they are ultra-moist. Best part – there is no chopping or melting of chocolate required which makes them so easy to make.

Fudge Brownies
Adapted from King Arthur Flour
Ingredients:

4 large eggs
1 1/4 cups cocoa (Rossmorr or local brand – 1 ¼ cups; if using imported cocoa powder or cocoa powder from Empress Market – quantity can be reduced to 1 cup since that has more chocolaty taste hence is a bit bitter)
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon instant coffee powder
1 tablespoon vanilla essence
200 grams unsalted butter
2 1/4 cups sugar (use normal sugar – no need to process in blender)
1 1/2 cups Flour
2 cups chocolate chips (I use 1 cup only)

Directions
1) Preheat the oven to 350°F. Lightly grease a 9" x 13" pan. Line the pan with a big piece of aluminium foil. It should hang out of the pan so that once the brownies are made you are able to lift them out of the pan using the aluminium foil. Grease the aluminum foil with oil/butter. Once the brownies are out of the pan you can put them a cutting board and cut using a serrated knife. Make sure you follow this step and grease the aluminium foil wel, otherwise the brownies might stick to the pan and it becomes very difficult to cut them properly.
2) Crack the 4 eggs into a bowl, and beat them with the cocoa, salt, baking powder, coffee powder, and vanilla till smooth. 

3) In a medium-sized microwave-safe bowl, or in a saucepan set over low heat, melt the butter, then add the sugar and stir to combine. Or simply combine the butter and sugar, and heat, stirring, until the butter is melted. Continue to heat (or microwave) briefly, just until the mixture is hot (about 110°F to 120°F), but not bubbling; it'll become shiny looking as you stir it. Heating the mixture to this point will dissolve more of the sugar, which will yield a shiny top crust on your brownies. 

This is the part which is the most important in the recipe and turns them into the best brownies ever. I do this with a saucepan so I am able to control the heat well. I do this with a saucepan so I am able to control the heat and while the sugar & butter mixture is heating, I use a whisk or a spoon/spatula to stir it a few times so that the sugar dissolves. Once it has reached the correct temperature, I whisk it for 2-3 minutes again. The reason I do this is because I made this recipe the first two times, and the crust was perfect but then the recipe failed on me, so then I had to adjust and tweak it a bit. Make sure you keep an eye on the mixture because once the sugar mixture got heated too much and it turned to caramel.
4) Add the hot butter/sugar mixture to the egg/cocoa mixture, stirring until smooth.
5) Add the flour and chips, again stirring until smooth. Note: If you want the chips to remain intact in the baked brownies, rather than melting in, let the batter cool in the bowl for about 20 minutes before stirring in the chips.
6) Spoon the batter into a lightly greased 9" x 13" pan.
7) Bake the brownies for about 30 minutes, until a cake tester inserted into the center comes out clean, or with just a few moist crumbs clinging to it. The brownies should feel set on the edges, and the center should look very moist, but not uncooked. Remove them from the oven and cool on a rack before cutting and serving.
To be on the safe side, take them out when the tester has a few moist crumbs since the brownies will keep on baking slightly once they are out of the oven. That has been my indication of when they are completely baked yet the right amount of ultra-moist fudgey center.
                                   

                                 

Note: The above pictures are from my friends dholki – she absolutely loves desserts and I had wanted to make her something special – made chocolate brownies and also a caramel chocolate variant (where I had swirled in thick caramel sauce in the batter)