Brownies the way I like them

Brownies is my favorite cake because of the rich, deep chocolate taste, crunchy walnuts and chewy yet at the same time soft, melt-in-a-mouth structure. And yes, it took me ages to develop a brownies receipt the way I like it. A little too much sugar and it got too heavy. Too many walnuts and it turned wood-like. And so on. So far, this is the best I have come up with, I think 🙂

For my pan that has 31cm width and 42cm length in total. Inside bottom measures are 25cmx35cm

• 200-250g walnuts chopped in big chunks (depending how dense those are drizzled over the dough)
• 250g butter
• 120 ml oil with neutral taste (I like rapeseed oil)
• 190g flour
• 70g cacao powder
• 500g brown sugar
• 200g regular granulated white sugar
• 600g chocolate chips (I like using Callebaut dark chocolate)
• 12 eggs

I avoid using hand mixer and use only spoon for beating the batter together. I start with cutting the butter into small cubes and put in a non stick saucepan together with chocolate. The mass is set on a low heat and I attend it frequently mixing it to make sure that the chocolate and butter are melted and not burned down. While the mass is melting I mix the two types of sugars and start beat it and eggs together, one egg at a time. Then oil is added into the batter with eggs. At this point the chocolate is completely melted without being not too hot (if hot, it needs to be cooled down before pouring it into the rest) and is poured over the egg mass. After the chocolate is incorporated into the batter, I sieve together cocoa powder and the flour and gently mix everything together. In buttered and lined with baking paper pan I pour some of the batter, then the walnuts are drizzled on top of that and the rest of the batter is added. I find this method of placing walnuts better, as their distribution across the dough is more equal and the walnuts tend to stay on the bottom of the cake as they should. The pan goes into the oven preheated at 160 C for about 37-40 minutes. If brownies is completely baked, it is called a chocolate cake, not a brownies. So I make sure to pull it off the oven not baked completely. It’s when the dough sticks to the toothpick when inserted into the cake. Another preference I have for my brownies it’s the serving temperature. I like it chilled, right from the fridge. It gives an extra dimension to the cake. Caramel, caramel sauce, buttercream with caramel topped with some type of sour berry (red currents are my favorite) or some fancy salt flakes are some ways to serve it. My family doesn’t mind vanilla ice cream to this cake as well.

This is a heavy cake, so I am trying to cut them into smaller portions compared to other cakes before serving. And cutting process is so much easier when the cake is frozen.