Brownies – 2 Variations

Or, as they’re called in our house: Pupischnutzis (no idea why!).

This recipe is the result of many, many, many trial-and-error-bakes. There was one 2-week period where we were eating fresh brownies pretty much every day. Of course, after that we couldn’t face another one for months. Anyway the first recipe below is the successful winning recipe which we liked best. It gives a firm, sticky but not too gooey brownie.

The second variation is what I came up with last night when I suddenly really fancied brownies but didn’t have quite all the ingredients necessary at home. So I improvised, and the result was rather good. I’d need to try both brownies at the same time to directly compare and see if I preferred one to the other, but the new, improved recipe from last night really was rather excellent!

Brownies - Recipe #2

Recipe #1
Ingredients

• 250g plain flour
• ½ tsp baking powder
• 1  egg, beaten
• 100g sugar
• 50g cocoa
• 100ml oil
• 200ml milk
• 100g chocolate (half melted, half chopped OR all melted)

Method

1. Mix together and bake in a lined tin at 180°C for 15 – 20 mins.
2. Cut into squares when cool.
3. Keep in an airtight container – they get better and stickier after a day or so!!

 

Recipe #2
Ingredients

• 250g plain flour
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1 egg, beaten
• 100g sugar
• 50g cocoa
• 100ml oil
• 100ml milk
• 100 – 200ml natural jogurt
• 1 large heaped tbsp chocolate nut spread eg Nutella

Method

1. Mix all the ingredients together to a thick, smooth batter. If it seems a bit dry, add more jogurt.
2. Bake in a lined tin at 180°C for 15 – 20 mins until the top is dry and a wooden skewer poked in comes out clean (or cleanish, but def. not covered in sticky batter!)
3. Cut into squres when cool.

I’m sure if you keep these in an covered container they would also get better, but we polished the lot off last night, so I can’t confirm this.
As to the flavour, I felt the jogurt added a rather pleasant slight tang, but no-one else seemed to notice it, so it could just be that I tasted it because I knew the jogurt was there. Using chocolate spread meant I didn’t have to faff around melting chocolate, which is a bonus as far as I’m concerned, so I will be using that again. I didn’t factor in that there is already quite a bit of oil in there though, so next time I would reduce the oil that goes into the recipe by about 20ml or so.

 

Muesli & Fruit Bars

These make an excellent snack and are not messy or sticky so can be eaten anywhere!

Ingredients

• 100g plain muesli (ie no added fruit or chocolate, and as little sugar as possible)
• 100g plain flour
• 50 – 100g sugar (depending on how sweet you want the bars to be)
• 150g chopped dried fruit eg raisins, dates, bananas, apples, cranberries…
• 75ml milk
• 75ml apple juice

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C and line or grease a small, square baking tin.
2. Mix together the muesli, chopped fruit, sugar and flour.
3. Add the milk and apple juice, and mix to a thick batter.
4. Pour into the prepared tin and bake for about 20 mins.
5. Allow to cool before cutting into squares or bars.

 

 

Carrot Cake

This is a very easy to make cake, really tasty and moist so it keeps well for a few days, wrapped in foil.

Ingredients

• 350g plain flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 180g brown sugar and/or honey or maple syrup
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp nutmeg
• 350g carrots (about 4 large ones), grated
• 3 eggs
• 75ml milk
• 200ml sunflower oil
• handful of chopped walnuts (optional)

Method

1. Preheat oven to 180°C.
2. Mix everything together in a bowl. You can vary the amount of sugar, depending on the sweetness of the carrots, or replace some of it with either honey or maple syrup.
3. Pour into a greased and lined cake (loose-bottomed if round) or loaf tin.
4. Bake for about 45 – 55mins until dark brown on top.
5. Cool before slicing.