Brownies

Amy's Brownies

These brownies are from the book An Everlasting Meal.  I have always struggled with scratch made brownies and have never found a recipe that I was completely happy with.  Brownies have always kinda been my nemesis because I think I'm pretty good at baking and bake a lot of great things and cannot for the life of me understand why I can bake cakes, breads and muffins but can't seem to conquer something as simple as a brownie... I mean there isn't any yeast and there are hardly any ingredients so they really shouldn't be that hard.  I am happy to report that I have conquered the brownie and these actually turned out well.  The reduced amount of flour (than most recipes) and high amount of chocolate and butter lend themselves well to a moist, fudgy brownie.  I do tend to like my brownies on the thicker side, so next time I'd probably bake them in a smaller pan than the recipe states so that each square has more height to it.  Other than that, I wouldn't change a thing, and I was quite pleased by the short ingredient list and simple steps for this recipe.

-4 oz unsweetened chocolate
-1 c butter
-3 eggs
-2 c sugar
-2 tsp vanilla
-1 c flour
-chocolate chips or walnuts (I omitted these)

Heat the oven to 350 degrees.  Grease a 13x9 baking pan.  Melt the chocolate and butter in a mixing bowl placed over a small pot of boiling water.  Remove from the heat and allow to cool for 5 minutes.  Beat in 1 egg at a time.  Add the sugar and vanilla and beat until combined, then add the flour.  Spread in the pan and top with chocolate chips or walnuts or anything else you like.  Check them after 20 minutes.  They should be done by 25 to 30.