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Basic Brownies

Let’s start with some life advice from someone supremely unqualified to give it, shall we?

I really would recommend leaving university, if you are that way inclined, with at least a vague idea of what you would like to do with your life once you have clambered off the carousel of read-write-sleep-repeat. Instead of doing this, I cooked a lot. When I worried that I had no idea what my future career would be, well-meaning friends, family members, and supposed authority figures, would tell me that it would all come together in the end. ‘You’ll figure it out by the time you graduate!’, they said, blithely optimistic.

It didn’t work out exactly like that.

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I did all the things you’re supposed to do. I won an internship for the summer between my second and third years. I wrote a CV. I went to all of the careers fairs the university offered. I saw a careers advisor. But I just… didn’t want to do any of the jobs that were real options. All of the jobs that I actually wanted to do (doctor, chocolatier, pilot, vet, recipe tester) were so wildly inaccessible to me, me with my English degree and my complete lack of experience, that I may as well have just said ‘I want to be a princess astronaut and have my own spaceship castle’, and left it at that.

Lots of people told me to do something I loved; not to worry about money or career progression at that stage, but to focus on doing something I enjoyed and trust that the rest would come later. Well, that’s all very well, but I needed money for WiFi and heating and croissants, and couldn’t afford to do unpaid internships. I was already deep in debt from degree number one, and I couldn’t bear the thought of further specialised study to actually get me onto a career path that might appeal, costing thousands of pounds and leaving me not earning for another year or two. So I left university feeling pretty directionless.

What I did have, instead of a five year plan and earning potential, was a fail-safe brownie recipe. It might not keep me warm at night (unless I eat enough brownies to cultivate an insulating layer of blubber) but it has other uses. I spent a summer testing various recipes, trying to find one that matched my brownie-ideals, and finally hit upon what I’m about to share with you below. I’ve memorised it and adapted it, and I genuinely can’t remember where the base recipe came from originally, so if you recognise it then please do let me know.

People are often down on brownies, thinking them dull and easy, but I think they are the solution to all of your dessert problems. They are incredibly quick and simple to make. They can be served hot and gooey, undercooked and fresh from the oven, with a scoop of ice cream. They can be served straight from the freezer in the summer, adorned with berries or sorbet. They are loved by children and adults alike. They keep, chilled, for ages. They are robust, and don’t mind a couple of hours in a hot car or a bumpy ride on the back of a bike.

Most of all, brownies are adaptable. Once you have a solid base recipe you are happy with, the possibilities are, if not literally endless, certainly numerous. Want to make them gluten free? Swap the flour for ground almonds. Want to make them vegan? Swap the eggs for apple sauce and the butter for oil. Want to feed people with allergies? Skip the nuts. Best of all, brownies are a vehicle. You can basically chuck anything you think would be good in there and call yourself a culinary genius.

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Notes: This recipe makes dense, chocolatey, rich, fudgy (rather than cakey) brownies, as this is my preference. I always think you should be able to dent a brownie with your thumb.

Ingredients:

275g dark chocolate (I use Lindt 70%)
225g butter
190g plain flour
1 tsp baking powder
a pinch of salt
4 large eggs, beaten
1 tsp vanilla essence
200g caster sugar
100g granulated sugar (I find the granulated helps give the brownies a crackling top, but skip it and use all caster if that’s what you have)
200g of ‘extras’ – go wild. Chopped dark, white, or milk chocolate? Chunks of Mars, Crunchie, Bounty? Pecans, walnuts, peanuts? Peanut butter? Raspberries, strawberries, cherries, orange? Caramel, fudge, toffee? Bacon?

Method:

  1. Preheat your oven to 180C/160C fan/gas mark 4. Grease and line a rectangular baking pan (mine is 20cm x 30cm, but whatever you have will probably be fine).
  2. Melt the chocolate and butter together in a glass bowl set over a pan of simmering water. While the chocolate and butter are melting, sift the flour, baking power, and salt together in a mixing bowl. Chop and prepare any additions you want for your brownies.
  3. Dump the sugar(s), vanilla essence, and beaten eggs into the joyous bowl of chocolate loveliness once it’s all melted, stirring well after each addition. The longer and harder you beat the mixture after you add the eggs, the more crispy top you will get. Then add the chocolate mix to the dry mix and stir it all together. Chuck in any additions you may be using and stir again. Pour it into your lined pan.
  4. Bake. This takes 20 minutes in my rather fierce fan oven, but could be more or less in yours, so use your judgement. You want them just starting to crack on top, round the edges, but not quite set in the middle.
  5. Leave the brownies to set in the tin, if you want to serve them solid. You can cover them and pop them in the fridge or freezer when they’re cool enough. You can also cut and serve them immediately, hot and gooey, as a dessert. Or, er, just eat them straight from the pan. Not that I have ever done that.

Enjoy, and reflect proudly on the fact that you know exactly what you’re doing with your life.

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Vaguely Healthy Breakfast Muffins

I often find breakfast tricky. It has a lot of limitations that other meals don’t.

I mean, sure, on a weekend it can be glorious. Pancakes studded with bursting blueberries, omelettes fat with cheese and ham, croissants shining with jam and butter, a steaming plate of bacon and eggs, home-made granola adorning berries and Greek yoghurt… what was I saying?

On weekdays, though, there’s time pressure – assuming you have to be getting out of the door and to some sort of job at some stage. You’re probably feeling a bit bleary and not up to cooking, or indeed eating, anything too elaborate. The idea of making your own batter for something is laughable.

I, personally, am a bit of a precious cow about eating the same thing every day. While my wonderfully unfussy partner would happily have an eat-by-numbers series of identical breakfasts forever, I tend to get bored. So, I set about finding recipes to make up this ‘Vaguely Healthy Breakfast’ series. ‘Vaguely Healthy’ only got in there because if I’m eating something pretty often, even I admit that the thing shouldn’t be peanut butter, Nutella, and raspberry jam on toast (don’t pretend that doesn’t sound delicious).

So I’ve started looking for things that are easy, have at least some nutritional value, and that can either be pre-prepped or made quickly. Enter: muffins.

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Vaguely Healthy Breakfast Muffins

Source: Recipe (minimally) adapted from the ever-wonderful BBC Good Food.

Notes: I thought these were good when I made them as per recipe, but lacking in a little flavour. I have swapped the honey for maple syrup, added a pinch of salt and some more spices, and mixed in raspberries with the blueberries for some added sharpness and a more complex taste. I also use Greek yoghurt instead of natural, as I like the tang. Since they use wholemeal flour, Greek yoghurt, seeds, fresh berries, oil instead of butter, and maple syrup instead of sugar, they qualify as ‘vaguely healthy’ in my head. If this supposition is incorrect, please don’t tell me, because I don’t want to know.

Ingredients

2 large eggs
150g Greek yogurt
50ml rapeseed oil (or any reasonably unflavoured oil you have lying about)
100g pureed apples (I used baby food because it’s all rock and roll over here)
1 ripe banana, mashed
4 tbsp maple syrup
1 tsp vanilla extract
200g wholemeal flour
50g rolled oats
1½ tsp baking powder
1½ tsp bicarbonate of soda
1½ tsp cinnamon
1 tsp nutmeg
100g mixed blueberries and raspberries (or whatever you think would work really – blackberries, apricots, grated apple…)
2 tbsp mixed seeds

Method

  1. Heat oven to 180C/160C fan/gas 4. Line a 12-hole muffin tin with 12 large muffin cases.
  2. Whisk up the eggs, yogurt, oil, apple puree, banana, maple syrup and vanilla in a large bowl, until it’s all well-combined. Chuck everything else, except the seeds, into another bowl, and mix that together too.
  3. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry slowly and mix until smooth. Don’t overmix (I kind of hate this instruction in recipes as OBVIOUSLY I wouldn’t overmix something on purpose, but basically mix it until it’s just combined and you can’t see any flour patches and then stop). Divide the batter between the cases – I find an ice cream scoop best for this.
  4. Sprinkle the muffins with the seeds. Bake. Mine only took 15 minutes at 160C in my fairly fierce fan oven, but you will know what is best in yours. You want them to be golden and well risen. Remove from the oven and leave to cool.
  5. Can be eaten as is. They’re also nice sliced, toasted, and spread with butter. The really great thing is that you can freeze them, so make a batch and that’s twelve breakfasts sorted right there.