The Recipe Room

Chocolate Brownies of any description are pretty heavenly.  Rich, moist and gooey!  Eaten warm with ice-cream is always my favourite way to devour them!  Brownies are often made with walnuts, but I want to give you a slightly different idea. 

Almond and apricot chocolate brownies have all the gooey richness of a classic brownie, but they offer a different kind of sweetness and crunch.  You can try experimenting with other fruit and nuts too.  Any variation is good fun to make, and lip-smackingly tasty!  Just be sure not to overcook your brownies, or they will be disappointingly dry.

Also, try this Go Free Chocolate Brownie recipe, which is gluten-free, wheat-free and dairy-free. Perfect for large groups with special dietary needs.

Ingredients:

• 300g good dark chocolate, roughly chopped
• 200g good milk chocolate, roughly chopped
• 220g unsalted butter, left to soften
• 220g light muscovado sugar
• 3 eggs
• 75g self-raising flour
• 100g almonds, roughly chopped
• 75g breakfast apricots, drained, excess juice squeezed out, and roughly torn

Preparation Guidelines:

1. Preheat the oven to 190ºC.  Grease and then line a shallow baking tray with grease-proof paper.
2. Melt the dark chocolate slowly together with the butter in a large saucepan, stirring well.
3. In a large mixing bowl, beat the eggs together with the sugar until creamy and light, then stir in the melted dark chocolate.  Once well mixed, add the flour, the almond and apricot pieces, and the roughly chopped milk chocolate.  Combine everything together with a wooden spoon.
4. Spoon the mixture out into the lined baking tray and bake for around 40 mins until the centre of the cake feels firm to the touch but soft directly underneath the surface.  The trick with brownies is never to overcook them. You need to look out for the golden moment, and take them from the oven before they begin to go dry.
5. If you’re not going to eat the brownies straight away, leave the brownie to cool in the tin.  Once cooled, turn it out onto a chopping board and cut it into squares.

Note: If you want to serve some of the brownie hot and fresh, you can remove the part you want from the tray as soon as it is cooked, and serve it in bowls with ice-cream. To make it fruitier, try topping with bits of strawberries and apricots. It will fall apart and be ever-so gooey!  Then you can leave the remainder of the cake to cool in the tray, to cut into servings and store.

Another idea for preparing it to eat hot, is to bake the brownie mix in smaller pots or ramekins to serve straight from the oven with cream and ice-cream.  Or you could even pop a square of brownie in the microwave for a few seconds to warm it at any time.  So many ways to eat a brownie!  Yum!

Time: 20 mins preparation, 45 mins baking

Cocoa Treats: 18 squares

Flapjacks are such a classic old favourite.  They are also a great way to get the benefits of oats into children who can’t bring themselves to enjoy porridge. (If they do like it, try this wholesome oats recipe.)  And let’s face it; we never really grow out of the comfort of a home-baked flapjack, even when we’re all grown-up.

Oats are a good source of some B vitamins, and also contain iron, calcium, magnesium and zinc, amongst other nutrients.  The humble oat is packed with soluble fibre which is thought to help reduce high blood cholesterol levels.  They also have a low GI (glycaemic index) so they are absorbed slowly into the blood stream, which helps to keep blood sugar levels stable. As you can see, oats offer some good health benefits for all age groups.

We have to admit here; however, that once those little oats are coated and doused in golden syrup, butter and sugar, that yes, they are rather full of calories.  But as afternoon snacks go, you can be sure you’re getting some good energy and nutrition into your body too.  And well, I couldn’t give you a flapjack recipe without including chocolate could I?  So here’s how to make some very yummy choc chip flapjacks.

Ingredients:

• 400g porridge oats
• 230g unsalted butter or margarine
• 230g light muscovado sugar
• 300g good quality milk chocolate bar chopped into small pieces, or milk chocolate chips
• 180g golden syrup

Preparation Guidelines:

1. In a large saucepan, melt the butter with the sugar and the golden syrup, mixing well as the ingredients melt, and then leave the mixture to cool completely.
2. Grease a baking tray with a little butter and preheat the oven to 180ºC.
3. In a separate bowl, mix the porridge oats and the chocolate together. Gradually fold in the syrupy mixture and stir well until all of the ingredients are very well combined.
4. Spoon the mixture into the baking tray and level off the surface with a wooden spoon.
5. Bake the giant flapjack in the oven for about 20-25 mins until the edges of the mix begin to turn a golden brown.  Remove and leave to cool in the tray.  Once cooled, transfer the large biscuit onto a chopping board and cut into small bars.  They are delicious served freshly baked, but you can also store them in an airtight container.

Time: 20 mins to prepare, plus cooling time.  20-30 mins to cook

Cocoa Treats: 20-24 pieces

This is the kind of pudding that takes me back to childhood. Those midweek nights of fish fingers and beans, when Mum filled the house with the wonderful smell of chocolate baking in the oven.  She’d put the dish on the table on a big wicker mat and ladle out this chocolate pudding into our eagerly clutched bowls, as long as we’d polished off the whole of our first course…. of course!

We loved eating it hot with a dollop of choc chip ice cream. (Check out the recipe on my blog for this ice cream, as well as another chocolate pudding option chocolate fondant with cherries and vanilla anglaise.) This recipe serves 2-3 people, so just double up the quantities if you have a bigger family, or if you have friends coming round.

Ingredients:

• 150ml milk
• 125g good dark chocolate, broken into pieces
• 25g unsalted butter
• 75g light muscovado sugar
• 1 egg, separated
• 12g cocoa powder
• 12g self-raising flour
• Dusting of cocoa powder

Preparation Guidelines:

1. Preheat the oven to 180ºC.
2. Gently warm the chocolate and the milk together in a saucepan until the chocolate melts completely.  Remove from the heat and stir together until smooth and cohesive.
3. In a large mixing bowl, beat the sugar into the butter until light and creamy.  Mix in the separated egg yolk, cocoa powder and flour.  Then gradually add the chocolate and milk mixture until evenly combined.
4. Whisk the egg white in a clean bowl until it is stiff before spooning and mixing it into the chocolate mixture.
5. Spoon the mixture into a 1L capacity oven-proof dish and set the dish inside a roasting tin.  Boil a kettle of water and pour 2cm water into the roasting tin all around the chocolate dish.
6. Bake in the oven for around 30 mins, until the top of the mixture has crusted but the mixture underneath remains a little soft. Dust with cocoa powder and serve with whipped cream.

Time:   20 mins to prepare, 40 mins to cook

Cocoa Treats: 2-3 servings