Dinner party number five

The fifth dinner party was the night after the fourth dinner party, and I was not up to cooking much. Also, there were a lot of people, too many to fit round our table, so by necessity it was going to be a living room, eat-on-your lap affair. Hence, the menu:

A variety of ordered-in pizzas

Homemade Maldon salt-sprinkled brownies, with ice cream

and caramel sauce

I was going to make a salad to go with the pizza, but after consultation it was decided that we all really just wanted pizza and brownies. We ordered the pizzas from a nondescript little place close to our flat that, in all our years in the neighbourhood, we’d never tried. Turns out they make perfectly thin-based, crispy, chewy and flavourful pizzas. That’ll teach us to judge a restaurant on its nondescript cover.

Brownies! I forgot to take photos on the night; this
is a recycled photo. Same recipe, though.

I used my favourite brownie recipe. It’s a slight adaptation of the old classic Hershey’s recipe: simple and basic, with no melted chocolate in the batter and no specialty extra-dark cocoa powder. There is a time and a place for expensive brownies laden with couverture chocolate, but I think there is even more time and place for these simpler brownies. My only concession to fancying them up is to add more salt to the batter, as well as sprinkling Maldon salt flakes on top before baking.

Again, a recycled photo - there are hazelnuts in these.
Most nuts are a good addition to these brownies.

Basic gooey brownies

Makes 9 to 12, depending on your pan size and how big you cut them

¾ cup cocoa powder

½ t baking soda

2/3 c butter, melted and divided

½ c boiling water

1 c packed treacle sugar

1 c sugar

2 eggs

1 1/3 c flour

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 tsp salt

180g chopped dark chocolate – I generally used Cadbury’s Bourneville

Maldon salt

Preheat the oven to 160 C. Butter a square or rectangular cake tin (20cm x 20cm is the classic size for this recipe, although I prefer a slightly bigger and more rectangular tin) and line with baking parchment, enough so that the parchment hangs over the sides of the pan and can be used to lift the finished brownies out of the pan. Butter the parchment and dust with cocoa powder and set aside.

In a medium-sized bowl, combine the cocoa powder, baking soda and half of the melted butter and stir to combine. Add the boiling water and stir until thick. Add the remaining butter, sugars and eggs, and beat for about two minutes till smooth and glossy. Add the remaining ingredients and stir until just combined, taking care not to over-mix – it’s fine to leave a few streaks of flour.

Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake for 30 to 45 minutes – the smaller the pan and the thicker your brownies, the longer they’ll take. The brownies are done when they’re starting to pull away from the sides of the pan a little, but still seem gooey and under-baked in the centre. It’s important not to over-bake the brownies, as they’ll end up dry, so don’t be afraid to take them out of the oven when they still seem a bit raw. Remember, they’ll continue cooking and setting as they cool.

(Tip: if you become distracted and over-bake your brownies, fill a larger pan than your brownie pan with some cold water and lots of ice cubes. Gently place the brownie pan into the ice and water, which will cool the brownies down quickly so they don’t keep cooking as they cool.)

Allow to cool for about an hour before lifting out of the pan and cutting up into squares.

These brownies keep well, covered, for up to five days.