The brownie is cake like!

...too bad I over-swirled the peanut butter and reduced the sugar too much.  Beautiful texture - on the inside - but the outside bubbled and cracked, and the flavour was extremely bland.  The result?  Into the composting bin...

Aunt Mary Dillion's Praline Cookies

To start: I DO NOT have an Aunt Mary Dillon.  However, I think someone from Martha Stewart's staff (or maybe event Martha Stewart herself) does.  I tried this recipe - it was really easy to make, but based on the amount of brown sugar called for, extremely sweet.

It's a yummy cookie, but for those who don't want a dessert toothache (or a sugar crash), reduce the amount of brown sugar used in the baking from 1.5 cups to 1 cup (since you'll be drizzling the sugared pecans on top of the finished cookies).

The cookies are actually pretty interesting - the time needed to bake these things varies from top rack to bottom rack.  The cookies on the top rack definitely needed an extra 2 minutes to turn golden, but the ones on the bottom only needed about 10 minutes at 345 degrees.

The difference in texture in just two short minutes is astounding.  They're either perfectly crisp to soft and doughy (which isn't bad in itself - it just doesn't work out so well for this type of cookie).

Who knew brownies could be so difficult?

I don't think I have enough readers to call this short posting "long-awaited" - definitely a delayed one though.

Life has been busy the last month - with a family wedding and my professional life taking up much of my time, I haven't had a chance until this week to actually try new recipes...

This past Thursday, I decided to try making one of the hundreds of brownie recipes squirreled away in my recipe box.

Using this recipe, I attempted my first batch of brownies. Being me, of course, I had to substitute and mess with the recipe (1 cup less sugar, dark chocolate, etc). The result? I thought I had screwed up (but I actually hadn't!). I did learn the difference between cake brownies and fudge brownies...one is supposed to be light(ish) and fluffy. The other, thick and gooey.

I started with the fudge brownie and thought the end result too dense, so I tried making a cake brownie. The result? It was too dry (which, at 10:30 p.m., was NOT amusing).

But after reflecting (and getting some awesome feedback from a friend who's an amazing chef), the solution seemed simple: mixing the two recipes together to make the perfect brownie.

Have I tried to? Not yet...but I will soon.

But if I did...this is what the recipe would look like:

Ingredients
- Vegetable oil cooking spray
- 8 ounces (2 sticks) butter
- 1 cup sugar
- 4 eggs, beaten
- 3/4 cup cocoa powder
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
- 1.5 cups all-purpose flour
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 5 ounces semisweet chocolate, chopped
- 2 ounces dark chocolate, chopped
- 1 cup pecans/walnuts, coarsely chopped

Directions
- Preheat oven to 345 degrees F.
- Spray a 13 by 9-inch pan with vegetable oil spray.
- Beat the eggs together and set aside.
- Whisk the flour, salt and baking powder together
- Melt the butter in a deep pot / pan on the stove (this will be where you actually mix all the ingredients together)
- Whisk in the sugar, eggs, cocoa, and vanilla.
- Stir in the flour, baking powder and salt mixture.
- Add chopped chocolate and nuts.
- Spread the batter in prepared pan.
- Bake about 25 minutes, just until brownies test moist but not wet.
- Cool completely before cutting.

My nemesis: the cake (or maybe even the egg)

I’ve been toying with the idea of talking about foods I’ve made that haven’t turned out so well. Do I only share my culinary triumphs or talk about foods that haven’t worked out, or plain failed? Afterall, I’m sure not even Bobby Flay gets all his dishes perfect the first time he makes it.

I guess my concession will be to not post any recipes that don’t work, but to talk about the dish itself.

I once said that cakes are my culinary nemesis. This is true. I other over beat or under beat the eggs, which makes the texture either too hard (think meringue: those white peaks are made by beating the eggs into submission), or too soft (think egg custard: you want to keep the texture denser and you don’t want it to rise). In this case, I didn’t beat the eggs enough, for fear of overbeating them.

I tried to make coconut pound cake (the cake in the picture is pink because of Chinese New Year). The taste is amazing, but the texture was just weird.
Will I try this recipe again? Most likely. But it might not be for awhile.