Cocoa Brownies

I’ve tried a lot of different brownie recipes in the last few months, but my all-time favorite recipe continues to be this one that I spotted on Dessert First almost 2 years back.

I made these cocoa brownies last night inspired by what I saw on Nupur’s One Hot Stove. Nupur, in turn, had been inspired by something she’d come across on Smitten Kitchen. I’ve made a few changes to the original recipe. The ingredients are listed in the order in which I’ve used them in the recipe.

Ingredients:
(For 20 brownies)
8 Tbsp butter
¾ cup cocoa powder
1 cup sugar
1 oz semi-sweet baking chocolate
Salt
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
½ tsp instant coffee powder (dissolve this in 1-2 tsp water)
½ cup all-purpose flour (I had to use whole wheat flour or roti flour here as I realized that I had no APF only when the batter was almost ready!)
¼ cup sun-ripened cranberries
½ cup walnuts, chopped (reserve a few pieces for sprinkling on top of the prepared batter)

Method:
Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F. Line an 8-inch square baking dish with foil and grease well.

In a microwave-safe bowl, melt the butter and chocolate. Add the cocoa powder, sugar and salt to the butter-chocolate mixture. Mix well. The mixture will be a little gritty at this point.

Next, add the eggs, vanilla extract and coffee. Mix well again.

Dump in the flour, cranberries and chopped walnuts and stir together gently until all the ingredients are just combined.

Transfer the batter (it will be really thick) to the baking dish and spread as evenly as possible.
Bake at 325 degrees F for 30-35 min, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.