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October 19, 2006
Week 2: Malted Milk Brownies
When I saw the title, the first thought, was 'UGH! Whoppers'. And the second thought was 'Where in the world will I find malted milk powder?' (Saline Road Meijer, Aisle 13).
Coming next Friday: Double-Double Brownies
Analysis:
These brownies were definitely a disappointment. I knew something was off when the recipe only called for 1oz. of baking chocolate. Upon further reading, I realized that the recipe was for an 8x8 square pan. Who only makes an 8X8 of brownies??? I had to stop and start doubling the recipe to fit in my standard 9x13. Still, only 2oz. of chocolate? I had my doubts.They turned out to be well founded. These brownies are devoid of flavor! If it weren't for the pecans (pecans again) in the mix I don't know that I would have tasted anything, especially not chocolate. The frosting had a bit more taste, thanks to the malted milk powder, but overall they were mostly just sweet.
The instructions were also a bit sparse. They called for you to take the brownies out of the oven while they were still moist. Immediately following that instruction they told you to put on the glaze. There were two problems with this. First, the brownies were really HOT, the glaze would have turned to melted butter soup. So I let them cool before frosting. Second, the brownies fell in the middle as they cooled, so there was a large lake of glaze in the middle and not much on the sides. (Sally you should have taken your piece from the middle)
* Prep time: 20 minutes (cake and frosting combined)
* Cooking time: 35 minutes
* Total time (includes cooling and frosting): 2.5 hours
Possible Modifications:
I don't know what I would modify on this recipe. I think it is perfectly yucky the way it is.
Improvements:
MORE CHOCOLATE! Possibly a chocolate malt topping. I still don't think anything would really improve them.
My Rating - scale of 1-10
* Diffculty Rating: 4 (I had to find malted milk powder that wasn't chocolate flavored)
* Recipe Complexity (over a basic no-frills brownie): 2
* Texture: 4 (more like cake than brownie)
* Flavor: 2 (the only reason they get anything is because they were atleast sweet)
* Overall Rating: 3
Posted by jamm at October 19, 2006 04:18 PM
Comments
The frosting was where it was at, actually. Unfortunately, being forced to throw out my proprietary grading scale for a fairer one where inclusion of butter, chocolate, sugar, and flour do not net 1 point apiece... I'd rate these a 2. Maybe a 3 with heavier weighting on the frosting component.
Posted by: olmsnj at October 19, 2006 06:37 PM
I thought these brownies were carrot cake, at first! I did like the frosting, though. That was my favorite part. I didn't think the "brownie" part was brownie-like enough to warrant reproducing the recipe.
(I still want brownies with your original chocolate cake frosting recipe.)
I wouldn't reproduce these. I would put the frosting on carrot cake.
Sally
Posted by: sweston at October 23, 2006 03:33 PM
I had high hopes for these. I was hoping for a traditional brownie, with the added goodness of malted powder. Sadly, this recipe failed to deliver much of anything except disappointment. Maybe I put them on a pedestal because of the malt. Maybe I just need to take a "regular" brownies recipe and add some malted powder to that for the taste I was expecting. I don't know, other than to say I know that this wasn't it (and you could, in my opinion, not really taste the malt when all was said and done).
This would have perhaps tasted better with Jennifer's "traditional" chocolate frosting.
Score: 4.5 out of 10
Posted by: jsterben at October 27, 2006 11:02 AM
I actually really liked these brownies, yet I don't care much for chocalate!
Posted by: julicher at November 10, 2006 11:21 AM
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