The KBAL Brownie Initiative

Analysis

Well, at least we are back on track with this recipe. It required a trip to the store during the making of it. I knew the last 3 weeks were too good to be true.

The one thing that I thought I had that was mysteriously missing when I went to get it out of the cupboard was dates. There had been a rather large container in there the last time we checked and nobody in my house eats them, not even me! My husband finally sheepishly admitted that, yes, he has been nibbling on them and had actually eaten them all. So I sent him to the store instead of me.

Making these was pretty easy. It was a bit yucky in that the dates got soaked in boiling water and then pureed in the blender. I reminded me of when I used to make baby food for the girls, or of something that was sometimes found in their diapers. At least these brownies had enough chocolate in them. And they were sized for a 9x13 pan.

After mixing everything together, they got plopped in the pan and cooked for 35 minutes. They look rather spongy and cake-like, but smell chocolaty. And since there is no frosting, you can eat them right away!

• Prep time: 30 minutes (I had to wait for my husband to get back from the store)


• Cooking time: 35 minutes (10 minutes extra)


• Total time: 1 hour (does not include cooling)

Modifications

None.

Improvements

None. Not that these are fabulous, I just cant think of anything that would improve them.

My Rating - scale of 1-10

• PITA Rating: 6 (Just for the frustration level of dealing with my husband)
• Difficulty Rating: 3
• Recipe Complexity (over a basic no-frills brownie): 4 (pureeing the dates was a bit extreme)
• Texture: 3 (too cakey for me)
• Flavor: 5 (not bad, good chocolate flavor)
• Overall Rating: 4