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January 25, 2008

Week 42: Lisa's Favorite Two-Layer Brownies

Oatmeal cookie meets brownie, covered in fudgy frosting. Sounds kinda yummy. But what I really want to know is: Who is Lisa and why is this her favorite?

I felt like I was in some weird kind of baking time trials when making these. I had exactly 10 minutes to make the second layer, which included washing the mixer bowl and beater. Talk about pressure! But it made the whole process pretty quick. And I had all the ingredients in the house.

The strange part of this recipe is that every time it called for butter (margarine, to be exact), it needed to be melted. In both layers and in the frosting. The bottom part mixes butter, brown sugar, oats and some baking powder, which is a crumbly mess. That gets pressed into the bottom of the greased pan and popped in the oven. And then the time starts... 10, 9, 8, 7,...

I had to quickly clean the bowl and beater and scramble around to melt butter, mix it with cocoa, add the eggs, flour and the rest to make the actual brownie part. This took me about 8.5 minutes, which included a small break to help my daughter with her vocabulary. Once the buzzer rang, I carefully took the hot pan out of the oven, and avoiding the sides of the pan, which were hot (this part was written in the directions, no lie), I carefully spread the brownie batter over the hot oat mixture and put the whole thing back in the oven. I'm glad the instructions warned me that the pan would be hot. Although I laughed at this, I almost did grab the pan without the pot holder when I went to put it back in the oven!

The whole thing took another 40 minutes to cook, which was a full 15 minutes longer than the directions. While it was cooking, I made the frosting, which also called for melted butter and came out a bit soft, but really yummy. All told, I was done in under an hour. The brownies cooled on top of the fridge overnight and were frosted in the morning.

This recipe was totally devoid of any kind of drama or surprises. I'm kind of missing the surprises of missing ingredients in my pantry and last minute dashes to my friendly Kroger. Oh well, I'm sure it won't be long until that happens again.

While not a true brownie in my book because of the oatmeal base, these are actually quite tasty. The bottom part gives a bit of chewiness (chewy in the sense of eating horse feed) and saltiness, while the brownie is chocolaty and the frosting is yummy and gets on your fingers. They are kind of hard to eat with a plastic fork due to the density of the bottom layer, but if these were cut into small squares, they would make lovely little items for a dessert tray at a party. Or for breakfast! Hey, there is oatmeal in them.

Week 41: Lisa's Favorite Two-Layer Brownies

Week 41: Lisa's Favorite Two-Layer Brownies

Modifications

None.

Improvements

Possibly make the bottom part a bit more cake-like so it is a bit softer.

My Rating - scale of 1-10

Posted by jamm at 07:13 AM | Comments (2)

January 21, 2008

Totaly Lack of Enthusiasm

I have been notoriously remiss these past few weeks in writing up my analysis of these recipes. Either things are getting easier, the recipes are all starting to be exactly alike, or I just don't care anymore. I'm voting for the latter.

As a matter of fact, I have had an overwhelming sense of the I-don't-cares since well before Christmas. I think that I am finally getting over the holiday malaise. It may also have something to do with the fact that the days are getting longer and I actually SAW the sun yesterday. Now I just have to tackle the birthday at the end of the month!

Posted by jamm at 07:17 AM | Comments (0)

January 18, 2008

Week 41: Cherry Brownies

Chocolate and cherries. This should be a yummy combination, unless the recipe calls for maraschinos. Which it does, of course.

Yuck, yuck, yuck! I sooo hate maraschino cherries. The only place they belong is in a Manhattan. And I had to chop them up. Eeeeeewwww.

Ok, enough with Jennifer's biases. The recipe itself was really not too difficult. A basic brownie base with nuts, maraschino cherry juice and chopped cherries and a simple frosting with more chopped cherries. My kids wanted me to decorate the top with some extra cherries, but I had to draw the line. The only bonus that I got from this is knowing that there is just over a cup of cherries in one of those Kroger jars.

There was no drama surrounding this recipe, except that I forgot until about 7pm that it was Thursday and I needed to make brownies. I had to go to the store and get the cherries, and not being sure how much was in the jar, I bought 2. Then it was back home to bake and help with homework.

The brownie base was pretty simple, basic brownie stuff. The only strange thing was using the maraschino cherry juice. The batter went in the oven and cooked for about 40 minutes. While the brownie was baking, I made the frosting. Again, no surprises, except for more chopped cherries. The brownies cooled on the top of the fridge overnight and were frosted in the morning.

These were not that good in my book. I think the maraschino turned me off to liking them from the get go. The texture was ok, but the chocolate flavor was a bit lacking. These are not getting a very good rating from me. We will have to see what others have to say.

Week 40: Cherry Brownies

Week 40: Cherry Brownies

Modifications

None.

Improvements

I would totally redo these with canned bing cherries and a kirschwasser for the cherry-alcohol flavor that the maraschino cherry juice was trying to imitate. In fact, I may do this soon because I happen to have an open can of bing cherries in my fridge.

My Rating - scale of 1-10

Posted by jamm at 08:58 AM | Comments (3)

January 11, 2008

Week 40: Amaretto Brownie Supreme

Lots to love about this one, if you like amaretto. Pretty easy to make as well. Too bad that almond extract puts me in a bad mood.

Week 39: Amaretto Brownie Supreme

Week 39: Amaretto Brownie Supreme

Posted by jamm at 02:16 PM | Comments (0)