TWD: Chipster-Topped Brownies

Every once in awhile one of Dorie's recipes will break your heart, and for me, this was the one. I was rather ambivilant about the recipe -- chocolate chip cookie dough on top of brownies seems a little excessive. It's the "one of a good thing means 5 will be better" kind of thinking that is the root cause of much that is wrong in modern times. But I was willing to give this recipe a shot. I love chocolate chip cookies. I love brownies. How could this go wrong?

It went wrong in one way - not getting cooked enough. When I came out to the kitchen the next morning and saw the crater in the middle of the pan, my heart sunk (just like this recipe!). Although I cooked it for the required amount of time, and did the test per Dorie's instructions, the middle was not cooked enough. The edges were cooked a little too much. If I were to make this again I'd make it in two smaller pans rather than in one large one.

I followed the directions and everything went great. I did use the nuts (stunningly I had just enough on hand), and had no problem getting the cookie dough on top of the brownie layer. The brownie layer seemed to set up nicely while putting the dough together, and I didn't have the problems there that some seemed to comment on in the P&Qs this week.

Since I planned on bringing these to work for an occassion, I tried to save the middle pieces by sending them back to the oven for a short time. Crazy, I know, but desparate times require desparate measures (it was a whole lot of chocolate and butter to just go to waste. I had to try something!). After 6-7 minutes in a 350 degree oven......well.......see for yourself.........

Before.........


After.........

Despite the trouble and heartbreak, these were very tasty and my co-workers gobbled them up. Sadly there were only a few that were just right rather than too soft or too dry (perhaps I'll call these the Goldilocks bars - I kind of like that!).

The recipe can be found at Supplicious and was picked by Beth. I always feel bad when I make something that doesn't turn out -- I don't want the one who picked to think they picked a dud! So Beth, although it was a mixed result, the part that was edible was really tasty (okay -- even the melty version above, super tasty!).

Caramel-Peanut Topped Brownie Cake

Now that I've dropped a class, I'm thinking about hopping on the baking bandwagon. The weather is turning cooler, so baking is more reasonable now than in the summer when it is so hot (and I have no air conditioner). I also wanted to see if I could commit to what it takes to participate with the gals over at Tuesdays with Dorie. I bought the book, and gosh, there are so many delicious and beautiful things to bake. I made this too late to post on the required day, but gave the Oct. 7th recipe a try, and will try to pick up with next week's item (the Pumpkin Muffins, just in time for a fund raising bake sale at work!).

If I had not taken a Baking and Pastry class previously, this recipe would have been very challenging. Dorie Greenspan does a really super job with directions, so I could have worked through it, but the extra experience sure helped (I'm not very confident trying new things in the kitchen. I need the remedial class most of the time!). The trickiest part is the carmel for the topping. That stuff is like molten lava, and the last thing you want is to have some sort of an accident. Yikes! But truth be told, I'd rather cook with that than chocolate. That stuff gets everywhere!

Since one of the rules is to not post the recipes for TWD, I'll just include some steps and pictures below.

The batter was pretty quick and easy. You can see the bowl from melting chocolate and butter over a pan of water behind the bowl with the batter. Like I said, that stuff gets everywhere!

One thing I do like about baking, is while the cake is in the oven, and/or while it cools you can do the dishes. It's nice to have a tidy kitchen.

After letting the cake cool, and preferable right before you serve it, you make the topping. That's when the science experiment begins. Many of the folks who tried this said this stage took longer than the recipe advised, and I had the same experience. Besides being the temperature of the sun, carmel is one of those things you need to keep an eye on. It takes forever to turn a carmel color, but once it turns it doesn't take long for it to pass the point of no return (and burnt tasting carmel). Happily mine did not.

Once off the heat peanuts are added, and then the cake, back in its freshly cleaned springform pan, is topped. I don't have any pictures of the cake once "released" from the pan, as that happened at work, and my co-workers took care of this cake in record time.

It's very good, though very sweet and very rich. A little goes a long way. I would definitely make it again -- especially as a celebration cake, or to impress someone.