Emergency Brownies ala Nigella

Really felt like having brownies today & I remember for Nigella week on Masterchef Australia recently, in one of the elimination challenges, the contestants had to make Nigella's brownies & they looked absolutely divine.

Did some googling & found the exact same recipe!

The ones I made were delicious. Perfectly ooey gooey, chewy, moist & chocolatey. Heaven.

Although, there are a few things I'd tweak in the recipe. Like the amount of salt. I also watched a video of Nigella on the Rachel Ray show where she made her brownies & she mentioned how she likes quite a bit of salt in what she makes. So if you're not really into that then you can always cut down on the amount.

But this is by far the best brownie recipe I've ever followed. Won't be using anything else after this.

Let's get started, shall we?

Here are the things you will need:

1. 50g all purpose flour
2. 50g cocoa powder
3. 40g soft brown sugar
4. a pinch of salt*
5. 50g butter
6. 1 egg
7. 1 tsp vanilla essence
8. 15g maple syrup**
9. 50g crushed walnuts
10. 50g chocolate chips (milk or dark)
11. Icing sugar to dust
12. Vanilla ice-cream
13. Canola oil

*The original recipe calls for 3/4 tsp of salt but for me that was a tad much
** I didn't have maple syrup so I substituted it with honey instead


Here's how you make it:

1. Preheat oven to 150°C
2. In a bowl, mix the flour, cocoa powder & salt. This is your dry mix.
3. In a pot over a low heat, gently warm the butter, brown sugar & maple syrup (or honey) until the sugar has dissolved. Once cooled a little, add to dry mix.
4. In a smaller bowl, whisk the egg & vanilla essence. Then add that to the rest of the mixture.
5. Add in the chocolate chips & walnuts. Mix thoroughly.
6. Lightly oil 4 moulds in a muffin tray with canola oil.
7. Scoop in the mixture into the moulds.
8. Place in oven & bake for 25 minutes.
9. Once baked, remove from oven & leave to cool for about 10 minutes. Then with a butter knife, slowly go around the edge of the brownies & carefully tip them onto a plate. They'll be very soft & gooey so be careful when you do this.
10. Plate up, dust with icing sugar & a scoop of vanilla ice-cream & serve immediately.

Happy baking!