Modifications to KAF fudge brownies
171g 70% cocoa chocolate, 24.3g fat per 100g (41.55g fat in this amount)
115g butter
~1 Tbsp Dutch process cocoa powder
Only light brown muscavado sugar
1/4 tsp baking powder
A bit of instant coffee powder
Double boil the butter, chocolate, cocoa powder, sugar. Stirring, gently heating and resting for as long as I could be bothered to dissolve the sugar before mixing with the egg in an effort to produce the shiny top.
This is more fat than the original, due to momentarily forgetting that I was halving quantities at a key moment when weighing the butter, then partially rescuing the excess butter from the melting bowl… 156.55g vs the 113g it should have been. I’m ok with this. I wouldn’t want more than this though… Maybe 160g max. Perhaps 140g or 150g would be perfect? This ballpark is perfectly good though.
I would continue to increase the chocolate and reduce the cocoa, but it is a great, easy way of increasing the chocolate intensity. I probably used more than 1 tbsp, next time I would use an absolute max of 1 tbsp and more solid chocolate. There’s an astringency that comes in with cocoa powder. This can be adjusted though… Melt the butter, chocolate and sugar first, taste, and if you want more intensity add in a little cocoa at a time.
For convenience of using up 1 whole typical pack of chocolate I’d be tempted to go for 200g, then modify for intensity with cocoa as described above.
I did not reduce the amount of sugar in response to the sugar in the chocolate, which I would have done had it occurred to me. But there’s a hint of chewiness that is welcome and may be being contributed by this sugar quantity. Total here is 268.5g with the sugar in the chocolate. I think the level of sweetness is ok, but you could reduce it… I want to keep the chewiness though, it wasn’t present in the original recipe. The larger proportion of flour I think also helps this.
This is proof that you can get the shiny top with brown sugar, you just need patience.
There’s quite a lot of water introduced here vs the original, brown sugar and extra butter… Again, this has only helped. The added weight possibly means you could return to the original quantity of baking powder for just a hint more lightness without detrimental effect… But I’m not sure if I want it.
These are excellent – I think this ended up being my favourite, but I have to say the above was taken from notes made almost 3 months ago. So I’m no longer certain. The answer is this one or the Gelataly brownie, are different but superb. Nothing beats the G brownie for simplicity, so if you’re low on time then that’s your bunny. The refund is excellent, with lovely flavour, but a little less bite, chewiness and refinement perhaps? Feels like a lava cake almost.
Which brings me on to graph about the special batch of Tartine that I messed up…
Special mention should go to these, which had double the eggs whipped up… And aren’t really brownies as they are far more mellow… They are however utterly delicious and I would make them again. Maybe worth just a touch more flour to help them stay together… But I’m not even sure about that.