Cooking with Shonda…Brownies!!!

I haven’t always been a huge fan of brownies but, recently, my daughter started making Lunch Lady Brownies.

One rainy day, I hit her up to make a batch but she was busy.

So, I headed into the kitchen myself but, when I measured out my cocoa powder this is what I found

If you don’t know what you’re looking at let me enlighten you!

Not enough cocoa powder.

I was in a slight panic because I’d already cracked my eggs into the bowl and really really really wanted brownies!

So, I searched my cabinet and came up with some baking chocolate that had probably been there for 5 years…..no fears, it worked just fine.

I melted the bitter chocolate and added it to my batter….Yummy!

There’s nothing more beautiful than watching the chocolate mix with the sugars, butter, and eggs. Pure chocolaty bliss!

I popped my brownie in the oven to cook.

A few word on how long to bake a brownie.

• Brownies aren’t the easiest thing to bake. If you bake it too long it will be hard. If you like hard brownies knock yourself out!
• It might take you several batches of brownies to perfect the technique of judging brownie “doneness”
• If you like soft brownies you’re better off to pull them out of the oven when they’re just starting to pull away from the side of the pan and the brownie doesn’t jiggle when you shake it….technical testing method there, isn’t it 🙂
• I recommend checking a small pan of brownies at 15 minutes and a large pan at 20 minutes.

NOW, back to the Brownie Baking….

After putting the brownie in the over I typically start making frosting but, on this occasion I was quite short on cocoa!

I was considering brownies void of frosting when my son said, “Why don’t you use NesQuick?”

I scoffed at him but decided it was worth a try

May I say…..I think it was better than frosting made with straight cocoa powder

Now, granted, I did mix it with my leftover cocoa powder…it was a pretty even mix. But, the Nesquick made a HUGE difference in the frosting.

I had one small taste test before putting it onto the hot brownie….well maybe a few small tastes.

Isn’t it gorgeous!

Top a piece with a bit of whipped cream….pure bliss.