Thursday 24 May 2012

Hazelnut brownies

In my previous post I mentioned entering alpha bakes, this month the letter is H and I made hazelnut macarons. However this meant I had nutella and hazelnuts left over. Not really a bad thing I suppose, but it is when I can eat nutella from the jar. Weirdly I used to hate it but I am making up for that now! So to stop raiding the jar with a teaspoon I decide to use up the nutella in a baking venture.



By chance I had also found a bar of dark chocolate left over from something ages ago. I decided that I should use up all my leftovers, after all, waste not want not, and made Hazelnut brownies.

Hazelnut brownies


200g dark chocolate
175g butter
200g caster sugar
100g brown sugar
115g plain flour
15g cocoa powder
3 large eggs
Chopped hazelnuts
Nutella

Preheat the oven to 170oC/fan 150oC and line a brownie pan with baking parchment.

Melt the chocolate and butter until smooth (I did this in a bowl over a pan of barely simmering water).


Once melted, remove the butter chocolate mix from the heat and stir in the sugar until fully incorporated.

Add the flour and cocoa powder to the bowl and mix until combined.

Beat the eggs lightly with a fork and add to the bowl, mix until smooth and then finally stir through the chopped hazelnuts. I was using leftovers so did not weigh them, add as many as you like for texture. Reserve some to sprinkle on top. 

Pour half the mixture into the prepared pan and add dollops of nutella, swirl these a bit with a knife. Add the remaining brownie batter on top. Blob on more nutella and swirl.





 Finish with a scattering of chopped hazelnuts and cook for 30-35 minutes until lightly flaky on top but not overcooked.




Leave to cool in the pan and then chop into chunks.




Quick confession, I only had 175g of dark chocolate and figured they would be fine. Which they are, no major disasters. Having said that the texture is different to that of my Oreo brownies. They are not quite as fudgy, a little lighter more cakey. They are not a cake, they are a brownie but the difference is definitely there. I like a fudgy brownie so that will teach me not to be lazy and go get more chocolate from the corner shop!


Saying that these are delicious, dark chocolate and hazelnut makes for the quite the sophisticated brownie. If I were to make these again, not using up leftovers, I would probably put in some chunkier chopped hazelnuts for more of a texture contrast.

3 comments:

  1. What a great way to use up leftovers - you can never go wrong with chocolate brownies! Love this recipe, thanks for entering it into Alphabakes!

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  2. I love brownies! A very good way of using up your leftovers. Thanks for entering AlphaBakes.

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  3. Thank you, these brownies have made me realise that I can eat 4 brownies in one sitting, a skill I never knew I had!

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