Basic Brownies

Like many bakers, I have several brownie recipes. Some are “special” (like the brownies with fresh ginger, Jessica Seinfeld’s brownies made with carrots and spinach or Ricardo’s brownies that use a whole jar of Nutella). So you’ll hear about different kinds of brownies here over time. But today, I figured I’d give you my basic brownie recipe – the easy one I make when I just crave chocolate, with no frills.

2 cups granulated sugar
1 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 cup all-purpose flour
½ cup melted butter or margarine
4 eggs
1 tsp vanilla

Preheat oven to 325 °F. Grease an 8-inch square cake pan.

In a mixing bowl, stir together sugar, cocoa and flour. Blend in butter. Mix in eggs and vanilla (mixture will be stiff).



Spread evenly in the pan and bake for about 60 minutes, or until shiny on top and batter has pulled away slightly from the edges of the pan. Let cool.

If you want, you can sprinkle icing sugar on the top, but then you’re dangerously close to brownies with “frills”, which wasn’t the point. Also, the Engineer and I personally don’t believe in adding nuts to brownies, but if you want some, you can add them in the batter. Enjoy!