Cookbook Challenge No. 4 - Love

Brownies! Everybody loves them, right? Right.

                                

Nigella's Flourless Chocolate Brownies from her cookbook : Nigella Express are a great after dinner treat. This recipe was perfect for the Cookbook Challenge No. 4 - Love

Nigella Express is a great cookbook its packed full of super easy and super tasty recipes. Whats not to love about that?  I also have the Nigella iPhone app and it has many of the great recipes that are in this cookbook.


I love the Cookbook and love all things chocolate so this one was a no brainer!
I must admit due to my crazy life, I have fallen a bit behind on the challenge over the last few weeks, with most of my fellow bloggers up to challenge number 5. I should be back on track soon, I promise.


I hope you enjoy this recipe, I didn't make the chocolate fudge sauce ( it was optional) and besides, I'm trying to watch the calories. This recipe is great for those of you out there who are gluten intolerant because the recipe uses almond meal which is one of my favourite ingredients when it comes to baking. I find it makes things super moist and I love that nutty texture it brings to a cake or in this case the chocolate brownie.


Nigella's Flourless Chocolate Brownies


Ingredients

• 225g dark chocolate, 70% cocoa solids
• 225g butter
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 200g caster sugar
• 3 eggs, beaten
• 150g ground almonds
• 100g chopped walnuts ( I didn't use walnuts on this occasion and added 2 extra tablespoons of almond meal instead)

Sauce

• 75g dark chocolate, 70% cocoa solids
• 125ml double cream
• 2 x 15ml tablespoons
• Camp coffee or 2 teaspoons instant espresso powder dissolved in 2 tablespoons water
• 1 x 15ml tablespoon golden syrup

Method

For the brownies:


1. Preheat the oven to 170'C/gas mark 3. Melt the chocolate and butter gently over a low heat in a heavy based saucepan.

2. Take the pan off the heat, mix in the vanilla and sugar, and let it cool a little.

3. Beat the eggs into the pan along with the ground almonds and chopped walnuts. Turn into a 24cm square baking tin or, mostly sensible, use a foil one.

( it was here that I added the chocolate mix to a separate bowl with the almond meal and eggs)

4. Bake in the oven for about 25-30 minutes, by which time the top will have set but the mixture will still be gooey. Once cooled , cut carefully, four down, four across, into 16 squidgy bellied squares.

For the sauce:

1. Break up the chocolate and put into a heavy-based saucepan.

2. Add the remaining ingredients, then place the pan over a gentle heat and let everything melt together.

3. Once everything has melted, stir well, take off the heat and our into a jug to serve.

I found that these brownies were best served hot. The addition of some good quality vanilla bean ice cream and hot fudge sauce would make the perfect dessert. 


You could also substitute the walnuts for different nuts - I think Macadamias would be great or alternatively you could add choc chips for extra rich brownies.

Do you have a favourite recipe that uses almond meal?

Enjoy x