Traditional American pastries quickly gained popularity around the world. This recipe, with its technology unusual for us, seems to American housewives a familiar and simple thing, as for us - cooking pancakes. Maybe we are confused by the "import" name? Out of habit, does it seem that a foreign is something very outlandish? If you call this dessert simply - chocolate cake, then the shyness of our housewives will immediately disappear. Oh, something, but we know how to bake pies.
Of course, there is one little trick in the recipe for chocolate pies according to American technology - not without it. But this secret is not difficult to solve. Learn all about the intricacies of making “brownie” so that every weekend a delicious and quick dessert can be gathered at the table by relatives and friends.
Brownie cake - basic technological principles
Chocolate confectionery, in fact, there are quite a lot. Chocolate or cocoa in the dough is not a novelty for a long time, and in this matter “Brownie” is no different from other chocolate desserts. A traditional American pie could be called an ordinary chocolate biscuit, if not for one highlight in the technology of its preparation.
Please note that the brownie dough contains a lot of sugar. This excess is not accidental. When baking, sugar forms a dense caramel crust on the surface, and in the inner layers of the dough it melts and turns into a stretching texture. Therefore, the classic “brownie” has, as it were, a double texture: it is baked on top and remains moist inside.
Given that the word "brownie" in translation from English is brown, it is quite possible to leave the chocolate color and taste to the pastries, but reduce its sweetness to the usual norm. The moist consistency inside the cake will disappear, baking will become more dense and springy. But for the Brownie cake, it’s not so scary, because the technology of making cakes allows you to give the dessert the necessary humidity using impregnation and creams.
That is, the Brownie cake, in all its variations, is essentially a chocolate dessert that every pastry chef can easily make. Creative imagination in pastry craft is always welcome.
1. Brownie Cake with Cherries - Holiday Recipe
Before you start cooking, note that chocolate must be natural. For a more saturated brown cake, optionally, replace part of the flour with two or three tablespoons of natural cocoa powder.
Product Composition:
Oil 340 g
Flour 100 g
4 eggs
Sugar 400 g
Salt
Chocolate bakery 240 g
Rum 75 ml
Vanilla essence
For cream:
Condensed Cocoa 300 g
Oil 150 g
Vanilla or rum extract
For glaze:
Cream 280 g
Chocolate 400 g
And:
Cherry jam 100 g
Cocktail Cherry for surface decoration
Natural Chocolate 100 g
Cooking Technology:
Melt butter and chocolate. It is more convenient to do this in a water bath so that nothing burns. While the chocolate is melting, beat the eggs in the mixer bowl, gradually adding sugar to them. At the same time, pour in rum, add salt and vanillin. Enter the warm melted chocolate, after mixing it well with butter. Sift flour or a mixture of it with cocoa into a liquid mass. Carefully move the dough with a spatula.
Grease two rectangular or square shapes of the same size with vegetable oil and cover with parchment. Pour the dough into shapes, dividing it in half. Put in a preheated oven (180? C).
Bake the cakes for 25 minutes, and then turn off the oven, but do not open the door and do not remove the processed foods for another ten minutes. Such a baking mode will help to achieve the correct consistency of the semi-finished product: on the outside it will become dry and baked, and inside it will be slightly moist and viscous, as it should be in brownie pies, using American technology. After taking the cakes from the oven, transfer them to the lattice with parchment paper, until completely cooled. Then turn over the semi-finished products, carefully remove the paper, put it on a wooden board and cover with a film: let them stand for at least four hours.
Beat butter at room temperature in a mixer bowl. Gradually add condensed cocoa to it (8.5%). Cocoa condensed milk can be replaced with ordinary condensed milk and cocoa powder (3-4 tablespoons with a hill). Add rum and vanilla for the flavor.
The cream should become very lush, increase 2.5-3 times in volume.
Melt the chocolate for the icing. Pour in hot cream and mix quickly. Bring the icing to a boil and remove from the stove.
Grease the cooled cakes first with cherry jam. You can add a little rum to it. Glue them with chocolate butter cream, laying on top of each other. Level the surface and hold the cake a little in the refrigerator to freeze the cream. Cover with chocolate icing by pouring it into the center of the cake and gently spreading it with a spatula over the entire surface and sides of the cake. Let the cake freeze again. Lay it on a stand, mark up from above: easily draw rectangles or squares (in batches). Put a border on these lines with cream from a pastry bag. In the center of each square, put a cocktail cherry and a petal or butterfly made of chocolate decor.
To decorate, melt a bar of dark chocolate. On the strip of parchment, draw the desired pattern, turn it over and lay it immediately on a hard surface. Gently apply chocolate along the lines of the cornet or syringe pattern. Transfer the chocolate patterns to solidify in the refrigerator, and then gently peel them from the paper. Set decorative elements next to each cherry.
The cake can be served whole or pre-cut with a knife-sawing along the lines-patterns.
2. Brownie cake - recipe for dough with cocoa and honey, without chocolate with orange Kurd
Ingredients:
Butter 180 g
Granulated sugar 220 g
Chicken eggs 2 pcs.
Vanilla Extract 10 mg
Cocoa (100%) 50 g
White flour 30 g
Salts 2 g
Baking powder for dough 6 g
Honey 70 g
Powdered sugar 250 g
For Kurdish:
Sweet and sour oranges 3 pcs. (medium sized)
Sugar 250 g
Eggs (D-1) 3 pcs.
Butter, unsalted butter 200 g
Cooking:
Preheat the oven to 175 ° C. Lubricate and cover a square baking paper.
Melt 110 g butter in a large saucepan and remove from heat. Beat eggs, sugar and half vanilla. Mix well.
Enter 1/3 cup cocoa,? cups of flour, salt and baking powder. Shuffle.
Distribute the batter into a mold and bake for 25 to 30 minutes, depending on the desired result. To reach the classic version - liquid inside, crunchy - on top, 25 minutes will be enough, and for a well-baked dough it takes more time. For a cake, choose a longer baking mode, until a stable texture. Divide the semi-finished product into two cakes, five to six hours after aging.
Make citrus kurd to mix the cakes. Beat eggs with sugar. Add 250 ml of orange juice. If the oranges are sweet, add a little citric acid to their juice or use a fresh lemon-orange. Pour the juice into the egg mixture and steam until thickened, periodically stirring the cream. Cool, add oil and beat until creamy. Lubricate the cakes, combine them and cover with glaze.
To make the glaze, mix 3 tablespoons of warm oil, 3 tablespoons of cocoa powder, honey, vanilla extract and powdered sugar, then beat until smooth. Cover with warm glaze. Soak in the refrigerator until completely solidified.
Garnish the cake with candied orange.
3. Brownie cake with butter chocolate cream in white chocolate icing
For shortcakes:
Dough - according to the recipe No. 1 or 2
For butter cream:
Sugar 150 g
Vanilla Powder 8 g
Milk, whole 80 ml
Oil 240 g
Dark chocolate 200 g
For glaze:
Baking chocolate, white 400 g
Drinking Cream 30 ml
Coconut Essence 25 mg
To decorate:
Hibiscus petals
Egg white
Sugar
Almond flakes
Cooking Technology:
Knead the crust dough according to any of the two recipes suggested above. The “highlight” of this recipe is that thin cakes are baked - not more than 0.5 cm thick. White - chocolate icing harmoniously blends into the overall taste, but at the same time covers the dark brown colors of the cake with its whiteness: when sliced, such a contrast looks unexpected and bright, truly festive.
Pour the dough into a prepared square shape with a thin layer, bake no more than five minutes. Do not forget to cover the form with oiled parchment under each cake: it is better to prepare sheets of paper of the right size in advance. The number of cakes does not matter. Separate the cooled semi-finished products carefully from the paper, stack them in a pile, greasing each of them with chocolate butter cream.
If the cakes are accidentally overdried during baking, sprinkle them with any dessert wine, fruit juice or sugar syrup - the cake will acquire additional pleasant shades of taste.
For cream:
Melt the chocolate in a water bath to a creamy consistency by adding milk. Cool at room temperature to 20-25? C.
Whisk the butter with refined sugar until a cream is obtained. Add flavor, pour in chocolate gradually, continuing to whisk.
Combine the cakes with the finished cream and smooth the entire surface of the cake. Remove to freeze in the refrigerator.
Make white chocolate icing:
Grind chocolate into a crumb, pour warmed cream into it. If the chocolate does not melt to the end, heat the mass for a couple until completely dissolved. Add coconut essence. Stir until smooth. Cool for two hours at 4-10 ° C, then beat until a snow-white thick consistency is obtained. Cover the cake fully with white icing.
For decor, take the hibiscus petals or other edible flowers (feel free to use the flowers of any medicinal plants). Cover the surface of the petals with whipped protein using a brush. Sprinkle with sugar or coconut and dry on a napkin. Lay the petals on the cake. Sprinkle almonds with dessert.
4. Brownie cake in a slow cooker
Ingredients:
30 g semolina
50 g premium wheat flour
3 eggs, diet
90 ml of milk
6 g instant coffee
30 g cocoa (100% powder)
240 g sugar
4 g vanilla
200 g butter
320 g baking chocolate
5 g of fine salt
30 ml of vegetable oil
Cooking:
Dissolve baking chocolate (droplets) and oil in a water bath, stirring occasionally.
Dissolve coffee in hot milk.
Combine semolina with flour, vanilla powder, cocoa; mix.
Beat the eggs, gradually adding salt and sugar. Please note that a large amount of sugar in the dough is necessary to get a dry crust on the outside, and a moist and stretching texture inside. Some recipes indicate that it is easy to mix the eggs, but in this case, a slightly baked cake after cooling down will strongly settle, compact, completely lose volume, and the necessary consistency will be violated.
In the beaten egg mass, enter the coffee with milk, without stopping the mixer.
Add melted chocolate and butter to the dough in a thin stream. The mixer can be turned off.
Continue to work with a spatula: introduce the prepared dry mixture in small parts, and mix it to a homogeneous mass, movements from bottom to top, rotating the container with the other hand.
Line the bottom of the multicooker with baking paper greased with vegetable oil. Pour the dough into the bowl. The traditional "Brownie" is baked in rectangular and square shapes in the oven, but when using a slow cooker there is no need to monitor the duration and temperature of the baking. Set the timer for 25 minutes, in the mode - "baking".
It is better to get out of the bowl and cut the pie after cooling. Pour portioned hot chocolate and sprinkle with nuts.
5. Brownie Cake - Vegetarian Recipe
Ingredients:
Baking powder 25 g
Flour 240 g
Refined Sugar 350 g
Cocoa 100 g
Walnut oil (any) 200 g
Salt 5 g
Coconut milk 150 ml
Cream (33%) 250 g
Vanilla 6 g
Baking Chocolate 200 g
Instant coffee 4 g
Crushed nuts (for sprinkling) 150 g
Cooking Technology:
Beat butter at high speeds until a lush, light and foamy mass is formed. When whipping, it is better to use a knife nozzle, which will be better to grind large fat molecules, which will allow, in combination with coconut milk, a thick emulsion. Pour coconut milk in small portions without stopping whipping and not reducing speed.
In a deep bowl, combine the dry components of the dough, after having sifted flour and cocoa. Make a deepening and pour in the liquid emulsion, stirring the dough with a spatula until a dough without lumps is obtained. Pour the dough into a pre-cooked dish greased with vegetable oil and lined with paper.
Bake for half an hour (+/- 5 minutes) at 180 ° C.
Melt the chocolate. Beat chilled cream until thickened by adding melted warm chocolate at the end. Stir it with cream with a spatula until smooth. For a richer brown cream, add instant coffee, 1-2 teaspoons, to hot chocolate.
Cover the cakes with butter cream and sprinkle with nuts.
6. Brownie Cake - Chocolate Cheesecake with Prunes and Nuts
Grocery list:
4 eggs
Oil 180 g
Curd, fat 0.5 kg
Cocoa (100%) 70 g
Vanilla Sugar 12 g
Semolina 50 g
Flour, nut 90 g
Baking powder 20 g
Refined sugar 450 g
Salt
Wheat flour 150 g
Cream cheese (any) 360 g
Dark chocolate 200 g
Essence
Pitted prunes 250 g
Oil 120 g
Apricot jam 90 g
Gelatin 40 g
Milk or Drinking Cream 200 g
Sugar 180 g
Cooking Technology:
Combine and mix sugar, salt, cocoa, semolina, baking powder, chopped nuts and sifted wheat flour in a deep bowl.
Beat butter with eggs and cottage cheese in a lush mass. Combine the liquid and wet parts of the dough.
Cover the bottom of a deep square shape with baking paper and pour out the dough. Bake for 40-50 minutes at medium temperature. Put the finished product on the grill for cooling. Then shift to the dish, bottom up, remove the parchment.
Transfer the cooled cake to a mold with a removable side. Cover with apricot jam.
Dissolve gelatin in milk and strain the mixture. Dissolve chocolate and butter in a water bath. Add sugar. Cut the prepared prune into thin strips or cubes.
Combine the warm chocolate mass with cheese, beat until fluffy, gradually pour the milk with gelatin. Add dried fruit, essence.
Put the curd cream soufflé into shape. Put the cake in the refrigerator to set the cream.
Garnish with grated chocolate, whipped cream and jam.
Brownie Cake - Cooking Tips
Some confectioners claim that it is not necessary to beat eggs for Brownie. However, you should not save time at this stage. It is known that whipping egg whites turns into a kind of long fibers, begins to stratify, and air gathers between the protein fibers when whipping. For example, the classic biscuit dough does not contain baking powder and yeast, and its lush and porous structure is formed, just due to air bubbles.Further: according to the Brownie technology, it is recommended to leave a little not baked inside, and if you still do not beat eggs, then the cake will quickly settle and compact immediately after cooling - and this will look unattractive. The consistency of such baking will become tougher and rougher. In a whipped dough, even if it is slightly baked, on the outside after baking, a lush, elastic and delicate texture will remain. So, be sure to beat eggs for Brownie without baking powder.
