Donna Hay's Classic Brownies

We haven't baked brownies for the longest time and when we saw Donna Hay's classic brownies in her latest 10th Anniversary magazine, we knew we couldn't, and shouldn't give it a miss!

I forgot how much chocolate and butter go into brownies. So as we were heaping, literally heaping, all the chocs and butter in.. the health-freakish side of me nearly froze on the inside.  Seriously.. it was a lot of chocolate and a lot of butter..  Oh well.. I couldn't chicken out right?  Had to go all the way.  

But boy were we rewarded with a great classic brownie!  The brownies turned out moist, super chocolatey, not too sweet... Bea..u..ti..ful!  Our love for chocolate and eating overtook the concern for our waistlines. 

As we didn't have a big enough tin, we decided to cut the quantity of the ingredients to 2/3 of her stated recipe.  (Also because we were too astounded by the amount of chocolate).  So in the recipe below, I would include her original recipe amount and the quantity I reduced to in brackets & italics.

Donna Hay Classic Brownies
Makes 8 -16 pieces (depending on size you cut)

400g dark chocolate, chopped  (we reduced to 270g)
280g butter (we reduced to 185g)
350g brown sugar (we reduced to 233g)
6 eggs (we used 4 eggs)
150g plain flour (we reduced to 100g)
* We added a teaspoon of vanilla essence and 1/8 teaspoon of sea salt

Directions
- Preheat oven to 180*C
- Place half the chocolate and butter into a small saucepan over low heat and stir until melted and smooth.  Allow to cool slightly.  (We cooled it for 10 mins)
- Place the sugar, eggs and flour (vanilla & salt, if using) in a bowl with the chocolate mixture and mix to combine.
- Stir through the remaining chocolate pieces and pour the mixture into a lightly greased 20cm x 30cm tin (we used a 20cm x 20 cm tin) lined with non-stick baking paper.
- Bake for 30-35 minutes or until cooked when tested with a skewer**.  Cool in tin and cut into squares.  Brownies will keep in an air-tight container at room temperature for 3-4 days.

* We recommend that you use an all silver aluminium tin.  As non-stick tins are dark in colour, it absorbs heat very quickly and causes the brownies to cook faster at the sides. The brownies will end up dry at the sides, and soft in the centre.
** When using a skewer to test, the skewer will come out clean when inserted at the sides of the brownies and slightly moist with crumbs when inserted in the centre.  Remove the brownies from the oven to cool, the residual heat will continue to cook the brownies and firm the centre.