5.30.2008

TWD: French Chocolate Brownies


All I can say is: WOW, WOW, WOW!!!!!

When I saw this recipe was chosen I was instantly excited because I have been making brownies a lot lately (and it's always been the same recipe- my favorite from Martha). With all of that brownie practice behind me, I had plenty of confidence in myself as I started to peruse the recipe. Then I saw I needed to use fire! That threw me for a loop, I got a little anxious and considered omitting the raisins all together.

Then I called Mom, told her about the recipe and she admitted she has never flambeed any foods either. She did give me an alternative to the fire- microwaving the raisins in the rum for a few seconds and then leaving it to sit & soak. I considered this too. When push came to shove though, I knew I was going to go for the fire.

I did have some trouble getting the rum to ignite and it took nearly a book of matches before I had success. I think the problem is, I was picking up the pan and tilting it so that I could light it and get my hand out of the pan (I don't have really long matches). I think I was also expecting to see 10" flames coming out of the pot so that was playing into my anxiety. Once I got my 1" flames for about 10 seconds I was happy though! It turned out to be a lot easier than I was making it out to be.

The brownies took a little under an hour to bake and boy was the smell driving me nuts while they were cooling. I had to cut them while they were still warm- and they were insanely good. I polished off 5 before I was able to get a hold of myself.

The perfect snack!
As much as I love my Martha brownies- I do believe Dorie's have taken over 1st place in my book. These were really unbelievable, and the rum raisins were a great touch!


16 comments:

Anonymous said...

Great job, but a little early y'all?

ostwestwind said...

Delicious, but do you have already Tuesday in your part of the world?

Ulrike from Küchenlatein

Jayma said...

technically no, it wasn't tuesday. but, it was a saturday night with a migraine while trying to pack to leave the next morning at 6 and i hit the post button instead of schedule. one of those things you end up doing when you're trying to remember and accomplish a 100 things at once.

Mari said...

I thought the flambeing was the best part, love it!

Anonymous said...

Yay for getting over your flambe fear! Great job!

Andrea said...

These brownies are pretty good. For my flambe starter I use a propane fueled lighter (for BBQ and gas stoves) No burnt fingers.

April said...

Great job! They look wonderful!

Prudy said...

I'm glad to hear that the flambeed raisins were tasty. I must admit that they scared me off so I left them out. The brownies are so yummy!

Carrie said...

I wa sleary about the added dried fruit thing to but I am SO glad that I did it. Nice post!

The Kitchen Vixen said...

your brownies look great! they seem so chocolatey.

Amy said...

I had never flambeed anything either, but boy was it fun. Your brownies look great!

Susie Homemaker said...

I thought the idea of flambe was a little daunting, but now i think it may be a little over-rated? not nearly as scary as I made it out to be...funny about the early post - life is like that sometimes!

Shari@Whisk: a food blog said...

Glad you liked them!

Cecilia said...

Yeah! You've converted from Martha (love her) to Dorie (adore her).

I'm glad that you ended up using the flames. I also thought that the flames would burn like crazy, but we worried for nothing, didn't we?

Garrett said...

Isn't the flambe fun? You should definitely use some long matches or lighter if you're going to have a lot of alcohol, though...yours might have gotten cooked off, but I sometimes get those foot-high flames.

Jaime said...

great job! glad you overcome your fear :) it really isn't that scary but to be honest, the flames from this flambe were really measly - there is less rum in it than when we made the brioche raisin snails - that was much more impressive (i have some pics of those flames in my blog). i only have short matches as well, but i used a shallow and wide saute pan instead of a deep sauce pan so i could get my hand out before the flames went up!