September – and by the looks of it, autumn – is well and truly upon us, and with this time of year come some spectacular root vegetables. Brownies are an essential part of any baking arsenal: they’re quick, easy and almost impossible to resist, and although beetroot may not be the first thing you think of putting in traditional brownies, it certainly adds to the delicious cakey texture you’d expect from a rich, chocolate brownie.
Another essential ingredient in the recipe below is good-quality chocolate. Making the most of Broughton’s very own chocolate shop, I have used Coco on Broughton’s 72% dark chocolate, a wonderfully smooth, dark chocolate which balances out the sweetness.[img_assist|nid=2139|title=|desc=|link=node|align=right|width=200|height=133]
There are generally two types of brownie recipes: cakey and fudgy. This recipe will produce moist, crumbly cake-like brownies as opposed to the dense, fudgy brownies – so don’t worry if they don’t resemble brownies you’ve had before. The secret to these ones is getting as much air into them as possible and keeping it there so that they don’t sink when baked. Use the tips in the recipe below and there should be absolutely no danger of that happening!
Makes approx. 24
Preparation time 30–40 minutes; baking time 25 minutes
Ingredients
Approx. 400g beetroot, raw
200g unsalted butter, cut into cubes
250g dark chocolate, minimum 70% cocoa solids (I used Coco on Broughton’s 72% dark chocolate)
3 eggs
250g golden caster sugar
150g self-raising flour
[Rubber gloves]
Method
Boil the whole, unpeeled beets in a large pot of water until tender. Keeping the skins on will stop the beets from becoming too waterlogged and therefore releasing too much moisture into the brownies. Cooking time will vary depending on the size of your beets, but they should take between 10 and 30 minutes.
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Once cooked and cooled, peel and grate the beets. You will need around 300g grated beetroot for the brownies. It is advisable to wear rubber gloves at this stage to prevent staining your hands.
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Preheat the oven to 180°C/160°C fan/350°F and grease a 20 x 30cm (8 x 12 inch) tin with butter. Melt the chocolate and butter in a bowl over a pan of boiling water, stirring the mixture occasionally to stop it burning. Alternatively, you can heat the mixture using the defrost setting in the microwave. Heat for 2 minutes, stir and heat again. Continue this process until the chocolate and butter are completely melted and well combined.
In a separate bowl, whisk the eggs and sugar until light and fluffy.
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Add the grated beets to the chocolate mixture and gently stir. Pour the chocolate into the eggs mixture and stir gently until combined.
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Sift the flour into the bowl and gently fold in with a metal spoon until just combined. A metal spoon, instead of a wooden spoon, is best at this stage as the sharper edges of the metal spoon help to cut through the mixture and ensure that as little air is lost as possible. Do not over-mix or the brownies will be tough.
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Pour the mixture into the tin and smooth the top with a spatula. Bake for around 25 minutes.
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When the brownies are done, they will be springy on the outside and soft in the middle. A skewer or knife inserted into the middle should come out a little gooey instead of clean. Leave to cool in the tin and cut into pieces once cool.
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If you’re feeling artistic, you can decorate your brownies with either a sprinkling of icing sugar or with a drizzle of white chocolate.
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If you have time to make the brownies a couple of days in advance, it’s well worth it. The beetroot acts like a sponge and absorbs all the wonderful chocolate flavour so that the flavour intensifies as the days go on. They may not be traditional brownies but I can guarantee that curiosity will get the better of many people and the batch will be gone in no time!
Fiona Harvey (http://madebyfi.wordpress.com)
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If you've followed this recipe, Spurtle would be interested to know how you got on. No conflagration too trivial, no triumph too contentious ... tell us what happened and send us a photo. The results will be published below.