Chocolate and Hazelnut Brownies

I have included this recipe because apart from mine still being very raw in the middle – very probably my fault – the bits that were baked properly, were absolutely gorgeous. My oven doesn’t heat evenly and rarely runs at the correct temperature, often running 30˚C hotter or colder, sometimes even more than that. At times it works fine….. Annoying and frustrating thing, that it is. My baking tray was also 8”x8” instead of 9”x12” so the cake batter was much thicker than it was supposed to be. So with my oven and my baking tray I had already set myself up to fail – it was just the centre though and completely my own doing, I just cut around the raw central bit, there was still plenty of baked brownie left over. I try not to get too cross with myself over my baking mishaps, as Glen keeps saying, everything I do is new, until now I had never really tackled baking ever, my Mum never taught me and my Ex would have had a fit if I had tried to bake something and ended up having to throw it in the bin, so I never had the opportunity until now. So I do try to just kind of shrug my shoulders, “Oh well” it and carry on. This time however it really irked me because I know what I did wrong and the recipe really is too good to be making mistakes like that, wasteful.

Chocolate and Hazelnut Brownies

100g/3 ½ oz hazelnuts

175g/6oz unsalted butter diced

300g/10 ½ oz good quality dark chocolate, broken up

300g/10 ½ oz caster sugar

4 large beaten eggs

200g Plain flour

25g/1oz cocoa powder, + extra for dusting

1. Preheat the oven to 200˚C/400˚F, scatter the hazelnuts over a baking sheet and toast them being careful not to burn them, for 5 minutes. Once they are toasted vigorously rub them in a tea towel to remove the skins.
2. Roughly chop the hazelnuts so you have random sizes and set them aside, line the base of your tin, 23x30cm/9”x12” or similar type tin with parchment paper.
3. Put the butter and chocolate, in a heatproof bowl over a pan of simmering water, and melt the butter and chocolate stirring continuously until smooth. Remove from the heat and allow it to cool. Once cooled add the sugar and mix well until combined.
4. Now add the eggs a little time, mixing well between each addition. Making sure to lift the sieve well above the bowl to aerate, sift the flour and cocoa powder into the butter and chocolate mixture.
5. Fold in the flour until well combined and smooth, stir in the nuts and then pour into the baking tray. Bake for 15 minutes, it should be firm on top but soft in the middle, leave in the tray but place on a wire rack to cool.
6. Lift the brownie out of the tray using the parchment paper for leverage, then carefully cut into 24 pieces.