Insanely Fudgy Deconstructed Twix Brownies

Happy Friday! Or, if you’re at my house, Happy Gooey, Rich, Caramel-y, Fudgy Friday…

In honor of this momentous occasion, I have composed an incredibly insightful, original, and profound song for all of you…

(Sung to the tune of something vaguely resembling Rebecca Black’s “Friday,” the rights to which I do not own–thank God.)

♪ Oo-ooh-ooh, ooh yeah, yeah

Yeah, yeah

Yeah-ah-ah

Yeah-ah-ah

Yeah-ah-ah

Yeah-ah-ah

Yeah, yeah, yeah

7 AM waking up in the morning

Skipping to the chorus ‘cuz this verse’s boring….

It’s GooeyRichCaramel-yFudgyday,

GooeyRichCaramel-yFudgyday,

gotta get brown(-ies) on Friday

Everybody’s looking forward to the

Freakin’ fudgy brownies!

(Spoken in a deep sexy male bass voice: Because nobody cares whether you should take the front or back seat, okay, Becky?) ♪

<<Fin.>>

I know. CRINGE. I didn’t say it was going to be good…but let’s be honest. Even you would rather listen to my version of this song than Rebecca Black’s, right?

Or what if I offered you these Gooey Rich Caramel-y Fudgy brownies, hmm? What say you fair folks then?

Cavities and utter bliss that is worth every hole, that’s what I say.

I first stumbled across the base recipe for this fudgy, chewy brownie on Allrecipes, the people’s domain of all things wonderfully (and sometimes not-so-wonderfully) edible. As of the moment of this writing, at an ungodly 2:37 AM the evening/morning before I teach my very first class of the quarter at 9, this recipe has 4.5 stars and a whopping grand total of 4,853 reviews. Yeah, that’s a lot of reviews and ratings. So you can probably see why I was thrilled to finally try my hand at it.

I was also, you know, excited to put off lesson planning. Aside from baking, one of my little-known talents is professional productive procrastination. I mean, these brownies had to happen eventually, right? And I’m making people the happier (and more cavity-laden–but happier) for it, right?

Obviously.

So I made these. And then I chopped up a bunch of homemade Twix bars because I had them sitting in my freezer from another event and couldn’t decide what to do with them except shove all of them down my throat in one sitting because I was so distraught about the pile of papers and research steadily towering above my head like the apocryphal sword of Damocles that hung by a thread above his head.

Then I decided that, since having Twix inside a brownie was neither enough nor original, I wanted my Twix on the outside of my brownies as well, and therefore smothered it in homemade caramel dessert sauce–which, by the way, is pretty straightfoward to make and ridiculously rich to boot.

Speaking of ridiculous, if you’re loving the colors and lighting in these photos, I spent part of today browsing through some of my very earliest blog photos from just last summer. Fantastic recipes, all of them…but what a change there’s been since those early times! I’m almost embarrassed to have them up, but on the other hand I absolutely love having them there–they serve as an awesome and really quite amazing reminder about how much a blog (and blogger) can grow in a short amount of time. Of course, I’m still learning absolute loads–for example, my DSLR camera is still about as comprehensible to me at times as heavy literary theory, i.e. less than not-at-all–but that’s most of the fun!

You, dear readers, inspire me every day to keep exploring and discovering all I can about the blogging world, so please share your stories, thoughts, links, recipes, and anything you think will add to the story that’s being written here with your help every day! Every voice counts, even if it’s just a small thought that will keep this little engine chugging along and puffing out more stories to share.

Insanely Fudgy Deconstructed Twix Brownies

(Original brownie recipe from Allrecipes)

Yield: 8×8-inch baking pan 

Twix Brownie

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup margarine or butter, melted
• 1 cup white sugar (I used a heaping cup-ful)
• 2 eggs, lightly beaten
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1/2 cup all-purpose flour (I used about 3/4 tablespoon less for a denser mix)
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/8 teaspoon baking powder
• 8 mini Twix bars, chopped roughly into pieces

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease an 8×8-inch baking pan and set aside.
2. Gently mix together melted margarine, white sugar, beaten eggs, and vanilla. In a separate bowl, combine cocoa powder, flour, salt, and baking powder. Add to wet ingredients and mix in only until just combined. (Overmixing will result in a much cakier brownie.) Gently fold in Twix pieces.
3. Pour into greased pan. Bake for 22-27 minutes, then remove from oven. NOTE: Be sure not to overbake–I removed mine from the oven about two minutes early and let them sit in the pan on the stovetop so they would finish cooking at a lower temperature while they cooled. This helps keep your brownies moist and fudgy.
4. Immediately after removing brownies from oven, smother half of the chocolate frosting (recipe follows) evenly on top so that it melts into the brownies and infuses that chocolate flavor. (You may want to poke some holes into the brownies using a toothpick or chopstick so that more of the frosting seeps in–it adds a GREAT rich dimension to them!) Allow brownies to cool completely, then smother with the remaining half of chocolate frosting. Cut into bars and top with caramel dessert sauce (recipe follows).

Chocolate Frosting

Ingredients:

• 6 tablespoons butter or margarine, softened
• 6 tablespoons cocoa powder
• 2 tablespoons honey
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 2 cups confectioners’ sugar

Directions:

1. Combine all ingredients in a large bowl. Spread on top of brownies as directed above.

Caramel Dessert Sauce

Ingredients:

• 1 cup white sugar
• 1/4 cup margarine or butter, room temperature
• 3 tablespoons milk, warmed in the microwave for 30 seconds

Directions:

1. In a saucepan over low heat, melt sugar while stirring frequently to prevent burning. Your sugar will begin by turning into a clear liquid near the edges, then turning into a light brown liquid. Continue to stir occasionally until all of the white sugar has melted into liquid, then stir constantly while it darkens into a medium-amber shade (about the color of very dark honey). Take care not to let the sugar burn; if you’re unsure, turn your heat on the lowest setting possible and continue stirring until it reaches that dark honey color.
2. Add margarine or butter and begin stirring quickly–your mixture will bubble up, which is perfectly fine. (Note: a saucepan with higher sides is best for making caramel to prevent overflow.) Continue stirring for 5 seconds, then add the still-warm milk. Stir rapidly, taking care not to splash as the caramel liquid will be very hot. When the lump of solidifying caramel dissolves completely into a liquid state, remove from heat. Your caramel is done! Pour over cooled brownies before serving.