Macadamia nuts – Feasting Is Fun

Hello lovelies. Do you need a chocolate hit? And, do you want to sink your teeth into something chocolatey, fudgey and studded with nuts? You are, because I’m here to help! Welcome to my Chocolate Macadamia Nut Brownies.

Chocolate Cravings…

So, the other night I was craving, I mean really craving chocolate. And not in the bar form, in a Brownie! Am I alone in my craving? Thought not!! Anyway it was too late to bake, so I settled down to sleep, thinking about Brownies.

It was still there, the craving, in the morning. Although, not so much the craving for chocolate, more the need to bake Brownies.

While I have a couple of Brownie recipes Nuts About Brownies and Triple Chocolate Brownies on this blog, I was in the mood for experimenting. Given that I’d had a couple of baking disasters during the week I knew this could be risky business!! Yet I ploughed on, wading through my collection of cookbooks in search of inspiration. And as usual I took a bits and pieces of information from here and there and came up with an idea-ish of a recipe!!

I love looking through cookbooks, however, I can honestly say there are very few recipes I follow completely from the start. Rather, the books are more a visual and written inspiration for how I like to cook and bake. Although I still have much to learn, what I know already serves to help me put a recipe together. It’s fun too, coming up with flavours, textures etc. on my own. Also, it’s how I learn and that is a big part of the enjoyment I get from cooking and baking.

Creating The Best Brownie Recipe

So, to the Chocolate Macadamia Nut Brownies – melted chocolate was top of the list in creating this recipe. Lots of it. Since I have a new bag of Macadamia Nuts in the cupboard they were guaranteed a starring role. Chocolate Chunks obviously, because – more chocolate!! The rest, well I know that brown sugar lends a depth to chocolate recipes, yet I still wanted that shiny, crackled top, synonymous with a good, fudgey brownie.

These Chocolate Macadamia Nut Brownies are everything I wanted and more. Fudgey, dense, intense chocolate flavour, with whole, buttery, Macadamia nuts for added crunch. So pleased am I with them I am sharing the recipe with you.

Recipe : Makes 20 Chocolate Macadamia Nut Brownies

200g/7oz Milk Chocolate

150g/5oz Dark Chocolate

225g/8oz Unsalted Butter

4 Large Free Range Eggs

1tsp Vanilla Extract – I use Nielsen-Massey

1/4tsp Salt – I use Maldon

125g/4.5oz Dark Brown Sugar

100g/4oz Caster Sugar

75g/3oz Plain White Flour

1/2tsp Bicarbonate of Soda

225g/8oz Macadamia Nuts

175g/6oz Chocolate Chips – plain or milk

Preheat the oven to 180C/160C fan, gas Mark 4, 350F.

First of all, line a 22.5cm x 30cm (9″ x 12″) tin with aluminium foil. This makes it so easy to remove the brownies once baked and less time cleaning up.

Melting The Chocolate For The Brownie Batter

Break up the chocolate (or chop) into individual squares, dice the butter and place both into a heat proof bowl. Place the bowl over a simering pan of water (a double boiler) ensuring the bottom of the bowl doesn’t touch the water.

Yep, I know. My bowl was too small, even for my smallest pan. Duh!!! So I improvised by using a steamer on top of the pan and placing my bowl in the steamer. This way you definetely won’t have the bowl touching the water. If you do try it make sure the water is just simmering, otherwise your hands could be burnt by the steam.

Stir the chocolate and butter until two thirds melted.

Improvised double boiler using a steamer!

Then remove the bowl from the pan and continue stirring until the chocolate and butter are completely melted. Using this method may be a little more labour intensive, it does stop the mixture heating up too much, thus less time for it to cool down. Me impatient? No I like to call it efficient!

Set the melted chocolate and butter aside to cool.

Making The Wet Ingredients For The Brownie Batter

Place the eggs, vanilla extract and salt into a bowl. Mix until combined.

Add the two sugars into the mixed egg and vanilla.

Stir the sugar and egg mixture until combined.

Pour the cooled chocolate mixture slowly into the bowl stirring slowly.

Adding The Dry Ingredients To Create The Finished Brownie Batter

Sift the flour and sodium bicarb. into the bowl.

Add the macadamia nuts on top of the sieved flour.

Fold all the ingredients together, resisting the urge to taste a spoonful!

Chocolate Macadamia Nut Brownies pour the mixture into a lined pan. Rap the pan onto the worktop a couple of times to allow any air bubbles to rise to the top.

Baking The Chocolate Macadamia Nut Brownies

Place the pan in the middle of a preheated oven and bake for 30 – 40 minutes. The Chocolate Macadamia Nut Brownies are cooked when the top is set and shiny, there should still be a hint of wobble when you gently shake the pan. Always better to slightly underbake Brownies. As soon as they are baked remove the Brownie pan from the oven.

Chocolate Macadamia Nut Brownies leave to cool in the tin.

Once completely cooled it’s so easy to remove the Brownies from the pan, in the foil. And then peel away the foil and slice into 20 squares.

These Chocolate Macadamia Nut Brownies are soo good. I’m not kidding, I was blown away by how dense, fudgey, chocolatey and more-ish these brownies are.

I shared them with friends, neighbours and of course our crew. And all of the feed back was good, so now I’ve shared them with you!