During this lockdown period, I have significantly increased the amount of baking I’ve been doing, and judging by the fact that flour has become a rare and precious possession, I’m not the only one.
The other day, I turned to Yotam Ottolenghi’s recipes for inspiration, because let’s be honest, has he ever created a bad recipe? I came across two that looked delicious, but sadly I didn’t have all of the ingredients for either of them.
This led me to combine the two to create my own – tahina caramel brownies. I took the brownie recipe from one, the tahina caramel recipe from the other, adjusted ingredient quantities and baking time, and I was done! I can honestly say these tasted amazing - so chocolatey and rich. Here’s how I made them…
Ingredients
For the brownie
163g unsalted butter, cold and cut into cubes
163g dark chocolate (70-75% cocoa solids), broken into squares
102g beaten eggs
224g caster sugar
81g plain flour
20g cocoa powder
88g chopped and lightly roasted walnuts
½ tsp salt
For the caramel
135g caster sugar
81g water
68g unsalted butter, room temp and cut into cubes
54g double cream
102g raw tahini paste
Pinch of salt
These are definitely weird quantity numbers, but I only had a 21x21cm baking tin whereas the original recipe was for a 21x31cm tin, so I made my adjustments! If your baking tin is a different size, adjust the ingredient quantities accordingly to avoid your brownies being too thin or too thick.
Start by making the brownie batter.
Preheat the oven to 160°C for a fan oven.
Fill a small saucepan with some boiling water (and then bring down to medium heat), and place a heatproof bowl over it (not touching the water), to create your bain-marie.
Put the butter and chocolate in the bowl to melt, and once melted, stir to create a shiny sauce. Put aside to cool to room temp.
Whisk the eggs and sugar for about 3 minutes until they become light and creamy, using a stand mixer or electric whisk (you can use a normal whisk but it will take a lot longer!)
Fold the chocolate mixture into the egg mixture without stirring more than necessary. The chocolate has to be room temp at this point to avoid cooking the eggs!
Once combined, fold in the flour, cocoa powder, salt and walnuts. Pour into a greased baking tin.
Now it’s time to making the tahina caramel. The biggest tip for making caramel (which I learnt the hard way) is to leave it to form by itself, without stirring! The more you disturb the process by stirring, the more likely it is to crystallise and become unusable, so leave it to do its thing!
Put the sugar and water in a small saucepan over medium-low heat. Once the sugar has dissolved, bring it to a medium-high heat.
Leave it to boil until the sugar is a golden-brown colour, which will take about 12 minutes.
Take the saucepan off the heat and add the cubed butter and double cream. Stir with a whisk until the butter has melted.
Add the tahini paste and salt, and mix again with the whisk.
Once you’ve made the caramel, pour around half of it over the brownie batter in the baking tin. Make sure it’s spread evenly, and put it in the oven for 30-40 minutes.
After half an hour, check on your brownies, and leave them in longer if they’re not yet done.
They should be set enough that you can cut them into squares without them blending into each other, but gooey enough that there’s brownie left on your knife after you’ve cutting it. Remember that the brownies continue to set a bit after you’ve taken them out the oven, so don’t take them out too late!
Keep the other half of the tahina caramel in a tupperware box in the fridge. When serving, microwave the sauce until it's just melted, and drizzle some on top of each brownie.
Here is a video showing the whole process, which we'll all pretend I made just for this blog post rather than TikTok!
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