Stack of chewy brownies
It was a last minute desicion to attend a dinner potluck at a friend’s place and I had to come up with something fast and good. Since there was plenty of food planned, brownies seemed like a good idea. However, the fact that brownies had never been a part of my prior culinary experiments, was making it seem like a bad idea.
Like any other student of Google university, I typed out, brownies with oil, and lo…there were several such recipes, made for lazy last minute bakers like me. I tried one such recipe, try as I might I cannot seem to find the correct source. As soon as I do, it will be appended into the post.
I chose a recipe for a 9×9 pan, so that if a disaster was encountered it wouldn’t have become a huge waste.
The results of the first batch were highly encouraging and I quickly put in a second batch. DH and me tasted one and oohed and aaahed over it. The friend who came to pick me up insisted that he have one first before we landed up at the potluck house and he gave me his double thumbs up too! People at the potluck finished it off, including the crumbs. So, when you need to impress people without spending too much time, this is JUST the recipe for you.
Walnut Brownies with orange zest
Time taken – Under 30 minutes
Category – Dessert, potluck party, picnic food
Makes 16 pieces
For a 9 inch square pan
Easily the easiest to make Brownies
Ingredients
- 1/2 cup Canola oil - I used soyabean oil which is pretty much odourless
- 1/2 cup sugar
- 1/4 cup jaggery brown sugar powdered brown /
- 2 eggs
- 1 tsp vanilla essence
- 1 tbsp orange zest (optional - but it gives a wonderful flavour)
- 1/3 cup cocoa rd unsweetened powder ( I used Cadbury's)
- 1/2 cup AP flour
- 1/4 tsp baking powder
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1/4 cup walnuts chopped
Instructions
- Preheat oven at 350F. Line a 9 inch square pan with foil coming out of the edges and grease base sides with oil.
- Blend the sugars into the oil, in a large bowl. Lightly whisk the eggs and fold it into the oil-sugar mix. Do not beat this much.
- Add the vanilla extract and orange zest into this mix.
- Sift the baking powder, AP flour and cocoa powder onto a sheet.
- Put in the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients, along with chopped walnuts and stir gently till well incorporated. Do not beat air into it or over mix if you want your brownies to be chewy.
- Pour mix into greased pan, even it out and bake for 15-20 minutes, or until the top is dry and it springs back on touch.
- Cool well.
- Cut with a pizza cutter for clean edges into 16 squares.
- Serve warm with vanilla ice cream. You could even refrigerate overnight and serve next day when the brownie will be its fudgiest best.
The recipe sounds tempting. I am going to try them.I can’t see the picture, dear.
wow, you have the energy for one more recipe after all those….;-)will have to come back for the pic though 🙁
Wow! thanks for the easy-breezy recipe, Nandita. I will get back for the pics, though.
nandita, i can’t see the picture either. recipe seems yum but picture helps me drool :)) will come back for the picture
These look yummm….brownies are my all time favorites !! And you are so right in pairing orange zest with chocolate…I couldn’t see the pic, but a right click & view image on the little orange box that shud have had the pic made it appear.
Sounds GR8!!Cannot see the pic.. pl reload it!
LOL LOL !!! Student of google University!!!!! HahahahaNo pic! 🙁
Hey ladies, sorry for the goof up, I was doing this very late last night and I copied URL while editing the pic on Kodakgallery, that’s why you couldn’t see it. Funny that I could still see it though!Richa- LOL, yeah after all that, I thot I’d better put up a real post heheheCoffee- arent we all students of GU??;)
Hmmm… I baked some brownies too… thanks to the Hershey’s site 🙂 Will share. Nice stuff 🙂 Love your blog.
Students of google university!!loved that..LOLI have all the ingredients..will have to try this thanks.
Sorry girls, I have forgotten to list a most important ingredient, a pinch of salt. Add it the dry mixture while sifting.
oooh looks way too yummy!
Hi Nandita,Your blog is quite addictive I must say :)I love the “idea” of baking and drool over all the yumm recipes that are available on your and other blogs. But I am hesitant in trying them because I have few questions… very basic ones, pls don’t laugh if u find them silly.It would be great if you could clear them please. You n me being in India (infact, in Mumbai) I feel you are the most correct person to ask the questions (and most imp I love your way of describing things nicely) :1) When a baking recipe says 1 Cup, what size cup are we talking abt? Approx how many grams? Not that I know capacity in gms for the cups I have :-P2) I hope all the measurement spoons that u get in market are consistent (ones which have 1 tbsp, tsp, 1/2 tsp, 1/4 tsp).. The ones that I have do not look too reliable to me for some reason!3) How imp is the pan size for baking? Like this one says 9X9, some say 5×5, some say 8in round tin etc.. Is it just for the shape or it is going to affect the quality of the final product (like cake not becoming spongy enuf)?4) I have MW with convection (LG). Any idea if it will yield the as good results as the OTG that you have? Any tips for using Convection mode of Microwave if you are aware? Or should I buy conventional OTG only?I want to try this brownice and pita bread and carrot cake and banana muffins and …. so many things from your blog itself…. so I really hope you do get time to respond to my queries above.. maybe then I can post next batch of questions :PThanks and keep the kitchen stove burning pls :)-Archana
Dear Archana.Thanks for all the interest and any kind of questions are welcome. You’ll see my answers below each of your Qs1) When a baking recipe says 1 Cup, what size cup are we talking abt? Approx how many grams? Not that I know capacity in gms for the cups I have :-PYou get standard measuring cups for baking in any big superstore. If you are in Bombay you can try SHoprite Hyper / Hypercity mall. SO one cup is using the 1CUP measuring cup. That is the safest way out.2) I hope all the measurement spoons that u get in market are consistent (ones which have 1 tbsp, tsp, 1/2 tsp, 1/4 tsp).. The ones that I have do not look too reliable to me for some reason!Same as above, if you use spoons from the same set, the ratio of ingredients will almost be right. Although the best way to go about perfect baking is to weight ingredients, for simple baking US measurements work fine.3) How imp is the pan size for baking? Like this one says 9X9, some say 5×5, some say 8in round tin etc.. Is it just for the shape or it is going to affect the quality of the final product (like cake not becoming spongy enuf)?Size is important while choosing pan because if a recipe asks for a 6 inch pan and you bake in 9 inch pan, the cake will be very flat and not have the reqd height, simply because the batter is spread over wider area. In case of brownies, this 9 inch pan gives the right height to these brownies.4) I have MW with convection (LG). Any idea if it will yield the as good results as the OTG that you have? Any tips for using Convection mode of Microwave if you are aware? Or should I buy conventional OTG only?You can surely use convection mode of LG- my mom has the same model at home and you just turn the knob to convection mode, preheat at reqd temp, and then use the provided pans. Best is to call the LG team for a demo on baking in convection mode. They’ll be glad to do it.
Hi Nandita,I love your blog. I am a regular lurker here but have never left a comment before. This time, I just had to. I just finished making a batch of brownies using your recipe & it turned out to be so darn yummy!The house is smelling so good…. feels like I’m in heaven :-). I know they taste better when refrigerated overnight but I just couldn’t wait!. The only change I made was to use pecans instead of walnuts coz that was what I had.I especially like your Tam Bram section & have bookmarked a few recipes. Keep up the good work!Thanks for sharing.
Thanks a lot Nandita for the detailed reply !Finally I made the brownies yesterday evening and they turned out nnniiiccee :)The changes that I (had to) made:1) Did not have 9 inch sqare pan, so used 9X5 baking tray…2) Used little less than 1/2 cup of cocoa, two reasons a) My cup did not have mark for 1/3 cup. 2) After filling the cup little more than 1/4 cup mark that it has, I had only little cocoa powder left in the packet, so thought why not use up all :-))One or two doubts that I (still) have are –>Does the mixture get bit sticky when u mix all the ingredients (and more stickier as the time passes)?Or was it because I used little more of dry ingredients than mentioned (more cocoa) but the same amt of oil? Should I have increased oil content by little?When I poured everything in the tray, I saw that it is just abt to cover the base of the pan and was wondering if I have done something wrong and this is going to be a flopshow ! But no, it rised well enuf to give me brownie cake of decent thinckness.Thanks again for a wonderful and simple recipe that completely unexperienced person like me too can make it.I have one question which is not directly related to brownies.You mentioned that you do not use canola oil and use soyabean oil instead. Is it because its not good for health? Should one or should not one use Saffola (which has blend of rice bran and safflower/canola)? Since you are a nutrition consultant, and have knowledge abt this, can you pls do a post over cooking oil(s) and their good/bad points?Thanks a ton again,ArchanaP.S. Shoprite does not have measuring cups, what the hell they do not even have cake tins in aluminium and have very very few baking trays in glass, just one or two :(Just FYI since I saw in one of your older posts that you visit Mulund sometimes…Shoprite is my source of almost all the things that one needs in kitchen. But now I guess I will have to search somewhere else for baking resources.Sorry for the LOOONNNNGGG comment 😛
archana,Can you mail me – I can reply you in detail! Since you dont have visible profile, I cannot contact you. My contacts are available on the profile page.
Hey Nandita,I baked some brownies again over the weekend and put up the recipe.How have you been?
yummy brownies!! i like ur blog very much. you have got nice collection.
Nandita, Any substitutes for eggs in this recipe?