Tuesdays With Dorie - French Chocolate Brownies

Last week, as usual, I was looking forward to learning what this week’s pick would be for our Tuesdays with Dorie rendez-vous. Di, of Di’s Kitchen Notebook chose French Chocolate Brownies.

Ah, brownies. One can never have too many recipes for a good brownie. And this is no ordinary brownie. It’s contains 6 ounces of gorgeous chocolate and is chock full of boozed up raisins. Yes, raisins, boozed up, with rum. Tell me, how can this not be good? So, knowing a good thing when I see one, I doubled the raisins in the recipe, therefore, doubling the rum as well. Then, after plumping up some golden raisins and warming up the rum, I lit a match, flambéed said raisins and watched the most beautiful light show I’ve ever seen, in my very own kitchen. That was one cool moment my friends. I was so nervous though, I almost had a shot of rum afterwards to calm my nerves, but as it was 9 in the morning, I refrained myself.

As with any chocolate dessert, the brownies smelled divine and the worst part of making these was, of course, waiting for them to cool enough to be cut and devoured. After having a small taste, I realized that the rum flavor wasn’t very pronounced so I decided to whip up some rum scented cream. Yes, more rum. As I said how can this not be good? It can’t!

These were some of the most incredible brownies I’ve ever had, their texture is perfect, they taste fabulous and the rum scented whipped cream is just the best thing I could think of to make these even more grown-up. Of course, regular whipped cream, which is what I served the kids, would be great too. Just not as much fun. Thanks Di, this one’s a keeper! For a taste of what the rest of the gang thought of these babies, check out the Tuesdays with Dorie blogroll!

French Chocolate Brownies
- makes 16 brownies -
Adapted from Baking From My Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan.

Ingredients
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon cinnamon (optional)
1/3 cup raisins, dark or golden
1 1/2 tablespoons water
1 1/2 tablespoons dark rum
6 ounces bittersweet chocolate, finely chopped
1 1/2 sticks (12 tablespoons; 6 ounces) unsalted butter, at room temperature and cut into 12 pieces
3 large eggs, at room temperature
1 cup sugar

Getting ready: Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 300°F. Line an 8-inch square baking pan with foil, butter the foil, place the pan on a baking sheet, and set aside.

Whisk together the flour, salt and cinnamon, if you're using it.

Put the raisins in a small saucepan with the water, bring to a boil over medium heat and cook until the water almost evaporates. Add the rum, let it warm for about 30 seconds, turn off the heat, stand back and ignite the rum. Allow the flames to die down, and set the raisins aside until needed.

Put the chocolate in a heatproof bowl and set the bowl over a saucepan of simmering water. Slowly and gently melt the chocolate, stirring occasionally. Remove the bowl from the saucepan and add the butter, stirring so that it melts. It's important that the chocolate and butter not get very hot. However, if the butter is not melting, you can put the bowl back over the still-hot water for a minute. If you've got a couple of little bits of unmelted butter, leave them—it's better to have a few bits than to overheat the whole. Set the chocolate aside for the moment.

Working with a stand mixer with the whisk attachment, or with a hand mixer in a large bowl, beat the eggs and sugar until they are thick and pale, about 2 minutes. Lower the mixer speed and pour in the chocolate-butter, mixing only until it is incorporated—you'll have a thick, creamy batter. Add the dry ingredients and mix at low speed for about 30 seconds—the dry ingredients won't be completely incorporated and that's fine. Finish folding in the dry ingredients by hand with a rubber spatula, then fold in the raisins along with any liquid remaining in the pan.

Scrape the batter into the pan and bake 50 to 60 minutes, or until the top is dry and crackled and a knife inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. Transfer the pan to a rack and allow the brownies to cool to warm or room temperature.

Carefully lift the brownies out of the pan, using the foil edges as handles, and transfer to a cutting board. With a long-bladed knife, cut the brownies into 16 squares, each roughly 2 inches on a side, taking care not to cut through the foil.

Serving: The brownies are good just warm or at room temperature; they're even fine cold. I like these with a little something on top or alongside—good go-alongs are whipped crème fraîche or whipped cream, ice cream or chocolate sauce or even all three!

Storing: Wrapped well, these can be kept at room temperature for up to 3 days or frozen for up to 2 months.