Homemade Fudgy Brownies (Credited to actress Katharine Hepburn)

You know I have been on a kick lately to have desserts that are preservative and chemical free. Really tired of lab-food.

One evening recently, my daughter and I had a need for chocolate, and I mean a NEED for chocolate. I looked online to find a chocolate recipe we might have ingredients to make. Luckily, I had bought a package of Baker's Unsweetened Chocolate after Christmas on clearance (highly recommended, because unsweetened chocolate doesn't "expire," it keeps for a long time. So getting a package for $1.47 was a really great deal.

Well, I found this recipe called Katharine Hepburn's Brownies. It is a very rich, fudgy brownie. I was concerned that the kids might not like it, since they are accustomed to chemical-laden stuff, but they really liked this.

TIPS Before you start:

Use REAL butter, not margarine. Use REAL vanilla extract, not the fake stuff.

Right off the bat, there is something strange about these ingredients. Do you see it?
Very little flour. Ridiculously little flour. But that's what the recipe says and it works!

Also note that you want to add the ingredients IN THE ORDER LISTED below. Don't get all "industriously sidetracked" and get them out of order (like I did one time) -- follow the DIRECTIONS. It will make it much better.

When you get to the stage to add the eggs, ensure that the mixture has cooled enough that the whites of the eggs will not get "cooked." As you know, it doesn't take much heat to start cooking egg whites. Don't ask why I know this.

1 stick (8 TBSP) butter
2 squares of unsweetened chocolate
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1/4 cup all purpose flour
1/4 tsp salt
1 cup chopped walnuts (optional)


ALRIGHTY THEN - HERE ARE THE DIRECTIONS:

Preheat oven to 325°F.

Prepare an 8"x8" pan (I use that new Reynold's Non-Stick Aluminum Foil or you can butter the pan. Some people may want to butter and flour the pan, but I've found it is fine un-floured, plus you don't have white flour showing up on dark brownies if you don't flour the pan!)

Melt together 1 stick butter and 2 squares unsweetened chocolate then take the saucepan off the heat. This process is a little faster if you chop up the chocolate into smaller pieces. Be careful as the chocolate is hard and you don't want the knife to slip. Then we'd have to call you "Stumpy" and we don't want that now do we? (If you have a double-boiler, you may want to use that. I have also put water in a saucepan and set another pan on top of it to do the melting, so I don't have to worry about scorching the chocolate.)

Stir in sugar, and let it dissolve a little bit in the butter/chocolate mixture.

Add eggs and vanilla, and beat together well.

Stir in flour and salt.

Add the walnuts if you want to put nuts in this.

class="instruction"> Bake in a buttered 8" square pan at 325°F for approx 40 minutes.