Seriously Chocolate Brownies

 

That's no lie--these were the chocolate-iest  (no, it's not a word, but I'm a copy editor--we get to make them up) ever.

Little did I know that these brownies would be the kick-off to my six-day baking marathon. Seriously, I baked six days in a row. These brownies were to be for poker night. We have a group of friends we play poker with every week or so. There is usually food involved, and I insisted on bringing dessert. I really wanted to make something with lots of cinnamon and butter, so I settled on apple cobbler, but our one very good friend Scott is a bit of a picky eater and I wasn't too sure he'd do cobbler. But I knew he'd go for brownies. To say Scott loves brownies would be an understatement.

So, I went in search of another good recipe. I made some for work a few weeks ago, and they were really good. But I like this whole experimenting thing right now, so I decided to try a new recipe. After searching my Google Reader full of WC girls' blogs, I settled on these from Baking Blonde's Weblog Seriously, the perfect brownie.

Best Brownies
(adapted from Hershey's Best Brownies)

Ingredients:
1/2 c (1 stick) butter or margarine, melted
1 c. sugar
1 tsp. vanilla extract
3 tbsp. Hershey's Chocolate Syrup*
2 eggs
1/2 c. all-purpose flour
1/3 cup Hershey's Cocoa
1/4 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
1/2 c. chopped nuts (optional)
1/2 c. mini Semi-sweet Chocolate chips*
1/4 c. mini Milk Chocolate chips*

*Baking Blonde's variations.

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line 8 x 8 inch pan with foil and lightly spray with cooking spray.

2. In large bowl, sift together flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, and salt. Set aside.

3. In a large bowl, stir together butter and sugar. Add and stir in vanilla and syrup. Add eggs one at a time and mix well. Gently fold in flour mixture until well blended. Stir in chocolate chips. Spread batter evenly into prepared pan.

4. Bake 20 to 25 minutes or until brownies begin to pull away from sides of pan.

5. Cool brownies on counter for 5 minutes. Place brownies, still in pan, in refrigerator for 30 minutes (this was a tip from Baking Blonde to bring out the chocolate flavor--it worked) to cool.

6. Remove from fridge and finish cooling on counter. Once completely set and cooled, lift foil and brownies from pan. Peel back foil and using a sharp plastic knife, cut brownies. Store covered at room temperature.

Sissy's Variations:
I loved the idea of the chocolate syrup, so I used that.

I changed up the addition of the chocolate chips just a little, using 1/4 c. each of milk chocolate and dark chocolate chips and semi-sweet chocolate chunks.

 

I used my stand mixer instead of mixing my hand, and it worked  great. I did use the refrigerator trick, but then mine sat for another 24 hours before eaten.

They seemed to be a hit--super rich and very chocolate-y.