In a quest to make an eggless-dessert for Thanksgiving, I browsed around the dessert recipes at the Post Punk Kitchen. My eggless matzoh ball recipe started using their recipe and then modifying it to suit my tastes. Their brownies were no different. While it produced a light, moist brownie with decent chocolate flavor (and none of those funny aftertastes that some eggless baked goods seem to have), I wanted something heavier, denser, and with chocolate flavor that marched into your mouth like it owned the place.

Here is my altered version of Isa's Vegan Chocolate Brownies. Remember, I'm not vegan. I'm just avoiding egg.

Ingredients

Ingredient Group 1
1/3 cup all-purpose flour
3/4 cup cold water
12 oz extra firm silken tofu (usually one box)

Ingredient Group 2
1 cup 60% Cacao bittersweet chocolate chips
1 3/4 cups sugar
1 tsp. salt
2 tsp. vanilla
1/2 cup oil

Ingredient Group 3
3/4 cup Hershey's Special Dark cocoa powder
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup high-gluten flour (for more chewiness)
1/4 whole wheat flour (for a denser brownie)
3/4 tsp. baking powder
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper

Directions

Start by setting your oven to 350 to preheat.

In a glass bowl, use an electric wand mixer to puree the tofu, flour, and water in ingredient group 1 until smooth. If you don't have a wand mixer, you can use a blender and then pour the ingredients into the bowl. Seat the bowl on top of a pan of boiling water (double-boiler) and periodically whisk until the mixture is hot and begins to thicken (about 10 minutes).

Whisk in the chocolate chips, sugar, vanilla, and salt. You can put the bowl in the refrigerator to cool, stirring occasionally, or if you're impatient, you can put the bowl in an ice bath and cool it down more quickly. When the mixture is cooled to a bit below room temperature, stir in the oil.

Sift together the ingredients in group three, and fold the tofu mixture in until everything is well combined. I like my brownies thin (more surface-to-frosting ratio), so I spread the mix in a large greased aluminum baking pan, though some like a 9x13 cake pan.

Cook at 350 farenheit for 30-45 minutes (less if you're using the large pan, more if you're using the smaller pan) until you can stick in a knife and have it come out clean. Let cool, cut and enjoy.

If you want to frost the brownies, their chocolate frosting recipe is a good place to start. Not being Vegan, I used Crisco shortening and whole milk. I also stirred a handful of dark chocolate chips into the melted shortening right after melting it (letting it melt them) and opted for no almond extract (because I hate the smell of almond extract). I added the sugar a little bit at a time and warmed the milk, because using cold milk or the whole 3 cups of sugar caused the frosting to sieze. In the end, because of the melted chocolate chips adding body about 2-2.25 cups of powdered sugar got me a wonderfully thick consistency and a little bit of gloss.

If you're in the mood to take it a step further, you can use this chocolate chip banana bread pudding recipe, substituting these brownies (unfrosted) for the bread. I used about 2 pounds of day-old brownies (the recipe makes about 2.5 pounds) instead of 1 pound of stale bread, whole milk instead of a vegan milk substitute, and tapioca flour as my thickener/binder. Serve it warm with some vanilla ice cream (most low-to-mid-price brands use gums and soy lecithin instead of eggs). It made my wife fall in love with me all over again.

Happy Eating!

This entry was posted on Sunday, November 22nd, 2009 at 10:07 pm and is filed under Techno Thoughts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.