Cast Iron Brownies

I swear I don’t normally eat this many desserts. It just happened. Andrew is the sweets eater in the house, not me. I would much rather have an extra helping of dinner. Okay, that’s a lie. There are certain desserts I will make room for, like cannoli. Andrew had been talking dessert, and I had been stalking brownies. He’s an enabler. I popped over to New Seasons to get chocolate because I never have it and went to town…

…until I realized the only 8×8 pan I have is glass. And the recipe I was using said glass was a strict no-no due to shatter procautions. Mmmm glass brownies. Who needs nuts?

So I improvised. Hello cast-iron. I figure if you can make giant cookies in them, why not brownies? It worked out well, but they needed to be cooked longer than the norm. I probably could gave increased the batch size because these were pretty thin. I also learned that I need to start making dessert in Andrew’s name because while those brownies made with bittersweet chocolate rocked my world, he’s much more of a semi-sweet kind of guy and he’s the primary eater. These do get better with time though. Brownies like a fine wine, why not?

Adapted from Baked Bree and Matt’s Crazy Brownies – Makes 12.

Ingredients

• 1 stick of butter
• 4 ounces unsweetened or bittersweet chocolate
• 1 1/4 cups sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup flour
• 2/3 chopped nuts – Optional — I didn’t use any. Get those nuts out of my brownies!

Procedure

• Preheat your oven to 375º.
• Cube your stick of butter and toss into the cast iron skillet on medium heat.
• Break the chocolate into small pieces and add to butter, stirring often.
• Keep stirring until chocolate and butter are mixed and smooth. Don’t rush!
• Turn the heat down to low, and add the sugar, salt, and vanilla. Mix thoroughly.
• Add eggs one at a time, mixing completely before adding the other.
• Add your flour and mix until smooth. I had a few bubbles, but that’s normal.
• Once the mixture starts pulling away from the side, add your nuts if you’re using them.
• Bake for 25-30 minutes. Check occasionally to make sure a toothpick comes clean in the center of the mixture. They might take a little longer, but the brownies are pretty thin.
• Pull the brownies from the oven and prepare an ice bath either in the sink or in a bigger pan than your cast iron skillet. Make sure you don’t make the water too high, just enough to submerge the bottom half the pan.
• Let the skillet cool in the ice water to stop the baking, and turn the brownies into ooey gooey fudge.
• Cut into whatever slice size you desire and gorge. It’s so, so good.