Dariy Free Chocolate Brownie

Again this is an adapted version of the brownie recipe in the Humingbird bakery book.  It is garanteed to go down well. It never fails me and takes seconds to make that I always make this when people come over. It works for afternoon tea, as well as a pudding warmed up with a dollop of ice cream. Yum.

Ingredients

200g dark chocolate
175g  soya spread
325g caster sugar
130g plain flour
3 eggs
I use Dr Oetker dark cooking chocolate bars only say may contain but don’t list dairy products in their ingredients so I assume it is just that the factory uses milk in other products and they write this to cover their backs.  If you use dark dark chocolate it tends to be too rich for brownies and they don’t turn out so well.  For the spread I use dairy free soya spread as this tastes similar to unsalted butter. If you can use the soya version rather than the sunflower or olive version. Also fresh eggs really help make this brownie lovely and light and slightly sticky. Mmmm
Instructions

This recipe works well by hand, I had never tried doing this is a food processor before last week as it is so easy to make I can’t justify the extra washing up the processor causes! However as I discovered when I did do it in a processor it does get the mix far smoother but I have to say this didn’t impact on the taste!
Preheat the oven to 170’C and prepare your tin. I tend to use baking paper to line the tin.  Just a long strip going across in one direction with extra hanging over wither side to life the cake out with after cooking.

1)      Put the chocolate (broken up into chunks) into a heatproof bowl with the margarine and melt this in the microwave.  Keep a close eye on this. Don’t multitask at this stage just watch over the chocolate and keep taking it out and stirring to combine it as it melts.

2)      Add the sugar to the chocolate mix and stir in until smooth.

3)      Add the flour and stir in. It will seem a little stiff and doughy at this stage. Do not fear the eggs will change that!

4)      Now add the eggs into the bowl and mix, you will notice that the mix becomes lovely and smooth and probably has air bubbles on the surface.

5)      Pour this into your prepared tin and put into the oven for 30 – 35 mins

6)      Keep an eye on it from 30mins on, when you take the cake out, if you gently wobble to tin from side to side if the cake wobbles and moves in the centre you know the mix is still liquidy and not quite ready. Put it in for a further 5 mins. Keep taking it out and checking like this until it is no longer wobbling in the centre. When you think it is finally done take the cake out, and insert a skewer, if the skewer comes out clean you know that is is cooked!

7)      Leave the cake in the tin for 30 mins until it is more solid, then lift it out of the tin onto a rack.  I like to turn mine upside down and use a sharp wet knife to slice the brownies into squares. Then I cut a shape out of paper like a heart or Christmas tree etc nd place this in the middle of the square and then sprinkle icing sugar on the top of the brownie do when you lift of the paper shape you have a pretty topping!