Cooking with BLT: Chilli Chocolate Brownies

Don't worry, this post isn't about some weird chilli chocolate brownie that involves bacon, lettuce and tomato as well! It's about a planned chillout night at Sir D's place which quickly turned out to be a boys night + my friend BLT and myself. So what do we do when the boys are playing video games? We bake of course!

Although I love a classic chocolate brownie, sometimes spicing things up with a kick of chilli just makes things a bit more exciting ;). In this case it definitely made things more exciting, since we decided to play a practical baking joke and give some unsuspecting guys a super-mega-chilli hit!

Deadly dousing of chilli...

The brownies were well received by all, even by those who received a slice that had been given the extreme chilli treatment. Funnily enough, most of them thought that there was something wrong with their tastebuds when they tasted the spicyness in the brownie rather than there being something wrong with the brownie itself! BLT and I were beginning to think that we hadn't doused the brownie with enough chilli powder until one person said, "I need some water...!"

Chilli Chocolate Brownies
This brownie is cake-like in texture, so unfortunately if you're after something dense and fudge-y then this isn't it. At the start, it just tastes like a normal chocolate brownie and then as you keep eating the chilli heat kicks in. The chilli is reasonably subtle for the quantities given in the recipe, but it still makes its presence known.

125g dark chocolate
90g unsalted butter, softened
250g (1 cup) caster sugar
2 eggs, beaten
80g (2/3 cup) plain flour
30g (1/4 cup) cocoa powder
½ teaspoon baking powder
¾ teaspoon chilli powder (add more if you like it hot!)

1. Preheat oven to 180ºC. Line a square baking tin with baking paper.

Melting the chocolate and butter

2. Melt chocolate and butter in a saucepan on medium low heat. When chocolate has fully melted, add sugar and stir until melted. Add eggs and stir until combined.

BLT expertly mixing the dry ingredients in a scientifically proven way!

3. Place flour, cocoa, chilli powder and baking powder into bowl and mix together. Add to chocolate mixture and stir until combined. Pour into baking tin and bake for 30-35 minutes or until firm and comes away from the sides of the tin. Cool in tin.