Berry & cream-cheese swirl sticky brownie (+ giveaway)

 

My contribution to the Summer Chillin’ Blog Hop 🙂

 

 

 

 

These would go perfectly with Eva’s Mojitos…

 

 

Feast your eyes on this baby…

What could possibly be better than a perfect gooey-in-the-middle sticky chocolate brownie?

How about a sticky chocolate brownie with cream cheese and berries swirled through it? Bite into it, warm from the oven, and you find a gooey swirl of cream cheese, a tart squishy berry, and then rich, dark, indulgent brownie.

The thing I bake most often is my brownie. I started with a traditional American recipe and adapted it to lift it to heaven. You think I’m exaggerating? Try my recipe and see for yourself 🙂

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Ingredients

4oz (100g) butter

1 ½ oz (40g) cocoa powder

2 eggs

8oz (225g castor sugar)

1 teaspoon (5ml) vanilla essence

2oz (50g) self raising flour

approx 250gm cream cheese

approx 1 cup of mixed berries; frozen are ideal

Oven temperature:

Gas mark 3 / 160 degrees C

1. Grease an 8 inch (20 cm) square, shallow cake tin and line the bottom with baking parchment. Preheat the oven.

2. Gently melt the butter in a small saucepan, stir in the cocoa until blended and set aside to cool slightly.

3. In a medium-sized bowl, beat the eggs and castor sugar together until light and add the cocoa mixture.

4. Stir in the vanilla essence and then sift over the flour and mix in.

5. Turn into the prepared tin. Smooth the surface.

6. Add teaspoon-sized dollops of cream cheese across the surface, then swirl gently into the brownie batter. It should only be lightly mixed. The idea is to have pockets of cream cheese.

7. Sprinkle the berries across the top of the batter.

8. Bake in the centre of the oven for 40 – 45 minutes until the edges start to ‘crack’.  The middle should be gooey, it firms up as it cools. It’s really easy to overcook this, so the trick is to take it out of the oven while it still looks slightly underdone. In the worst instance, you can eat it as a hot chocolate sticky pudding with cream, or ice cream – or both 🙂

9.  Allow to cool for 10 minutes in the tin before removing to a rack to finish cooling. It is easier to cut into 2-inch (5cm) portions when the Brownie is cool.

Eat, indulge, and nod your head at the wondrous-ness of this recipe.

And now for the Giveaway. Tell me about YOUR favourite dessert and you’ll go into a draw for a copy of either Wolf At The Door or Obsession (winner’s choice). What could be easier?

And then go Hop some more 🙂

LINK to Blog Hop