Homemade Oreos

Aah, oreos. I’ve been known to down a pack or two at a time, and the numbers just double if you add some milk to dunk them in. Still, when I saw the website for homemade oreos on Smitten Kitchen, I knew I must try it out, regardless of how much flab I still need to sweat off of me.

The entire process took me one and a half hour, which is way more time that it would’ve taken had I had access to an actual cookie baking sheet, a food processor and a decent oven. Still, I baked the cookies in batches of 12, with a total of 4 batches. Now while my (admittedly weak) math says that should have yielded 24 cookies, I only managed to make 21. Go figure..

The original recipe says you can reduce the sugar if you want the actual cookie to be slightly salty, but I didn’t (reduce sugar, what?!, blasphemy!) so the cookies are very sweet. Still, they taste yummy and I don’t think they’ll survive more than a few hours in this house.

For the cookies:

- 1.25 cups flour

- 1/2 cup cocoa

- 1 teaspoon baking soda

- 1/4 teaspoon baking powder

- 1/4 teaspoon salt

- 1.5 cups sugar (you can reduce this to 1 cup too)

- 5 ounces butter

- 1 large egg

For Filling:

- 1/2 cup (4 ounces) butter

- 2 cups sifted powdered sugar (which I had) or confectioners’ sugar (which is what the recipe called for)

- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 375°F. (Anyone who’s read my whining before knows that I have NO idea what temperature my oven is on since the numbers are all faded and it doesn’t work properly)

Using a food processor (or your hand, like I did) mix the flour, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder, salt and sugar. Add butter and egg until the dough comes together.

 

Take teaspoonfuls of batter and place on baking sheet. I did this two different ways. The first time I placed it and then flattened the crap out of the cookies, making them too large and very thin and soft. The second time, I barely pressed them with my fingers, just to take the complete-roundness out of them, this worked better. Make sure you place them about 2 inches apart, otherwise they will expand, stick to each other and make you want to kill yourself. Bake for 9 minutes and then cool completely (completely!!) before handling.

For the filling, mix the butter, sugar and vanilla together till the mixture is light and fluffy.  Put into a pastry piping bag (or clean plastic bag, like I did) and cut the end off.

Place all the cooled cookies in a row, making sure you know which ones are the same size (so important!). Place as much frosting as you want (recipe says teaspoon-sized blobs, I put tablespoon sized blobs) on one cookie, place the other cookie on top and lightly press.

Voila…homemade oreos. In two hours or less. You can keep them in an airtight container for three days or so, if they survive that long.

Banana Muffins

Ever seen a shit-load of bananas. Not literally, but just so many bananas that you wonder how they are going to get finished. To make things worse, they aren’t the normal bananas you see. They’re smaller, slightly tougher…all round I-don’t-want-to-eat-this kinda bananas.

Well, I have. We got a whole tree worth (it seems like) of bananas recently and my mind immediately sprung into what-will-I-bake-them-into mode. After having made Banana Bread I was looking to go through my list of Banana Muffins recipes and this seemed like the perfect opportunity.

Banana Muffins (from AllRecipes)

Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3 large bananas, mashed
• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 1 egg
• 1/3 cup butter, melted

Instructions:
The key to making good muffins (I’ve learnt) is to refrain from over-mixing the ingredients. When you mix the wet and dry ingredients, mix just enough to get all the mixture wet, but don’t over-mix. Over-mixed batter = tough muffins

To start, preheat your oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Prepare your muffin pan by spraying with oil/butter or using liners.

Mix the dry ingredient, i.e. flour, baking powder, sugar, baking soda, salt together.

In another bowl, mix the bananas, egg and butter.

Add the dry ingredients to this slowly. Scoop into your muffin pan, about 3/4 full. 

Bake in oven for 10-15 minutes for mini-muffins, 25-30 minutes for larger ones. You’ll know they’re done when the top set and spring back lightly once pressed.

We still have a good 3 dozen bananas left, so I’m probably going to try out some other Banana Muffin variations (with chocolate chips, peanut butter, and possibly some desserts too).

World Peace Cookies

For those of you who haven’t figured it out yet, I’m a huge fan of Smitten Kitchen. I subscribe to the RSS feed, have gone through the archives, and have a hundred recipes (or nearabouts) bookmarked. Most recipes I’ve tried have turned out awesome, the biggest disaster to date (technical, not taste-wise) was the Chocolate and Peanut Butter Cake (which actually has a much longer and much more technical name in reality).

Anyhoo, Deb goes on and on about how this one recipe for double chocolate chip cookies is totally awesome and to die for. I’m thinking, “right, they’re just cookies with chocolate and chocolate chip, how awesome CAN they be.” Still, I had a good 7 ounces of chocolate chips to finish up (leftover from the Peanut Butter and Chocolate Chip Bread) and since the only other way they were going to finish was by me eating them off every time I was bored, I decided to just go ahead and bake something that would use them up, then foist the baked goods onto friends.

World Peace Cookies

Smitten Kitchen

Italics = My comments

Makes about 36 cookies (I can’t vouch for this yet. My count is a bit off considering I ate 1/2 the dough uncooked)

1 1/4 cups (175 grams) all-purpose flour
1/3 cup (30 grams) unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
11 tablespoons (150 grams) unsalted butter, at room temperature
2/3 cup (120 grams) (packed) light brown sugar
1/4 cup (50 grams) sugar
1/2 teaspoon fleur de sel or 1/4 teaspoon fine sea salt (normal salt works just fine)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
5 ounces (150 grams) bittersweet chocolate, chopped into chips, or a generous 3/4 cup store-bought mini chocolate chips (I used seven ounces since that’s what I had to use up)

Mix the flour/baking soda/cocoa together. Beat the butter till it’s creamy, then add both the sugars as well as the vanilla extract and salt. Beat for about 2 more minutes. I did this by hand, but the recipe calls for a mixer.

Next, start adding in the flour mixture. I did this about half a cup at a time. The first cup or so was easy to mix in, then it got more and more difficult and the dough got very crumbly and tough to work with. At this point, I put in the chips and mixed as well as I could. I’m sure this would work a lot easier if you had some form of a food processor, which I didn’t have, and sorely need.

Take the dough out onto a work surface and divide it into half (believe me, it’s easier to work with that way). Then take each half, and roll it into logs about 1.5 inches in diameter. Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate, or freeze. The recipe says 3 hours in the fridge or half hour in freezer, but I froze them overnight before I baked them cookies the next day.

To bake, take out the log (15 minutes before you bake them) and cut the logs into 0.5 inch thick slices. They will crumble, and I was sure my cookies would look ugly, but don’t worry about the crumbling. Just put the dough back together and bake on cookie sheet/wax paper/whatever you have. The oven needs to be at 325 degrees, but since I have a crappy oven, it’s set on the highest temperature possible and it worked just fine.

Bake each batch for 12 minutes. When you pull them out, they will soft to the touch, but leave them out till they cool down a bit and then put them into a container.

I did all the baking part just before I went out with Naila for the evening (since I wanted to pass the no-electricity hour somehow) but only made six (since I wanted to see how they turned out first). Safdar tested one (while still warm) and declared them a success, Naila/Vex/Andre all said they were really good. Andre put in some requests for cookies/brownies which I might or might not honor and Naila said I’m very sughar now

Now you may have noticed that no where did I mention having eaten the baked cookies. Besides a small bit that Naila practically forced on me, I avoided the temptation. But, (and this is embarrassing) I did eat half the cookie dough in one sitting while watching “The Uninvited”. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, half the frikkin dough! Clearly I shall be baking the rest tomorrow and foisting them off on any remaining friends that I encounter tomorrow.

Chocolate Chip & Peanut Butter Bread

After the success of the Banana Bread, I got my first ever request to bake something, Chocolate Chip Bread. Weirdly enough, I – the banana lover – have a sister who doesn’t like them so much. Thankfully she likes chocolate or we would’ve had to disown her me thinks.

Now, there are no recipes out there that I could find that have just chocolate chips involved with the bread, but I found several variations (Banana/Choc Chip, Prune/Choc Chip, Zucchini?!?/Choc Chip). I finally found one recipe (with a footnote saying it wasn’t a real recipe) which had Peanut Butter and Chocolate Chips in it, and despite the footnote decided to give it a whirl.

As of right now, the bread is baked and in the fridge, but no one has tried it yet since Api is sleeping and I guess she should do the honors. I’ll post an update on taste, but I already think that there might not be enough sugar in it…

Chocolate Chip and Peanut Butter Bread

- 2 cups flour
- 1/2 cup sugar
- Dash salt

- 4 teaspoons baking powder (I know, it sounds like too much, but the bread rose just fine)

- 1.5 cups milk

- 1/2 cup peanut butter

- 1/2 cup chocolate chips (I used semi-sweet and added a bit more than 1/2 a cup)

Just mix the wet and dry ingredient separately, then together till the mixture is wet (but don’t over mix). Put into bread pan and cook for about 50-60 minutes. My oven doesn’t really have proper heating, so I can’t say what temperature, but I’d say about 350 or so should do it.

Banana Bread

Once, when I was a kid…alright, not really a kid, but in A-levels and still very much in awe of people who could make things like bread and muffins, a friend’s mom made Banana Bread and I was like, this is the shit! Combining two of my favorite things, bananas and well, flour seemed genius. I couldn’t wait to bake it myself.

Fast forward to some 7 years later and the day finally arrived. Two days ago, I made Banana Bread in just under half an hour (not counting baking time). Turned out pretty good, and I am mucho pleased with myself and looking to now bake some Chocolate Chip & Peanut Butter Bread tomorrow (on Api’s request). Now if only I could figure out a way to finish off all the stuff I bake without having to eat it myself…

Banana Bread
Allrecipes.com

Ingredients:

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup butter
• 3/4 cup brown sugar
• 2 eggs, beaten
• 2 1/3 cups mashed overripe bananas (I used just 4, that’s all I had, still turned out great)

Directions:

My patience being what it is, I didn’t really read the instructions and went ahead mixing everything in randomly, but not over mixing it as I might have done in the past. The bread turned out great (I don’t have a bread machine, but this wasn’t the kinda mixture you need to knead anyway).

I suppose you could make it the intended way, dry ingredients mixed separately, butter and sugar creamed in one bowl with eggs and mashed bananas added in and finally all the wet ingredients added to the dry, but it seems like a waste of effort to me. It needs to cook for about 60 minutes at 350 degrees F.

Next on my list of things to bake are the Chocolate Syrup Brownies (again, but with the Chocolate/Peanut Butter Ganache from the Chocolate & Peanut Butter Cake), Chocolate Chip and Peanut Butter Bread, and Chocolate Chocolate Chip Cupcakes (I think).

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder

I swear, I feel like I’m suffering from PTSD. I spent over seven hours in the kitchen today (it’s like 40 degrees nowadays, much hotter in the kitchen) and all I managed to make was a mess.

I now know exactly what I did wrong (hindsight = 20/20). Here is a laundry list:

- To start with, I didn’t have the right cake pan. The one I have has a hole in (I think it’s called a bunt? pan). Anyway, that’s where the trouble started. The layers kept getting stuck to the bottom and kinda fell apart when I was getting them out.

- Then I didn’t freeze the layers as recommended. I just let them cool in the fridge for a while

- I used the frosting at a cooled state, when it should have been room temperature

These reasons are why the cake looks like it does (like a bomb went off in it, and I tried to cover it with chocolate). There were some taste issues, mostly that it’s really heavy (really, really) and that there is too much sugar in the peanut butter frosting.

Will I try it again? Maybe, someday. Not with three layers, maybe just two. But not for another two odd months. I’m going back to brownies/cookies for a while.

Peanut Butter & Chocolate Cake

I’ve been dreaming about baking this cake for a while, but never really had a reason to, till now. Since my mom asked me to bake this for an upcoming event at her work, I have to make sure it’s perfect, which means I get to make it twice (yay!!) to make sure it’s not a messed up katrina’s-best-brownie-type disaster. To that end, I went out today and got all the ingredients (down to driving waayy out of my way to get light corn syrup) as well as Pillsbury Chocolate Cake Mix (at my mom’s insistence) in case I fail to make the cake right.

Anyway, with Api arriving tomorrow, I won’t get a chance to put up the recipe later, here it is right now, along with pictures (as I told a friend, looking at pictures of this cake makes me want to eat my laptop!!) and the link to the original recipe from SmittenKitchen (of course!)

Chocolate and Peanut Butter Cake

2 cups all-purpose flour
2 1/2 cups sugar
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder, preferably Dutch process
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup neutral vegetable oil, such as canola, soybean or vegetable blend
1 cup sour cream
1 1/2 cups water
2 tablespoons distilled white vinegar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 eggs

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Butter the bottoms and sides of three 8-inch round cakepans. Line the bottom of each pan with a round of parchment or waxed paper and butter the paper.

2. Sift the flour, sugar, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt into a large bowl. Whisk to combine them well. Add the oil and sour cream and whisk to blend. Gradually beat in the water. Blend in the vinegar and vanilla. Whisk in the eggs and beat until well blended. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and be sure the batter is well mixed. Divide among the 3 prepared cake pans.

3. Bake for 30 to 35 minutes, or until a cake tester or wooden toothpick inserted in the center comes out almost clean. Let cool in the pans for about 20 minutes. Invert onto wire racks, carefully peel off the paper liners, and let cool completely. (Deb note: These cakes are very, very soft. I found them a lot easier to work with after firming them up in the freezer for 30 minutes. They’ll defrost quickly once assembled. You’ll be glad you did this, trust me.)

4. To frost the cake, place one layer, flat side up, on a cake stand or large serving plate. Spread 2/3 cup cup of the Peanut Butter Frosting evenly over the top. Repeat with the next layer. Place the last layer on top and frost the top and sides of the cake with the remaining frosting. (Deb note 1: Making a crumb coat of frosting–a thin layer that binds the dark crumbs to the cake so they don’t show up in the final outer frosting layer–is a great idea for this cake, or any with a dark cake and lighter-colored frosting. Once you “mask” your cake, let it chill for 15 to 30 minutes until firm, then use the remainder of the frosting to create a smooth final coating. Deb note 2: Once the cake is fully frosting, it helps to chill it again and let it firm up. The cooler and more set the peanut butter frosting is, the better drip effect you’ll get from the Chocolate-Peanut Butter Glaze.)

5. To decorate with the Chocolate–Peanut Butter Glaze, put the cake plate on a large baking sheet to catch any drips. Simply pour the glaze over the top of the cake, and using an offset spatula, spread it evenly over the top just to the edges so that it runs down the sides of the cake in long drips. Refrigerate, uncovered, for at least 30 minutes to allow the glaze and frosting to set completely. Remove about 1 hour before serving.

Peanut Butter Frosting
Makes about 5 cups

10 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature
1 stick (4 ounces) unsalted butter, at room temperature
5 cups confectioners’ sugar, sifted
2/3 cup smooth peanut butter, preferably a commercial brand (because oil doesn’t separate out)

1. In a large bowl with an electric mixer, beat the cream cheese and butter until light and fluffy. Gradually add the confectioners’ sugar 1 cup at a time, mixing thoroughly after each addition and scraping down the sides of the bowl often. Continue to beat on medium speed until light and fluffy, 3 to 4 minutes.

2. Add the peanut butter and beat until thoroughly blended.

Chocolate-Peanut Butter Glaze
Makes about 1 1/2 cups

8 ounces seimsweet chocolate, coarsely chopped
3 tablespoons smooth peanut butter
2 tablespoons light corn syrup
1/2 cup half-and-half

1. In the top of double boiler or in a bowl set over simmering water, combine the chocolate, peanut butter, and corn syrup. Cook, whisking often, until the chocolate is melted and the mixture is smooth.

2. Remove from the heat and whisk in the half-and-half, beating until smooth. Use while still warm.

Yumminess!! Will post more after attempt #1 is complete tomorrow night.

Chocolate Brownies, Peanut Butter Cookies and Faryal’s Famous Dessert

Last night I had one of those, “I HAVE to eat something sweet NOW” feelings. I rummaged around in the kitchen and discovered nothing worth eating so ate a banana and decided that today I would bake something…

But what to bake. I have a zillion recipes I want to try out and just choosing one can take hours. I narrowed it down to four contenders, chocolate brownies, peanut butter cookies, peanut butter cake and chocolate cupcakes. Obviously, I wasn’t going to make all four, so I sat down to go through each recipe in detail to figure out which was the simplest to make with ingredients I already had on hand (Yes, I did all this planning the night BEFORE I was actually planning on baking, lol)

Then my mom, who was on the phone while I was doing all this, hung up and said, “My friends are coming over tomorrow.” Yowza! Permission to go bake-crazy granted. After being told that I also needed to make something virtually guaranteed to turn out perfect (Faryal’s Famous Dessert), I cut out the peanut butter cake from the list and decided to make the cupcakes, cookies and brownies.

Cut to this morning. I wake up late (no one woke me up, and I’ve never been woken up by an alarm) and realized that I only had two hours and was missing some very important ingredients (butter, flour, brown sugar). I sent Safdar (the cook) on a grocery shopping trip and started with the first item on my list, the brownies.

Now let me start with the end result here. They didn’t turn out so great. They taste great, but they don’t have great texture so I’m not going to bother you with the recipe as it’s been deleted from my records forever. Still, these were better than the lard-oozing ones I made a few weeks ago, so they sit atop my mom’s fridge and shall be finished in due course.

While I was waiting for the brownies to bake, I made Faryal’s Famous Dessert, which is famous for the simple reason that it is ridiculously simple and absolutely delicious. Here’s how you can make it:

- 1 box Candi Biscuits (or graham crackers)
- 1  tin canned fruits
- 1 pack cream

Crush the biscuits till they’re no more than crumbs, put them at the bottom of a dish and spread ‘em. Next, remove the syrup from the fruits (very important) and add the fruit as the next layer. Finally, add the cream on top. Voila. You need to put this in a freezer for 15 minutes and then put it in a fridge for as long as you can wait.

Once, thinking that where canned fruit was good, fresh fruit was better, I added fresh strawberries. Ugh! The canned fruit is sweet (so maybe something like fresh mangos would have been better) but the strawberries were very sour and made the entire dessert non-sweet, which kills the point of dessert.

Anyway, once I’d made this (2 down, 2 to go) I moved on to the cookies (Safdar being back by this point). These, by the way, are absolutely delicious, which is why the recipe follows.

Peanut Butter Cookies
Via Smitten Kitchen

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 cup peanut butter at room temperature (smooth is what we used, but I am pretty sure they use chunky at the bakery)
3/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
1 large egg, at room temperature
1 tablespoon milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 cup peanut butter chips
1/2 cup chocolate chips

For sprinkling: 1 tablespoon sugar, regular or superfine

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

In a large bowl, combine the flour, the baking soda, the baking powder, and the salt. Set aside.

In a large bowl, beat the butter and the peanut butter together until fluffy. Add the sugars and beat until smooth. Add the egg and mix well. Add the milk and the vanilla extract. Add the flour mixture and beat thoroughly. Stir in the peanut butter and chocolate chips. Place sprinkling sugar — the remaining tablespoon — on a plate. Drop by rounded teaspoonfuls into the sugar, then onto ungreased cookie sheets, leaving several inches between for expansion. Using a fork, lightly indent with a crisss-cross pattern, but do not overly flatten cookies. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes. Do not overbake. Cookies may appear to be underdone, but they are not.

Cool the cookies on the sheets for 1 minute, then remove to a rack to cool completely.

Alright, so these are ridiculously simple too. I don’t have an electric mixer, so I used my hands (burning calories, see?). Deciding what size to keep the cookies was difficult. First, I made two that were super large, but then they broke when I was removing them from the tray leaving them looking very un-pretty, so I used teaspoonfuls (literally) for the next two batches. Beautiful!

Great, on to the next and last item, the cupcakes (which I was most excited about having never made cupcakes before). First ingredient on the list, butter. Wait, where’s all the butter? Crap, it’s finished.

Being lazy and really really tired by this point, I decided to quit while I was ahead and stopped at three items. Then I called my mom, “Hi Amma. When’re you guys reaching home?” My mom, “Oh, I forgot to tell you, my friends aren’t coming today.”

Moral of the story: Always make nice things for guests since you might have to eat them yourself if they don’t show up.

Divine French Toast

It seems like I’ve been searching for the perfect French Toast my entire life. Alright, I exaggerate a bit, but still. My mom makes great French Toast but they’re a bit on the deep fried side, my aunt makes great ones (I remember this one time in Swat when she made friggin’ awesome ones) but doesn’t have a set-in-stone recipe, I made some awesome ones in college with the help of a friend, but don’t remember exactly how.

Basically, French Toast are one of those things everyone knows how to make, but you never really bother with working out the ratios. That means that they end up tasting different every time you make them. On top of that, everyone likes theirs differently. Some like ‘em all brown, some like them very soft. It’s annoying really.

I gave up on the search a few years ago when I realized that I could never work out the milk/egg ratio that would make the toast soft, yet egg-y enough. Times have changed though…with all this new found time on my hands I decided to jump straight into developing a recipe for French Toast that I (at-least) could recreate again and again without a change in taste.

Some things to note. I like French Toast really soft, almost not cooked through but brown on the outside. Also, I am one of those one-egg-per-toast kinda people. Finally, sugar is your friend, use it generously.

French Toast

Ingredients:

2 slices Bread (I use whole grain)

2 eggs

2 tablespoons sugar (feel free to add more if you want)

2 tablespoons milk

Instructions:

- Put milk and sugar in a deep dish and nuke for a few seconds, then whisk the sugar till it dissolves. It won’t completely dissolve, no worries about that.

- Add egg (make sure milk isn’t hot) and whisk more till egg/milk are mixed in thoroughly.

- Add bread. Let it soak through. I let the first side soak till I can actually see the liquid seeping through it, and then I turn and let the other side soak about half as long. By the time I actually pick it up and put it in the pan, it’s threatening to break apart, but never really does.

- Heat a pan, add a very little amount of oil. Just enough to coat the bottom lightly. You can probably skip this if you have a good non-stick pan. I don’t Make sure the pan is hot hot hot, then reduce heat a little before you add the bread.

- Add the bread to the pan, let one side cook for about a minute or so, till lightly browned then turn over. Cook other side till lightly brown…you get it

- Once both sides are browned, the bread should be soft to the touch still. I like it this way, but you can continue to completely cook it and toughen it up like a piece of cow hide if you want.

Tada…French Toast. I made these for my mom, and she loved them. She’s a pretty mean cook herself so that’s a pretty high standard right there. My cat, Charlie, also loves them. He doesn’t really have a high standard, but this is the only non-cat-food thing he yowls for once he smells it, so I’m thinking he likes them a lot

On a related note, I have found a great recipe software Cook’n which is free and also lets me copy/paste recipes in from websites. The only problem is that it doesn’t give nutritional values, but I guess I can’t have it all

Katrina’s Best…I think not…

Alright, so I was craving chocolate again (what is it with me!) and I was like, “well, last time went so well, I should bake some brownies”. But, there was no chocolate syrup left. “Oh well, the entire world makes brownies with cocoa powder, let me try”….bad idea.

So the recipe said they were Katrina’s (don’t ask me who she is) best brownies ever…or something like that. Feeling a little confident, I went through the reviews and recipe. Some people had said that their brownies had come out too oily, but that they might have made a mistake. “Pshh…I don’t make mistakes,” I thought. This one guy had gone so far as to say that everyone should ignore the negative comments, “they’re there for a reason buddy!!”.

Anyway, seemed like a simple enough recipe. I obviously halved it but even then I didn’t have enough butter/margarine. I went and checked on the internet and a lot of people had said I could replace margarine with vegetable oil, so I figured, alright, I’ll do that. Ooops.

What ensued was messy. I knew from the minute I mixed everything together that I had done something really stupid (or the recipe was completely wrong). I went back, went over the math, I’d halved everything down right, which meant that the problem had to be in the margarine/oil mixture, which was weird since they’re essentially the same thing.

Anyway, after baking, I ended up with what looks like little chocolate squares with sugar showing. Not appetizing…you can taste the oil a mile away. I actually sponged some of the oil off the mixture (about half what I put in) because it just wouldn’t mix in!

I’m not going to add the recipe here. Not worth my time. I shall try it one more time, with the right ingredients and the right proportions, and if they still turn out wrong I will give Katrina a review she won’t forget easily.

Oh…chocolate syrup brownies…I miss you so