Capuccino Brownies

My parents were big cappuccino drinkers in the 80's. I was little, but I can remember the cappuccino machine, the special cups, and the noise that the steamer made while my mom would froth the milk. Eventually, cappuccino became my coffee beverage of choice, and my introduction into the crack that is now my daily caffeine habit. I've graduated to plain old drip coffee, but I still enjoy a good cappuccino on gala occasions. Le Pain Quotidien makes excellent cappuccino -- it reminds me of the cafe au lait that I drank every morning in France.

The July issue of Bon Appetit has a great spread devoted to dessert bars. I immediately flagged nearly all of them, and the issue proceeded to lay ignored at the bottom of my pile of books, magazines, and assorted crapola for the next month. Last weekend I was pondering some fun things to bake, and I returned to this magazine. While there were several that I thought about making, the cappuccino bars won out because I knew that they'd be an immediate hit. It's basically an espresso-spiked brownie with a white chocolate ganache and a cinnamon sprinkle. Warning: these are seriously rich brownies! I have to say, though, that the cappuccino flavor really comes through. While I don't always appreciate the sprinkle of cinnamon on my cappuccino foam, just the tiniest sprinkle really works here. These were such a hit around these parts that I think it will definitely be a repeat recipe!


Cappuccino Brownies
Bon Appetit, July 2009
Brownies:

• Nonstick vegetable oil spray
• 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, diced
• 3 ounces unsweetened chocolate, chopped
• 1 1/2 cups sugar
• 3 large eggs
• 1 tablespoon instant espresso powder
• 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup all purpose flour

White Chocolate Ganache:

• 6 ounces high-quality white chocolate (such as Lindt or Perugina), chopped
• 5 tablespoons heavy whipping cream
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon

For brownies:
Preheat oven to 325°F. Fold 16-inch-long piece of foil to 8x16-inch strip; place in 8x8x2-inch metal baking pan, leaving overhang on 2 sides. Repeat with another sheet of foil in opposite direction, lining pan completely. Spray foil with nonstick spray.

Stir butter and chocolate in heavy large saucepan over very low heat until chocolate is melted. Remove from heat; whisk in sugar, then eggs, 1 at a time. Whisk in espresso powder, vanilla, and salt; sift flour over and stir to blend well. Transfer batter to prepared pan.

Bake brownies until puffed and dry-looking and tester inserted into center comes out with some moist batter attached, about 35 minutes; cool completely in pan on rack.

For ganache:
Place white chocolate in medium microwave-safe bowl. Bring cream to simmer in small saucepan. Pour cream over chocolate in bowl. Let stand 30 seconds, then stir until chocolate is melted and smooth. If necessary, microwave on low power in 10-second intervals until white chocolate is melted completely. Chill until ganache is thick but still slightly pourable, about 25 minutes.

Using foil as aid, lift brownies from pan. Turn over onto sheet of parchment paper; peel off foil.

Pour ganache onto center of brownies; spread to edges (some may drip over). Sprinkle with cinnamon. Chill until ganache is set, at least 2 hours. DO AHEAD: Can be made 2 days ahead. Cover and keep chilled.

Cut brownies into 4 strips. Cut each strip crosswise into 5 or 6 pieces, or cut each strip into 6 triangles. Arrange brownies on platter and serve.

Cobb Salad

My mom and dad don't eat lunch; in fact, they rarely eat breakfast. They're those odd creatures that subsist on half an apple in the morning and the other half for lunch. Sometimes they'll go out for lunch, but when they do they're too full to eat dinner. I don't know where they get this trait as both sets of my grandparents were devoted to their three meals a day. A trait, I might add, that I have inherited. My dad always points out that I take after his side of the family because I have to have my breakfast, lunch, and dinner. He thinks it's strange, but I'm fairly certain that he might have it backwards. When I was younger, my California grandparents were big fans of having lunch "at the club," and of course I loved to join them. I don't remember what I ate, but I do remember that they both ordered a cobb salad fairly regularly. I would look at this odd combination of eggs, bacon, avacado, and who knows what else with interest. On the one hand, that salad was beautiful and colorful; on the other hand, it was full of gross stinky cheese and slimy avacado. There was no way I was going to mess with that.


Times have changed, though, and I love a cobb salad now. I was really excited to try Ellie's version of the cobb, because as much as I love this salad, it's not exactly light on calories. I still don't like avacado though, and I left that out. I neglected to grill chicken for the salad, and I 86'd most of the yolks out of my hardboiled eggs (Lucy likes them a lot more than I do!). The result is that my cobb salad isn't exactly the rainbow of goodies that I think a cobb salad should be; rather, it's sort of a red, pink, and white party in a bowl. Nevertheless, it was still delicious. I loved the dressing that went with this salad, and I thought that it was much more refreshing than the usual heavy dressing.

TWD: Vanilla Ice Cream

When it comes to my ice cream cones, I've never really been a vanilla ice cream sort of girl. Vanilla ice cream is essential for things like warm brownies, peach cobbler, and apple pie. Hot fudge is lonely without vanilla ice cream, and crushed up Oreos are are a perfect foil for that creamy goodness. But, I never could get excited about plain old vanilla ice cream. It must be people like me who give vanilla a bad name. I've always disliked the use of vanilla as a synonym for meh, or it's all right but it doesn't knock my socks off. While I might not seek out vanilla at the ice cream shop, I understand the purist point of view on this one. A good vanilla ice cream stands in a class by itself. It's the Grand Poobah of ice creams.

So, it really shouldn't come as a great surprise to anyone that once again, the often imitated, but never duplicated, Dorie Greenspan, has come up with a recipe for an insanely good vanilla ice cream. Dudley is a big fan of vanilla ice cream (so much so that he orders vanilla milkshakes, an act that I simply can't fathom. I keep trying to explain that milkshakes were meant to be chocolate!) and Dudley declared this the best vanilla ice cream he'd ever had in his life. He liked this ice cream so much that he devoured the quart over the course of about 36 hours. I was actually going to make some hot fudge for this ice cream, but he declared it so good that hot fudge would only detract from it's very vanilla wonderfulness. Too good for hot fudge? No such thing! However, I was only too happy to let him eat the ice cream while I found other goodies to eat.


I used vanilla beans to flavor the ice cream, and I thought it came together very nicely and easily. The only problem that I ran into is that the full recipe is a scosh large for my KA ice cream bowl so it had some trouble chilling and running over the top. I actually loved the custard base for this, and I had a couple of spoonfuls before I set it in the fridge to chill.

Is it the best vanilla ice cream ever? Dudley certainly thinks so, and I think it's outstanding, too. Last summer I made the Cook's Illustrated vanilla bean ice cream, and earlier this month I made (but never posted, oops!) the Sweet Melissa brown sugar vanilla ice cream. I loved that brown sugar ice cream, I thought it was SO good! I know that people have made David Lebovitz's vanilla ice creams, and I'm interested to hear about how they stack up against this vanilla ice cream. Thanks to Lynne of, Cafe Lynnylu, for picking this very wonderful and versatile recipe this week. You can visit her blog for the recipe!

BBA SOS: Holla for your Challah!

Last weekend was the first weekend of the summer that I had to myself. It was the first weekend without social events on the calendar. Well, there were drinks on Friday night, but the rest of the weekend was free and clear. On Saturday Dudley & I went down to the Mall and did some exploring; we even found the Einstein Memorial, which may seem like a no-brainer to some of you, but I'd been haphazardly keeping an eye out for it, and I was thrilled when we finally spotted it. Then Sunday after the farmer's market, I had time to bake! It was my goal to use the day to play catch-up with some of my baking groups that I've sadly neglected this summer.

One of my mom's friends from high school lives in DC and I see him about quarterly. He's a confirmed bachelor, and I always bring him some "treats" whenever we get together. Well, last Thursday you might say I had my knickers in a twist because I didn't have time to make anything to bring him. Mind you, this is a personal obligation that I put on myself -- I doubt that he'd mind if I skipped the baked goods once or twice -- but seeing as Dudley and I go over to his house and drink his wine, it makes me feel better to bring him something to nosh on. It finally occurred to me that I could bring him the cashew butterscotch bars in my freezer and the rest of the brioche.

The fluffy interior of the challah.

This was actually a great moment and the inspiration for the Sunday baking bonanza. I'd actually cleaned my freezer out of any and all baked goods. My freezer was a clean slate, and it was just begging to be filled up again. Besides, who knows when I might need an impromptu baked good? It's nice to have backups. So, last Sunday I set out to make casatiello, challah, and ciabatta from The Bread Baker's Apprentice. Actually, I wanted to get tackle cinnamon rolls and cinnamon walnut bread, but that's over ambitious no matter what. The BBA is arranged alphabetically, and I'm itching to get out of the C's!

The challah dough was fairly easy to work with. It requires multiple proofings, an attribute of bread dough that I remember from baking with my BaBa. We never made challah but I remember having to wait and punch, wait and punch, before we ever got to do anything fun with that dough! At one point I had to leave the house for a bit so I just stuck the dough in the refrigerator to retard. When I got back home, I took the dough out, let it come back to temperature, and it resumed rising as usual. You're supposed to concentrate on getting the bubbles out of the dough during the initial proofings and kneedings, but I still had bubbles when I was rolling out the strands for the braids. It's actually really fun to pop these bubbles -- they squeak and if you like playing with bubble wrap, this is the dough for you.

I now have two giant loaves of challah in my freezer, and I'm not sure what I'm going to do with them! They're actually crying out to be made into toast (in my opinion) but they may end up as bread pudding at some point. Dudley's parents are going to be in this neck of the woods visiting friends soon, and I'm definitely going to send one their way. It's such a pretty braided loaf -- I think it's a wonderful part of a food gift. I've lost track of the members of the BBA SOS group, but check out Nancy's blog, the Corner Loaf if you'd like to see the round up of recipes.

Rosemary Cheddar Cheese Bread

In the battle of yeast breads vs. quick breads, yeast will always win with me. That said, I can't deny the convenience of a quick bread when you're strapped for time. I made this rosemary cheddar loaf to have with cocktails and appetizers one night, and it definitely didn't disappoint! It was an impromptu dinner, and this bread really delivered! The recipe is from the King Arthur Baker's Companion cookbook, and I have a sticky note on the page for the next time that I need a quick bread to have with wine and other sundries. It makes two very good sized loaves, and I promptly stuck one in the freezer for later. I was a little worried about the flavor combination, rosemary plus a spicy cheddar seemed a little odd to me, but it really, really works. The rosemary whole wheat is on the sweetish-side (by no means sweet, just sweeter than the cheddar) and it really compliments the savory cheddar bread.

Here are some things that I made note of for next time:

1. This is a great recipe, but get ready to dirty some dishes! The double batter aspect means twice the bowls. It's worth it, though.
2. Make sure that your milk is room temp, and buzz it in the microwave for a few seconds if you have to. Room temperature butter hardens quickly when you add cold milk, and it's ridiculously hard to whisk the liquid ingredients when you have giant chunks of butter floating around.
3. I didn't have dried rosemary so I used herbs de Provence -- this was a great substitution!


Rosemary Cheddar Cheese Bread
The King Arthur Baker's Companion

Rosemary Whole Wheat Batter
1 large egg
1 1/4 cups milk
4 tablespoons softened butter
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 tablespoon dried rosemary
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 cups whole wheat flour or white whole wheat flour

Cheddar Cheese Batter
1 large egg
1 cup milk
4 tablespoons butter, melted
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon cayenne
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1 1/4 cups grated cheddar cheese


Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease two 8 1/2 x 4 1/2" loaf pans.

For the Rosemary Batter: (In a medium bowl) Beat the egg and add the milk and softened butter. Stir well. (In a large bowl) Mix together the dry ingredients with a whisk. Add the egg mixture to the flour mixture and stir until just combined. Put half of the batter into each of the two prepared pans.

For the Cheese Batter: In a medium-sized bowl, beat the egg, then stir in the milk and butter. In a separate bowl, whisk together the baking powder, salt, cayenne, black pepper, and flour. Stir in the cheese, then the milk mixture, stirring until just combined.

Pour half of the cheddar batter into each pan on top of the rosemary batter. Use a table knife and stick it, point down, all the way through the batter to the bottom of the pan. Keep the tip touching the bottom of the pan and drag the knife through the batter in curving motions until the loaf is marbled. Repeat with the second loaf.

Bake the loaves for 50 to 60 minutes, or until nicely browned and a cake tester inserted in the middle of a loaf comes out clean. Remove from the oven and let them rest for 5 to 10 minutes before turning out and cooling on a rack.

Oven Fried Onion Rings

I hate to get low on "supplies." By supplies, I mean those necessary things that make my life run smoothly: milk for my coffee, baking powder, all of those bathroom necessities, basically anything that's going to make you frown when you open your cupboard and discover that it's not there. Well, I've run dangerously low on supplies here at chez Singleton, and in an effort to remedy the situation, I went to the grocery store after work the other day. I purposely skipped Safeway by work and went over to Harris Teeter in Alexandria because I knew that they'd have everything that I needed. Ah, the best laid plans. This grocery store is in (or next door to) Pentagon Row, a big 'ole complex of restaurants and shops and apartments. Usually I'm there in the morning and parking isn't an issue, but at 5:30 pm on Tuesday night this parking lot was bumping. In fact, there was a decided lack of parking spaces, and the parking lot had turned into one of those disaster zones where people wait and put on their blinker to get a spot. Or, even worse, they tail people around the parking lot to snag their space. I have no patience for this, and I quickly aborted the mission and proceeded on to Whole Foods. As a result, I was able to get some superior meat and organic frozen fruit, but alas, I left without the Baked Lays for these onion rings.


So, I subbed Pirate's Booty! I followed the suggestions and added a little bit of onion and garlic powder to the mixture. As you can see in the picture, I had some trouble getting the crumbs to stick to the onions, but other than that this was a simple recipe. I'm not a really big fan of onion rings, but I thought that these were delicious! I'm sure that they'll be a repeat recipe around here. Thanks, Mary Ann, for picking such a great recipe!

BBA SOS: Casatiello

I seem to lack motivation these days. I'm not sure why as I tend to be a "get it done" sort of girl, but I haven't been able to motivate myself to blog, or to run, or to call people back (although, honestly, I've never been really good at the last one). I'll blame it on summer vacation. Being back in school is great, and summer vacation is even better. This means that I have time to do all of the fun things that I've wanted to do since I moved to D.C. Even better, people come visit, and life is a big social event. I *heart* summer vacation. Or maybe it's that I spend my days motivating my students to write and I'm motivated out by the end of it? Who knows, really? And excuses are just that, excuses.

All excusing aside, I devoted a large chunk of my time to catching up on the BBA challenge this past weekend, and I managed to get through ciabatta bread. In the meantime, I'm going to post more than a week late on the casatiello bread. Casatiello made its debut in the Singleton's kitchen this past winter, but I never posted it. Sooo, I was really just going to cheat and post my pictures from the first time that I made this delicious bread. But then I saw Nancy's post. She made the cutests casatiello rolls. Now, I'll admit, there are many times when I cheat because Dudley is here to help me eat a lot of what I make and bake, so it isn't always a true Singleton's kitchen. Or, I give things away frequently. But, I can tell you, more often than not, one of the biggest issues I have is what on earth, or how on earth, I'm going to deal with all of this food? There's only so much food one person can eat, and I only have so much space in my freezer. This is why I love anything that can be broken down into single serving portions and saved for later. Eat some, freeze some, give some away! The saving for later part is VERY important! With that in mind, I made the minis and I'm looking forward to working my way through them at a later date.

By the way, casatiello rocks. It's soft, delicious bread, and it really is sort of a meal in itself. I think that these rolls are the perfect accompaniment for a nice green salad. They're very rich, it must be due to that whole butter and egg combination again, but they're soft and pillowy, and I just love the added meat and cheese. The first time I made casatiello I purchased authentic Italian cured salami. This past time, I used the some sliced sopressata that I had leftover from an antipasti platter. I do think that this is such a versatile bread and the add-ins are numerous. It's just one more reason why I adore Peter Rheinhart and all of his fabulous bread!

Sweet Melissa Sundays: Whole Orange Poppy Seed Cake

This week's Sweet Melissa Sundays comes to us courtesy of Melissa. Check out her blog, Lulu the Baker, for the recipe, and if you're anything like me, you'll be completely smitten with the green and white polka dots and fabulous kitchen creations.

I love tea cakes, and this orange poppy seed version is fabulous! I actually ended up using Minneola tangerines because they were on sale. I'm not sure if this changed the outcome or not, but I do know that this is delicious. I made four minis rather than one large loaf. Two are in the freezer, and Dudley ate the other two yesterday. He LOVED this bread/cake. I'd just finished taking the pictures when he got here yesterday morning and he proceeded to demolish the loaf and the orange slices, too (oh, to be really tall and eat whatever I want!). Yesterday afternoon he was scrounging around for something to eat while I was in the middle of a bake-a-thon. As I was trying to shoo him out of the kitchen he spotted the second mini loaf and, "OH, may I please have some of that delicious bread?" I happily sent him on his way, and out of the kitchen, with the second loaf of cake. Not to worry, I had a bite, and I can also say that it's very delicious! Thanks, Melissa, for such a wonderful pick this week. I know that this is a repeat recipe for me.

Tate's Bakeshop Beach Brownies

As much as I love posting on this blog, and I do, I love reading other blogs. One of the first blogs that I came across when I was discovering the oh-so addictive world of food blogging was Cookie Madness. I usually try to take a peek at what Anna's baking, and I've gotten some great recipes from her site. One day, she posted about the Tate's Bakeshop Cookbook -- specifically their chocolate chip cookies. I went on over to Amazon and read the reviews of this book, and it wasn't that long before I'd found a nice used copy to add to my shopping cart. This cookbook is outstanding! There are so many recipes that I'd like to try, and I also really want to take a field trip up to the Hamptons to check this place (and several others) out! Anyone want to join in?

These brownies are my first foray into the book. The name immediate caught my attention. Beach Brownies anyone? Umm, I like the beach, and I like brownies -- sign me up! These are a brownie take on s'mores, one of my favorite things in the world, and I think that there are several s'mores brownies floating around the blogosphere. Baking Bites has a S'mores Cookie Bar that I made last summer, and let me tell you, it's outstanding! I'm always up for a new take on the S'more, and I definitely wanted to try these.

These brownies are not for the faint of heart, though. It's a huge batch of brownies, and mine was a little bit bigger because I had to use two 8x8" pans rather than a 9x13" pan. The recipe calls for quite a bit of butter, nearly 3 sticks, and quite a bit of chocolate. In case anyone might wonder (because I had no idea) one bag of chocolate chips is 2 cups of chocolate chips. So, for this recipe, you'll need almost 2 bags of chocolate chips or 21 ounces of chocolate. I suggest making these for a crowd, or for a few really hungry boys.

They're worth it though! These brownies are so sinfully delicious. Dudley's favorite part was the graham cracker base, but my favorite part happened to be the chunks of milk chocolate floating in the brownies. Or maybe it was the marshmallows -- I could never quite decide. At any rate, they're a fantastic summer brownie, and I was so sad when I went to have another one and I found out they were all gone.

Oh, I did make the very famous Tate's chocolate chip cookies, and they're every bit as good as their reputation. In fact, they're so good that they were devoured before a picture could be taken. I'll have to make more!


Beach Brownies
Tates Bakeshop Cookbook

Graham Cracker Base:
2 cups graham cracker crumbs
7 tablespoons salted butter, melted

Brownie:
1 cup salted butter
1 1/2 cups sugar
3 1/2 cups semisweet chocolate chips
1 tablespoon vanilla
5 large eggs
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1/4 tsp salt
4 oz milk chocolate, chopped
12 large marshmallows, cut in half

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

To make the base: In a small bowl, combine the graham cracker crumbs and melted butter. Spoon the mixture into a glass 9x13" pan and pat down evenly to cover the bottom only. Set it aside.

To make the brownies: In a medium saucepan, heat the butter and sugar, stirring until the butter and sugar are melted.
In a large bowl, add the chocolate chips. Pour the hot sugar mixture over the chocolate chips and stir till it is melted. Add the vanilla and mix. Beat in the eggs, one at a time.
In a medium bowl, mix the flour and salt together. Add the flour mixture to the chocolate mixture and stir until they are just combined. Stir in the milk chocolate.
Pour mixture into a prepared pan and spread it evenly. Place the marshmallows, cut side down, evenly over the top. Try to arrange it so that each brownie has a marshmallow half on it.
Bake the brownies for 35 minutes, or until they are slightly firm to the touch. Do not overbake.
Let the brownies cool, then cut them.

Aromatic Noodles with Peanut Lime Sauce

I'm late for work, but I really want to get this post up before I leave. It came down to commenting on papers or blogging. And I chose blogging. I decided I could conference rather than comment. Woo hoo! I'm determined to get back into the blogging swing. I have bunches of yummy things to post, and besides, I really miss reading all of the blogs. If I were honest, that's always been my favorite part of blogging.

Anyhoozles, I was super organized and I made these noodles last Friday. I didn't take the picture until Tuesday. So, what you see is actually the dregs of the noodles. My sister came into town last weekend to visit . . . and to go to the Elton John Billy Joel concert. This blogging thing has gotten me into trouble because instead of going out to dinner, people expect me to cook! EEK! I was trying to think of something that I could get together after work and these noodles came to mind. I love peanut sauce, and I would put it on just about anything, hence I love these noodles. I skipped the broccoli and used snap peas and carrots. The noodles are seriously delicious, and I'll definitely be revisiting this recipe! I served this with Mary Ann's potstickers and dinner was a hit all around!

Dudley, Sis, & the Singleton

CEiMB

I have been a Craving Ellie slacker lately, but I promise it hasn't been intentional slackage. I actually made the recipes for the last two weeks -- I just never posted them. However, I didn't make the lobster rolls that Duff, of Lonely Sidecar, chose for this week. Do go visit her blog, though, and not just to check out the recipe. Lonely Sidecar is easily one of my very favorite blogs. Duff is a fantastic, and interesting, blogger -- and some of her posts leave me in fits of laughter. Last week I thought that I would blog about the breakfast cookies and the vegetable cheese strata on Thursday, but I ended up not blogging on vacation. I don't know why I thought I would, actually, but I really thought I would.


First up, the vegetable cheese strata. Now, I made a strata last March when I was eating down my fridge and I remembered why while I was making this one. I don't like broccoli, it's so cliche, I know, but I dislike it nonetheless. I'm so-so on button mushrooms, and as I had some other veggies around, I decided to swap. I made my strata with some blanched farmers market green beans and some frozen chopped spinach. I used some chicken sausage that I had on hand in place of the ham, and I used Seduction Bread from Whole Foods (am I the only person who loves this bread?). When it was all said and done, I'd cleared my fridge of:

• Dijon mustard
• green beans
• spinach
• parmesan cheese
• shredded cheese blend
• chicken sausage
• eggs
• milk

And this was great! I love having a nice, clean refrigerator when I leave to go out of town. And, best of all, the strata was delicious. I loved the addition of sundried tomatoes -- yum!

On to the breakfast cookies. I was really nervous about making these cookies. I chose Sweet Melissa's breakfast cookies when it was my turn to pick the Sweet Melissa recipe, and I didn't like them at all. I actually threw most of them away, and I almost never throw my naked goods away unless I think they're absolutely without redeeming qualities. Add to that expereince the fact that these are made with carrot baby food and I was pretty much determined to sit this one out. But, then I read that you could substitute apple sauce and I thought maybe I'd make 1/2 of a recipe. Then I saw that a recipe only makes 12 cookies and I decided that I'd make the whole thing. I made the recipe with KA white whole wheat flour, Special K High Protein cereal (it seems similar to bran flakes to me), and dried cranberries. I am so glad I made these! They are absolutely delicious, and they're a wonderful breakfast solution. They taste healthy . . . but not too healthy. I know that I'll make them again!

This ends my CEiMB catch-up posts and I shoud be back to normal by next week!

TWD: Tribute to Katherine Hepburn Brownies

Oh botheration! I am so behind on my blogging, and I do apologize for it. I've actually managed to keep up with making and baking. I just haven't managed to keep up with posting. I got swamped with work and then I left for a bit to go on vacation with my family. I just returned from a lovely trip to Blackberry Farm, and things should hopefully return to normal around here.

Lazy feet in a hammock . . . what a nice way to spend the morning.

I think that I'm a lucky girl, and one reason is because I've had the opportunity to know my grandparents very well. I'm the oldest child of an oldest child, so growing up my grandparents were "young" grandparents. I also had a great-grandmother, BaBa, who is the source of my love of baking. She would come to Houston every year, either for Thanskgiving or Christmas, and I would always help her make the cinnamon rolls, cheese bread, and homemade noodles on my days off of school. When she moved to Houston when I was in middle school, I would go over to her house and we'd pour through issues of Bon Appetit, and make lists of all of the menus we wanted to make. I learned so much from her, and while I am certain that I would like to be in the kitchen without her influence, I credit her with my continued desire to try new things when I'm cooking. When she passed away, my grandmother asked me what I would like, and I asked for her recipe files. She had two metal recipe boxes, one green and one gray, with all of her clipped recipes. When I was going through them right after she passed, I came across a clipping for Katherine Hepburn's brownies. I never made them, but I remembered them because the preface to the recipe included an anecdote similar to Dorie's about Katherine Hepburn and her brownies. I adore Katherine Hepburn. I started watching old movies when I was in about 8th grade or so, and I love all of her movies, but I think that my favorite has to be The Philadelphia Story. So, the combination of memories of my BaBa's recipe files, Katherine Hepburn, and brownies had me very excited to try this recipe.

I made these brownies right before I left for vacation. I had a ton of work to do before I left and some of this work involved a very late night typing my stundents' creative writing anthology. What better fuel for a night of editing and typing then brownies? The brownies are a seriously easy, one bowl/pan recipe. I made them as directed, minus the nuts, baked them, and ate them. No problems here. They're very, very fudgy -- perhaps a little too fudgy for my taste -- but very delicious. Dudley was over when I made them, and he found the Sweet Melissa Brown Sugar Vanilla ice cream in my freezer and used the two to make a delicious brownie sundae. I enjoyed mine plain while typing, and Dudley enjoyed the rest while he took care of Lucy for me. Thanks to Lisa of Surviving Oz for picking this delightful recipe!