My favorite is ghirardelli triple chocolate brownie mix. Mixes aren't usually my thing, but for these puppies, I make an exception. They are super fudgy and super chocolate-y and so easy to make. I get the mix at Costco and keep it on hand for the picnic or bring along. Always a hit!

I'm more of a mix person myself. I follow directions on the box very well. lol I do have a Pampered Chef brownie pan that makes the little brownies which is really nice.

I'm a mix person too. IMO, brownie mixes produce just as good as homemade from scratch and are far easier. I also like Ghirardelli's but it doesn't have to be the triple chocolate and pretty much any other mix will do as well. I do add a dash of cinnamon to enhance the chocolate!

I adapted this from the recipe booklet that came with my old Cuisinart FP - I never make anything else, and I like them thin and chewy/crusty:

1 Dish Cocoa Brownies

yield: 8-16 brownies

Super-chocolate-y & chewy when baked thin. I use butter to grease the pan .

Ingredients:

1 cup + 2 Tbsp. sugar

1/2 cup softened butter or olive oil - or both

2 eggs + 1-2 Tbsp. water

1/4 tsp. salt

1-2 tsp. vanilla(to taste)

1/2 cup cocoa powder

1/2 cup flour

3/4 cup chopped/broken nuts (optional)

Preheat oven - 350F

Grease a 9x13 inch baking pan for thin brownies, 9 inch square pan for thick ones.

In a bowl, blend cocoa, salt & sugar, then add shortening & cream, then add eggs, water & vanilla & beat until slightly fluffy. Add flour & mix until smooth. (I do this by hand)

Pour into prepared pan & sprinkle nuts(if desired) on top. Bake 20-30 minutes, or until edges pull away from sides of the pan & top no longer appears moist.Chill before cutting.

Top brownies - if desired - w/ this rich glaze:

1/2 cup semi sweet choc. chips

2 Tbsp. butter or margarine

1 Tbsp. honey or corn syrup

Melt everything together in a small pan over very low heat, stirring well until

smooth. Drizzle(prettier) or spread over brownies while warm. I like to sprinkle some flaky sea salt on top before it sets.

Store in fridge - if you have leftovers, that is

I have more than a dozen brownie recipes but T&T this is the best:

Brownies—Betty Crocker Looseleaf Cookbook c. 1970-ish

INGREDIENTS

2 oz unsweetened chocolate
1/3 cup shortening (butter, 100C per margarine or vegan baking sticks work fine)
1 cup sugar
2 large eggs
3/4 cup flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup nuts, chopped [opt.]

DIRECTIONS

Heat oven 350
Grease 8x8 pan
Combine dry ingredients
Melt chocolate with shortening
Beat in sugar and eggs
Mix in dry, then nuts
Pour in pan and bake 30-35 min. Until slight finger poke stays slightly

Or for something different, and a great way to use old bananas, this "brownie" (using white baking chocholate -- really a small, short yellowie) is really good.

https://backforseconds.com/banana-brownies/

I’ve not made these myself but have tried them. Very good and I’m not even a big brownie fan.

Sally’s Baking Addiction - Brownies

Sally does good recipes. :)

I typically make the Katherine Hepburn brownie recipe but mean to try Maida Heatter’s Palm Beach Brownies.

Saw a promo for this in passing: The Kitchen S40E4 9-13-25 Slow cooker fudgy brownies. I thought the picture looked kinda disgusting, but I prefer fudgy fudge and moist but open textured brownies. ;) If fudgy is your thing, however, maybe this could be it.

I stopped using any other recipe after finding One Bowl Brownies on the Baker's unsweetened chocolate squares box. It is SO easy and delicious.

One Bowl Brownies

I like Ina Garten's "Outrageous Brownies", they make a big pan, something like 12x10, and have coffee as well as a pound of butter and 3 eggs. It makes enough for a big family dinner or other gathering. It's rich and that coffee just hits right for me.

Annie

I have not made these. My own favorite is Jiffy Mix brownies. but I saw this not long ago from a poster I follow and I liked the story. My real question is, chocolate processing has changed since 1893 according to the preface in a later Julia Child Mastering the Art of French Cooking book, so I wonder how this would turn out today. One thing I found interesting: they were traditionally frozen and served cold!

Palmer House Brownies

Chicago has given the world a lot of famous foods, but the brownie is one of our best firsts. The very first brownie was created here in 1893 when Bertha Honoré Palmer was asked to come up with a dessert for the World’s Columbian Exposition that people could eat while walking around in the heat. She went straight into the Palmer House kitchen and invented something small, portable, and so rich it probably stopped conversations. It was named the brownie, most likely because of its deep, dark chocolate color. And unlike the later cookbook versions that started showing up in 1904, the Palmer House brownie is made with more than a pound of melted chocolate and a pound of melted butter. It is finished with a light apricot glaze, which gives it that shiny top and a little tang. The texture is part fudge, part brownie, crispy and chewy on the edges, ultra dense in the center, and best served very cold because otherwise it turns into a delicious chocolate avalanche.

This is the original 1893 recipe. Over the years the Palmer House has made tweaks, and their online recipe reflects those changes, no matter how often they say it is the original. This one is verified through research. If you want to know what thousands of fairgoers tasted for the first time in their lives, this is it. And if you change anything the first time you make it, you will never know what it was supposed to taste like.

YIELD: About 24 brownies. Active time: 20 minutes.

Brownie ingredients:

1 lb plus 2 oz high‑quality semi‑sweet chocolate (or four 3.5‑ounce bars).

1 lb butter (2 cups or 4 sticks).

12 oz granulated sugar.

8 oz cake flour.

1 tablespoon baking powder.

4 large eggs.

1 lb crushed, toasted walnuts.

Apricot glaze ingredients:

1 cup water.

1 cup apricot preserves.

1 envelope unflavored gelatin powder.

Instructions:

Melt the chocolate and butter together in a double boiler or a heatproof bowl over very hot water. In a separate bowl, mix the dry ingredients except the walnuts. Combine the melted chocolate mixture with the dry ingredients. Whisk in the eggs one at a time, taking about five minutes from the first egg to the last. Butter and flour a 9 x 12 baking dish.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

Toast the walnuts for about fifteen minutes until fragrant, then lower the oven to 300 degrees. Chop the walnuts and set aside.

Spread the batter into the prepared pan. It will be very liquid. Sprinkle the chopped walnuts on top and press them down slightly. Bake at 300 degrees for 45 to 50 minutes until the edges have crisped about two inches around the pan. The center will still be slightly jiggly. These brownies will always test gooey in the center because of how rich the batter is. Cool on a rack for thirty minutes.

The brownies were served near frozen at the Fair, and restaurants continued serving them that way. For the cleanest slices, freeze the brownies for three hours after glazing, then cut and serve while very cold.

To make the glaze, mix the water, preserves, and gelatin in a saucepan over medium heat. Whisk until boiling and let it boil for two minutes. Spread the hot glaze over the warm brownies. Cool completely, then freeze for three to four hours. Slice and serve cold.

Y I do remember Ina Garten adding coffee to her brownie mix...IIRC someone did a taste test and the coffee enhances the chocolate flavor but does not taste like coffee or mocha. It just makes it taste like better chocolate.

Some tempting recipes to try, here...

I use espresso coffee in my mud cake -- she's right, it enhances the chocolate without imparting any coffee-like flavor.

When I made Ina’s brownies I cut back on the coffee, but I also halved the ingredients using 1 T. of instant coffee (full recipe calls for 3 T.). The full recipe makes a lot using a 12x18x1 pan. I used a 9x13x1 pan for half. They’re very rich. Coffee does elevate the chocolate, but less works better for me since I’m not a fan of coffee-flavored desserts.

^^ I think there's only a tablespoon or two in my mud cake recipe, but I'd have to look it up to be exact; it certainly isn't much.

^^^My chocolate cake recipe include 1 cup of "strong" coffee: I make it with about a tablespoon and a half of instant. You can't taste it.

My brownie recipes is an adaptation of the recipe on the back of the Baker's chocolate bar, because it's hard to get American style chocolate here (the fat proportions are different). Over the years I've literally made hundreds of dozens of these as they're pretty much my go-to for work morning tea and any event, and I used to bake 4 dozen every weekend and sell them for a fundraiser. They are always popular and when my SIL took some leftover brownies from a family event to her mother's nursing home, the little old ladies there asked for the recipe :-)

Brownies

Place into a glass bowl

250g/half a pound of butter (not margarine)

2 cups of caster/superfine sugar

Zap in the microwave until the butter is melted and bubbling, a few minutes. Stir well.

Beat in

2 tsp vanilla

3 beaten large eggs

Until well mixed. Next, stir in

100g / 1 1/4 cups cocoa (not hot chocolate) powder, sifted

1 cup chopped pecans (my be subbed for other nuts or omitted)

and finally, stir in

1 cup plain/allpurpose flour

Pour into a 25cm/10"square pan which has been greased and lined with greased baking paper. Do not use foil as it tends to stick. Bake at 180C/350F for about 45 minutes, or until the edges just start to pull away from the sides of the pan (ovens can vary). Remove the pan from the oven and place on a cooling rack for at least ten minutes (more is fine). Turn out onto a cutting board and cut into 16 pieces.

I cut mine into triangles, cutting from corner to corner, then in halves vertically and horizontally, then from the centre of each side to the centre of the next side, rather than squares. I'm not a fan of edges, and with squares you get four two edged pieces, eight one edged pieces and four no edge pieces. My way you get eight one edge pieces and eight no edge pieces :-D

I do that too colleen, with cakes and puddings.

I've tried quite a few brownie recipes and the best are always the ones someone else bakes.

It seems I haven't found the perfect recipe - oh they all taste great. My problem is judging when they're done and trying to find the perfect balance between cake-like brownies and fudge-y brownies. My oven is calibrated, the extra oven thermometer reads true - the problem is me.

Nothing add, just scrolled down to see what Ricky would have to say! 😂

@maire_cate, understandable! Are you looking for advice or just commenting? if the latter, read no further.

If other things you cook/bake always come out the same each time in your well calibrated oven, you just need to be scientific. :) Keep a brownie journal. Record the oven temp by setting and thermometer, the time, the results in texture, etc. Also note the weather, the ambient temperature of the kitchen (you can always use your extra oven thermometer and remember to put it back in the oven), if the air feels humid or dry, family/eater opinions of the results, etc.

To even up the starting poinys, take out all your ingredients as you pre-heat the oven, and wait until they're room temperature and the oven has been at set temperature at least half an hour. Not only will this make your experiments more like to like, these ar the general recommendations for baking, even though they're rarely seen in recipes. Brownies are pretty forgiving, so don't really need the precautions, but until you have down pat the brownie you want, it's a good idea to follow them.

If you keep at it, you'll not only find the right settings, you'll have a bunch of experienceto lean on going forward!

How about a great brownie with no or low sugar for us diabetics/pre-diabetics? Anyone?

Any baking recipie with chocolate gets instant coffee granuels or strong coffee in the case of 'water' added. Had a black bean brownie last week very good very chocolatey, very moist. Grandma Sue created it. As good as they were I said I would have added coffee.

@littlebug Zone 5 Missouri, in general, opting for something nutritious will be more satisfying in the long run, but there are brownie mixes in your category, and I just found this recipe, for fudgy gooey brownies, if you're willing to use the alternative ingredients, sounds like it might be brownie enough, and has under 10g total carbs (a little over 8g net) for a 2.25" square. And a ton of saturated fat. I don'tt know if it would work with vegan baking sticks instead of butter.

https://www.sweetashoney.co/sugar-free-brownies/

The recipe I have been using for years may have come from the Baker's Chocolate Bar box from eons ago, but it is pretty standard. Somewhere along the way, I started using only cocoa because I always have cocoa on hand. My DH came home with brownies his cousin had made that I tasted peanut butter in though she swore she never uses peanut butter. I really liked the peanut butter that wasn't in them. lol.

Anyway, I started subbing peanut butter for part of the butter. I screwed that up and added 1 cup peanut butter but only removed one stick of butter. But the taste was what I was looking for. Then I started reducing the sugar by 1 tablespoon each time I made them, so that I started out using 2 cups of sugar and am now down to 1 1/4 cups. The difference was barely noticeable until I got to 4 tablespoons less and then after that each batch tasted better than the last. I didn't notice much difference in volume until about 1/2 cup was removed. Decreasing the baking time was necessary. I started out baking them for 30 minutes and now bake them for only 20 minutes.

I'm not promoting any particular recipe, just suggesting that most brownie recipes would probably be fine with reducing the sugar. This is from a serious chocoholic with a major sweet tooth.

This prompted me to recall that I also reduce the sugar in the one bowl brownies from 2 cups to 1.5 cups.

Plllog - great suggestions. Thanks. Having the ingredients at room temp is a given - as is a proper preheat. Keeping track of the outcome is a good idea - especially since I often try different recipes or mixes. That makes consistently a tad difficult.

And you are so right about brownies being forgiving and fortunately my family is too. Actually I Idoubt they even care about the texture.

So... Maybe perfect one recipe first. Then if you're making a fudgier recipe, or a crustier edges, or just a bigger pan, you can apply your knowledge and make adjustments as needed for your oven, etc.

I don’t ’bake from scratch’ like I used to do, so my usual brownie is also Ghirardelli’s triple chocolate brownie mix. I almost always use a tablespoon or 3 of brewed coffee instead of water or other liquid. I occasionally make a Mississippi Mud Cake, which is basically a 9x13 brownie with mini marshmallows and then a chocolate frosting poured over the top while warm. I use brewed coffee in the frosting and no one has ever tasted coffee.

One recipe i have tried is the Ultimate Fudgy Brownie Recipe (linked in title) from Once Upon a Chef. Her recipe uses melted chocolate instead of cocoa. If you like a fudgy brownie, this one gets it right. She also has a recipe for a one-serving coffee cup brownie. I have also read that the King Arthur Flour recipe is a favorite among many but i can’t comment on that.

Outside, I was thinking King Arthur could be another good source.👍🏻

I love pot shake in my brownies.

One more vote for Ghirardelli Triple Fudge Brownie Mix. Have also used the King Arthur mix. Both are much easier and just as good as any I have made from scratch.

My go to for potlucks is Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Brownies. 1 box of Ghirardelli Triple Fudge Brownie Mix mixed as directed, one batch of Tollhouse Chocolate Chip Cookie batter made as directed. Drop the cookie dough by the spoonful into the brownie mix and bake.

It seems a lot of recopies now have them layered rather than dropped, but everyone loves them the way I make them, so not changing any time soon.

mine look like this:

Jennifer, those look great! Not long ago I came across this recipe on Instagram.

I recently considered making brownies with cheesecake tops, which is another popular layered recipe. Some of the recipes look quite good. I draw the layered line of brownie layers at lemon bar. I do not want lemon curd on brownies, blondies or anything in between, but the chocolate chip drops and cheesecake layers look good.

Oh, those look soooo good, Jennifer!

I decided to try the Sally's recipe (link above), pretty much solely for the reason I've gotten some good recipes off that website before. I skipped the frosting, though. The brownies were good but not "it" for me. Neither was the recipe I tried from the Death By Chocolate cookbook I have, but I liked the Sally's better than the DbC one -- those were more cake-like.

I think I might have figured out what it is I didn't like - there's cocoa powder in the two recipes I've tried so far, and I can not only taste it but sense it texture-wise. I don't know the best way to explain it, really.

I see some of the recipes in this thread don't have cocoa powder, I'll try one of those next. Or just buy a pan of brownies from the market, it's probably cheaper than all this testing; reference my other thread about expense...

Mr. Picky loves brownies. I made super chocolaty ones with Valrhona cocoa powder which I and the beloved helpers loved and he didn't. Another day I made the Betty Crocker with Baker's chocolate and he liked them fine. ;) You're not alone!

"You're not alone!"

Well, that's good to know! It's funny how an innocuous ingredient can be a turn-off for some folks.