OMG, these brownies are rich!!!

You would think that the 500g of chocolate, 500g of butter and 12 eggs would have given me a hint as to the absolute decadence I was about to create.  But I didn’t really turn my mind to the ingredients.  I was attracted to the photo of the gooey chocolate swirled tahini and to the fact that the recipe was called tahini brownies.  “Tahini brownies are something different,” I thought.   I love tahini and was relishing the combo of tahini and chocolate.  As it turns out, there is so much chocolate in these guys, you can barely taste the tahini.  But, jeez, they are good.  Joudie Kalla, the author of Palestine on a Plate, says one piece is enough but, to be honest, a tiny square with coffee may be enough. They are that rich.

As you can gather from the previous paragraph, this recipe is not for the faint hearted – a lot of chocolate, butter and eggs is involved here.  I cut my slab into 18 pieces and froze 12 pieces straight away.  As I did so, I said to Maus, “There is no point serving more than one piece each. No one is going to want two.”  Because they are so rich, you could easily cut them into 36 small squares.  A small square would be perfect with coffee.  If you aren’t feeding a crowd any time soon, do as I did and freeze the majority.  You can then take one out of the freezer whenever you feel like a gooey chocolate hit.

Recipe from Palestine on a Plate by Joudie Kalla

Ingredients:

• 500g dark chocolate (with 70% cocoa solids)
• 500g salted butter
• 500g golden caster sugar (This is just fine raw sugar.  I put some raw sugar in my Vitamix and gave it a couple of bursts to make it fine.  I am sure normal caster sugar would do just fine.)
• 160g plain flour
• 12 eggs, beaten
• 8 tbs* tahini

*These are 15 mil tablespoons.

Method:

1. Preheat your oven to 160°C fan.
2. Line a 23cm x 32cm deep baking tray with baking paper.
3. Put the chocolate and butter in a bowl and gently melt it in the microwave.  I put it on medium and gave it a stir every minute or so.
4. Once melted, add the sugar and mix well.
5. Add the flour and mix until no lumps remain.
6. Add the eggs and whisk well to thicken the mixture.
7. Pour the brownie mix into the prepared tray – level the surface.
8. Tap the tray on your bench top a couple of times to remove any air bubbles.
9. Drizzle the tahini all over the brownie mixture and swirl it to make a nice pattern.
10. Bake for about 40 minutes.  Check it regularly – you want the brownie to still have a slight wobble in the centre.
11. Remove from the oven and leave it to settle and rest for, at least, one hour before cutting and serving.
12. Ignore the calories, if you can 😦