Sunday, August 26, 2007

Fudge Cashew Brownies

Fudge Cashew BrowniesThese brownies are just what they advertise to be: glorious fudgy goodness in cake form. And though I'm not big on frosting, this hint of cream cheese sprinkled with cashews is wonderful.

Though now that I get a good look at that picture I'm suspicious that I ran out of cashews and used almonds as a substitute. Whoops. Just forget you noticed--cashews would be better.

1 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup butter or margarine
2 eggs
1/3 cup cocoa
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup chopped cashews

for frosting:
2 cups powdered sugar
2-4 tablespoons milk
2 tablespoons butter, softened
3 ounces cream cheese, softened
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/3 cup cashew halves

Heat oven to 350 degrees, lightly grease an 8-inch square baking pan. In a large mixing bowl, combine the sugar and butter. Beat with mixer on medium speed until light and fluffy. Add eggs, cocoa and vanilla. Beat at medium speed until well blended. Add flour, baking soda and salt. Beat flour, baking soda and salt. Beat at low speed until well blended. Stir in chopped cashews. Spread mixture evenly in prepared pan. Bake fro 23 to 33 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Don not over bake. Cool completely. In medium mixing bowl, combine frosting ingredients (except cashews). Beat at low speed of electric mixer until smooth. Spread frosting evenly over brownies. Sprinkle cashew halves evenly over frosting.

A note: if you want to have perfectly square brownies (maybe you're trying to impress the other moms at the bake sale or something) line the pan with aluminum foil and lightly grease before filling with batter. Then after baking let the brownies completely cool and lift the brownies out of the pan by the aluminum foil. If you really want to get fancy use a pizza cutter and straight edge to make them come out perfect. Though they might be so perfect you could scare some people.

Technorati tags:

14 comments:

Anonymous said...

Don't line anything with foil. The aluminum in the foil gets in the food and you are then ingesting it. This is not good and we've all been doing it for eons!! Your brownies look delish. Tessa

Loralee Choate said...

Whenever I bake brownies or anything that is supposed to be square, I head it off at the pass by talking about how much I love the casually quaint, yet elegant "Rustic Food Look".

:)

Deb said...

I have never baked or served anything perfectly square but none of it has ever failed to promptly disappear.

My cashew-addicted husband will be lobbying for these no doubt.

Blondie said...

I have NEVER thought of using a pizza cutter with such things. This is brilliant!!

Shelby said...

a pizza cutter for the brownies is an EXCELLENT idea - I shall do that next time :)

Sandy said...

I'm hungry.

Unknown said...

Hi, Michelle,

I just found your blog about a month ago through MarthaStewart.com. I am a big fan! I also graduated from BYU. It's a great place. Anyway, I love to try out new recipes and I am definitely going to try these brownies. I was thinking that you could have a contest where different bloggers submit their recipes and then you could have guest judges try to make them and pick a winning recipe. I don't really know what kind of recipes it would be or if you could have a winner in each category (ex: main dish, salad, dessert, etc). Just an idea. Thanks for such a great blog!

Daisy said...

So perfect you might scare people -- snicker. I know some moms like that. Not me, though. Not by a long shot.

Ice Cream said...

Is it ok if I just pick the cashews off the top? I'll even settle for the almonds. I'm just not a chocolate or icing fan. But I LOVE nuts.

Anonymous said...

Oh man those look good and sound good too!

Anonymous said...

OH STOP! You're torturing me!! (HA)!
It's almost 10 pm (EST) on Sunday night, and I'm just getting around to reading your blog..(Sorry)!
Too late to bake..too late to eat..your Fudge Cashew Brownie recipe
looks SO good...I'll have to try it ASAP! Thanks!

The Estrogen Files said...

Evil, evil, evil. Don't you know I'm on a DIET?! Okay, not diet, just careful eating and a bunch of exercise... Still, I will have to try these!

Heffalump said...

Ah...if I can keep cashews around long enough to make these. Cashews are my favorite nut, so I tend to just inhale them.

Lisa said...

These look yummy!