I have always used a brownie recipe for 47 years from The Family Circle Cookbook my parents gave me as a newly-wed (but brought up at my best cook ever mother's knees baking along). Everyone has their own favorite brownies, but to me it is a perfect mix of chewy, fudgy and cakey.

It calls for melting 2 squares of unsweeted chocolate in 1 stick of butter. It also calls for creaming a cup of sugar into 2 eggs. Then when the eggs/sugar mixture is light and thick, stirring-in the chocolate-butter mixture (then folding in the dry ingredients).

It always has a perfect shiny crust. So perhaps it is using actual chocolate -- either chips or squares, and not using cocoa.

• Reply