The chocolate holiday

Let's admit it, for some of us, Valentine's Day is just an excuse to indulge in as much chocolate as we can. With that in mind I want to share two of my favorite chocolate desserts.
They will win the heart of any valentine on your list.

First, these very simple and very tasty brownies. I have made them several times this year already.
They were a touchdown at the Super Bowl party I went to !

Katharine Hepburn's Brownies   

Ingredients
    •     ½ cup unsweetened cocoa powder
    •    1/2 cup butter
    •    2 eggs
    •    1 cup sugar
    •    ¼ cup flour
    •    1 cup broken-up walnuts or pecans
    •    1 teaspoon vanilla
    •    pinch of salt

 

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Grease an 8x8 inch pan.

2. Melt butter in saucepan with cocoa and stir until smooth. Remove from heat and allow to cool for a few minutes.

3) Whisk in eggs, one at a time. Stir in vanilla.

4) In a separate bowl, combine sugar, flour, nuts, and salt. 

5) Add to the cocoa-butter mixture. Stir until just combined.

6) Pour into a greased 8x8 square pan.  

7) Bake 35-40 minutes. Do not overbake; they should be gooey. 

8) Here comes the hard part...let cool, and cut into bars. It's important to let them cool, as the texture changes.

 

For something a bit fancier, for that special Valentine's day dinner, here's my flourless chocolate cake.

I made this one as the dessert for my Hearts card game party.

 

 

 

Flourless Chocolate Cake

 

Ingredients
4 ounces fine-quality bittersweet chocolate (not unsweetened)
1/2 cup butter

3/4 cup sugar

3 large eggs

1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 teaspoon vanilla and/or almond extract or any liqueur of your choice
1/2 teaspoon salt.

 

1) Preheat oven to 375°F

2) Butter an 8-inch round baking pan. Line bottom with a round of parchment paper and butter paper.

 

3) Chop chocolate into small pieces. 

4) In a double boiler or metal bowl set over a saucepan of barely simmering water, melt chocolate with butter, stirring, until smooth.

5) Remove top of double boiler heat, you can transfer it into a bowl at this point, whisk sugar into chocolate mixture. 

6) Add eggs and whisk well.

7)  Sift 1/2 cup cocoa powder into chocolate mixture and whisk until just combined.

8) Pour batter into pan.

9) Bake in middle of oven 25 minutes, or until top has formed a thin crust. 

10) Cool cake in pan on a rack 5 minutes and invert onto a serving plate, if you plan to serve it immediately. Be careful it is delicate and crumbles easily. I made mine ahead of time, so after it cooled, I put it in the fridge in the pan. I recommend this.

 

This cake begs for a topping, I decided on vanilla ice cream and boysenberry sauce. It was delightful, tangy and the perfect foil for the chocolate. The heart sugar cookie was my friend's addition ;-)