Recipe Box Project

Well, I knew it would happen eventually.

Remember way back when this project first started and I was making one cheesecake every month?

That was a long 12 months.

I thought I ran out of cheesecakes and while I definitely ran out of cheesecakes proper, I did find this recipe only a few days ago for ‘Philly Marble Squares.’ And let’s be real: these are chocolate chip cheesecake brownies. So I wasn't super thrilled to find the recipe... because I'm still recovering from the cheesecake saga of 2015-2016.

Do you ever set kitchen goals for yourself? Like, ‘I’m going to learn how to make macarons’ or ‘I’m going to learn and master the difference between Swiss and Italian meringue buttercream’ or ‘I’m going to teach myself to frost cakes’ or whatever? No? Just me? Well, if so, I think it’s important to note that I’ve conquered macarons and buttercreams and frosting techniques are next on my list.

Well, one of my cooking goals has been to get better about mise-en-place, or prepping for a recipe before I actually dive in to cooking it. It seems silly, but getting all the ingredients together, measured, and set aside would save me a shedload of dishes (no dishwasher, remember?) and probably drastically improve the results of my more sensitive baking endeavours. The unexpected bonus of cooking in this way is that it makes me feel like Julia Child hosting a cooking show when I have pre-measured glass prep bowls filled with ingredients I can just pour gracefully into the mixing bowl instead of faffing around looking for a measuring cup while my whipped cream overwhips itself into butter or my meringue falls flat before I have a chance to stir in my almonds. (Can you tell I’ve been on a macaron kick over here?)

I was on the fence about how much prepping for a recipe before actually cooking it could really help make the process go smoothly, but I gave it a try on this recipe and now I’m never going back. It’s an easy recipe, but it does require several steps that need to be taken fairly simultaneously, so I’ve listed the steps below such that you won’t get stuck halfway through realising that your chocolate isn’t melted or your cream cheese mixture isn’t… mixed. Doing it this way gives you ample time at the beginning to be interrupted if, say, your puppy needs a sudden walk while you’re still in the middle of sifting the flour and somehow makes the actual ‘active cooking’ part shrink to take up almost no time at all.

I thought these would be just a slightly softer, richer brownie when I read the recipe, and honestly was afraid they might come out too firm to really be enjoyable but not only was I wrong, I was thrilled to be wrong. I haven’t made brownies this good in awhile, and I make a lot of brownies. The ‘brownie’ part is less dense and fudgy than a normal brownie and verges closer to a really soft sour cream pound cake; top that with a barely-sweetened cream cheese mixture and stud the whole thing with chocolate chips and you’re in business. A dessert that tastes as good chilled from the fridge as it does at room temperature, doesn’t leave your fingers a sticky mess and involves no ‘wait for cake to cool, then frost’ steps is a win in my book. This passed the test of someone who doesn’t love cheesecake but does love chocolate (me) and someone who doesn’t love cake but does love cheesecake (Judson). Bonus? When I presented them to a group, they were gone in less than a minute.

The verdict:

4 spoons out of five, but ONLY because they rose unevenly so the top of the dish of brownies looked rippled. But I think it's important to note that this is a spoon demotion purely for cosmetic reasons, not flavour.

One year ago: One-Egg Cake with Creamy chocolate frosting
two years ago: Brioche

the recipe:

Chocolate Chip Cheesecake Brownies

the directions:

Grease and flour a 10x15-inch jelly roll pan (I think this would work just as well in a cake pan of a similar size).
Preheat oven to 185C/375F.
Combine flour, 2 c sugar, baking soda and salt in a bowl and set aside.
Combine 2 eggs and sour cream, stir well and set aside.
Combine cream cheese and remaining 1/3 c sugar, stirring until smooth.
Add remaining egg to cream cheese mixture, stir until smooth and set aside.
Combine butter, water & unsweetened chocolate in a pot and melt over medium heat. Bring to a boil then immediately remove from heat.
Stir in flour mixture to melted butter mixture until thick and pulling away from sides of bowl.
Add sour cream mixture and stir until uniform.
Pour into prepared jelly roll pan.
Pour cream cheese mixture over chocolate mixture, trying to pour uniformly across the entire surface.
Drag a knifepoint through the mixture in swirly designs to create a marble effect.
Sprinkle with chocolate chips, then bake 20-30 minutes until pan jiggles just slightly in the middle and a wooden pick inserted in the middle comes out clean.

the ingredients:

2 c flour
2 1/3 c sugar, divided
1 tsp baking soda
½ tsp salt
3 eggs, 2 for base and 1 for topping
½ c sour cream
8 oz cream cheese, room temperature
½ c butter
¾ c water
1 ½ oz unsweetened chocolate
6 oz semi-sweet chocolate chips

You're not supposed to mix the chips into the batter. But I misread and sprinkled some in. Don't be like me.

It's been awhile, dear reader. I know that, you know that, and while I'm ashamed to admit the way that I let 2016 get away from me, let's be real: it wasn't a great year for most of the world. On a personal level, I travelled more than I ever have in a single 12 month period (14 trips, 10 of them outside Scotland!), I quit a job that was leading nowhere and acquired a job in my field that I love (all within a week of each other!), and I planned & executed a week-long major event at my workplace- in fun news, I read more books for pleasure in 2016 than I think I have since high school (part of this was an escapism urge, and maybe better used elsewhere); Judson got his UK driver's license (a process that took him two years because of all the hoops we have to jump through) and a much-deserved promotion along with lucrative and fun freelance design gigs, and we got to see friends from all over the world here in Edinburgh.

So maybe that explains a little of why I was in and out of here all throughout last year. I can't claim burnout on something I had done for only a year previously, but starting a new job really took so. much. energy. and then I got used to being able to come home after a long day and relax with a book instead of trying to cook/photograph/edit/write/post and it was a nice change of pace. Previously, throughout the entirety of my adult life I've almost always been looking for a job, so now that I have a job I like, it was a pleasing change of events to not have anything I had to be doing. So with my birthday and the holiday season on the horizon in early November, I resolved to get back in the saddle and start cooking again. In fact, I had a whole celebratory post written about my birthday and the US election and how excited I was about both (I made tiny sugar cookies in the shapes of gingerbread ladies on election day, and I was STOKED). But then when I awoke to the news the next morning, my spirits were crushed and November became more about surviving than it was about writing.

On the bright side, these months off have allowed me to experiment more with the things I love to cook, and Judson and I have never eaten better. From duck & sweet potato rosti to brown butter kimchi ramen, from my (other) grandmother's cinnamon rolls and egg nog to the booziest cranberry sauce I ever accidentally made, it's been a good time to be a resident of the Cowan house.

But I've missed cooking these weird recipes and I've missed Eleanor. I miss engaging with the past in this way and I miss, honestly, the reminder that the world spins madly on. The reminder that other people (other women) have been through good times and bad for eons before me and that we'll continue to survive no matter what the future holds.

So here's a simple recipe for getting back in the saddle. Maybe you've never been much of a 'homemade' type person, maybe you hate cooking, maybe you're trying to cut out packaged foods in the new year, or maybe, like me, the kitchen is an old friend you've just been treating badly for the last few months. Here's a recipe that takes only a few minutes to whip up but will leave you pleased with your efforts and without too many dishes to clean, and your friends will think it's fab that you made them a home-baked dessert... if you decide to share.