Fudgy vs. Cakey: A Deep Dive on Brownies with David Lebovitz

Episode Transcript

- That much further, you know?

- Oh, God, I love brownies so much.

- From King Arthur Baking Company, this is "Things Bakers Know." I'm David Tamarin, King Arthur's Editorial Director.

- And I'm Jessica Battilana, Staff Editor at King Arthur Baking. Today, we're talking about really one of my favorite baked goods, brownies.

- Yeah.

- Who doesn't love a brownie?

- They're everyone's favorite baked good. I mean, not to take away from you and your originality, you are a very original person. However, this is one instance where your Jess-opinion is, I think, widely shared.

- Yeah, for once.

- A very lovable thing.

- Yeah.

- I mean, there are outliers, people who don't like them, but many people-

- I feel strongly about them. I feel strongly that I love them-

- Mm-hmm.

- Which I hardly ever say on the show. We should start like a love and loathe list, you know? But brownies hold sort of as, I don't wanna say a special place in my heart, but kind of 'cause it was like the first-

- I would hate to say that.

- I would hate to say that. I don't wanna get all emotional so early in the day. But they were the first thing I learned how to bake. And I remember I had a babysitter, she was, you know, several years older than I was, and, probably, she was actually like six months older. I feel like when we were kids, our babysitters were also kids. But she had a subscription to "Seventeen" magazine. "Seventeen" magazine, for a while. had a, I don't wanna say food section, but they did some food content.

- Yeah.

- And there was a brownie recipe in there that I saw, and I was like, "I'm gonna do this." So I made those brownies a lot. And it was sort of, you know, I'm always telling beginner bakers to pick a recipe and just make it multiple times.

- Yes, get your reps in.

- But I perhaps overdid it, because I made those brownies like, I mean, it was all I made. Like, I would show up, I would have brownies. But I will say I made, like, every possible error-

- Wait, wait, what age are we talking about?

- I mean, I was probably 12.

- So you were showing up where?

- Oh, at the library.

- At the library?

- Yeah.

- Oh my gosh, librarians. Oh, so lucky.

- I brought the librarians brownies 'cause that was like my hangout.

- Oh my gosh.

- I thought the librarians were my friends. I mean, they probably were not, they just were taking pity on-

- Probably were, you were bringing them brownies.

- I was bringing them brownies. But I was like, you know, you learn the hard way. Like, what happens if I forget the eggs? Like, what happens if I use salt instead of sugar? Like, what happens if I mess up-

- Oh, salt instead of sugar? Like, a cup of salt? Did you do that?

- I don't know if I did a cup, but I made errors is all I'm saying. Like, they didn't always turn out.

- Mm-hmm

- But I kept coming back to that recipe. And I have since tried to find that, you know, I mean, the internet should be able to find anything.

- Yeah.

- So I've looked for that recipe. I don't remember exactly what was in those brownies, even though I made them so many times. I just remember that they were my preferred texture of brownie. And here's where we're getting, right to the meat of the matter.

- Right, exactly, 'cause that is-

- She was on the cover.

- A dividing line with so many people is are you a cakey brownie person, or are you a fudgy brownie person? And I believe later in this episode we're gonna talk about the myth of the chewy brownie.

- Well, and here's where I do have an opinion, which I can save for later. But, you know, I fall into one of these camps.

- Yes.

- And as I recall those "Seventeen"brownies, they were on the fudgier side.

- Mm-hmm.

- And, you know, there's also the question of like, "Do you prefer it all-cocoa brownie?"

- Right.

- Or, "Do you prefer a brownie made with chocolate?"

- I was just about to ask you if this was a cocoa brownie or a chocolate brownie.

- I don't remember.

- Oh.

- Isn't that pathetic? I think cocoa.

- Okay.

- I think cocoa, but I can't say for sure. But I will say if you add melted chocolate instead of cocoa, you're gonna have a wetter batter, which in turn means that you'll have to add more flour.

- Mm-hmm.

- Right? Because cocoa powder, like, sucks moisture out of something, which then could result in a, could result in a cakier brownie.

- Mm-hmm.

- I mean, that's just science. I do think that cocoa brownies tend to have a more intense chocolate flavor.

- Which is weird 'cause they don't have chocolate in them. Yeah.

- It is weird.

- I also think that, sort of, that can depend sometimes on what unsweetened chocolate you use in your chocolate brownie. I grew up using Baker's-

- Baker's.

- Which is not a high-quality chocolate, but, you know, I loved the brownies I made with it. I mean, they were kinda more sweet, not super chocolatey, you know, because that chocolates didn't have. It was probably mostly cocoa butter and not cocoa in that chocolate-

- I mean, and this is a little bit of a divertissement I'm gonna take us on. But, you know, if you eat a boxed brownie with your eyes closed, which I did recently actually, we were doing some, the R&D kitchen here was doing some testing and they had a bunch of boxed brownies because, you know, of course King Arthur has two brownie mixes, our All-American Brownie Mix and the Gluten-Free Brownie Mix. And so they had made those brownies and then a host of other mixes that are available on the market, and we were tasting them. And I was tasting them just for fun with my eyes closed. And quite a lot of brownie mixes, when you eat them with your eyes closed, don't actually taste like chocolate at all.

- Mm.

- They taste sweet.

- Sweet, yeah.

- I mean, and it's interesting you made, you know, the point about like the cocoa, like brownies made with cocoa, just the cocoa butter, right? So cocoa butter, obviously we've talked about this in our chocolate episode, is like a key part of chocolate.

- Mm-hmm.

- So cocoa brownies don't have any cocoa butter in them. And, you know, I do think that that's where some of the texture stuff comes in because a cocoa brownie is going to be, well, it gets hard when it's cool.

- A chocolate brownie.

- Yeah, I'm sorry, yes.

- So a melted chocolate-

- A melted chocolate brownie-

- Gets hard when it's cool because it has more cocoa butter-

- Yes.

- And butter solidifies-

- Yeah.

- Including cocoa butter solidifies in cooler temperatures.

- So I do think-

- And some people like that, I mean. And you get this density and you can achieve this sort of chewiness that way. I know there are some chewy brownie recipes out there that call for chilling it and eating it sort of cold, which is sort of, I don't know, I think a cheat, you know? That's how you get to the chewy texture. But it is true, it's a much different texture eating a melted chocolate brownie cold than at room temp or warm-

- Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I do think a chocolate brownie tends to dry out a little more quickly, which also tracks, you know, so...

- Because usually using butter, which has less water, I feel like cocoa brownies sometimes use oil.

- Yeah, they do.

- So the oil is gonna keep it-

- Well, and all, I mean, not all, I think there's probably an alt to put melted butter in boxed brownies, but most of them are made with oil. And that does give you like, you know, that texture that remains the same, cold, hot. You know, so there is some kind of science to that. And, you know, I think it's going to be fairly, this is a statement of the obvious, I probably make quite a few of them on the podcast, but if you want, I mean, particularly with cocoa, but I think if you want a delicious brownie, whether it's a chocolate brownie or a cocoa brownie, like you have to start with good quality chocolate or cocoa.

- Mm-hmm.

- Because there's not a lot of other stuff in brownies.

- Well, some people put extra chocolate in their brownies, and I think this is sort of a controversial point.

- Oh, uh-huh.

- You know, folding in chocolate chips or chopped chocolate at the end so that you, you know, have chips in there.

- Yeah, where do you stand on that?

- Since coming to King Arthur, I've sort of been converted to folding chocolate chips or chopped chocolate into my brownies because of the nice crackly top you get.

- Right.

- Which we've talked about on the show before. I think we had a question about that during the chocolate episode. How do you get a crackly top, shiny crackly-topped brownies, which everybody likes.

- Yeah, I call that a tissue paper top.

- Oh yeah, that's apt.

- You know? Like, I mean, a homemade version is never gonna be quite like what you get from a box where it's like really, you get that very thin layer on top.

- Mm-hmm.

- But I do think it's a desirable quality in a brownie that people look for.

- Yeah.

- And yeah, I mean, we did talk about this before, but I don't think it hurts to say again that, you know, our testing experience, although we can't quite explain the science of it, is that if you add additional chopped chocolate or chocolate chips to your brownie batter-

- At the end, you fold them in and bake them like that, that does result in a tissue paper top.

- And the thought is that it is adding just a little bit of additional sugar-

- Right.

- that dissolves and makes that crack.

- It kinda floats to the top. And almost like a meringue creates like this, like, little super thin layer of meringue at the top of the brownie.

- Harold McGee, if you're listening, let us know what's going on.

- Yeah. Any food scientist, let us know. I mean, we've tested it extensively, and we have food scientists here, and that's what our theory.

- Yeah.

- But so, yeah, and it's nice. And it certainly adds way more chocolate, true chocolate flavor, especially if you're using a good chocolate to add to your brownie. And so, yeah, I'm kind of into it. I mean, I don't need it, but more is more, you know, with me. If I'm gonna eat a brownie, why not?

- Yeah, why not? I do also like a frosted brownie. I'm not gonna go, but I do like frosted brownie.

- Okay, see, this is really wild to me. 'Cause, yeah, I mean, and we recently published a recipe for frosted brownies that were sort of a copycat recipe of the Cosmic Brownies that Little Debbie does.

- Yeah, yeah.

- Never have it. I was an Oatmeal Pie Little Debbie person, not a Cosmic Brownie person. That's totally out of realm for me, I do not-

- The Cosmic Brownie?

- No, the frosted brownie.

- Frosted brownie.

- I mean, I like sugar but, like, that's really gilding a little bit, you know?

- You know, I wanna talk for a second about, so, again, brownies, relatively short ingredient list.

- Yes.

- But I wanna talk about eggs.

- Okay.

- Because, in general, a fudgier brownie is going to contain fewer whole eggs and a cakier brownie is going to contain more. And, you know, you were talking earlier about really, like, chewy brownies.

- Mm-hmm.

- And I think there's a correlation between a chewy brownie and the number of egg yolks. Like, often a chewy brownie has more egg yolks added to it.

- Added, yeah. And that, to me, is a pretty, that's an advanced brownie recipe.

- That has yolks.

- If you're separating eggs to make a brownie, I think you're in sort of advanced territory. Because, to your point, before you mentioned that this recipe, the "Seventeen" brownie recipe with one bowl-

- I wasn't separating eggs.

- Right, I mean, most brownie recipes are one bowl, and that's sort of the appeal of them, that you can bring them together with pantry ingredients-

- Yes.

- so quickly. If you're separating eggs, wow, you're committed. But yeah, that makes sense to me. I mean, again, less water, right? I think that there's a lot of water in egg whites, so removing that but you're keeping the fat-

- Fat, yeah.

- I think sugar plays a big role in chewy brownie as well.

- Yes, yes.

- And there's some methods that I like. I really like a brownie recipe, and this is also advanced, where you simmer the butter. I guess I've only seen this done with butter. You wouldn't do this with oil. But you melt the butter in a pan, add the sugar, and let it simmer, really cook down-

- Oh.

- and reduce in the pan before incorporating it into the rest of the butter. The Canal House folks, their brownie recipe does this.

- Oh.

- And it's an extra step. And, you know, you let it go for a few minutes.

- Interesting.

- But you're boiling out the water of the-

- Yeah, in the butter.

- in the butter, but you're also getting the sugar to a certain temp, you know, that you might not be able to get it to otherwise. 'Cause, you know, in most recipes you're just whisking the sugar in.

- Yeah.

- So that can contribute to a really nice chewy texture or chewier texture, and also it helps with that tissue paper top.

- I mean, that's interesting. I've never made that recipe. Although I have a very clear image in my mind of that page in their cookbook where they've, 'cause they are a good-looking brownie.

- Yeah, yeah.

- Oh, God, I love brownies so much. But, you know, the elephant in the room, always the elephant in the room here at King Arthur is flour.

- Mm-hmm.

- And brownies are actually a bake that do not really use that much flour.

- Like, just enough to hold it together.

- Just enough to hold it together.

- I feel like it's usually half a cup.

- Yeah.

- For an eight by eight or nine by nine, yeah.

- I mean, it's really relying on the eggs and the fat for structure.

- Mm-hmm.

- And that's why I think it's really, like, gluten-free brownies are really great.

- Yeah.

- Because you're not counting on flour to do a ton of the, like, you know, a lot of brownies have no leavener at all-

- Mm-hmm.

- You know, like, it's sort of almost like, you know, a flourless cake.

- Yep, right.

- So if you're swapping in Measure for Measure or using an alternative flour, like it kind of doesn't matter that much 'cause there's not enough, like the flour's not doing a lot of heavy lifting.

- Yeah, to add a little bit of structure. I think that, I'm glad you said alternative flour, is because brownies are a great vehicle for rye flour-

- Yeah.

- Spelt flour, any type, buckwheat. It's hard to taste these things through all that chocolate, although I do think rye can. Fight through, you can get that flavor. But it's a great place to experiment with other flours. I believe we're going to a conversation with David Lebovitz.

- We are. David Lebovitz, of course, is just like, I mean, he's such a star baker. He was, for a long time, the pastry chef at Chez Panisse.

- Mm-hmm.

- He has written, gosh, I don't know how many cookbooks, but quite a few cookbooks.

- Some classics.

- Yeah, "Room For Dessert," which was just reissued.

- Yeah, we use his ice cream book in my house.

- Ice cream book. He's the author of "My Paris Kitchen," which is a very funny recipe memoir about moving to Paris and his life there. But just like a really generous and smart baker, and he has a lot of thoughts about brownies. And it was interesting also to talk to him about, like, are brownies a thing in Paris? So super fun conversation, and I'm really glad he was able to join us.

- Can't wait.

- When we were talking about this episode and thinking about who to have come on, I was like, "We gotta have David." Because, you know, I mean, I think you have such a huge following on your Substack, like, your books are so great, you do so much rigorous testing of all your recipes. And I know that you are a man that knows his way around a brownie, so I thought it would be fun for us to chat about that today. And one of the first things I was thinking about is, you know, I think brownies have, like, a very American identity.

- Yes.

- Like, a very American sort of bake sale identity.

- And only Americans can bake them, I've learned-

- Well, I was gonna say too.

- From living abroad.

- 'Cause I saw you said something on your Substack, you know, a few years ago, I think you wrote, that you hadn't had good brownies outside of the United States. So I was sort of curious about how they're perceived. You now live in Paris, and there's a lot to recommend Paris, but perhaps brownies is not one of the things. I don't know.

- Well, some bakeries do have them. And there was a bakery over in my previous neighborhood, and they were making "Les Brownies" and they were really not good. And I like the bakery, so I gave them my recipe. I said, "Try this one. It's really good." And then I went in there, and they were like really dried out and terrible.

- Oh, no.

- And it's not an insult to anybody, but some things just have to be made in, or by a certain person or in a certain country to taste the same way.

- Yeah. I think, like, brownies are a thing that people have like a lot of nostalgia wrapped up in. Like, you know, often it's like, it's the first, in my case, it was like the first recipe I learned how to bake. So I do feel, and there are other baked goods where I would say this is similar, but the brownie that you grew up with I think sometimes like has an outside, like, you know, hold on you.

- Brownies sort of, like in theory, like shouldn't work. It's like a very moist cake, but it's not. Well, they should never be dry, and they hold together when you slice them, that's another thing. They can't fall apart.

- Right.

- But they need to be very moist. And they need to be very chocolatey.

- Yeah, and it's interesting because I think, you know, and we talked about this earlier in the episode, like I think brownies fall along a couple of lines, right? Like, there are chocolate brownies and within that there's like the subset of like ones that are made with unsweetened chocolate, and then there are cocoa brownies. And I think of cocoa brownies as being like particularly pantry-friendly, right, like, I don't always have unsweetened chocolate on hand, but I pretty much always have cocoa.

- Well, unsweetened chocolate is actually quite hard to find in France.

- Oh, interesting.

- When I went to chocolate school in Belgium, it was a chocolate company and we used to buy their chocolate in America when I was a pastry chef, I said, "How come I can't get your unsweetened chocolate here in Europe?" And they go, "'Cause no one uses it here. It's very American."

- Mm. You know, something that I have noticed, like, you know, over time, obviously you've riffed on brownies like one gajillion times in your career, in your revised "Ready For Dessert," there's a cheesecake brownie-

- Yes, I love those. And in another book, I have one with dulce de leche-

- Oh, yeah.

- Which is called confiture de lait. And that was something that I came up with when I was, I just moved to France and I would see these big pots of confiture de lait at cheese stores-

- Mm.

- And I was like, "That looks suspiciously like dulce de leche," and it's not. You know, it's made with cow's milk rather than goat's milk, which is-

- Goat's milk.

- Which is infinitely better, which I think is the original but I'm not 100% sure.

- Mm-hmm.

- But I was like, "I'm gonna bake these in brownies and see how it turns out," it was amazing.

- You dolloped it on top?

- Yeah.

- So I was gonna ask you like, what are some ways to sort of like elevate a brownie without making them fussy? That's a very good one.

- Well, I think mix-ins, you know, Thin Mints are really good.

- Oh, yeah.

- I, too, love Thin Mints.

- Mm-hmm.

- You know, I have a recipe in my chocolate book that's coming out for the candied cocoa nibs that are like really crunchy. And if you put them on top, like they provide this, like, crunchy, crackly crust.

- Oh, yeah.

- So I think, you know, experimenting. I like to add things to brownies. I like chocolate chips in them. I like cocoa nibs. I like nuts.

- You've written a little bit about, you know, whatever brownie formula you're following, just the importance of sort of like watching those brownies in the oven like a hawk and taking them out. So let's talk about that. Like, how do you know when your brownie's done? What should you be going for? 'Cause I do think an overbaked brownie is a terrible thing.

- Well, Michael Recchiuti, who's a chocolatier in the San Francisco Bay area, who's a wonderful chocolatier and baker, he told me once like, "Always take, like, chocolate desserts out, like, 5 or 10 minutes before the recipe says."

- Oh, interesting. Interesting.

- And that's not an exact quote, but it's to that effect.

- Yeah.

- I always tell people, you know, like when you see a recipe that says bake for 25 minutes, your oven's gonna be different than mine. I have two different ovens, and they're both, even I've got thermometers on both, they bake very differently.

- Yeah.

- So, you know, I'm like, "Go by texture, touch it, and also make the same recipe over and over again." You're like, "You know, they're burnt. Okay, how can I fix this?"

- Have you served American-style brownies to your French friends, and are they just like, "Eh, we're not into it," or did they like them?

- No, people like them. The great thing, once again, about brownies is you have the ingredients, and they can be in the oven literally in 15 minutes-

- Yeah.

- and servable, you know, within the hour.

- Yeah.

- So they're very easy to make. And who doesn't love chocolate?

- I know.

- Fortunately, little by little of French people are getting more used to American foods, you know, for better or worse-

- For better or for worse. Jinx.

- Well, do you know, it's interesting, something like 83% of restaurants in France now have a hamburger on the menu.

- Oh, wow.

- And that's not a fast food restaurant, that's all restaurants.

- All restaurants. Well, a brownie is sure to follow. You know, it's just a few steps behind maybe, I don't know.

- Well, you know, basically, you know, a brownie is a gâteau au chocolat.

- Yeah.

- A friend of mine who lives, once again, also on my website, I have a recipe from my friend, my friend Hélène's brownies. She made them for me when I was down in, they live near Angoulême, and I was like, "Oh, these are really delicious." They sort of broke the rules for what a brownie is supposed to be.

- Mm-hmm.

- But they were delicious, so I put the recipe up. And, you know, they're thin. It's basically a thin chocolate cake batter.

- Mm-hmm.

- But it's somebody's interpretation of brownies, so...

- If you had to eat one brownie for the rest of your days, which of your recipes would you choose?

- That's a really good question. Probably the Kate and Dave's ones that's in my chocolate book.

- Okay.

- Just because it's a very basic brownie, but they're really, really good.

- I'm excited to try the recipe. I don't think I have made that. I've made lots of your recipes over the years. I love them. Some of them have become mainstays of our life, including, I know I've told you this before, but your bourbon chocolate pecan pie is a mainstay at Thanksgiving. I've made your salted caramel sauce more times than I can count. Like, you're a total, you know, a gem of a baker, a gem of a person. And I'm excited to see the revised "Great Book of Chocolate." Well, it's always a treat to talk to you. I'm sorry we only get to do it like once every 12 years. Latest updated version of "The Great Book of Chocolate" will be out May fifth. People can find you on davidlebovitz.substack.com. We'll put links to all of that in the show notes.

- Yes.

- And everyone should go and make the Dave and Kate's brownies.

- And I wanna just give a shout-out to King Arthur, who has done an amazing job over the years just promoting bakers, helping bakers, being a very aware company as well. You know, holding people together through baking, which is so important now, especially nowadays when things have become fractured.

- Yeah.

- Baking is something that really brings people together and is a joyful activity. But it's also, and I hate to use the word 'cause it sounds like a cliché, but nourishes our soul. But it's true. So thank you, King Arthur, and everybody there, for being such good people-

- Oh.

- and helping people to become better bakers.

- You're the best. You're the best.

- I'm gonna cry.

- I know. Hand me the tissues, no. We appreciate you, and I think we share that sentiment.

- Yeah.

- Thank you. And let's talk again soon.

- This episode is sponsored by Curio Spice Co., a woman-owned, mission-driven spice company. And let me tell you something, Jessica, if you are somebody who thinks that spices and brownies do not go together, listen up the Da Lat Spice they sell, it's a blend of coffee, cocoa nibs, cinnamon, star anise, I'm sorry, I would put all of those things in my brownie. It sounds delicious. From now on, my brownies are spiced brownies.

- They're Da Lat brownies.

- And they're Da Lat-icious.

- Okay, at least I got you to laugh. Listeners just turned off the podcast.

- You know what I also like to do to my brownies is, you know, and chocolate chip cookies, but sprinkle them with a little flaky salt at the end. And Curio Spice Co. has that delicious Cypress Salt, you know, the big flake, which is a really nice finishing touch. Why is salt and chocolate so great together? We should talk about that on a future episode.

- You can find lots of Curio Spice Co. spices at kingarthurbaking.com. And, of course, you can find their full collection at curiospice.com, C-U-R-I-Ospice.com. This episode is brought to you by Supernatural. Supernatural makes sprinkles, food colors, and flavors that are completely colored by plants, fully traceable, and totally free from anything artificial or synthetic.

- And it's just a proven fact, it is just a proven fact that sprinkles make everything more fun. So you can add 'em to your pancake batter, you could sprinkle 'em on your ice cream, and of course you can use them to top a frosted cake.

- Yeah, or a brownie. I mean-

- Or a brownie.

- There's a very popular brownie out there that has sprinkles on it. I don't mess with that, but I will mess with this.

- Supernatural sprinkles, food colors, flavors, and more at kingarthurbaking.com. And the full line is available at supernaturalkitchen.com. This episode is brought to you by our best-selling Gluten-Free Fudge Brownie Mix. And here's a little secret for you, David. This is my favorite brownie mix. Despite the fact that I am not gluten-free. And I'm not alone. People love these brownies no matter their dietary preferences. They're fudgy, tender, super decadent, easy enough for my 12-year-old to make them. It's the thing he always requests that I bring back. I have a little secret. You know, because I am not gluten-free, I do like to hack this mix a little bit.

- I know you do.

- So, you know, I'm just gonna offer my tip, which is that I like to add a couple of tablespoons of all-purpose flour to our Gluten-Free Brownie Mix, which I think gives it, for me, the ultimate texture. So, you know, people might wanna try that, but they're also perfect as written if you are following a gluten-free diet.

- There really is a cult around these brownies.

- They're great.

- Like, my sister is gluten-free and she, oh, sorry, gluten-free, we got some comments on my pronunciation of gluten-

- It's a T, not a D.

- Yeah, right. And she and her friends are now obsessed with this brownie. And like you said, those who eat gluten and those who do not, they all love this brownie.

- Yeah, it's a great brownie. And you can find the mix on our website, but it's also available on the grocery store shelves around the country.

- The blue box.

- The blue box.

- Yeah.

- It's time for our next segment, Ask the Bakers. For Ask the Bakers, we wanna hear from you. If you have a baking question for us, head to kingarthurbaking.com/podcast to record a voice message and we may end up using it all on the show. That's kingarthurbaking.com/podcast.

- And, of course, if you simply cannot wait, you can always reach out to us at our Baker's Hotline via phone, email, or online chat. Just go to kingarthurbaking.com/bakers-hotline, that's /bakers-hotline. Or call us 855-371-2253. That's 2253 as in B-A-K-E.

- Let's hear our brownie questions.

- [Caller] Hi, this is Julie from Winchester, Massachusetts. I prefer fudgy brownies, but I don't like them when they're kinda raw inside. What makes a brownie more fudgy versus cakey?

- Okay. You know, I mean this sounds sort of silly at the onset, like, you don't like a raw brownie, of course you don't like a raw brownie. But, in fact, I think a lot of people do like an underbaked brownie that sort of is almost like molten.

- Yeah, they do.

- I don't know what the food safety on that is, so I'm not gonna comment.

- Not great probably. Yeah, I mean, and we talked in the top of the show a lot about sort of like what makes a fudgy versus a cakey brownie.

- Yeah.

- So I think hopefully we've answered that question.

- But you know what, there is one thing we didn't talk about though.

- What?

- Which is we talked about flour, but the amount of flour does, I think, have a big impact on whether it's fudgy or cakey. And if you have a fudgy brownie recipe that you wanna make cakier, you can just throw in some more flour. It will make it cakier. It will.

- That's true.

- It will, Jessica. It will. I see skepticism on your face.

- No. I don't see many brownies that use this method anymore. But, you know, if you were to treat your butter and sugar for a brownie the way that you do for a cake, like if you were to cream butter and sugar-

- Yes, right.

- And then add in the other ingredients that, you know, you would end up with something cakier because you're using, you know, a technique that incorporates air.

- Right.

- So-

- It's about the leavening. 'Cause also if you throw in some chemical leavening to your brownies, you're gonna get a cakier brownie because, again, same reason why doing the creaming gives you a cakier brownie. It's gonna add air-

- Yeah, a little loft.

- A little loft to the-

- Exactly. But I do think, you know, the question about doneness is not a silly question, because I do think it can be hard, especially if you get, you know, a brownie that gets that sort of, you know, crackly top. It can be hard. And, you know, like the toothpick test. Like, sometimes you insert the toothpick and then that crackly top, like, basically wipes your toothpick clean. It can be hard to tell when it's done enough but not too done.

- It can. You don't want a clean tooth pick out of a brownie.

- You don't want a clean tooth pick out of a brownie.

- Right, yeah.

- Let's go to our next question.

- [Caller] Hi, this is London calling from Falmouth, Maine. Love your show, especially our hometown baking hero, Jessica. I'm callin' with a question about cocoa. What kinda cocoa is best for brownies? Can't wait to hear you guys chat about that. Thanks, bye.

- Mm, this is a great question. And we've talked about cocoa powder before. I think, you know, in some cases there is, like, a functional reason to use a natural cocoa versus a Dutch-processed cocoa, you know, versus a black cocoa because they do interact with the leaveners differently. In the case of brownies, that's not really coming into play because they typically have little, if any, chemical leavener added. So what we're really talking about here is flavor.

- Yep. And so technically you can use any cocoa you want in a brownie really. It comes down to flavor. And I also think, for me, it kinda comes down to color too.

- Oh.

- Like, some of these, you know, a natural cocoa, which can be very light brown, almost reddish, you know, it's gonna give you a brownie that, to my eyes, it's not gonna be that appealing.

- Oh, yeah, it just doesn't look as dark and-

- I don't know, it's gonna look like pale brownie perhaps. And then a black cocoa, on the other end of the spectrum, I think has an intensity-

- Too intense.

- That I'm just not looking for in my brownies. Also gonna make it jet black, which again is not what I'm looking for aesthetically. So, you know, if I were to-

- You just go by looks. I knew it.

- I'm very shallow. I'm just here for the looks of the brownie.

- Well, the black cocoa gives things like, you know, almost like the, I describe it as the flavor of like an Oreo cookie.

- Yeah.

- Like, it is that sort of like intense, almost bitter.

- Yeah, it's delicious. I love it, but I wouldn't use 100% black cocoa-

- Well and, you know, Alice was telling me that she makes like pastes of cocoa and eats them plain.

- Oh, interesting.

- You know, just to get a sense of what the cocoa-

- That's very intense.

- Is the quality of it. You know, I mean, and she's a super taster.

- Yeah.

- But I was thinking, you know, it's not a terrible idea for a home baker to kind of be thinking about that way because they really do have differences in flavor. You know, from brand to brand, you know, natural versus Dutch-processed. Like, there's gonna be different levels of acidity. Like, they will have different flavors. So, you know, her advice was like, "Well, figure out what cocoa you like the flavor of and let that guide you," which is, I mean, obvious, but nobody does it, and very smart I think.

- Yeah.

- When I make brownies, I usually use our Double Dark Cocoa because I feel like that's a sort of a, it's a combination of natural and Dutch processed cocoas, and I think that has a really nice balanced flavor. If you wanted something that has some of that black cocoa, our Triple Cocoa Blend is a combination of all three. So natural, Dutch-processed, and black cocoa.

- And that's what I use.

- Oh, it is?

- Yeah.

- Okay.

- I mean, I just think that, and I think that's the answer. Like, well, you can use whatever cocoa you want, but a blend is gonna give you a nice combination of elements from different cocoas and it's gonna add some nice nuance and the perfect amount of color to your brownies, so... And if you can't find a blend, I would say you can just, the Hershey's cocoa is gonna be fine. Like, any cocoa powder that you get on the grocery store, I think on the typical grocery store shelf is gonna work in your brownie just fine.

- Yeah, I mean, it'll definitely work. And I do think, like I said earlier in the show, I mean the better the flavor of the cocoa-

- Right.

- The better the flavor of the brownie.

- Yeah, with chocolate, you get what you pay for.

- It's true. I mean, we talked about that in the chocolate episode.

- It's not necessarily cheap time for chocolate, but-

- No.

- It's also, for some people, a more affordable luxury. So yeah, you can spring further than one level up of cocoa, it's gonna make a big difference.

- Yeah, I agree. Let's hear our next question.

- [Listener] I see some recipes for brownies that use oil and some recipes that use butter in them. How are they different, and which one's the actual best version?

- I said earlier something about like, "Well, butter is subjective," and you were like-

- No, I am 100% butter brownie person.

- Yeah.

- With the exception of when I'm making a boxed mix. I actually did make our All-American Brownie Mix the other day. I had it in the cabinet. And my husband had made some gelato, and I was like, "Well, you can't eat gelato without a carb." So I was like, "I'll just make this brownie mix." And in that mix, you do have the option of using melted butter or oil. And I chose oil because that, to me, is the vibe of a boxed brownie. Like, you know, it's gonna keep it fresher for longer or the texture's gonna stay for longer. It's gonna be a little chewier. So that's fine. When I'm going for boxed brownie realness, I'll choose oil. But if I'm making a brownie from scratch, I've never even heard of using oil for a brownie from scratch. You know, I always use butter.

- I will say, though, you know, that there was a, the previous question about doneness, and I will say that the margin of error with a butter brownie versus the margin of error with an oil brownie is a little narrower, right? Like, I think you have to nail the bake on a butter brownie.

- 'Cause you're saying you can dry it out.

- You can dry it out. And in fact, I did this just the other day. I made, well, you know, I was gonna take the fall for this, but in fact it was my wife that overbaked, so...

- Yeah, let's throw her under the bus.

- So they were slightly overbaked.

- Yeah.

- Not tragically overbaked, but slightly overbaked. And, you know, they were a little dry. And then of course the next day there were some leftover, and they were drier still. But, honestly, we revitalize those with like a quick hit in the microwave and a scoop of an ice cream.

- That's what I'm saying. Like, you can put ice cream on it.

- It was fine. It was fine.

- Like, who cares?

- I mean, you know, were they a little drier? Sure. But I think the flavor of butter is superior.

- It wins.

- It wins. It's gonna win any arm wrestling competition. So if this question comes up again, always butter is the answer.

- Right, that is the definitive answer, that is the correct answer. There is no other way.

- Nope.

- Just choose butter.

- Just choose butter. Great, okay.

- All right, so that's my David-pinion. All butter and brownies. But-

- You're always trying to edge in on the opinions, aren't you?

- I'm not, I'm setting that up-

- You want a new segment.

- No, I don't. This is my transition into the most important segment of all of our podcasts. Every week, we like to check in with Jessica to see what wildly surprising and full-throated ideas are in her head, a segment we lovingly call Jess-opinions. Jessica, it's all about you. What is your Jess-opinion about brownies?

- This one, I think I wanna have some discussion with you 'cause I actually don't know where you stand on this.

- Oh, oh, I'm allowed to speak in this segment now? Okay, let's do it.

- I'm tapping you in. You know, our test kitchen worked on a recipe for something that is quite popular.

- Mm.

- And it was sort of surprising that we didn't already have a recipe for it, which is Brownie Brittle.

- Mm, mm-hmm.

- So brownie brittle, for those who, I don't know, have just come out of a seven-year coma, is, you know, a brownie batter that's spread very thinly in a pan. And the point is to make it like a cookie. Like, dry and crumbly. I'm already tipping my hand.

- I would've said crispy, yeah.

- Yeah, you would've said crispy and I would've said dry and crumbly because, here's where I give the Jess-opinion, I hate brownie brittle.

- Oh, you hate it?

- I hate it.

- Oh, huh.

- I just think it's, everything that's good about a brownie, I mean, if you are a lover of a fudgy brownie, what business does brownie brittle have in your life?

- I think you're getting caught up in the name a little bit too much.

- Well-

- I mean, like, if someone gave you a plate of brownie brittle and said, "Here's-"

- Dusty chocolate crumbs. I'd still say, "No, thank you."

- Yeah, well, yes, if they said that. But if they said, "Here's my crispy chocolate cookie edges," or, "Here are my thin crispy chocolate bars."

- Mm, hmm-mm.

- No?

- Mm, I don't think so.

- I don't know, I think there's something sort of addictive about them that are sort of, like the potato chips, they're crisp, I like the texture. They're sweet and chocolatey. And I think we've discussed this on the show recently, I'm like really into biscotti right now. And so, like, they're not that far from biscotti.

- You're really pushing your Italian, first gelato, now biscotti. Like, we get it. You just came back from Italy.

- I'm Italian now. Yeah.

- We get it. You took a Roman holiday.

- Yeah, right. I did. No, but even before that I was getting into biscotti. I know-

- Crunchy.

- The texture thing, yeah.

- Yeah.

- Like, I would appreciate if every time I got a cup of coffee anywhere-

- Oh.

- They put a little brownie brittle on it-

- You would?

- Oh, yeah, I would love that, sure.

- Oh, interesting.

- Yeah.

- I feel like sometimes-

- I don't want something soft with my coffee.

- Sometimes these Jess-opinions lead me to some self-discovery. And I was just thinking like, "Do I like a crunchy chocolate thing?" I love a biscotti, but do I like a chocolate biscotti? I don't know that I do.

- Mm.

- So maybe this is a blanket statement.

- So would you like blondie brittle?

- Oh, does that exist?

- Not yet.

- I mean, it's like a thin, we should invent this recipe.

- Yeah, there you go.

- I'm gonna call the test kitchen as soon as we finish this episode, get it in the pipeline.

- Yeah.

- I mean, blondie brittle, it's like a thin and crispy-

- Butterscotchy type things.

- Oh, I think this is a good idea. I think this has legs. Okay, Sarah Jampel.

- Look at this. We took a negative and turned it into a positive.

- We did. We did. I mean, it's a new year, new us.

- Maybe you should bring me into Jess-opinion a little bit more.

- I guess so. Well, what do you, if not brownie brittle, if not gelato, if not biscotti, what are you baking this week?

- Oh, pizza, lasagna, cacio e pepe. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

- You're just method acting your way through the Italian cannon.

- Actually, on my list for this week is, I believe this is a Swedish bake. I'm gonna have to double-check that.

- Finnish, Swedish, Nordic?

- Rossi is double-checking that as we-

- Nordic bake.

- Nordic bake. And we have had some comments on the podcast, just some reviews, which we read the reviews. Thank you for the reviews. Please send more reviews. Even the ones that criticize my pronunciation of things like the word gluten.

- Oh, I didn't read that one.

- [Rossi] Norwegian.

- So this is a Norwegian bake. Thank you, Rossi. And I'm gonna attempt to pronounce this. I will probably butcher it, I apologize.

- The Norwegians are just-

- Norway.

- They're at their keyboards right now ready to write in. Go on.

- Solskinnsboller.

- I think that's right.

- Yeah, it's probably right.

- Solskinnsboller.

- Otherwise known as Sun Buns. These are wildly delicious. I mean, it's a soft, sweet yeasted dough with a, you know, sort of yellow pastry cream in the middle. It looks like a very sunny-looking center-

- Just yellow from like the addition of egg yolks.

- From egg yolks.

- Yeah, it's not a lemon.

- It's not a lemon thing.

- Where was I when these were being developed, you know?

- It's a vanilla custard. And the recipe we have on our site comes from Trine Hahnemann, who wrote "Scandinavian Baking," which is a great book. I've made some cookies from that book and they're really good. So anyway, I grabbed one in the test kitchen. I don't know where you were. I think I was here by myself, and I just grabbed six sun buns, you know, and ate them-

- Breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

- You know, crying in the closet and it made me feel better. They're so good. And, you know, we're not quite in spring or summer yet-

- Not in Vermont we're not.

- No.

- And this is I think the hardest time of the year.

- Yeah.

- Because, you know, elsewhere, say, like, you know, one of our producers lives in California and she's all like, "Oh, strawberries," like, "Oh, rhubarb's old news." Yeah, and meanwhile, back here, we're still eating like root vegetables now with sprouts, you know?

- So to channel some of that Rossi energy, I'm making sun buns to sort of, you know, get ready for spring.

- Yeah, that sounds great. You know, I'm in, of course, like a similar position where you're just, like you're waiting and you're waiting and you're waiting, and it's not happening. And so what to do but eat more cheese? No-

- Yeah.

- There's a recipe on our site, and it's-

- It's bulking season.

- Yeah, it's bulking season. It's a Yotam Ottolenghi recipe for these, again, I'm gonna do my best on the pronunciation. It's a Cheese and Mint Ka'ak, K-A'A-K.

- So good.

- And, you know, it's a like a bread pocket, well, it's, how do I describe it? Why am I having trouble with words? It is a stuffed bread is what it is. And it's stuffed with grated halloumi cheese, which I love, one of my favorites, like salty. That's mixed with cream cheese, but it also has fresh mint added to it, which I think, I feel like fresh mint is like a nice sort of gateway herb right now. Like, you can get it at the grocery store even at this time of year when there's nothing really fresh and green and it does bring the sort of vibrancy.

- Yeah.

- And then they get coated in sesame seeds and baked like that. So they are a little crunchy on the outside, and you have salty cheese. And they're fun to make, and they're just like a great little snack or, like, side dish to a meal-

- Yeah.

- While we wait for spring. And wait, and wait, and wait. And while we're waiting, we thank you for tuning in and joining us here on "Things Bakers Know."

- Please remember to like us, subscribe to us if you don't subscribe already.

- I always like, when you say please remember to like us. It's like a subliminal message.

- And please leave a review wherever you listen. Apple Podcast, YouTube, Spotify, Amazon Music.

- Or where you watch. You know, we're out here.

- Or where you watch.

- We're out here on the videos now. And leave us a review while you're there or share an episode with a friend.

- Yep. And remember, folks, do not forget, always follow the recipe. "Things Bakers Know" is hosted and executive produced by me, David Tamarkin.

- And me, Jessica Battilana.

- Rossi Anastopoulo is our senior producer, Chad Chenail is our producer, and Marcus Bagala is our engineer. Original music by Megan and Marcus Bagala.

- Thanks again to David Lebovitz for appearing on today's episode. You can find more about him and his work at davidlebovitz.com.

- "Things Bakers Know" is a King Arthur Baking Company podcast.