Friday night I was SO excited to make these amazing looking (and sounding!) white chocolate brownies w/ raspberries. I had picked out this recipe earlier in the week to make on Friday and was really looking forward to it.
So, I am usually not a white chocolate person. Honestly, when I think of white chocolate I think of those Hershey's Cookies & Cream bars that were popular several years ago. Those were my first introduction to white chocolate and I was convinced that I didn't like it at all. However, I have come to enjoy it in small doses through white chocolate macadamia nut cookies and TCBY's delicious white chocolate mousse frozen yogurt. I realized that it's not white chocolate that I dislike--it was just that specific candy bar. I am so glad it has pleasantly surprised me :) I also am not a brownie person. I don't really know why--there are just other desserts that I prefer I suppose. But, when I saw a recipe for something so different that was classified as a "brownie", my curiosity got the best of me.
Another amazing thing about these brownies is that they have a meringue topping! I was nervous to make meringue because the last time I attempted to do so was for a meringue cookie recipe that did not turn out so well. They were runny, probably because I didn't whip the egg whites enough. It's something that I am always afraid of screwing up. But, I was going to challenge myself to do it correctly.
So, I began my baking adventure by preparing all of my ingredients. I got to use my new mini food processor to grind almonds that were part of the flour mixture. It was fun to use the food processor! It chopped those almonds so quickly...I was impressed! The next step was to melt the white chocolate with butter in a bowl over boiling water. I carefully (or what I thought was careful) followed the directions. White chocolate is difficult to melt because it burns easily and doesn't move well unless you are there mixing constantly. I was so scared that it was going to harden and burn (because that has happened to me before!) that I didn't pay enough attention to the fact that if the butter and chocolate get too hot, they will separate. I was just about to take the melted ingredients off of the boiling water when I noticed that it looked very yellow (from the butter) and there was this big lump of grimy chocolate sitting beneath it. Whoops...it separated. Of course I didn't have any extra white chocolate so I had to go to the store to pick some more up. I was frustrated because I was all ready with everything to just make the brownies--which really weren't supposed to take very long!
I came back with the new white chocolate bar, chopped it up in the food processor and started the melting process once again. This time I watched it VERY carefully and didn't let it get too hot. So after all this, I was able to proceed in completing the recipe. I got everything mixed up for the batter, added the raspberries and then made the meringue topping. I was very impressed with the meringue. It turned out AMAZING! After the brownies baked and cooled, I added a little powdered sugar to the top. I was looking forward to trying them because they looked good (from the cookbook) and they also looked interesting--like nothing I've ever had before. They were very good. I was glad that they turned out well, after everything :) The only thing that I wish was different is that they looked more professional like the picture in the cookbook. Oh well...I'm still learning!
No comments:
Post a Comment