It’s become more and more of a tradition in the last couple years for me to prepare some desserts for big family holiday meals. I recently decided to do a test run of a new recipe and take a crack and making Breakfast Stout Brownies. I found a recipe for oatmeal stout brownies here and stuck to it almost entirely. The only changes I made were to bump up the white chocolate chips to a full cup (because hey, white chocolate is awesome) and use a full 12oz bottle of Founders Breakfast Stout instead of the 10oz called for (because leaving behind just 2oz of such a tasty beer to drink is just a cruel tease).
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| Stage one of the batter, ready to go |
This was actually my second attempt at Breakfast Stout Brownies, as I took my first run at them about a week and a half ago. That was the same day that I went into NYC for a tapping of the whole Founders Breakfast Stout family (Breakfast Stout, Kentucky Breakfast Stout, and CanadianBreakfast Stout). I thought the brownies would be a fitting end to the day, but, suffice to say, baking after imbibing that much imperial stout was not one of my better ideas. Basically I ended up with brownies that, while flavorful, could have been strapped to someone’s feet in order to drown them in a river. Batch two though had my undivided attention after I finished bottling my Belgian Dubbel.
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| Cream cheese portion added, ready for the oven |
The baking process went relatively smoothly, and I’m pretty happy with the results. As a kid I grew up with my mom baking brownies that were very light and cake-y, and so I've always internalized that as what brownies are/should be like. These are not like that, they’re very rich. The flavor is great though, and I like the extra edge that using a coffee stout brings as opposed to a more traditional stout. I’m calling these a definite success, and will be putting them into my regular rotation of desserts.
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| A plate of the finished product, these are heading down to a beer release/bottle share with me |
