Your Daily Facts about Brownies
Brownie, Brownies – The name comes from the deep-brown color of the cookie. The first known published recipe for “brownies” appeared in the Sears, Roebuck Catalogue in 1897. It is thought that it was created when a careless cook failed to add baking powder to a chocolate-cake batter (the dense, fudgy squares had been made for some time by women who received the recipe by word of mouth).
Brownies are dense squares of chewy chocolate cake, usually containing nuts.
Culinary historians have traced the first cake “brownie” to the 1906 edition of The Boston Cooking-School Cook Book, edited by Fannie Merritt Farmer. This recipe is an early, less rich and chocolaty version of the brownie we know today, utilizing two squares of melted Baker’s chocolate. We don’t know if Fanny Farmer obtained the recipe from another source, printed it as is or adapted it, or provided the name.
The second recipe, appearing in 1907, was in Lowney’s Cook Book, written by Maria Willet Howard and published by the Walter M. Lowney Company of Boston. Ms. Howard, a protégé of Ms. Farmer, added an extra egg and an extra square of chocolate to the Boston Cooking-School recipe, creating a richer, more chocolatey brownie. She named the recipe Bangor Brownies; we don’t know why. Perhaps the original brownie recipe, published by Ms. Farmer, was submitted by a housewife in Bangor; or that said housewife improved upon that recipe and this was the one published by Ms. Howard. This is discussed more thoroughly in The Oxford Encyclopedia of Food and Drink in America, which is the “Encyclopaedia Britannica” for food lovers—two volumes and 1,500 pages on the history, manufacture and marketing of food in the U.S.
It is speculated that the careless cook may have lived in Bangor, Maine – thus the name, “Bangor Brownies.” This is my personal favorite story since I actually grew up in Bangor, ME.
Chocolate brownies are one of the few foods where there is a strong divide between the way a brownie should be prepared. Half of the world loves a cake like brownie, whilst the other half would die without a beautiful fudge brownie to devour.
The world’s largest brownie was made in 2001. It weighed in at 3,000 lbs. and was made with 750 lbs. of chocolate chips, 500 lbs. of butter, 850 lbs of sugar, 500 lbs. of flour and 3,500 eggs!
Although cannabis is the most controversial brownie mix-in, walnut remains the most popular and legal.
Do you like chocolate brownies? I’m sure that you do, unless you were deprived of it during your childhood. These brownies are a timeless classic that have many different tasty variations. It’s a given that you love chocolate if you are fond of chocolate brownies. After all, chocolate is good for you. In fact, adolescents and women of all ages consider it as a major food group.
You can’t ever go wrong if you bring a plate of this delicious desert to any type of gathering. The chocolate brownies will surely be gone in no time. You can add nuts, cherries, raspberries, marshmallows, caramel, peanut butter, white chocolate, and mint flavoring to a basic brownie recipe. Some modified versions of the classic recipe including low fat brownies, and recipes that use sugar substitutes.
January 22 is National Blonde Brownie Day.
December 8th is National Brownie Day.
PS..My wife makes the best damn brownies ever! From scratch no less! So there….