Salt goes with caramel like peanut butter goes with jelly—it’s timeless. So, when I was flipping through the Barefoot Contessa Foolproof cookbook and spotted this brownie recipe, I knew I had to try it. These brownies are perfectly rich, fudgy, and (*cringe*) moist. As if they weren’t delicious enough on their own, a layer of gooey caramel and a sprinkle of sea salt on top create the perfect balance of sweet, salty, and decadent in your mouth!
As you can probably sense from the recipe, these brownies are super easy to make. They only require the use of a few bowls, which is great for cleanup (and we all know that’s the worst part of baking). While the recipe is straightforward, there are few tips I want to share with you that, in my experience, make the process even simpler. First, the ingredients list calls for a specific brand of chocolate chips, but I have used others and it hasn’t made a difference, so do not worry! It also calls for instant coffee, but I personally do not like coffee and even without it the brownies still taste delicious.
When you begin baking, be sure to actually follow the recipe when it tells you to butter and flour the pan. There is nothing worse than a perfect batch of yummy brownies that are practically glued to the pan! A little of butter and flour truly goes a long way. Also, the Barefoot Contessa says that you should melt the chocolate and butter in a glass bowl over the stove. I always melt mine in the microwave though…it’s a million times easier. Just make sure to use a microwave-safe bowl and put it in for one minute increments so that you don’t score it or melt it too much. Then, the recipe says to let the bowl sit out to cool. I like to speed up the process by putting the bowl in the fridge. It speeds the process along nicely. Don’t try and skip the cooling step all together though. According to Ina Garten, if you don’t let the chocolate cool you could ruin the brownies (and you obviously don’t want to do that!). Another trick I like to use when baking is to crack the eggs into a separate and smaller bowl, just in case any shell falls in. It’s much easier to remove shell from a small dish than a big bowl full of batter. Finally, when deciding on the right time to remove your brownies from the oven, use a toothpick to poke them in multiple places in order to get an accurate sense of whether or not they are done.
I’ve baked these brownies many times, and if you follow the recipe and use my tips I can guarantee a delicious, ooey-gooey, salted caramel brownie experience!