Personally, I like browned butter in place of plain butter or oil. I also prefer cream cheese or mascarpone cheese instead of sour cream, because the tang of sour cream does nothing for me in sweets. Here is my basic brownie recipe, not for a novice baker:
- 1 cup browned unsalted butter
- 1/4 cup softened cream cheese or mascarpone cheese
- 1 cup white sugar
- 1 1/2 cups packed brown sugar
- 4 eggs
- 1 tablespoon vanilla paste or extract
- dash salt
- 1 cup all-purpose flour (sift, then measure)
- 1 cup good quality, unsweetened cocoa powder (Ghiradelli is my favorite)
- 7 oz chopped chocolate or 1 bag large chocolate chips
- 7 oz chopped, toasted pecans
Mix all wet ingredients together until well mixed. Add sugars and mix. Sift flour and cocoa together, then add to wet ingredients. Then add chocolate chips and pecans, measured by weight. Do not overmix. Use parchment paper if you have any to make it easier to get them out of the pan. Also, use butter or cooking spray to make it even easier. Bake at 350F in either a 7×11 (thicker brownies) or 8×12 pan for about 30 minutes. Light-colored pans work better. Bake in the center of the oven. Start checking at 25 minutes. You don’t want to overbake these. If you use the toothpick method to check doneness, you should get a sticky bit on the toothpick but not gooey. The brownies should be set but not firm. They continue to bake after you take them out of the oven. Set your timer on these. they are OK if they overbake by a tiny bit, but not as fudgy.