Last week I was in the “depths of despair” to quote Anne Shirley; had the “mean reds” as Holly Golightly would have it. Baking brownies was imminent. Most of them were packed up nicely as a housewarming gift. Most of them.

This recipe hails from In the Sweet Kitchen. I frequently find this book mentioned on food magazine lists of must-have cookbooks, with good reason. In this book, I have found my holy grail of brownie recipes, aptly titled “Really REALLY Fudgy Brownies”,  on page 488. While grabbing the Amazon link it looks like there is going to be a new paperback edition published this spring.

At any rate, get ye to the grocery store and pick up a shocking amount of unsalted butter and squares of baking chocolate (I used Baker’s with excellent results, no need to get fancier than that) ’cause this recipe makes an awful lot of brownies – a 9 x 13″ pan may not sound like much, but hoo boy. You might also want to send out a call for volunteers to help you eat them all.

7 ounces unsweetened chocolate, finely chopped
3 ounces bittersweet chocolate, finely chopped
1 cup plus 2 tbsp unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
4 large eggs, at room temperature
2 1/3 cups granulated sugar
1 1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract
1 1/4 all-purpose flour
3 tbsp good-quality unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa
1/8 tsp salt

Preheat oven to 350F. Grease a 9 x 13″ baking pan and line the bottom of pan with parchment paper. Leaving extra parchment paper to hang over the long sides makes the brownies easier to remove from the pan. Gently melt chocolate and butter in a double boiler, set aside to cool slightly. Beat eggs and sugar until mixture becomes thick and pale, about a minute or two, then add vanilla. Pour the chocolate and butter mixture into the egg and sugar mixture and stir to combine. Sift the flour, cocoa and salt together in a small bowl and then fold into the batter in three additions.  Pour into pan and bake for 35 minutes. Cool completely before cutting.