Brownie Babe Nr. 3

After my disappointing brownie last time, I decided not the divert from the tried and trusted recipe anymore. For the third edition of browniebabe hosted by Myriam I have made this recipe as long as I can remember, I would bring these to school for every birthday or special occasion and know the proportions off by heart. But even though they're great, I felt they needed to be jazzed up a little bit for this event and this is where it all started to go horribly wrong...

You know when you have (what you think is) a brilliant idea and you're so chuffed with yourself for having it that you fire straight ahead without giving it another thought....and then in hindsight you can't believe how stupid you were...well that's kind of what happened to me. I somehow decided it would be great to make honeycomb brownies. I saw someone making the stuff recently on television where it looked really easy and fast plus I love the stuff. Off I went, melted sugar, golden syrup and once caramelising added the bicarbonate soda...no problem...let it cool, chopped it up and put it in the batter....easy peasy....put it in the oven and went away. After 30 min I suddenly smelt this terrible burning, the whole flat was cloudy, so what had happened?! Of course it had kept rising as it had so much bicarb in there...duh!! So it rose higher and higher, flooded over the tin and onto the heating element at the bottom of the oven...damn! Still can't believe I didn't think of that!

Anyway, lesson learned so for the second batch I was a bit more conservative. I'd bought some Kumquats so added these as you can't really go wrong with the chocolate orange combination. To enhance the citrus flavor I also added some Yuzu juice and powder that I picked up when I was in London in May. I love the taste of this Japanese fruit which is a bit more bitter and tart than an orange but not as harsh as a lemon. I also simmered some left over kumquats with honey and Yuzu juice to drizzle on top. The brownies turned out perfect and were squidgy and moist as usual with bits of kumquats for a change of texture and taste. They're a bit bitter/tart, as was the Yuzu but this was nicely complemented by the sweet honeycomb I'd sprinkled on top.

Kumquat and Yuzu Brownies
175g butter
450g sugar
50g good quality cocoa powder
4 eggs
250g flour
1 tsp baking powder
ping of salt
24 kumquats
1 tbsp Yuzu juice*
1 tsp Yuzu powder*

Melt the butter in a large pan, add sugar and cocoa and mix well. Then stir in the eggs and sift in the flour, baking powder and salt. Finally add in the kumquats and pour into a bog baking tin. Bake 30-45 min at 175°C and take out once a knife comes out clean.

Leave the brownies to cool and in the mean time make the honeycomb using this recipe (I halved the amount) and the syrup by combining 2 tbsp honey, 2 tbsp Yuzu juice 15-20 chopped kumquats. Leave to simmer for about 5 min, cool slightly and drizzle over the still warm brownies.

* optional as not very easy to obtain, try Japanese supermarkets for it.