Champurrado chile brownies.
Dry: about 1 cup fine-ground (yellow) cornmeal, 1 cup sugar, 1 tsp salt, 1 tsp baking soda.
Hot: 5-6 oz brick dark chocolate, 1/4 lb butter, inside of 1 vanilla bean, 1/3 cup combined pasilla and california chile powder (mill with a bit of sugar to get it finer), 2 tsp cinnamon. Melt first three together and then mix in the rest.
Wet: Mix the hot ingredients into the dry ingredients. Stir in 2 eggs, then about 1/2 cup milk or until it looks runny enough to be brownie batter. Pour into square greased pan; bake at 375 until done.
Impressions: Aroma is prety much perfect. Correct proportions, complex enough, and each flavor is important overall. Deep-flavoured chocolate is good here. May be slightly heavy on the cinnamon. Texture-wise, the lack of wheat flour makes it interestingly particulate, which is definitely good. It also disguises the remaining coarseness of the chile powder. Rather fluffy; it’s more like cornbread in texture than brownies. Daniel doesn’t mind but I think it’d be better if it were denser.
Notes for next time: Leave the baking powder out; the eggs should leaven it enough. Maybe decrease cornmeal slightly as well? Use slightly less cinnamon. If buying chocolate use Scharffenberger 70%. Try a different kind of cornmeal if convenient — red or blue might be tasty.
