"It's All Relative" Healthy Chocolate Brownies

Quite some time ago I made Chocolate Heartache Cupcakes which used eggplant as a base, and were flour and butter free. They were so incredibly rich and moist and dense that the thought of applying the whole eggplant-as-a-baked-goods-base concept more broadly has been playing on my mind ever since.

 

It was inevetable that my thoughts would turn to inventing a brownie that was (gasp!) healthy. I mean, who wouldn't want to be able to eat brownies, relatively guilt-free?? I carefully crafted the recipe over several days' driving to and from work (50 minutes each way. Why yes, I DO devote a lot of time to thinking about food, why do you ask?) and was finally ready to test it on the guinea pigs at work execute the magnificience that is these brownies. Inevitably I made some changes on the fly to improve the texture, but that was always going to happen.

And lo and behold, these healthy chocolate brownies were born. Relatively healthy, anyhow!

 

INGREDIENTS:

1 medium eggplant

1/2 large zucchini

1 banana

1 block Club chocolate (180g)

2 large dollops honey (it's probably close to 1/4c, but to me it was using a dessert spoon and doing two huge spoonsful)

3tbsp cocoa powder

1 1/2c ground almonds

1tsp vanilla extract
1/2c choc chips
1/2c pecans

 

Prick eggplant all over with a fork and place in a covered dish in the microwave with a little water in the bottom. Steam for 4 minutes. Flip over, and steam for a further four minutes. Allow to cool enough to handle, then chop the top and peel skin off. Mash or blend until relatively smooth and set aside.

 

Grate zucchini. Squeeze as much excess moisture out as possible. Add to eggplant mix.

 

Mash banana. Add to eggplant mix.

 

Melt chocolate. Add to eggplant mix.

Mix in honey, lightly beaten eggs, cocoa powder, almonds and baking powder until you have a consistent mixture.

Transfer mixture into a greased baking dish or tin and bake for about 50mins at 180oC until set.

 

Note that you will likely find it quite difficult not to eat several pieces at once. If I were you I'd do what I did and bring it into work!

 

EDIT: It helps them hold together if you refrigerate them overnight once cool. I cut the lines in before refrigerating, and then just cut over them again before serving. Also, I'm quite sure those are the quantities but the question has now been raised in my mind. When I get home tonight I'll find the envelope I wrote the recipe on and correct if need be!

 

EDIT #2: If you have copied this recipe out before the 23rd of June 2013 then the quantities are are a little out of whack and there are a couple of things missing. Obviously I found the envelope I wrote it on this morning and am editing it accordingly. Sorry if I stuffed up your brownies! Best you try again ;)

Anzac Day Porridge

For those of us here in Australia (and also in New Zealand, and various Commonwealth island nations), last Thursday the 25th of April was ANZAC Day. It is a national holiday and treated as a day of remembrance, much like November 11th (Remembrance Day, known as Armistice Day or Veteran's Day elsewhere in the world), although it initially began to commemorate the 12,000 members of Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) who fell during the Gallipoli campaign in Turkey which began on the 25th of April in 1915.

Gallipoli was the first military campaign of WWI that sustained heavy Australian and New Zealand casualties, and around 2,000 Australians died on the first day. At the time that meant that for every 550 Australians, one person from a very narrow demographic (able-bodied young men) died in that single campaign. For a young nation, this campaign and the war in general went a long way to shape national identity.

People argue the relevance of a 98-year-old military failure in modern Australia, but personally that makes me quite angry when people disregard it all so easily. I'm not pro-war by any stretch of the imagination, but where you are today is a result of everything that went before, and I feel very blessed to live in Australia. Our military history is part of the nation's history, and so it is a part of me. I think people also underrate the sacrifices military personnel and their families made and make, and I don't think we should ever forget it.

The qualities the diggers at Gallipoli displayed became known as the Anzac Spirit. Things like courage, making the best of a bad situation, working hard, helping your mates out and a tendency to be a bit cheeky and push the envelope. I, for one, am more than happy for that to be a part of our national identity, and I fear that those qualities are slipping in today's society.

Anyway, you didn't come here for a rant. You came here for noms!

Normally I bake Anzac biscuits on Anzac Day. They are made of oats, flour, butter, coconut, golden syrup, coconut and sugar. Because there are no eggs or milk they keep very well, and legend has it that people would make them and send them to our troops serving overseas.

Knowing how untrustworthy I am around a batch of Anzacs (I have to have a little bit of the raw mix; a piping hot one which hasn't yet set that will inevitably burn my tongue; and a cooled one. Quality control, you see!) I decided to go with something on a smaller scale that could possibly be construed as wholesome, and invent myself some Anzac porridge.

No need to reinvent the wheel here! I just microwaved 3/4 cup of rolled oats mixed with (I think it was) half a cup of water for a minute or two, stirred it, mixed in 1/4c of milk and a heaped tablespoon of desiccated coconut and microwaved for another minute, then got a massive dollop of golden syrup on my spoon and drizzled it all over the top of the porridge.

Yum-oh!

You'll have to play with the times and the liquid quantities because every microwave is different. Be aware that I have had porridge literally explode all over the microwave, and I have also had it boil over and coat everything with a thick, sticky mess. Choose a deeper bowl and put less in it. If mine turns out dry I usually just add a little more milk and work it into the porridge.

I have heard disturbing rumours that other parts of the world don't have golden syrup, and this shocks and saddens me. The best way I can describe it (and in fact, I have cobbled some together like this) is a cross between honey and molasses, kind of a pale treacle. It is basically a cane sugar-based syrup that has a wee bit of bitterness to its sticky sweetness. Honey is too sweet and molasses is too bitter. I imagine a 3:1 mix might come close. Maybe. Or you could just Google it - no doubt someone has done the maths!