Mocha Brownie Trifle

We had to add some glitter for the festivities

So this little recipe actually started out as plain old brownies but then went a tiny bit wrong along the way.

For New Years Eve, some friends and I were having a little party and we were all bringing along food and lots of drink to see in the New Year. I thought it would be nice to make a super dooper brownie cake with chocolate ganache topping to finish off our NYE feast, so me and Sami set to work. Then I don't really know what happened (we got distracted/didn't cook it for long enough) and something went wrong with the brownie and it all kinda collapsed on us. We were left with a pile of chewy brownie (along with lots of brownie goo) and a big bowl of chocolate ganache and not much time to do anything about it. There was nothing else to do but make a Mocha Brownie Trifle.

We layered up the broken brownie with a biscuit base, the ganache, raspberries and topped it all off with some whipped up double cream (handily left over from making the ganache earlier). In the end we were pretty proud of our efforts! 

You can try making the brownies and hopefully they'll end up as we intended or make them into a trifle like we did with whatever extra ingredients ya fancy. This just shows that when things go wrong in the kitchen you can normally find a way to turn it around and still be left with something delicious to enjoy.

Ingredients:
For the Brownie:
4 oz semisweet chocolates
1 cup brown sugar
2 eggs
1 tbs instant coffee powder dissolved in 1 tbs hot water, cooled
2/3 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
2 oz butter
For the Ganache:

100g good quality dark chocolate
150ml carton double cream 

Plus any extras if making a trifle

To Make:

• Pre-heat oven to 180°C.
• Combine flour and baking powder, set aside.
• Place the chocolate and butter in a heavy bottom pan over low heat until melted. 
• Stir and let cool. 
• Beat sugar and eggs until light and fluffy. 
• Fold in the chocolate mixture and cooled coffee and mix well. 
• Add flour mixture and lightly fold into the mixture. 

• Pour the batter into a greased square cake pan and bake for 25 to 30 minutes or until firm and a tooth pick inserted into the centre comes out clean. 
• Now make the ganache: chop the chocolate into small pieces and tip into a bowl. 
• Pour the cream into a pan and heat until it is about to boil.
• Take off the heat and pour it over the chocolate. Stir until the chocolate has melted and the mixture is smooth.
• Spread ganache over cooled brownie or break up brownie and layer with whipped double cream and anything else!

We didn't actually get around to eating very much of this after all our other food and drink but it was good to enjoy on New Years Day evening after a big bowl of my mums turkey soup.

Happy New Year!