Dark Chocolate Brownies with Peanut Butter and Nutella

This is my second month with the Peanut Butter Bash and I am almost down to the deadline in finding a suitable recipe!  Not that we have didn't have plenty of notice, but I have just been really unlucky in locating a British recipe that seemed to work with the required ingredient of peanut butter and nutella!  But I believe I have found one now!

The link to our Facebook page is:  https://www.facebook.com/groups/peanutbutterbash/  If you are a food blogger, it is fun to have this challenge every month!

This recipe has been pinned to my fridge for almost a year though, so I didn't have to look very far!  Last year, the Steamer Trading Company in Glasgow had a special opening of its basement!  Doesn't sound like much, but they had rented their premises as one floor and noticed the stairs that went down to virtually nothing. Once investigated, there were dirt floors and who knows how long that part of the building was used last!  Needless to say, they held a grand opening and the basement is beautiful now.  During this celebration, there was champagne, cupcake decorating demonstrations and free baked goods from the Riverside Bakery just across the street.

Sue and I fell in love with their brownies and got copies of the recipe, the suggestions on this recipe is just add whatever you feel like. The ones we had included Salted Caramel sauce!  Fabulous!

For some reason, this recipe has lived on my fridge for all this time and only got its debut this morning!  Now I have to let these brownies cool and then post them to my son in London, since I really need them out of my house!  We will be going on a cruise soon and I don't need any temptation like delicious brownies sitting around in my kitchen!

I have attempted to convert the British measurements into cups and hope these work out alright for those of you who want to try this recipe using cups and not by weight.  For the butter, I always go to the online butter  conversion.  This has been the best thing for me to ever discover! Before that, I had such difficulty measuring butter.  When growing up with butter in measurable sticks and all recipes I used calling for this sort of measurement, it was virtually impossible for me to use my favourite American recipes when I first moved to Scotland!




Adapted from the leaflet provided by the Riverhill Coffee Bar 

Dark Chocolate Brownies      

Oven temp - 170C/350F

Ingredients:

300g/ 10.5 ounces Dark Chocolate 70%

200g/ 1 & 3/4 sticks  unsalted butter

4 eggs

200g/ 3/4 cup caster sugar (any granulated sugar will do really!)

140g/ 5/8 cup soft brown sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla

170g/ 1 cup flour

3 tablespoons cocoa powder

my added ingredients for the Peanut Butter Bash:

4 tablespoons creamy peanut butter

4 tablespoons Nutella

Prepare a square 8 x 8 baking tin.

Being careful not to overwork the chocolate, gently melt the chocolate and butter on a low setting in the microwave, checking frequently.  When melted, let it cool slightly.

Add eggs and both sugars to a large bowl and whisk with an electric beater or Kitchen Aid until mixed thoroughly and becoming thick and creamy.

Add vanilla and cocoa powder and make sure they are well incorporated into the egg and sugar mixture.

The recipe calls for the chocolate and butter mixture to be "folded" in and I wonder why that is?  To me, that is what you do for muffins....however, I would fold as requested!

Following this, add the flour in small portions to ensure it is well incorporated into the rest of the batter.


On low and using 2 small pans, melt the peanut butter and Nutella separately.

Pour the batter into the brownie tin then add the peanut butter and Nutella on the top.  I dropped this onto the top in lines then took a knife to add a bit of a pattern.  If I were to do this again, I believe I would "cut" the peanut butter and Nutella a bit deeper into the batter to make them easier to cut mainly!

Next time, I would take the knife a bit deeper so the peanut butter and Nutella are not all on the top.

Bake for 25 minutes - (I had to bake an additional 5 minutes but am wondering about my oven since I seem to have to do that quite often now.)

The brownies should be fudge-like - if you bake them for too long, they will be more cake like.

Riverhill suggests adding all kinds of different things to this recipe such as pecans, white chocolate, salted caramel, berries or whatever takes your fancy, like I did with peanut butter and Nutella!

These brownies are amazing, if I do say so myself!
So yummy, in fact, that I quickly packaged up as many as possible and posted them to my son in London!
That way I won't be tempted to eat them!


Standard procedure at the post office is to ask what the contents of a package are.  After I told her it was brownies, the lady behind the counter laughed and said her next question should be the approximate worth of the contents, but these would be priceless!  Let's hope Martin agrees!

Added note - Just before posting this blog,  I got a message from Martin and his colleagues in London after they received the package of these brownies.  From the picture, it looks like they all agreed the brownies were priceless!  

"The trouble with remakes is that people fall in love with the original. It's like peanut butter. If you try to change the taste of peanut butter, you're in trouble."

Sylvester Stallone

Also be sure to check out all the other recipes from this month's Peanut Butter Bash!

From the Riverhill Coffee Bar  here is their recipe for

Dark Chocolate Brownies

Preheat oven to 170C/350F

300g/ 10.5 ounces Dark Chocolate 70%

200g/ 1 & 3/4 sticks  unsalted butter

4 eggs

200g/ 3/4 cup caster sugar (any granulated sugar will do really!)

140g/ 5/8 cup soft brown sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla

170g/ 1 cup flour

3 tablespoons cocoa powder

my added ingredients for the Peanut Butter Bash:

4 tablespoons creamy peanut butter

4 tablespoons Nutella

Grease and line a brownie tin.

Melt together the chocolate and butter in the microwave and leave aside to cool slightly.

Meanwhile whisk eggs and sugars together with electric beaters or in a Kitchen Aid until pale and thick and creamy.

Add the vanilla and cocoa powder.

Fold in the chocolate and butter mixture and lastly the flour.

On low and using 2 small pans, melt the peanut butter and Nutella separately.

Pour the batter into the brownie tin then add the peanut butter and Nutella on the top.  I dropped this onto the top in lines then took a knife to add a bit of a pattern.  If I were to do this again, I believe I would "cut" the peanut butter and Nutella a bit deeper into the batter to make them easier to cut mainly!

Bake for 25 minutes - (I had to bake an additional 5 minutes but am wondering about my oven since I seem to have to do that quite often now.)

The brownies should be fudge - if you bake them for too long, they will be more cake like.

Riverhill suggests adding all kinds of different things to this recipe such as pecans, white chocolate, salted caramel, berries or whatever takes your fancy, like I did with peanut butter and Nutella!