Bonfire Night Brownies

Bonfire Night or Guy Fawkes Night, is one of my favourite events during the Winter season, mainly because it's a night spent with friends and family in front of a fiery inferno, watching fireworks while you stuff your face with a massive amount of treats and goodies and write your name in the sky with sparklers.  In honour of the occasion I've created some mouth watering treats, gooey chocolate orange brownies topped with a delicious mini bonfire. For more information on how I made these, then carry on reading.

As per usual I took a simple chocolate chip brownie recipe from Mary Berry's baking bible and made a few orangey additions to get the flavour I wanted. I suggest leaving the butter you need out overnight, as this will make sure it's perfectly softened for baking. For the brownies you will need:

275g softened butter

375g caster sugar

4 large eggs

75g cocoa powder

100g self-raising flour

100g plain chocolate chips (I used milk chocolate, white would be nice too)

zest of one orange

orange extract

1. Pre heat the oven to 180°C fan and then grease a 30x23cm baking tin and line with baking parchment. The tin I used was slightly larger, which just results in slightly large but thinner brownies. I also didn't have baking parchment so alternatively you can grease the tray with butter and then cover this with cocoa powder. My brownies came out a treat without sticking using this method.

2. Measure all the ingredients in to a bowl and mix until they're evenly blended together. Simple!

3. Spoon the mixture into the tin, making sure you get all the mixture out of the bowl and ensure the mixture is spread to the corners of the tin.

4. Bake in the oven for 40-45 minutes. When you take them out the brownies should have a crusty top and a knife or skewer should come out clean when inserted into the centre. 

5. It's very important that you leave the brownies to cool before you attempt to cut them or take them out the tin. I left mine for a good half hour at least before coming back to them.

6. Once cool use a sharp knife to cut your brownies into squares, I did about 15 but this may change depending on how big you want them and the size of your tin. 

Now you can leave your brownies as they are, they're super gooey and dense, just like a brownie should be with a delicious chocolate orange flavour. Or, like me, you can go the extra mile to add a bit of decoration to them. To decorate as I have done you will need:

4 or 5 Cadbury flakes

300g icing sugar

150g softened unsalted butter (proper butter gives a much nicer flavour than margarine)

orange extract

orange food colouring 

piping bag and nozzle (I used a Wilton 1M)

1. Beat together the icing sugar and butter until smooth, adding half a teaspoon or so of orange food colouring and orange extract. You can alter these measurements as you wish to create the desired effect but remember that the more liquid you add, the runnier the buttercream will become. 

2. Break up your flakes in to a bowl. These will act as your wood or logs for the fire. 

3. I put a small blob of icing on to each brownie first to act as an adhesive for the flakes.

4. Arrange your flakes as desired on each brownie to create a bonfire effect.

5. I found the easiest way to create the flames was to pipe them first on to a plate and using a knife carefully lift them on to the brownies. Piping directly on to the flakes was tricky as the icing has nothing to adhere to. 

I'd love to hear your thoughts on this recipe! Will you be baking any treats for the Autumn/Winter season?