I am late to the party when it comes to chocolate brownies. I’ve always found them to be either a bit too gooey, or a bit too dry. I’ve discovered that the secret to the perfect brownie is to bake them yourself, that way you are in control of how gooey your brownie is. This week I baked a batch of Chocolate Marshmallow Brownies and after years of being entirely indifferent to brownies, I ended up making the best brownies ever!

Baking brownies is such a lovely thing to do with children, my son loves stirring the chocolate and butter and watching them melt over the gentle heat of the bain marie. He’s 8 now, so only just trusted to do this job knowing the dangers of naked flames, hot water and inattention.

After school on Tuesdays, the boy and I like to have a couple of hours of baking and crafts together. It’s my favourite time of the week, his too I think. Of course, the secret to craft and baking success is planning, something I entirely forgot to do. Thankfully I had everything we needed to bake our usual chocolate brownies with cherries, everything that is apart from the cherries. No fear, I thought, I’ll improvise.

Hiding in my coffee cupboard was a bag of marshmallows which I sprinkle on top of hot chocolates. I wondered how they’d be if I used them in the brownies, it turns out they were excellent. You could stir them through the brownie batter, or you can just sprinkle them on top before they go in the oven. They go all toasted and gooey, just like round the campfire.

Chocolate Marshmallow Brownies

Ingredients:

250g milk chocolate
250g unsalted butter
4 medium eggs
250g sugar
2 heaped tablespoons self raising flour
2 heaped tablespoons cocoa powder
60ml of vegetable oil
2 handfuls of Marshmallows

How to make your Chocolate Marshmallow Brownies:

Pre-heat your oven to 185° and line a deep sided baking dish with baking parchment.

In a bowl, over a pan of simmering water, melt the chocolate and the butter together until smooth. In a separate bowl, mix the sugar and the eggs, whisk them until they’re light and fluffy.

Pass the flour, cocoa powder through a fine sieve and add to the eggs and sugar. Gently whisk the ingredients together until combined. Then mix in the melted chocolate and the vegetable oil to combine.

If you want to stir your marshmallows through the batter, do that now. if you want to sprinkle them on top, pour the batter into the baking dish and sprinkle them all over the top.

Bake for 35-45 minutes until the brownies have lost their wobble but are still a bit gooey inside. Take out and leave to cool. You want to almost under bake them so they are still soft in the centre.

Once they are cool, cut them into squares, sprinkle them with icing sugar if you prefer. These are my favourite brownies ever. I urge you to give them a try.