20 Next-Level Brownie Recipes to Keep in Your Back Pocket (2024)

FAQs

How do you upgrade boxed brownies? ›

Boxed brownies can be their own blank slate for just about any snacks, sweets, or baking scraps you've got in your pantry or fridge. Add a teaspoon of instant coffee or espresso powder. Throw in a handful of nuts—pecans, walnuts, macadamia, whatever you have on hand. Scoop in a palmful of dried or frozen fruit.

One change is to use milk or heavy cream instead of water. This change will make brownies more moist and gooey since milk is more fatty and flavorful than water. A second change is to use butter instead of oil. For similar reasons to using milk, butter adds a rich and more decadent quality to the batter.

Do Brownies Need to Be Refrigerated? Brownies don't need to be refrigerated, but they'll hold up a few more days if they are. Unless your brownies include more perishable ingredients like fresh fruit or cream cheese frosting, they'll be fine at room temperature as long as they're stored in an airtight container.

To test for doneness with a toothpick, insert a toothpick into the center of the brownies and pull it back out. For fudgy brownies, you'll want to see some moist crumbs attached to the toothpick when you pull it back out. If it looks like it's covered in brownie batter, the brownies will need to bake a bit longer.

Swirl in Some Good Stuff

Dollop cream cheese, fruit jam, pumpkin puree, peanut butter or caramel over brownie batter. Spoon it into the pan, then cut through the batter to create this wow-worthy effect. Your dessert will be prettier and tastier than every other treat on the table.

Add nuts – Add a handful of finely chopped pecans or walnuts if you love brownies with nuts. Add mix ins – Jazz up a basic brownie mix with chopped mini peanut butter cups, white chocolate chunks, or your favorite chopped up candy bar. Add a swirl – Swirl in spoonfuls of peanut butter or Nutella before baking.

If you want to get a little more creative with your brownie mix hacks, add an extra egg to the batter. The extra protein will help thicken up the batter and make it fluffier, creating a more decadent, fudgy texture. You can also add the yolk by itself in addition to the 2 eggs a box brownie mix typically calls for.

the butter brownies actually had a fudgier texture. they were softer, and they really just melted in your mouth. they also had that shiny crust and just better flavor, whereas the oil brownies were actually chewier.

Conclusion. Ultimately, using milk instead of water in brownie mix recipes can add a richer flavor and texture to the treat. However, it can also add fat and require a longer baking time!

Like all other methods of storing brownies, freezing brownies works best when the brownies are kept away from the air. Aluminum foil, airtight containers, plastic wrap, and resealable bags can all be used in the freezer to keep your brownies fresh.

Is it better to refrigerate brownies or leave them out? ›

Brownies can be kept at room temperature for up to five days for most brownie types. A cheesecake swirl or frosting or a ganache frosting should not be kept at room temperature. Store brownies in the fridge if they contain add-ins that are normally refrigerated.

Bottom Line. While most baked goods can be left out at room temperature, there are some exceptions. Always store cakes with fresh fruit, whipped cream or cream cheese frosting in the refrigerator along with breads featuring meat or hard-boiled eggs.

If the middle is raw but the edges are burning, your oven is too hot. For a standard recipe, cooked in an 8 inch square tin, we'd look to cook the brownies low-and-slow - around 30 minutes at 160C.

It may be your oven isn't calibrated correctly or your brownies are too thick. Use a cooking thermometer to check your ovens temperature and make sure you're correctly following directions. It's possible, you have too much batter in the pan, and that most of it is in the center.

Carefully inspect the toothpick to determine if what you're seeing is crumb or chocolate, since melty chocolate on a toothpick is not an indicator of underbaked brownies! If you're still not sure, you can slightly underbake your brownies and rely on carryover cooking to bring them to doneness.

Use Chocolate

Dipping different desserts into chocolate gives a touch of elegance that says you put in a lot of effort. The great thing about chocolate is that it can cover anything sweet! Your store-bought brownies and biscotti will look like a million bucks with a little drizzle here and there.

You can absolutely substitute butter for the vegetable oil. Use the same quantity specified in the directions (for example, if it calls for 1/3 cup of oil, use 5 1/3 tablespoons of butter). Melt it down, then let it cool a bit. You might not ever go back to oil!

Other ways to make brownies chewier

If you can't imagine not following the package directions, think again and try melted butter in place of the vegetable oil. The fattiness of the butter works similarly to the milk in the previously suggested swap — it makes the batter denser and the brownies chewier.