Classic Fudgy Brownies

Is there anything better than sinking your teeth into a warm, gooey, fudgy brownie? That amazing intensely chocolatey flavor, crackly top, and fudgy center; I mean it’s practically one step removed from eating pure chocolate!

Brownies can be a bit polarizing though. Lots of decisions when it comes to brownies! Chewy, cakey, or fudgy? Middle or corner/edge? Nuts, or no nuts? Boxed mix, or from scratch?

Personally, I’m a fudgy, corner, with nuts, and from scratch kinda gal. My son is a brownie-holic, and I’ve made countless batches of brownies over the years. Every variety, some from a box, and most from scratch.

No knocking boxed mixes, they work well in a pinch; but I definitely prefer the flavor of from scratch brownies. Plus, I know exactly what’s in them!

If you’ve never made brownies from scratch before, you’ll be amazed at how easy it actually is! No mixer needed, made in just one bowl/saucepan, and they’re ready for the oven in about 10 minutes.

How to make fudgy brownies?

This is just an overview; the full ingredients and directions are in the recipe card toward the bottom of this post.

1. Melt butter and chocolate. Once they’re melted, turn off the heat and remove the pan.
2. Whisk in sugars. Whisking both the sugars in really well while the butter is still warm helps to get those crackly tops!
3. Add eggs. Whisk them in one at a time, then add in vanilla.
4. Stir in dry ingredients. The dry ingredients in this recipe are cocoa powder, flour, salt and espresso powder. A rubber spatula is the best tool for this.
5. Stir in chopped chocolate. This gives you those little pockets of melted chocolate!
6. Bake. Bake for 35-45 minutes.
7. Let cool before slicing.

Variations of this recipe

• Types of chocolate – I prefer using bittersweet or semi-sweet for this recipe, but milk or dark chocolate will work as well.
• Mixing bowl – if you’d prefer not to make the batter in your saucepan, you can melt the butter, and add it to a mixing bowl with the sugars. Then just continue as written.
• Larger pan – I totally get it; sometimes an 8×8″ pan just isn’t enough brownies! This recipe can easily be baked in a 9×13″ pan, for about 25-30 minutes.
• Nuts – nuts are a very common brownie addition! I love to add a generous handful of toasted chopped walnuts.
• Salted caramel – try drizzling some salted caramel sauce over the top of the baked brownies.
• Peanut butter cup – for a fun twist, sometimes I like to push some peanut butter cups down into the brownie batter before it’s baked.
• Oreos – do the same as above, but with Oreo cookies instead!

Making fudgy brownies ahead of time

These brownies can be made ahead of time, and will keep for around 2 days at room temperature. However, there’s just nothing better than a freshly baked, warm brownie, so we like them best when baked fresh.

Storage

These brownies should be kept covered tightly in an airtight container, and consumed within 3-4 days for best texture.

For longer storage, they can be refrigerated, but make sure they’re covered really tightly so they don’t dry out.  They should last about a week when refrigerated.

I haven’t tested freezing these (honestly they never last long around here lol), but I’m sure they would freeze well.

Any nutritional information shared is an estimate, and is automatically calculated through a program.  If calorie count is important to you, we recommend running the ingredients through whichever online nutritional calculator you prefer.  Calories can vary quite a bit depending on which brands were used.

The Chunky Chef is not a nutritionist and doesn’t provide full nutritional information for recipes as there is a potential for error and we wouldn’t want to potentially and/or unknowingly pass along incorrect information.