My First Baking Attempt

I've never literally done baking by myself before. Usually I just helped my mother or my little sister who loves baking cakes and cookies, but never really tried to bake alone. When I moved here, I decided I want to start baking in my spare time. Besides that buying cakes is quite expensive in here, I always admire my friends who have passion for baking, where they turn the passion into business. Well, who knows if I might be able to sell my own cakes someday :)

I've searched for the perfect recipe for my first trial, until I found the delicious brownies recipe on this website. I love having a chocolatey brownies, which have moist texture and dry cracked crust on the top and this recipe provides the exact brownies. The recipe is as follows (I've added some additional instruction to make it more precise and the sequence is more suitable for me):

Brownies (25 brownies)

Ingredients:

5 ounces (150 grams) semisweet or bittersweet chocolate chopped

1/2 cup (1 stick) (113 grams) unsalted butter, cut into pieces

2 tablespoons (15 grams) cocoa powder

1 cup (200 grams) granulated white sugar

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

3 large eggs

3/4 cup (95 grams) all-purpose flour

1/4 teaspoon salt

3/4 cup (125 grams) semi-sweet chocolate chips(optional)

Method:

1. Prepare a square baking pan of 23cm x 23cm, place a baking paper at the bottom of the pan and butter the paper and the side of the pan.
2. Prepare and weigh the ingredients.
3. Preheat oven to 180 degrees C for 15 minutes and place the rack in the center of the oven, use timer for precise timing. Use the top and bottom heat.
4. Melt the chocolate and butter in a stainless steel bowl (or a small saucepan) and placed over a saucepan of simmering water, until smooth.
5. Remove from the heat and stir the cocoa powder and sugar with a whisker (do not use mixer because we don't want the batter too smooth).
6. Next, whisk in the vanilla extract and eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition.
7. Finally, stir in the flour, salt and chocolate chips (at this stage, the batter is getting thicken, so it's better to use spatula)
8. Pour the batter into prepared pan and bake for about 20-25 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out with a little batter a few moist clumps clinging to it. Do not over bake. Remove from oven and let cool.
9. Cut the brownies with a cake knife into 3x3cm square per pcs. Between each cut, clean the knife with a tissue or paper to get a better cutting result.
10. The brownies is ready to serve.

Here are the picture of my brownies. It tastes as expected, very chocolatey and moist. When it is still hot, the chocolate chip inside the brownies is melted in your mouth. Very yummy!

As it is quite successful, I decided to give it as a present for a friend of mine who will receive confirmation this Sunday and I was asked to be her sponsor. So, this is my brownies gift for her:

Really hope she'll like it :)

Cheers,

Indispensable Lady