The best traditional brownie recipe (GF)

I have to confess that as a kid, I really hated discount stores.  I guess I must have been a child snob, but I dreaded following my mom around as she searched through the endless clothing racks for a "find," or accompanying my grandma to Big Lots (back then it was called Pic N' Save) to buy cookies, pasta sauce, and beauty products that I looked at warily, convinced they couldn't be as good as the full priced items at the mall and grocery store.  I have many, many memories of being dragged by mom to Marshall's, TJ Maxx, Ross, and worst of all, the 99 Cent Store.   

My mom has always loved a deal.  She grew up in a huge Irish-Catholic family with nine brothers and sisters.  Yes, you heard me right, my grandma had TEN kids.  My grandpa was a mail carrier and my grandma was a school bus driver, so neither made a whole lot of money. My mom has all kinds of stories about her dad buying the "day old" meat at the grocery store and creating casseroles with anything on hand that he named "slums."  Growing up with less caused my mom to be very aware of what she has as an adult and so she's a very frugal person.  When I was a kid, we would travel to three different grocery stores in an afternoon so that she could catch all of the sale items featured in that week's ADs.

She loved the 99 cent store, too.  I HATED it.  Things were unorganized, there was usually an eccentric character shopping across from you, and I just didn't trust why things were so much cheaper.  Especially the refrigerated items and produce.  It just didn't make sense!

Now that I'm an adult, I have become a thrifty, discount loving, 99 cent store shopping lady who drags her husband to bargain stores- Ha!

As many of you know, baking can be quite an expensive hobby.  Especially if you are like me and fixate on a single recipe idea without compromise, forcing you to go out and buy a bunch of specialty ingredients you don't have on hand.

With these brownies, I just felt like eating brownies and I wanted to make something simple and delicious with ingredients I already had.

My most recent 99 Cent Store Only find was boxes of unsweetened Baker's Chocolate.  They have consistently had them at the store in Santa Monica and, according to my mom, at other stores as well.  If you can snatch some up at your local store, they are really a great find.

These brownies are homemade, but truly easy to make.  They are rich and decadent, yet come together so quickly for any event or non-event you bake them for.

The Best Traditional Brownie Recipe (GF)

Adapted from Baker's Chocolate

3 squares (3 oz) Baker's chocolate
1 stick, plus 1 tbsp butter
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 eggs, plus 1 white
1 tsp vanilla
3/4 cup gluten free flour  (1/4 cup sweet rice flour, 1/4 cup potato starch, 1/4 cup GF oat flour or sorghum flour)

Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees.  

Line an 8x8 square baking pan with parchment paper.  Butter and flour the parchment paper and pan (use sweet rice flour, if using gluten free flour blend).

Combine butter and chocolate squares in medium sized bowl.  Microwave for 1 1/2-2 minutes or until butter is melted and chocolate is melted/combined with butter.  You may want to microwave in intervals and break up chocolate/stir if you do not pre-chop the chocolate into small pieces.

Spoon chocolate and butter mixture into large mixing bowl, scraping sides to ensure that as much of the mixture falls into the bowl as possible.  Add the sugar and stir until combined.  Add the 2 eggs, 1 white, and vanilla extract, stirring and folding with an offset spatula or spoon until well mixed.

Add 3/4 cup gluten free flour mix, or 3/4 cup regular flour, and fold until combined.

Bake for 30-35 minutes, until toothpick inserted into center comes out with wet crumbs.