ChefSteps

Transforming recipes into formulas, we mapped out the brownie building blocks in this handy chart so you can compare at a glance how the various ingredient quantities and inclusions yield different, delectable results. 

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Brownies: A Parametric Recipe

You know we love a good infographic

Let’s take a closer look at the brownies we baked

A tried-and-true recipe from Matthew’s days as a pastry chef, this brownie is thin, slightly chewy, and fudgy with a balanced chocolate flavor. Finished with ganache icing, this brownie also involves a surprise technique—a flip! After baking, the brownie is flipped out of the pan so the crunchy top becomes the bottom. This provides a wonderful textural contrast to the smooth icing on top.

Matthew Woolen

In true boxed mix fashion, these brownies are a simple mix of wet and dry ingredients. A touch of water helps to bloom the cocoa, adding chew and fudginess. We thought these were the best chewy brownies of the bunch with a gooey interior that’s studded with chocolate chunks.

Michelle Lopez, Weeknight Baking

This recipe was the chewiest of all the brownies we tested due to the technique of cooking the eggs and sugar together before whipping to a full ribbon. The final chewiness was almost like nougat. Thick and soft with no crunch, these brownies were also smoky and spicy thanks to the addition of smoked paprika and chipotle powder. While chili pairs beautifully with chocolate, we found the spices to be a touch overpowering.

Johnny Iuzzini, Sugar Rush

With browned butter, espresso, and dark chocolate, this brownie is chock full of rich, chocolatey flavors. The top is shiny, glassy, and a little crunchy, and the interior is dense and gooey. The Dutch-processed cocoa makes this brownie darker in color.

Stella Parks, BraveTart: Iconic American Desserts

From the classic American chocolate manufacturer, this brownie is nice and thick. Texturally, it fits somewhere in between chocolate cake and a gooey brownie. Made with natural cocoa powder, it has a delicate flavor—we found it lacking the chocolatey punch of other brownies we tested. The interior is very soft and the top has a nice crunch.

Hershey’s

From a textbook that both Grant and Matthew used in culinary school, this recipe includes nuts and uses a modified sponge technique with no air whipped in. The recipe includes both dark and unsweetened chocolate. The texture was tender but dense, and a bit dry and crumbly. Noticeable nut (pecan) flavors.

Wayne Gisslen, Professional Baking

From an American icon, this is a recipe that never disappoints. It uses a modified creaming method with a touch of coconut oil, a bit of brown sugar, and unsweetened chocolate. These brownies were one of our favorites. Like Baby Bear’s bed in Goldilocks, they’re not overly sweet nor dense. Fudgy with a great chocolate flavor, these brownies are juuust right.

Martha Stewart

From another iconic home baking reference book, this brownie has a classic, nostalgic flavor that doesn’t disappoint. With unsweetened chocolate and walnuts, this brownie has a great looking glassy top and lots of crunch. We personally found the nuts overpowering and the chocolate flavor was on the milder side.

Betty Crocker

All about science, just like us, Alton’s recipe calls for baking these brownies twice at low temperatures. The recipe includes less flour than usual with a heavier percentage of granulated and brown sugars, cocoa, and egg. The result is a brownie that is darker in color with a great interior and a box-style bittersweet dark chocolate flavor.

Alton Brown

Like with our <a href="https://www.chefsteps.com/activities/the-ultimate-guide-to-chocolate-chip-cookies-when-average-equals-amazing">ultimate average chocolate chip cookie</a> experiment, we used the parametric chart to calculate the average of all ingredients and tested an “ultimate average” brownie using a simple mixing technique. (The eggs and sugar were lightly whisked together; chocolate and butter were melted together and married with the egg mixture; sifted dry ingredients were added last, along with the vanilla extract.) 

This brownie was just average, not ultimate. The flavor and texture were good—it had loads of chocolate flavor and a texture in between chewy and fudgy. The center was dense yet still soft and creamy. 

It needed to be a touch sweeter, and the appearance needed improvement. While the texture was good, it wasn’t yet the best darned brownie on the block. We knew we could do better. So <a href="https://www.chefsteps.com/activities/ultimate-chocolate-caramel-brownie">we did</a>.

Calculating and testing the average

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Ever wondered how to make a fluffy cake-like brownie? Or one that’s dense, decadent, and fudgy? Here’s how to manipulate ingredients and techniques to build the brownie of your dreams.

The Brownie Building Blocks: From Boxed Mix to Epic and Ultimate

This is one decadent dessert! Dense and fudgy, swirled with caramel, this brownie recipe includes some surprising ingredients and steps to make it the “ultimate.”

The Ultimate Rich as F*¢K Brownie

The brownie quest continues ...

What makes a brownie, a brownie? The combination of chocolate, flour, sugar, eggs, and some kind of fat seems so simple, but is actually incredibly complex. From fluffy and cake-like to dense and fudgy, the brownie universe is nearly boundless. To uncover the mysteries of scratch-made brownies, we scoured the internet and cookbooks, and baked batch after batch of the most popular recipes from these ten trusted sources. We wanted to explore the diversity of brownies in-depth and not simply test the same version ten times. So, we thoughtfully chose recipes that showcase various mixing methods, textures, and flavor profiles, and utilize a variety of chocolate types and quantities. Some recipes involve a creaming method while others use an egg foam technique. Matthew Woolen’s brownie has a ganache icing, while Bo Friberg’s includes nuts and raisins. Stella Park’s BraveTart brownie is rich with brown butter and espresso powder, while Alton Brown’s is actually baked twice! Like our <a href="https://www.chefsteps.com/activities/the-ultimate-guide-to-chocolate-chip-cookies-behold-the-cookie-calculator">journey to create</a> the ultimate average chocolate chip cookie, we created a parametric chart for brownies that compares the foundational ingredients and inclusions in each of these recipes.We also calculated (and baked) the average, but discovered that—unlike the <a href="https://www.chefsteps.com/activities/the-ultimate-guide-to-chocolate-chip-cookies-when-average-equals-amazing">ultimate average cookie</a>—an average brownie was just that ... average. So, we took what we learned here and leveled up to develop the <a href="https://www.chefsteps.com/activities/ultimate-chocolate-caramel-brownie">Ultimate Rich as F*¢K Brownie</a> recipe. So, whether you like your brownies cakey or fudgy, swirled with peanut butter or <a href="https://www.chefsteps.com/activities/ultimate-chocolate-caramel-brownie">caramel sauce</a>, studded with extra chocolate chips or chopped walnuts, you’ll find some great brownie-baking inspiration below. You can also check out the <a href="https://www.chefsteps.com/activities/the-ultimate-guide-to-brownies-understanding-the-ingrediets-and-process">building blocks of a great brownie</a> to learn how to swap ingredients or try new techniques to create your own ultimate recipe.

The Best Brownies Out There: A Parametric Analysis