Wheeler Cowperthwaite | Put some cilantro on it!

In Memoriam of Norbit, 9-3-2025

Norbit died of euthanasia after a massive stroke followed by heart failure on Sept. 3, 2025. He was 16.

Norbit was a very good boy. A consummate lover of laps, he loved his bed time, and in the past year had taken to being a between-the-legs cat. Stretched out the length of the bed, in a little ball, laying against your leg, all positions between two legs he adored.

Close up on awake Norbit on heating pad.

Just as much as he loved lap and bed time, Norbit loved his cat beds, whether it was lying in them, lying next to them, or with his claws sunk deep into them as he dreamed whatever cats dream of, or smooshing his face into them. The positions he sought to sleep in should baffle any sleep scientist.

Norbit was not a headbutter, or much into slow blinks. He wasn’t a fan of being held, except maybe as a baby, and then, only sometimes.

Norbit getting chin scratches

His purrs were some of the loudest I’ve ever heard, rivaling an AC unit. He was fearless. Not in the way that some cats will take on dogs or bears, but in the way that few things ever bothered him and not once did we see him run and hide. He didn’t like crowds of loud people, but was indifferent to noises, as he was indifferent to windows, although he didn’t mind a sun spot.

For some reason, he was never really into toys, except for the one type of string ball toy that was also Dexter’s favorite (RIP) — and he walked away with it in the same way. That and his catnip banana, which he would insist on sleeping on top of.

While Norbit was 16 when he died, he came to us as an older cat, an estimated 13, weighing a mere eight pounds in the summer of 2022. (We got him after the sudden death of Dexter).

At the Providence Animal Rescue League, his picture with a little tie on his collar, adorned the wall as the cat who had been stuck in the shelter the longest.

When he went to the shelter, it was one of the few times he was available to see, as he was back in the shelter from where he was being fostered, as he did not do well in the cage.
Norbit was brought to the Providence Animal Rescue League after his dad died. Norbit had been with his dad since he was a kitten. His daughter took Norbit in, but after litterbox issues that went undiagnosed, he shrank from over 18 pounds to 8 and she surrendered him to the Providence Animal Rescue League, where he was diagnosed as diabetic.

We were sent home with a vial of insulin, a few needles, and instructions on how to give him his injections. (Fortunately, he never felt a thing.)

When we brought him home, for the first month or so, as we sat on the couch, he would sit on the floor, just staring at us.

Norbit the first time he jumped on the bed. He was super skinny.

Then one night, he jumped on the bed. Seemingly, he had made the decision to trust us, and then later, I can only hope, love us. Or at least he quickly became comfortable enough with us to start bopping us in the nose and mouth in the morning with his paw because he wanted to be fed. When his demands went ignored, he would turn to face licking.

After a few months, he started gaining a little weight. Early pictures of him, he looks like skin and bones, a sad version of the cat we had to let go. He would max out at 16 pounds with us, slowly losing a little weight over the past year, as medications were added to his roster.

Norbit sleeping on a lap.

Sometime after we adopted him, we would ask a friend to board Norbit when we went away for a vacation. Much to my chagrin, he reported the first night, Norbit slept on the bed. The second morning, Norbit was bopping him in the face. Soon thereafter, he was getting the morning face licks for not complying with feeding time.

Norbit was not shy about his need for pets, either. Around 3-4 p.m. each day, he would begin to stir from his mid-afternoon nap and demand pets followed by lap time. As Norbit’s boarder (his uncle) recounted for us, his schedule kept no matter where he was staying.

In the mornings, until the past six months when he stopped jumping, he insisted on being on The Providence Journal’s morning meetings, walking on the keyboard, only sometimes settling for lap time.
Norbit was a lap cat, even if it took a few days of being starved of constant human companionship for him to warm up to his cat sitters.

Norbit loved to get on the desk when someone was working.

Norbit’s death came as a surprise at the same time it didn’t come as a surprise. For a diabetic 16-year-old cat, he was doing really well. Healthy weight. He could still jump, if he chose not to most of the time. His interest in toys waned but not his interest in pets. He got a set of stairs for the bed, which he quickly learned to use, hopping down in the middle of the night to eat something, then quickly getting back to his spot between the legs. In the mornings, evenings, anytime that seemed appropriate or inappropriate, he was liable to announce himself: popping his head above the comforter, letting out a loud meow, before walking onto the bed.

Norbit sleeping in a bed on the desk.

Earlier in the year, we took him to the vet for an emergency appointment after he suddenly lost the function in his back legs for about three minutes. He regained the function while I was on the phone with the vet, but still we took him in.
It was probably a stroke, she said. More may follow. And they did. Norbit had periodic episodes until Sept. 3 when he woke from a nap and found he was unable to control his limbs, furiously trying to get up.

At the emergency vet, he seemed to be doing fine as could be expected, angry about his lack of functioning limbs. Blood pressure? Fine. Blood sugar? Fine. Until he started to crash, having a hard time breathing, as he went into heart failure.

The common refrain for our pets is that they’ve gone over the rainbow bridge and if we’re lucky enough to have an afterlife, they’ll be there too, although no one ever addresses what happens when there’s a clowder of cats waiting for you.
Instead, I like to think that Norbit is somewhere with his dad and they’re probably taking a nap together.

Norbit on a lap.

Green chile stew hearkens to warm summer days

(Skip to the recipe)

Perhaps the most fitting meal for winter is the spicy stew. Bubbling in a pot on the stove for hours on end, it’s a filling meal that warms the body, warms the soul and warms the taste buds.

I have my own take on classic green chile stew, which assumes that there are no leftover roasted chiles from the roasting season and that you know how much heat you can tolerate.

This stew gets its classic smoky flavor both from the use of vegetables roasted in the oven – chiles, onions and tomatillos – and from bacon.

When I first started working on this recipe, I used two to three pounds of chiles. To me, that was not nearly enough, and future iterations were made with four to five pounds.

I also have a taste for the acidic. I love a hot and sour soup, which gets its sour from vinegar. In this case, I like to add some lemon and lime juice to the stew to give it a little more of an acidic kick than might be in the usual green chile stew recipe. More importantly, the little addition of acidity really made the flavors pop, just like a tiny bit of salt when the stew is being served that unlocks the flavor of a dish.

The recipe is broken into a few different parts. The first is the roasting of the vegetables. Recipes follow into two camps: a Dutch oven or on baking sheets. If you go with a baking sheet, use parchment paper instead of aluminum foil because all the liquid the vegetables release will make them stick to the metal. Also, make sure they are far enough apart that they aren’t steaming each other.

I included potatoes in my recipe to add a starch, but they are by no means required. Rice is another option.

The beef or chicken stock will add plenty of salt to the stew, but if more is desired, add additional salt — and pepper — at the very end of the cooking process, or even make sure a salt shaker is available when serving. I find that each person usually has a different level of ideal saltiness, which is better served by slightly under salting than over salting a dish.

This green chile stew may not be green as chile verde, but it is just as delicious.

Ingredients

4-5 pounds chile peppers
4-5 tomatillos
2 medium onions
2-3 pound beef or pork roast
5 cloves of garlic, chopped
1 pound bacon (optional)
5 red potatoes, cut in quarters (optional)
5 cups chicken or beef stock
1 tablespoon cumin
Vegetable or canola oil
Lemon and lime juice
Salt and pepper
Water as required

Directions

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees
Wash all the peppers and tomatillos
Cut all of the peppers in half, take off the stems, deseed if desired and cut the onion into quarters
Either place the peppers, onion and tomatillos into a Dutch oven or place them, skin-side up, onto baking sheets lined with parchment paper. Sprinkle vegetable or canola oil over the vegetables.
Roast for 40 minutes to 1 1/2 hours, until very fragrant.
While the peppers are roasting, cut the pork or beef roast into 1-inch cubes.
In a medium pan, fry the bacon. Remove the bacon to a side dish.
In the same pan, begin browning the pork cubes in small batches on high heat. Do not crowd the cubes. If not using bacon, brown with oil.
Remove the pork cubes to a separate dish.
When the vegetables are done roasting, put them into a food processor or blender along with the chopped garlic. Add 1/4 to 1/2 cup lemon juice. Blend until pureed.
Add the chicken or beef stock to a large pot, along with the vegetable puree, pork/beef, bacon if being used, cumin, bones (if a bone-in roast was used) and potatoes.
On medium heat, bring to a simmer. Reduce to low heat, and stirring occasionally, simmer for 2 to 5 hours.
If the liquid level gets too low, add water or stock.
When done, remove the bone to a dish. Remove any remaining meat from the bone and add the meat back to the stew. Throw away the bone.
Salt and pepper to taste.
Add 1/4 cup lemon juice and 1/4 cup lime juice to the stew and stir in. Add more juice as desired or to taste.
Serve or cool and serve the following day.

Going low sodium for the new year with a stir fry

A while ago, my mother had to take her boyfriend to the emergency room, which turned into a hospital stay.

Turns out, it was congestive heart failure.

The doctors suggested a few lifestyle changes including a change in diet. They asked him to lower the amount of sodium he consumes each day. That mostly comes from salt, but also lots of prepared foods.

The doctors suggested a low-sodium diet because it helps with a lot of things: kidney failure, high blood pressure (also called hypertension), diabetes and lupus. There’s a problem. Going low sodium is hard, especially because salt often adds just that kick to a dish that turns it from ho-hum to fantastic.

After I got the news, I started to pay attention to my own sodium consumption. One of the easiest ways to control sodium intake is to cook at home because the cook controls the amount of salt. According to the Food and Drug Administration, packaged and restaurant foods are responsible for 70% of our sodium intake.

I am not a particularly high risk for congestive heart failure and there is no medical reason for me to reduce my salt intake other than, Americans eat too much salt. According to the Food and Drug Administration, we eat an average of 3,500 mg of sodium a day, but their guidelines cap the daily recommended dose at 2,300 mg, about a teaspoon of salt. Those with high blood pressure should further reduce intake to 1,500 mg a day.

For the new year, I’ve decided I should reduce my salt intake. That means using more herbs and spices, using low-sodium versions of things like soy sauce and using more flavorful oils.

If I needed to cut back my salt to levels acceptable for someone with high blood pressure, it would be a rough couple of months. Dick Louge, in his cookbook “500 Low Sodium Recipes,” wrote it took a month, on a 1,200 mg sodium diet, before he no longer craved salt.

“Today, a ‘normal’ salted potato chip tastes way too salty to me,” he wrote.

I can relate. When I lived in Germany, I found that most restaurant food, but especially Turkish kebabs, were just way too salty for my American taste buds, almost too salty to eat. When visiting Sarajevo in Bosnia and Herzegovina, I had a few kebabs and, to my surprise, they were not too salty at all. I then realized, it wasn’t me. It was the Germans.

I decided that a stir-fry would be a recipe to start thinking about how much salt goes into a dish and how to make something taste better when there is less salt.

The first step was to look at the labels of the basics, including chicken stock and soy sauce. One can of chicken stock contained 750 mg of sodium per one cup, compared to just 250 mg for the low-sodium version. A single tablespoon of an average soy sauce has 879 mg of sodium compared to Kikkoman’s low-sodium version with 575 mg per tablespoon.

The second step was to take stock of the fresh herbs and spices I could use to add flavors to the dish. Those included mint, basil, ginger, lemon and mushrooms. Thai basil and holy basil are also good additions, although have a spicier taste than Italian basil.

One thing to consider about lemon is that the rind of the lemon, when it is still pliable and fresh, a more bright yellow, makes a great addition to sauces and dishes. The rind is delicious, either cut up, sliced or as lemon zest.

The third step was to consider other ingredients in a dish, in this case, the oil, and seeing if there are more flavorful substitutes. That meant moving from canola oil to sesame oil.

This recipe will leave you wishing there was just a little bit more salt, and maybe a little bit more soy sauce, or a little oyster sauce, would be in order, but going low sodium takes a little time.

This low-sodium stir-fry relies on ginger, basic, mint, lemon and chiles to bring out lots of flavor while reducing the amount of sodium.

Print Recipe

Low-sodium chicken stir fry

Cutting down on the amount of sodium in a stir fry requires getting flavor from other ingredients, especially herbs.

Prep Time30

Cook Time15

Total Time45

Course: Main Course

Cuisine: American

Keyword: low sodium, stir fry

Servings: 2 people

Author: Wheeler Cowperthwaite

Ingredients

1/4 cup chopped basil fresh
2 tablespoons chopped mint
2 chopped green onions chopped
2 cloves chopped garlic
2 tablespoons chopped fresh ginger
1/2 to 1 lemon de-seeded
1 pound chicken breasts or thighs cut into bite-sized pieces
2 tbsp low-sodium soy sauce
1 small onion, chopped
3-6 green chiles, chopped
1 small eggplant cut into bite-sized pieces
Red, yellow or orange bell pepper, sliced into bite-sized pieces, or (optional)
broccoli or any other vegetables available, sliced into bite-sized pieces (optional)
sliced mushrooms (optional)
3/4 cup low-sodium chicken broth/stock

Instructions

In a blender or food processor, mix the basil, mint, 1/4 cup of broth, green onions, garlic, 1 tablespoon chopped ginger and lemon. Blend until minced.
Cut the chicken into bite-sized pieces and combine with the soy sauce. Let it briefly marinate.
Chop the onion, chiles, eggplant or other vegetables being used.
In a large pan over high heat, add the sesame seed oil. Once the pan is very hot, add the vegetables and cook until tender, 4-8 minutes. Remove to a bowl.
Add another tablespoon of sesame seed oil and add the basil-lemon-ginger-mint mixture and cook for 1 minute, stirring.
Add the chicken, marinade and 1 tablespoon finely chopped ginger to the pan and cook until done, 2-3 minutes.
Add the 1/2 cup of stock, bring to a boil, and re-add the vegetables to the pan. Cook for another 1-3 minutes. Serve with rice or noodles.

Notes

Adapted from the Mayo Clinic’s chicken stir-fry with eggplant, basil and ginger. At a serving size of two cups, the sodium level should be 395 mg.

French onion soup to warm the soul on cold winter nights

Cooler winter days cry out for a change in menu, for something that stays hot during the whole meal, that feels like the enveloping warmth of a dinner lit by a fireplace and candles.

Now is the perfect time to break out the cognac, slice some French bread (or sourdough), get out the little tureens and impress family, friends, or a date, with perhaps the most romantic soup: the French onion.

Like so many French recipes, this will involve bread and cheese, butter and onions, cognac and time. Some of the time will be spent attentively watching onions as they slowly brown in butter, but the majority of the time can be spent away from the stove as the soup simmers, and simmers, and then simmers some more.

French onion soup starts not with onions, or French bread, or nice cheese, but with stock, which builds the base everything else is built on. There are many strongly held beliefs on the stock that should form the base of the French onion soup.

Some call for making your own veal stock, with pounds of veal neck bones, or veal shanks, roasted in the oven, then boiled for at least two hours. Others call for making your own beef broth, with beef neck bones.

Still others say store bought beef broth will do, even the low sodium kinds, or even chicken broth, although if you have a turkey carcass still being covered, consider turning it into stock. Still some say skip the animals and go straight to vegetable broth.

Bon Appétit’s Chris Morocco goes so far, in his “French-ish Onion Soup” to get rid of stock altogether, instead letting the namesake of French onion soup to do all the work.

This recipe is a bit of a hybrid. I’ve pulled from a few different sources, including Morocco, Julia Child and Petit Trois, the French bistro in Los Angeles and Sherman Oaks. (They’re the ones who call for six pounds of veal neck bones.)

This recipe comes in a few parts. You can serve the soup with toasted French bread (or sourdough) on the bottom, on the top or float it on the top, cover it in cheese and bake it in the oven. You take it up a notch with an egg yolk, Worcestershire sauce and some extra cognac for a deluxe soup.

This recipe can easily be vegan, by omitting the cheese, using vegetable broth and using olive oil instead of butter, or just vegetarian, with the use of vegetable broth.

One final note: French onion soup takes time. There are no shortcuts and there is no cheating. You can’t increase the heat on the stove to make the onions brown faster.

French onion soup takes time is well worth the wait. Photo by sousvideguy/Flickr.

Ingredients

For the soup

2-3 pounds thinly sliced yellow onions

4 tablespoons butter or olive oil

1 tsp salt

¼ tsp sugar

3 tbsp flour

8 cups of stock — beef, chicken or vegetable

½ cup dry white wine or dry white vermouth

3 tbsp cognac

1-2 cups grated Swiss or Parmesan cheese

For the toasted French bread

8 slices of French bread or sourdough bread, cut ¾ to 1-inch thick

Olive oil

Grated swiss or Parmesan cheese

Directions

Heat a heavy, 4-quart saucepan over medium heat until hot. Add 3 tablespoons butter and 1 tablespoon oil and all the thinly sliced onions. Turn heat to medium-low and cook the onions slowly for 15 minutes, while covered.

Uncover the saucepan, raise the heat to medium, and stir in the 1 teaspoon salt and ¼ teaspoon sugar, which will help them brown. Cook for 30-60 minutes, stirring frequently, until they have turned an even, deep and golden brown. They should be evenly golden, but not mushy.

Sprinkle the flour over the cooked onions and cook for another 3 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees.

In a separate pot, bring the stock to a boil.

Take the saucepan off the stove, once the onions are done, and blend in the 8 cups of stock, the white wine or vermouth, and add salt and pepper to taste.

Return the saucepan to heat and simmer for 30-40 minutes. Add salt and pepper as needed.

While the soup simmers, put the bread on a roasting pan and bake for 30 minutes, until the slices are dried out and lightly browned. After 15 minutes, baste each side with a teaspoon of olive oil. After the bread comes out of the oven, rub each piece with a cut piece of garlic.

Just before serving, stir in 3 tablespoons of cognac.

Either:

Pour the soup into individual soup cups or tureens, on top of the rounds of bread and pass out grated parmesan and Swiss cheese to be added by guests or

Pour the soup into individual oven-proof cups or tureens and float the rounds of bread on top and spread the grated Swiss and Parmesan cheese on top, then sprinkle with olive oil or butter.

Bake for 20 minutes in the oven and finish under a preheated the broiler for 1-2 minutes until the cheese on top of brown and serve immediately.

Recipe adapted from Julia Child, Chris Morocco and Petit Trois.

Mastering the art of beef bourguignon for a new Christmas tradition

As the weather begins to cool, I find that its time to think about warming foods, hearty foods and perhaps, most importantly, what to serve at dinner parties that will impress, will wow, that can double as a Sunday dinner, or even work for a holiday, like Christmas.

Enter beef bourguignon, the long-simmering French delicacy, a hearty beef stew made with a base of red wine (typically, burgundy), that takes hours to make and longer to simmer but is well worth the wait. Like most stews, it tastes even better the next day.

This French stew gets much of its richness from browning the beef before it goes into a pot, which then goes into the oven, for the long simmer (two to three hours). The rest comes from the wine that serves as the stew’s base, three cups of a full-bodied young red wine, like Chianti.

So too does richness come from pork fat, added in the form of blanched bacon, put in boiling water to remove its signature smoky taste.

Really, though, the richness in the recipe comes from a whole host of places. So too does it come from the pound of fresh mushrooms, sautéed in butter, and the small white onions, braised in stock.

The mushrooms, and onions, have their own set of instructions in the recipe, and should be done while the stew is in the oven.

When done correctly, the mushrooms will be lightly brown and will not exude their juices while being cooked. For this to happen, the mushrooms need to be dry, the butter needs to be very hot and the mushrooms can’t be crowded in the pan. Sauté too many at once, and they steam, instead of browning. If you don’t have a large enough pan or a hot enough stove, consider making the mushrooms in multiple batches.

The cooking for this recipe is done in either a large casserole dish (I’m a fan of enameled cast iron, like Le Creuset or Lodge), for the stew proper, or in large skillet, for the mushrooms and onions.

While it might be a stew, most of the long cooking time is spent in a casserole dish or pot in the oven. This is done to create a more uniform heating, rather than just the heating element at the bottom of the pot.

This recipe should serve six, with a basic ratio of 1 pound of beef per two people.

Julia Childs writes in “Mastering The Art of French Cooking” that beef bourguignon is typically served with boiled potatoes, but buttered noodles work as well. Personally, I enjoy some warm bread, either a crusty sourdough or a French baguette, with a little butter.

Mastering the art of beef bourguignon (a French beef stew with a red wine base) could be the key to a new Christmas dinner tradition.

Ingredients

6 slices bacon, cut into small strips or cubes

3 1/2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

3 pounds stewing beef, cut into 2-inch chunks

1 large carrot, sliced

1 large white onion, sliced

1 pinch coarse salt and freshly ground pepper

2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

3 cups red wine

2 1/2 to 3 1/2 cups beef stock

1 tablespoon tomato paste

2 cloves smashed garlic

1/2 teaspoon thyme

1 crumbled bay leaf

3 1/2 tablespoons butter

For the onions

18 – 24 small pearl onions

½ cup chicken stock, white wine or water

2 tablespoons butter

1 herb bouquet (4 sprigs parsley, 2 sprigs thyme, 1 bay leaf)

For the mushrooms

1 pound fresh mushrooms, quartered

2 tablespoons butter

1 tablespoon oil

Salt and pepper

Directions

Remove rind from the bacon and cut bacon into sticks 1 ½ inches long. Simmer rind and bacon for 10 minutes in 1 ½ quarts of water. Drain and dry. Skip this step to retain some smoky flavor in the stew.

Preheat oven to 450 degrees.

In a 9- to 10-inch fireproof casserole, at least 3 inches deep, Sauté the bacon in the oil over moderate heat for 2 to 3 minutes to brown lightly. Remove to a side dish with a slotted spoon. Set casserole aside. Reheat until fat is almost smoking before you sauté the beef.

Dry the stewing beef in paper towels; it will not brown if it is damp. Sauté it, a few pieces at a time, in the hot oil and bacon fat until nicely browned on all sides. Add it to the bacon.

In the same fat, brown the sliced vegetables (but not the mushrooms or pear onions). Pour out the sautéing fat.

Return the beef and bacon to the casserole and toss with the salt and pepper. Then sprinkle on the flour and toss again to coat the meat lightly with the flour. Set casserole uncovered in the middle position of the preheated oven for 4 minutes. Toss the meat and return to the oven for 4 minutes more. (This browns the flour and covers the meat with a light crust.) Remove casserole, and turn the oven down to 325 degrees.

Stir in the wine and enough stock or bouillon so that the meat is barely covered. Add the tomato paste, garlic, herbs, and bacon rind. Bring to simmer on top of the stove. Then cover the casserole and set in the lower third of the preheated oven. Regulate heat, so liquid simmers very slowly for 2 ½ to 3 hours. The meat is done when a fork pierces it easily.

While the beef is cooking, prepare the onions and mushrooms. Set them aside until needed.

For the onions, place them in a saucepan or skillet with ½ cup white wine or chicken stock. The butter and the herb bouqet. Cover and simmer very slowly, rolling the pearl onions in the pan periodically, for 40-50 minutes. The onions be tender but keep their shape. Add more liquid if it all evaporates. Remove the herb bouqet and reserve.

For the mushrooms, put a skillet on high heat with the butter (2 tablespoons) and oil. Once the butter foam subsides, add the mushrooms. Toss and shake in the pan for 4 to 5 minutes. In the first few minutes, they should absorb the fat, which will reappear on the surface as they begin to brown. Once browned, remove to a separate dish until later on.

When the meat is tender, pour the contents of the casserole into a sieve set over a saucepan. Wash out the casserole and return the beef and bacon to it. Distribute the cooked onions and mushrooms over the meat.

Skim fat off the sauce. Simmer sauce for a minute or two, skimming off additional fat as it rises. You should have about 2 1/2 cups of sauce thick enough to coat a spoon lightly. If too thin, boil it down rapidly. If too thick, mix in a few tablespoons of stock or canned bouillon. Taste carefully for seasoning. Pour the sauce over the meat and vegetables. The recipe may be completed in advance to this point.

For immediate serving: Covet the casserole and simmer for 2 to 3 minutes, basting the meat and vegetables with the sauce several times. Serve in its casserole, or arrange the stew on a platter surrounded with potatoes, noodles, or rice, and decorated with parsley.

For later serving: When cold, cover and refrigerate. About 15 to 20 minutes before serving, bring to the simmer, cover, and simmer very slowly for 10 minutes, occasionally basting the meat and vegetables with the sauce.

Adapted from Julia Child’s “Mastering The Art of French Cooking”

Befuddle your sweetheart with some brilliant brownies

(See just the recipe here)

Love and courtship might be a little bit harder in a time of pandemics and lockdowns, but if you’re trying to woo someone with a sweet tooth or offer a home-made delight, instead of the usual package of chocolates or flowers, I have the perfect recipe.

These brownies befuddled by German friends. They carry an extra amount of cocoa powder.

It’s brownies.

I know you’re probably thinking, brownies? I’ve done that before, or I buy the box in the store.

Well, that might well be true, but I have found these befuddling brownies are easy, cross cultures and are sure to win a few hearts.

I have always used brownies as a way to win hearts and minds. New workplaces, new sources, new groups, new classes and new love interests. They’re great for winning all kinds of positive attention, romantic or otherwise.

When I moved to Germany to become an au pair, I was in for a surprise. Brownies did not exist. Germans are not big on sweets – many American staples I baked were totally new to my guest family, including cookies, crumbles and crisps.

Even some of the language we use to describe brownies, mainly fudge, did not exist, because fudge just isn’t a thing. For the record, I’m firmly in the fudge camp, which also means a few minutes less in the oven.

Germany did have the basic needed ingredients, although instead of chocolate chips, I had to buy chocolate bars and chop them by hand. When I did make them, my guest family, my language class, my friends, everyone was befuddled by this thing they had never had before.

Baking the brownies

When it comes to making the brownies, there are three problems with the run-of-the-mill brownies, and brownie recipes – overuse of sugar, underuse of dark chocolate and a lack of dark cocoa powder.

I also differ from some recipes in my use of oil instead of butter. After some taste testing, I found I could not really discern any difference between the two. As for flour, I use whole wheat. I find it gives a coarser texture and a slightly nuttier flavor.

If there is one thing you take away from my brownie recipe, it should be the use of normal and dark cocoa powder, and the increased amounts of each in the brownies. This gives them a much richer taste that pairs well with an increased amount of dark/bittersweet chocolate. When I learned dark cocoa powder was a thing, I initially tried the brownies with just it but found a combination between the two came with the best taste. Either way, the amount of cocoa powder in this recipe should be higher than many comparable ones.

There is one key step I have learned the hard way: thoroughly mix the cocoa powder and flour before adding it to the mixture of oil and eggs. Otherwise, they both tend to clump.

Finally, I suggest using parchment paper to line the baking dish instead of greasing it. I always find it much easier to remove than trying to cut into brownies in a pan.

Print Recipe

Befuddling brownies

These brownies are especially rich, thanks to the use of dark cocoa powder.

Prep Time20

Cook Time38

Total Time58

Course: Dessert

Cuisine: American

Keyword: brownies

Servings: 1 9x13 pan

Author: Wheeler Cowperthwaite