Double Chocolate Pretzel Espres...Just Read Below!

I am trying to bake more and more, but it just seems like my newly busy lifestyle doesn't support the baking schedule I used to have! It really blows considering baking is my TRUE passion. So far, September has been yet another busy month on the weekends for us AND it's now football season again. I'm hoping life will slow down in the next month or so so I can get more of my passion in!

Anyways...I decided to make double chocolate pretzel espresso brownies with caramel drizzle for our Labor Day cookout at my parents. Now you know why I left out the rest of the name in the title of this post. It's just too dang long.

I decided to use the brownie recipe that I have used in the past for our "girls night" party back in July. The recipe is from Epicurious, one of my favorite websites! When I made it in July, I followed the recipe and once cooled, I drizzled a homemade raspberry sauce on top of each and added a few raspberries for decoration. They were yummy! However, I don't know that I'd make them again with the raspberry sauce. Very, very sweet.

This time around, I used the same brownie recipe because it was absolutely amazing (All of Epicurious' recipes get GREAT reviews so how could you pass them up??) but I decided to put another twist on it.

I added pretzels and caramel.

Caramel is the best topping on a dessert. Period.

So basically, I laid out mini pretzels in the bottom of a sprayed glass baking dish. I poured the brownie batter on top, and baked for almost 30 minutes. This recipe says 20, but I found that both times more time was needed.

The hardest part of this recipe: Cutting the brownies! The addition of pretzels sure does make these brownies extremely hard to cut and keep pretty. I actually only let them cool for a short amount of time and cut them while they were still a bit warm. I placed them upside down on my dish and used my fingers to re-shape them. This made them pretty :)

HOMEMADE CARAMEL!



Super easy! I don't care what anyone else says! I used a simple recipe that incorporated brown sugar instead of regular, whipping cream, some butter, little bit of salt, and a dash of vanilla. I can't find the recipe that I used, but after bringing everything BUT the cream to a boil, I mixed for 6 minutes, removed it from the stove, and then added the cream. It didn't get thick enough, so I put it back on the stove later on and added some corn starch. This did the trick!

Random Tip: When using corn starch to thicken something, ALWAYS make sure you dissolve the corn starch in water first before adding to the substance. Use the same amount of water as corn starch. Be sure to add the corn starch slowly to the water while stirring.

I drizzled the caramel over each already cut brownie and they were AWESOME! Everyone enjoyed them at the cookout (besides my mother...she said there was too much going on with them!)

I want to try s'mores brownies next! MMMMM

Cheers!