Hawaiian Cookies

I wanted to make some cookies to supplement the chocolate deliciousness that was the cupcakes this weekend. I had dog-eared Maple Nut Refrigerator cookies awhile back in my Betty Crocker Cookie Book and decided to give em a whirl! I'd already decided to use mini chocolate chips (we had a plethora of those little guys in our freezer), when Spice handed me a bag of dried pineapple and told me to get rid of it. So what did I do? Threw em in! I then realized I had a bunch of white chocolate chips I wanted to get rid of too. Why not toss them in as well?!

I ended up with a good cookie! They tasted Hawaiian to me, so thus they got their name. Maybe with some coconut they would be even better! I liked the maple taste the dough had but Annie Bananie didn't like the pineapple chunks in them. The cookies were pretty flat and crispy, if you like that sort of thing!

Hawaiian Cookies
Adapted from Betty Crocker Cookie Book

3/4 cup packed brown sugar
3/4 cup butter, softened
1/4 cup pure maple syrup
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup mini chocolate chips
1/2 cup chopped dried pineapple
1/2 cup white chocolate chips

Beat sugar, butter and syrup together until creamy. Stir in the flour, baking powder and salt. Stir in chips and pineapple.

Shape into roll about 12 inches long. Wrap and refrigerate 2 hours or until firm.

Heat oven to 375 degrees F. Cut roll into 1/4 inch slices. Place on greased cookie sheet and bake for 8-10 minutes.

Devil's Food Cupcakes with Magnolia's Vanilla Buttercream Frosting

These cupcakes were very lovely! I have been planning to make cupcakes for awhile and just hadn't gotten around to it. I was excited to try out a new decorator tip and a cupcake carrying case that Annie Bananie got me!

When our landlord helped us out with a crisis in our apartment one morning (don't ask)...I decided this would be the perfect opportunity to make some cupcakes for him! This recipe made a TON of cupcakes, though. So I also gave some to my friend who was in a play this weekend and Annie Bananie also sold some at the Broadway Flea Market! Obviously these cupcakes got a lot of mileage.

The cupcakes are a Martha Stewart creation, so obviously they were delish. I could have used more chocolate in them, but that is just me being a crazy chocoholic. The frosting was the Magnolia Bakery's recipe for vanilla buttercream. Of all the cupcakes out here in NY, Magnolia's are pretty far down on my list, but their frosting gets me every time. YUM!

Devil's Food Cupcakes
Martha Stewart

3/4 cup unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder
3/4 cup hot water
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 1/4 teaspoons coarse salt
1 1/2 cups unsalted butter
2 1/4 cups sugar
4 large eggs, room temperature
1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup sour cream, room temperature

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Lind standard muffin tins with paper liners. Whisk together cocoa and hot water until smooth. In another bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt.

Melt butter with sugar in a saucepan over medium-low heat, stirring to combine. Remove from heat and pour into mixing bowl. With an electric mixer on medium-low speed, beat until mixture is cooled, 4 to 5 minutes. Add eggs, one at a time, beating until each is incorporated, scraping down sides of bowl as needed. Add vanilla, then cocoa mixture, and beat until combined. Reduce speed to low. Add flour mixture in two batches, alternating with the sour cream, and beating until just combined after each.

Divide batter evenly among lined cups, filling each three-quarters full. Bake, rotating tins halfway through, until a cake tester inserted in centers comes out clean, about 20 minutes. Transfer tins to wire racks to cool 15 minutes; turn out cupcakes onto racks and let cool completely.

Magnolia's Vanilla Buttercream Frosting
Food Network.com

1 cup butter (softened)
6 to 8 cups confectioners' sugar
1/2 cup milk
2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Place the butter in a large mixing bowl. Add 4 cups of the sugar and then the milk and vanilla. On the medium speed of an electric mixer, beat until smooth and creamy, about 3 to 5 minutes. Gradually add the remaining sugar, 1 cup at a time, beating well after each addition (about 2 minutes), until the icing is thick enough to be of good spreading consistency. You may not need to add all of the sugar. Top with shaved chocolate.

Banana Bread

Stop reading if you are squeamish about bugs (that means YOU, Spice...I mean it! Don't read this!). Why I am putting this story on a food blog, I have no idea...

So last night, I'm coming home from rehearsal, step into my apartment and turn on the light. Scurrying right across the floor is a gigantic cockroach. I definitely do not like bugs. Spice, however, may take the cake with this one (luckily she wasn't home). The only other time we have seen a cockroach in our apartment was at the beginning of the summer and it happened to be in Spice's room. I'm sitting on the couch minding my own business (its probably about 11:30pm) when Spice screams, runs out of her room, starts hyperventilating and bursts into tears. We tried to find the cockroach in her room, but couldn't. Spice was determined to take EVERY PIECE OF FURNITURE out of her room to find the little bugger. Long story short, we woke up all our neighbors and our land lady's son had to come kill it for us. Side note: This was cyber cockroach. He flew, hit walls and literally wouldn't die despite multiple wacks with shoes and a pool of bug spray.

Anyways...so last night, upon seeing the cockroach, I knew I would have to kill it before Spice came home or we would have another freak out. Luckily, this was a normal (by normal I mean he didn't fly) cockroach and I attacked him with bug spray and a broom and he was gone within 15 minutes. And when I say bug spray I literally mean there were pools of bug spray all around our apartment. After the killing, I washed up and even swiffered the floors, but it still smelled like bug spray and chemicals.

Out of sheer brilliance, I made some banana bread to make the apartment smell better. Only I would think to bake instead of spraying air freshener.

I found this recipe in the latest issue of Cooking Light and it turned out GREAT! I made a few changes which I wrote below. The bread stayed very moist and had a great crispy crust after cooling. Despite reading about cockroaches for several minutes, I think you should make this banana bread this weekend.

Banana Bread
Cooking Light

3/4 cup all-purpose flour
3/4 cup whole-wheat flour
1/4 cup oat bran
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
3 medium bananas, mashed
3/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup plain low-fat yogurt
1/4 cup canola oil

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.

Combine flours and next 4 ingredients (through baking soda) in a large bowl, stirring with a whisk. Combine banana and next 4 ingredients (through oil) in a small bowl. Add banana mixture to flour mixture, stirring just until moist.

Spoon the batter into a 9 by5 inch loaf pan coated with cooking spray. Bake at 325 degrees for one hour and ten minutes. Cool for ten minutes in a pan on a wire rack and remove from pan.

Cinnamon Twist Cookies

I know I am weird. I guess most people are. But I usually know what it is about me that makes me weird. Every once upon a time, however, I do something I don't realize is strange until someone tells me.

For example, I wanted to make these cookies. They were dog-eared in a cookbook I have. I finally got around to it at about 10:30pm on Sunday night. I just wanted to bake them, not really for any purpose other than that. I guess that's odd, but it just hadn't occurred to me. Annie Bananie, one of my roommates, was there and voiced how weird it was that I liked to just bake. Not to eat it. Not for someone's birthday. Just to bake.

Upon reflection, I realized just how strange that was. Most times when I bake something, I try to decide how I am going to get rid of said item. Should I bring it to rehearsal? Will Spice be home so she can bring it to work? Will Annie be home so she can bring it to the show?

Oh-well. I just like to bake. That's that. Deal with it. =)

These cookies were great! Not really how I expected them to be. I kind of had a vision of the cinnamon twists that I assume now are made with puff pastry. The dough was very chewy, which I thought made them good. I brought them to work and they were a big hit. Per usual =)

Cinnamon Twists
Betty Crocker Cookie Cookbook

1 cup sugar
1/2 cup butter, softened
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 egg
1 3/4 cup flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.

Cream the sugar and butter together. Add the vanilla and egg. Stir in the flour, baking powder and salt.

Divide dough in half. Stir cinnamon in one half.

Shape level teaspoons full of each plain and cinnamon dough into 3 in ropes. Lay them side by side and twist gently. Repeat with remaining dough.

Bake for 8-10 minutes on a greased cookie sheet. Let cool several minutes on sheet before removing to a wire rack to cool completely.

Caramel Apple Cookies

Doesn't that sound like the best idea for a cookie EVER?! I was so excited when I stumbled across this recipe and couldn't wait for the weekend to try it. You would think they would have turned out grrrreat, right?!

Epic fail.

Don't let the first picture I used fool you. About 10 of these cookies actually turned out into real live cookies. The rest crumbled as soon as they came off the baking sheet or the caramel bits melted out of them while baking. See sad picture below. Boo.

Although I have no for sure reason why these cookies were so drastically terrible, I have a few ideas. For one thing, I was using the final dregs of our can of cooking spray, which maybe meant it didn't have the full nonstick punch. Second, I chopped up those caramel candies because I couldn't find caramel baking bits. And third, I didn't ground the oatmeal.

Surprisingly enough, the cookies tasted delicious. I couldn't stop eating the crumpled remains of the broken cookies and my roommate couldn't stop eating the actual cookies. Lesson learned. I will follow directions from now on.

Caramel Apple Cookies
Craftzineblog.com

1 cup butter
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup white sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 cup flour
2 3/4 cup old fashioned oats (not quick cooking oatmeal)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
12 oz caramel baking bites
2 cups granny smith apples, chopped

In a large bowl, beat the butter and sugars until fluffy. Add the vanilla and eggs, beat until combined.

Measure oatmeal into a food processor and pulse until ground finely. In a medium sized bowl, stir the oatmeal, flour, salt, baking powder and baking soda until combined. Set aside.

Stir the flour mixture into the butter mixture until combined. Stir in the caramel bits and apples.
Refrigerate dough for one hour. Roll the cookie dough into golf ball sized balls. Bake on a parchment paper-lined baking sheet in an oven preheated to 350 degrees F, for 10-12 minutes. Cool on the pan for 4 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.

Baked Pumpkin Bread

I freaking LOVE pumpkin. Around this time, I try to make everything I can with it. I decided to start the season off basic...with pumpkin bread. I have a recipe in my arsenal for a pretty awesome pumpkin bread, but I decided to try something different and found a recipe on All Recipes for a little bit healthier pumpkin bread. I took it one step further and used half whole wheat pastry flour.

It turned out really well! But I've had better...nonetheless, it was a great start for a healthier pumpkin bread. I guess having eaten about half of it on my own already in just a couple of days, goes to show either my complete lack of self control or a rather delicious pumpkin bread!

Baked Pumpkin Bread
AllRecipes.com

1 cup whole wheat pastry flour
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 1/4 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1 cup solid pack pumpkin puree
1 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 egg
2 tablespoons butter, softened

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

Sift the flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon and nutmeg into a large bowl. Mix in the pumpkin, browl sugar, buttermilk, egg and butter until well blended. Pour into a 9 by 5 inch greased loaf pan and smooth the top.

Bake for 1 hour in the preheated oven, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.

Banana Mini Muffins

You can now say I am OBSESSED with the mini muffin tin Spice brought home several weekends ago. Things are just so cute in miniature sizes!

Random though...mini muffins always make me think of that episode of Friends where Ross tries to get Ugly Naked Guy's apartment. He sends him mini muffins while other people are sending extravagant gifts to try to win the lease. Long story short, he ends up getting the apartment. But, it wasn't because of the mini muffins ;)

I had some bananas to use up, so I made these cute little Banana Mini Muffins. They turned out really well. I didn't use the orange juice, because we didn't have any. Didn't use any nuts and added cardamom and cloves.

My only qualm with the mini muffin tin is that we only have one, so each time I take something out of the oven, I have to wait for it to cool and then remove it from the pan, rinse it off and re-load it with whatever I'm making. Sort of time-consuming and obnoxious. Oh-well, all for the love of baking =)

Banana Mini Muffins
Adapted from Vintage Victuals

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup whole wheat pasty flour
1 2/3 cups sugar
1 1/4 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2/3 cup shortening
2/3 cup buttermilk
3 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/2 cups mashed ripe bananas (I used 2 large bananas)
2 tablespoons orange juice
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon cloves
1/4 teaspoon cardamom
Powdered sugar

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Blend together the shortening and sugar. Add buttermilk, eggs and vanilla and mix well. In a separate bowl, mix together the flours, spices, baking soda and salt. Add the dry ingredients to the wet and mix well. Add the mashed bananas and mix well.

Grease a mini muffin tin with cooking spray. Fill each hole about 2/3 full. Bake at 350 degrees for 15-20 minutes.

Cool completely on wire racks. When cool, sprinkle with powdered sugar.

Mini Carrot Cake Cupcakes with Maple Cream Cheese Frosting

As I said before, I'm pretty obsessed with fall rolling in at the moment. Carrot cake sounded just perfect for another rainy New York day. And, can you believe that one of my roommates had never had carrot cake before?! Outrageous. I decided that must be remedied immediately.

Thanks to Martha Stewart, I can now say my roommate LOVES carrot cake and must have eaten oodles of these little guys. I also enjoyed these mini cupcakes. I think next time I will add some more spices, maybe a little nutmeg and some cardamom. I also left out raisins, because I don't like them in my carrot cake, and nuts, because my roommate is allergic. I really liked the buttermilk in them too, but who am I kidding?! I love buttermilk in most baked goods!

Carrot-Cake Mini Cupcakes
Martha Stewart

1 cup sugar
2 large eggs
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/4 cup buttermilk
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups grated carrots

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease mini muffin cups and set aside.

Beat sugar, eggs, oil, vanilla and buttermilk together in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment until well combined.

In a large bowl, sift together flour, cinnamon, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Slowly add three quarters of flour mixture to the sugar mixture; mix well until combined. Add carrots to remaining flour mixture and toss to combine. Stir batter until well combined.

Fill each muffin cup with about 2 teaspoons batter. Bake about 10 to 12 minutes. Transfer cupcakes to a wire rack to cool. Let cool completely before frosting.

Maple Cream Cheese Frosting
Martha Stewart

1 8-oz package cream cheese, room temperature
1/2 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
1 tablespoon maple syrup
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 cups confectioners' sugar

In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat cream cheese and butter together until smooth. Add maple syrup, vanilla and confectioners' sugar; continue beating until well combined and smooth.

Vegetarian Bean and Pumpkin Chili

Oh, crockpot...how much do I love thee? Let me count the ways, I'll start at 100....

Seriously, though. How sweet is the crockpot? Lets be serious...you just shove in shit in the morning and when you come home at night, not only does your house smell delicious, but you have an entire meal ready! Crazy!

Fall has been in the air lately here in NY, so I am in full fall cooking/baking mode! And craving the foods of fall: Apples, pumpkin and cinnamon...oh my!

After a long, rainy, frustrating day on Saturday I came home to this creation. It was REALLY good! And SO filling! The pumpkin in it really did it for me. It gave the chili a great flavor and texture. My roommate tried some and she could tell there was something different in it, but couldn't pinpoint the pumpkin until I told her. I was ready to just fall asleep right after I ate it, or just curl up in bed with sweatpants on and read. =)


Vegetarian Bean and Pumpkin Chili
Tasty Eats at Home Blog

1 lb. dried black beans
1 large tomato, chopped
1 5-oz can pumpkin puree
1 can diced green chilis
2-3 cups vegetable broth
1-2 cups water
1 onion, chopped
3 garlic cloves, minced
1 1/2 tablespoons cumin
1 teaspoon cinnamon
2 teaspoons ground coriander
1 1/2 tablespoons chili powder
Tabasco sauce to taste

Rinse the beans and soak overnight. Rinse again and place in crockpot. Add rest of ingredients and mix well. Cook on low for 8 hours, or until beans are tender.

Sugar Cookies

As party favors for the wedding last weekend, Butthead and her hubby gave out cookie cutters to each guest. As resident Willy Wonka, I received one of just about every cookie cutter. As you could probably guess, I was OVERWHELMED with the urge to roll out some dough and cut it out with my new little friends. Needless to say, each cookie cutter alone is completely random and if you didn't know the bride and groom, you wouldn't understand why there is a hammer or a fleur de lis.

I also really wanted to try my hand at real royal icing, the kind where you outline the shape and then flood it with icing.

Success! I made sugar cookies and had so much fun decorating them! It was fun experimenting with the consistency of the icing to outline and flood each cookie and then go back and add some detail. I got a little impatient with the last step and didn't completely wait for each cookie to dry, but they turned out well anyways! I'm ready for Christmas cookie time now =)

I gave these cookies to one of my roommates to bring to work (she works on the Broadway show Billy Elliot) and they all LOVED them! I got a picture of a cast member partaking of some sugar cookie deliciousness.

Rolled Sugar Cookies
All Recipes

1 1/2 cups butter, softened
2 cups white sugar
4 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
5 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt

In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar until smooth. Beat in eggs and vanilla. Stir in the flour, baking powder, and salt. Cover, and chill dough for at least one hour (or overnight).

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C). Roll out dough on floured surface 1/4 to 1/2 inch thick. Cut into shapes with any cookie cutter. Place cookies 1 inch apart on ungreased cookie sheets.

Bake 6 to 8 minutes in preheated oven. Cool completely.


Royal Icing
All Recipes

4 egg whites
4 cups sifted confectioners' sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Beat egg whites in clean, large bowl with mixer at high speed until foamy (use only grade A clean, uncracked eggs). Gradually add sugar and lemon extract. Beat at high speed until thickened. NOTE: When dry, Royal Icing is very hard and resistant to damage that can occur during shipping/handling.

Sean's Asian Sauce and Marinade

You know those people who don't really have to follow a recipe? They just make stuff out of what they find in their kitchens and it turns out fabulous? My friend Sean is one of THOSE!

We made dinner a few weekends ago (by "we" I mean "he") and Sean used this Asian sauce he had whipped up a few nights earlier. I was so impressed with the sauce that I asked for the recipe. That led to him giving me a list of ingredients with no idea how much of each he put in. Thanks, that helps a lot, Sean!

Have no fear! I experimented and came up with an almost identical sauce, I think. When Sean made dinner, he used it as a chicken marinade and a vegetable and rice sauce. I used it last night with some salmon and mixed vegetables on top of a bed of spinach. Yum!


Sean's Asian Sauce and Marinade

2 tablespoons sesame oil
2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
2 tablespoons olive oil
1/4 cup low sodium soy sauce
4 tablespoons honey

Whisk all ingredients together. Easy as pie. =)

Chocolate Dessert Extravaganza and Chocolate Covered Strawberries

Butthead's rehearsal dinner desserts equaled success! Yes!

The wedding was a success too! The ceremony was outside near a river on grass covered with rose petals. Then the reception was upstairs in a clubhouse. Perfectly decorated. Butthead and her Groom were so adorable and beautiful. It was hard not to be completely taken aback by the beauty of the wedding! Here's a picture of Butthead and I at the wedding:



Back to the baking. Boy, was I worried that I wasn't going to get all six desserts done in one day! Luckily, I was able to bake the cupcakes and make the cookie dough on Friday when I flew in, before we started bachelorette shenanigans. Then the next day I got to work early, and was able to make the rest of the desserts with time to spare!

In case you missed my earlier posts, I made Red Velvet Cupcakes with Chocolate Cream Cheese Frosting, Mini Chocolate Cheesecakes, Chocolate Truffles, Chocolate Chocolate Chip Cookies, Raspberry Cheesecake Brownies and Chocolate Covered Strawberries (recipe below).

I have to say, everything turned out delicious, just like I knew it would! I got so many compliments I was in hog heaven =) Maybe someday when I'm done dancing I can get into catering or baking as a career...something to think about!


PS: I also got to meet Eleanor Francis...maybe the cutest puppy EVER. Don't you just wanna play with those ears????!!!!!


Chocolate Covered Strawberries
Martha Stewart

8 ounces semi-sweet chocolate
1 lb fresh strawberries
Melted white chocolate for drizzle

Place chocolate in a bowl set over (not in) a saucepan of simmering water. Stir occasionally, until melted, 3 to 5 minutes. Remove from heat.

Line a baking sheet with waxed paper. One at a time, dip each strawberry in chocolate, twirling to coat.

Chill chocolate-dipped strawberries at least 15 minutes to set chocolate. Drizzle with white chocolate and refrigerate until serving.

*All pictures were taken by Lisa Tilson.

Cilantro Salmon

I leave bright eyed and bushy-tailed tomorrow morning for Butthead's wedding! Wish me luck on all the baking! And of course CONGRATS to Butthead and Mike =)

I was craving some real protein earlier this week and remembered a recipe LadyJayPee had for salmon that I LOVED. It is really super easy and very delicious. I only tweaked it a little. I was lucky enough to have leftovers the next day for lunch. The only seafood I have tried making is salmon. Maybe next time I will try halibut. Ah! Look at me being all adventurous!

Cilantro Salmon
Eating, Etc.

1 tablespoons olive oil
1 garlic clove
Wild Salmon
salt and pepper to taste
1/2 teaspoon dried dill weed
1/4 teaspoon paprika
1 container cherry tomatoes
large bunch asparagus, cut to 1 1/2 inches
Juice of 1 lemon
1/4 cup fresh cilantro

Saute garlic in olive oil over medium heat.

Season salmon with salt, pepper, dill weed and paprika. Place salmon skin side down in skillet and cook about 3 minutes. Turn salmon with spatula and cook another 3 minutes, then break into chunks.

Add garlic, tomatoes and asparagus. Cook until salmon flakes easily. Stir in cilantro. Mix well and cook for another 2 minutes.

Baked Brownies

Before I get to the brownies, this past weekend I took an adventure to a baking specialty store. I had never been to one and boy, was I excited when I got there! I went here and found some decorating supplies for Butthead's rehearsal desserts. Not to mention I also got some chocolate, but you could have guessed that, I'm sure. It was like Disneyland in there, though! It was really hard not to buy out the store, which probably wouldn't have worked out anyways because I wouldn't have enough money!

Onward! Since I wasn't a huge fan of the other brownies I made, I tried some others out last night in preparation for Butthead's rehearsal dinner. These were definitely a keeper. Much fudgier and gooeier, just like I like em!

They turned out simply ginormous, though! The recipe called for an 8 inch baking dish but I used a 9 by 13 so I doubled it. For the real thang, I am covering the brownies with a raspberry cheesecake swirl, so I am definitely going to put the original recipe in the 9 by 13 baking dish and cut down the cooking time a little!

I also tried out a chocolate cream cheese frosting to put on top of the red velvet cupcakes. Um. This frosting was to die for. Spice and my friend Kali both wanted to stick their heads in the bowl of icing before I had even frosted the brownies! Silly! Luckily, I got the brownies frosted, and I definitely give super kudos (yet again) to Martha!

So Good Brownies
MyRecipes

4 (1-oz) unsweetened chocolate baking squares
3/4 cup butter
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
1/2 cup firmly packed brown sugar
3 large eggs
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/8 teaspoon salt

Preheat oven to 350°. Grease an 8 inch pan (or a 9 by 13 inch one).

Microwave chocolate squares and butter in a large microwave-safe bowl at HIGH 1 1/2 to 2 minutes or until melted and smooth, stirring at 30-second intervals. Whisk in granulated and brown sugars. Add eggs, 1 at a time, whisking just until blended after each addition. Whisk in flour, vanilla, and salt.

Pour mixture into prepared pan.

Bake at 350° for 40 to 44 minutes or until a wooden pick inserted in center comes out with a few moist crumbs.

Chocolate Cream Cheese Frosting
Martha Stewart

12 oz semi-sweet chocolate
24 oz. cream cheese
1 cup confectioners' sugar

Melt chocolate in a heatproof bowl set over a pan of simmering water, stirring until smooth. Let stand until just warm, 10 to 15 minutes.

Put cream cheese and sugar into the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Mix on medium-high speed until pale and fluffy, about 4 minutes. Reduce speed to low. Mix in melted chocolate until combined. Use immediately.