Cooking with Annie: Episode 9 – Chocolate Mint Brownies

I can feel steel being forged in my spine and my spirit as each day I wake to choose calm, grace, kindness, and caring. As I choose to focus on how grateful I am for so many of the ‘little’ things, while what I maybe would have called the ‘big’ things swirl around and around. Outside of me. Outside of my control. Outside of my realm of influence.

The realm I choose is grateful. The realm I choose is grace. The realm I choose is forging steel in my spine and my spirit as each day I sit, sometimes with faith and sometimes with discomfort, and give witness to this experience. It will not go to waste, this time of waiting.

And until the waiting is over, we bake… with chocolate.

Bailey’s Irish Cream Chocolate Mint Bars 
This is one that my family would make every Christmas, sans Bailey’s when we were little. My brothers and I could eat a pan of these in no time flat. It’s really no different on the Riggin – they disappear quickly.  Excerpted from At Home, At Sea: Recipes from a Maine Windjammer.

2/3 cup (1 1/3 sticks) unsalted butter
4 ounces (4 squares) unsweetened chocolate
2 cups firmly packed light brown sugar
3 large eggs1 tablespoon Bailey’s Irish Cream
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon table salt

Frosting
2 cups confectioner’s sugar
1/4 cup (1/2 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
2 tablespoons Bailey’s Irish Cream
3/4 teaspoon peppermint extract

Glaze
3 ounces (3 squares) unsweetened chocolate
2 tablespoons unsalted butter

Preheat oven to 350°F. Lightly grease a 9- x 13-inch baking pan. Melt the chocolate and butter in a double boiler until the chocolate is almost melted. Remove from heat and stir occasionally until the chocolate is completely melted and cooled to room temperature. Beat in the sugar, eggs, Bailey’s, and vanilla. Sift in the dry ingredients and stir until just combined. Spoon the batter into the prepared pan. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean and the center springs back when lightly pressed. Cool in the pan on a wire rack.

Frosting
Beat the frosting ingredients together until light and creamy and then frost the bars.

Glaze
Melt the glaze ingredients, cool slightly, and pour the glaze over the frosting. Tilt the pan to spread the glaze. Cool before cutting.  Cut into 24 bars.

Makes 24 bars

Annie
Hang in there!