Nutella Brownies

Oh yes. You read that right. Nutella. And brownies. In the same sentence. In the same recipe. I must admit that I'd never really tried Nutella, though I've heard great things about it, especially from Italian chefs who cook with hazelnuts. Then one day I was scrolling through my Facebook newsfeed and saw one of those short recipe videos start to play: Three-Ingredient Nutella Brownies. I do like to keep things short and sweet, though I tend to get a bit skeptical of recipes with very few ingredients. Is it really possible to turn just three things into brownies? And awesomely delicious brownies at that? I had to experiment to find out.

When the time came to host a girls' movie night with my friends, I knew I had to make some kind of delicious dessert. I knew it had to be easy--I wouldn't have much time after work to prepare--and it had to be chocolate (Hey, what else would you pair with popcorn and wine?). What a perfect time to test out Nutella Brownies! I bought a jar of Nutella two days before the event and decided to bake the brownies the night before just in case it turned out that Nutella plus eggs plus flour did not equal delicious.

I didn't need to be worried.

Ingredients:

1 and 1/4 cups Nutella (chocolate-hazelnut spread. I used a whole 13 oz jar)
2 eggs
1/2 cup flour (as per usual, I used whole wheat pastry flour)

Directions:

1.) Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Pour the entire jar of Nutella into a mixing bowl. Add the eggs and flour (sifted in if possible) and stir until all ingredients are combined. Caution: it will be thick.

2.) Pour the brownie batter into a square brownie pan that's been sprayed with nonstick cooking spray (the recipe from the video used a 9x13-inch cake pan, but I prefer squares for brownies and didn't think I had enough batter to fill a rectangle anyway).

3.) Bake for about 15 minutes. Remove the brownies from the oven to cool before cutting (you can also refrigerate them overnight and cut the next day).

These brownies may be a little low (no baking powder or soda to help them rise). They may be a little gooey (but that's personally my favorite kind). They will definitely be delicious.

So the main question that remains is, why wasn't I introduced to this delicious flavor of chocolate and hazelnut before?? I'm not a big chocolate person, but I am a big nut-butter person. Nutella seems to be the best of both worlds (I definitely licked my spoon after emptying the jar, and pretty much scraped the jar clean...). The brownies were a hit at movie night and I plan to repeat any recipes that are this easy to put together (so long as I keep my pantry stocked with Nutella. Shouldn't be hard).

Experiment success!