SALTED CARAMEL AND CHOCOLATE BROWNIES

PREP TIME 40 mins COOK TIME 40 mins TOTAL TIME 1 hour 20 mins Serves: 18

INGREDIENTS

Pretzel crust -

75g plain flour

75g salted pretzels, finely crushed (I put them in a plastic bag and used a rolling pin to do the crushing)

75g soft light brown sugar

¼ teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

110g butter, melted

Chocolate brownie -

200g dark chocolate, roughly chopped

175g butter

55ml water

225g caster sugar

110g light brown soft sugar

2 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

200g plain flour

¼ teaspoon salt

To decorate -

50g dark chocolate, melted

10 pieces of soft fudge, gently melted in the microwave with a splash or two of water (you may need to experiment with the amount of water depending on how hard the fudges are)

a sprinkling of crunchy salt (something like fleur de sel)

INSTRUCTIONS

Preheat the oven to 180°C (gas mark 4)

Line a 23 x 33 x 5 cm tin with baking parchment.

First make the pretzel crust by combining the plain flour, salted pretzels, soft light brown sugar and bicarbonate of soda in a large bowl. Now add the melted butter and mix thoroughly. Pat the mixture gently into an even layer in the bottom of the tin and bake in the oven for 10 minutes.

Now make the brownie mix by gently melting the dark chocolate, butter and water in a large bowl in the microwave. Make sure there are no lumps of chocolate remaining.

Next add the caster sugar and light brown sugar and mix well.

Stir the eggs and vanilla extract into the mixture and then finally, mix in the plain flour and salt.

Spread the brownie mixture over the pretzel base and bake in the oven for 25-30 minutes (or until a sharp knife inserted near the centre of the tin comes out clean).

Allow to cool in the tin on a wire rack.

To decorate, you could simply dust with icing sugar but you can take it to the next level by using a small spoon to drizzle the melted chocolate and melted fudge sweets over the top of the brownie. You will need to work quickly with the melted fudge sweets before they cool too much.

While the chocolate and melted fudge sweets are still wet, sprinkle lightly with a little crunchy salt.

Find your sharpest knife to cut the brownies into 18 pieces.