Copycat Duncan Hines Brownies- The Brownie Wars

Ahh brownies. They are one of the most basic food groups in life.
And wars you say? Yes, I keep expecting people to pop up in chain mail with swords in hand and I promise you, I would join the fight. There is a brownie and there is NOT a brownie. To me a brownie is not a brownie without that lovely paper thin crackly top. No crackly top, you might as well call it chocolate cake. And if, horror of horrors you make them cakey!, then that’s what you’ve made. The whole point of a brownie, IMHO, is that it have a chewy texture and while somewhat fudgy NOT be gloppy in the middle. So these are many obstacles to overcome.

I’ve done myriad experiments with brownies and also on my beloved family, and hands down far and away, the boxed Duncan Hines mix (which is miraculously non-dairy) is the winner. I carefully didn’t let them know so that they wouldn’t come with preconceived notions about boxed mixes. Time after time, the mix won.

This was like waving a red flag in front of a bull. I HAD to conquer this and make my own boxed mix type brownie. So, how do you go about deconstructing Duncan Hines? DH wondered if the chemicals in there alter the texture. Nay nay I said. Cannot be so. I checked into the ingredients (practically on the level of a chemist 🙂 ) and interestingly, there doesn’t seem to be any chocolate but rather cocoa. Also, you use oil to make it, not butter. Only 2 eggs and they use water in place of some of the oil, and baking soda. But then, aha, I spotted carrageenan – which I looked up and it’s a thickener made from seaweed. Gak, not something I can readily use. At this point I understood that I had to think out of the box (Ha) and went through tens of recipes where others had done the work and I would bake them and see if I could recreate the texture I so desired.

I will spare you my endless research and instead tell you of two more types that I tried. I made the Tasty version (Ultimate Brownies) and to my mind they were a tad misleading. They dared to say they were not cakey (they totally were- I deeply suspected they would be by the number of eggs alone), but the next day developed a tiny bit of chewiness, but the worst crime they committed was how gooey, raw and uncooked the middle was although they did have the crackle top. I cut them up (since the toothpick came out with fudgy crumbs as it was supposed to) only to discover that I had to convection bake them for 8 more minutes CUT UP to make them edible. If you like a very wet, fudgy gooey brownie AFTER rebaking them, this might be for you but even goo lovers will pause. No worries, the grandkids will eat them for Shabbat. But I wasted 10 minutes whipping eggs for this. Aggro as my British friends would say.

So I thought to myself, wherefore art thou perfect brownie? And I had an epiphany. My fave equipment provider of baking products, Wilton, also has recipes! Eureka! I figured they would go with the traditional textured brownie. I have a smug smile on my face of utter triumph when I tell you that Wilton did not let me down. Annnnd, yeah, it’s the copycat version of the Duncan Hines boxed mix. Hurray, I say. No more boxed mix (unless of course utter desperation strikes 🙂 ).

On to the prep! Mix the dry ingredients together (I like to use a whisk) and set aside.

On the stovetop, melt together the butter/marg, water and sugar and stir till sugar dissolves. By the way, I tried this once in the microwave and the sugar started to caramelize! So, yeah, do this on the stove! The sugar dissolving is critical to the crinkle top of the brownie, so this must be done.

Then, I changed this part, they wanted you to add chocolate chips while the mixture was still on the fire. Don’t, you might overcook or burn the chocolate. Take off the heat but immediately add the chocolate. The residual heat is still very strong and your chocolate will melt but not burn. I also wanted better tasting chocolate than just chips, so I added good quality chocolate which I chopped. It improves the flavor enormously.

And the combined mixture

A neat trick, take your parchment paper, and make cuts with a scissors into each of the 4 points and then the ends of the paper tuck into each other.

I added the flour mixture, then the beaten eggs (which I whizzed with my stick blender but you can just beat with a fork) pour into prepared pan, and then bake. The final crackle top results!

Note that they deflate in the center. This is normal, don’t stress about it. Of course, the best part is to eat the edges. Naturally, this is to present the brownies prettily and has nothing to do with sneaking the best bit in the kitchen… Glorious, box mix brownie texture and better flavor since you use better chocolate. Mystery solved.

Copycat Duncan Hines Brownies

1 1/2 cups flour

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

2/3 cup (151 grams) butter or marg

1 1/2 cups white sugar (NOT brown, if you’ve run out of white, just don’t make the brownies that day. Really. Brown sugar has molasses in it and it will completely change the texture of your brownie, thereby ruining all your hard work.)

1/4 cup water

2 cups (350 grams) chopped chocolate or chocolate chips or a combination thereof which is what I did, see above pic

1 teaspoon vanilla

4 eggs

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Prepare a 9×13 pan by spraying with oil spray and then fitting parchment paper in.

In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda and salt.

In a small pot (with high enough side, therefore not a pan), put the butter/marg and on low heat start to melt and add sugar to this, and the water. Stir together over the heat till the sugar melts. Remove from heat, add vanilla and chocolate and stir till chocolate completely melts. Add flour next and stir well till incorporated and lastly add the eggs (I add eggs last so they shouldn’t curdle from the heat) stirring till smooth.

Immediately pour the batter into the prepared pan and smooth the top if needed. Put into preheated oven and bake for 25-30 minutes depending on your oven. Since I know my oven is properly calibrated, I baked them for exactly 28 minutes. Check with a toothpick, they should have a few moist chocolaty crumbs clinging to it. They will puff up and when you remove them from the oven they look so pretty but then will deflate. This is normal. Let them cool completely!! no cheating, and then cut into even squares. Of course, you might trim off those less pretty edges and nibble them. After all, you worked hard for your brownies and that’s the chewiest bit. Mmmm yeah.

As you can see, there is some fudginess going on but NO goo and totally chewy. I promise!

The original Wilton recipe is below:

https://www.wilton.com/fudgy-brownies/WLRECIP-265.html