This post may contain affiliate links. Please read our privacy policy.
This is perhaps the recipe I have tested and tested and tested the most. After much contemplation and baking, it dawned on me that the surest way to achieve brownie nirvana, the kind of fudgy chocolatiness that wimpy people say is too chocolaty (and then go on to polish off another brownie or two), is best achieved by combining cocoa powder and melted chocolate.
Best Brownie Recipe Ever
So, here’s the thing. If I had to say which of my recipes were kind of “famous”, these One-Pot Fudgy Brownies would be in the top 5. People love this recipe. I have friends and also random people that have written to me who make this on the regular, and who make it for their kids’ birthdays every year because that’s what the kids requested instead of cake. So cool.
Also, when I am making this for someone else, and my kids smell this baking, they get pissed. And then I usually capitulate and make another batch.
Best One-Pot Fudgy Brownies: These homemade brownies are fudgy as anything and SO easy to make – 15 minutes to get them into the oven!
Tweet This
Shortcuts for Easy Homemade Fudgy Brownies
This whole recipe takes less than 15 minutes to get into the oven, which is a fact that you can keep to yourself. All anyone will know is that you made them fudgy brownies from scratch.
I am also ridiculously pleased to say that this recipe shaves off two more common brownie-making steps. Often a recipe will tell you to chop the chocolate before melting it. Here you just make sure to melt it with the butter over low heat, and the chocolate will dissolve gently into the butter, without scorching.
Also, you can skip the whole double boiler thing if you keep the heat low enough, don’t stray too far, and stir frequently. This saves you washing a chopping board, a knife (or a food processor bowl and blade), and the second double boiler pan. You will want to celebrate this with a brownie.
One-Pot Fudgy Brownies: This is one of the best brownies recipes in the whole world, and the batter is made in one pot (easiest clean up!)
Tweet This
How to Make Fudgy Brownies
What makes a brownie fudgy vs. cakey is a higher level of fat. More butter and more chocolate. Cakey brownies often have just cocoa powder in them, and also almost always have some sort of leavening usually baking powder or soda. Also lean on the side of very slightly underbaked, which will give you that amazing moist and fudgy texture.
How to Make Brownies From Scratch:
Preheat the oven to 350°F. Generously butter a 13 by 9–inch baking pan or spray it with nonstick cooking spray. Place the butter and chocolate in a medium size saucepan over low heat and let melt together
Stirring frequently until smooth.
Stir stir in the cocoa powder, sugar, and salt, then blend in the vanilla.
Beat in the eggs one at a time, stirring to mix quickly so they don’t have a chance to cook at all before they are blended in.
Blend in the flour.
Scrape the thick batter into the prepared baking pan and smooth the top with a spatula.
Bake until the edges just begin to pull away from the sides of the pan and a wooden skewer or toothpick inserted into the middle comes out clean, 25 to 30 minutes. Let the brownies cool in the pan on a wire rack.
How to Cut Brownies
When completely cool, cut them squares. Here’s a great way to cut these brownies — you can’t do this with all brownie recipes, only the dense fudgy kind. And you have to make sure you really piled or sprayed the pan.
Place a cutting board over the top of the pan.
Flip the cutting board over. Lift the pan from the brownies and the brownies should come out in one solid block.
Slice the brownies with a sharp knife into 12, 18, or 24 squares, depending on how large you want the brownies to be.
Other Brownie Recipes and Squares!
- Lemon Squares
- One-Pot Mexican Hot Chocolate Brownies
- Chocolate Peanut Butter Squares
- Butterscotch Brownies aka Blondies
Like this recipe? Pin it to your favorite board on Pinterest.
Pin This
Best One-Pot Fudgy Brownies
Ingredients
- 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter plus butter for greasing the baking pan (optional)
- Nonstick cooking spray optional
- 3 ounces unsweetened chocolate
- ½ cup unsweetened Dutch-processed cocoa powder
- 2 ½ cups granulated sugar
- ½ teaspoon kosher salt
- 1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract
- 3 large eggs
- 1 ½ cups all-purpose flour
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F. Generously butter a 13 by 9–inch baking pan or spray it with nonstick cooking spray.
- Place the butter and chocolate in a medium size saucepan over low heat and let melt together, stirring until smooth. Remove the saucepan from the heat and stir in the cocoa powder, sugar, and salt, then blend in the vanilla. Beat in the eggs one at a time, stirring to mix quickly so they don’t have a chance to cook at all before they are blended in. Blend in the flour.
- Scrape the thick batter into the prepared baking pan and smooth the top with a spatula. Bake until the edges just begin to pull away from the sides of the pan and a wooden skewer or toothpick inserted into the middle comes out clean, 25 to 30 minutes.
- Let the brownies cool in the pan on a wire rack. When completely cool, cut them into 12 or 24 squares.
Notes
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
I’ve had mixed results with brownie recipes until I found this one. It comes out perfectly every time.
thank you Annie!
In the oven right now
I just made this recipe this weekend. The first time it came out perfect. My second time the batter looked greasy as i finished mixing everything and when it was done baking there was butter bubbling on top but the brownie was somewhat burned. What am I doing wrong? It seems like the butter was separating from the batter.
Cindy, it’s hard to tell. Were you using the same ingredients both times? Is it possible the chocolate was past its prime? And if the oven was running hotter, that could have also been the issue.
Haven’t tried these yet, but I wanted to chime in on melting the chocolate. You should not have to keep the pot on low heat if you chop the chocolate into small pieces and add it to the butter while it is still hot. Simply remove the pot from the burner, add the chocolate and come back in 2 minutes. I’ve used this method for as long as I can remember and it has never failed.