Dark Chocolate Chunk Brownies

Foodie factoid: Dark chocolate is good for you, we all know that, but let’s take a look at why: it has antioxidants, it can lower LDL (bad) cholesterol, and reduces the risk of blood clots. Well that’s that I’m eating chocolate all day long! Ok, let’s be honest–I’m a milk/white chocolate fan, I can’t even pretend that I’m going to permanently convert.

These brownies are beautiful and delicious, with just the right amount of simplicity. We have so much random chocolate in the house, plus the uber awesome bar of baking chocolate I brought home from Puerto Rico that needs to be used that I thought–hey why not? I know that sometimes I should leave well-enough alone and make a simple brownie recipe, but the pockets of gooey dark chocolate embedded inside are the perfect addition to the already sinful nature of these. You can feel free to ignore it or substitute it, but I strongly suggest the addition. Plus, dark chocolate=healthy, which means that you can obviously eat 1-5 of these without feeling guilty…

Chocolate Chunk Brownies:

Adapted from Smitten Kitchen

Preheat oven to 350°

4 oz unsweetened baking chocolate

1 stick of butter

1/4 tsp salt

1 1/2 tsp vanilla

1 1/3 c granulated sugar

2 eggs

2/3 c flour

1 1/2 bars dark chocolate (at least 60%)

1. Preheat oven to 350°

2. Chop chocolate into pieces and cube butter.

3. Place chocolate and butter in a bowl and microwave at 20 second intervals until melted. Stir regularly.

4. Add in the other ingredients aside from chocolate bars

5. Chop up dark chocolate bars into pieces and add to the batter

6. Spread batter into an aluminum-lined 8×8 pan.

7. Bake for 22-25 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean

*Linked to Time To Sparkle link party