These are my favourite new creation - a “healthier” dark chocolate vegan brownie, that you make in a nutribullet (or magimix, or with a stick blender, or potato masher…)
I’m a massive fan of learning new tricks when baking, and this recipe definitely ticks that box…
For me, the most important thing in baking is the TASTE. Baked goods have to be delicious, better even, than your favourite indulgent version - otherwise, what’s the point? For me, my favourite brownie ever is the Ottolenghi hazlenut brownies, which taste incredible.
Baked goods need to taste good, but, if they then have a secret, healthier or different ingredient combination, then this is what makes them truly “better”. These brownies are vegan, which is great for many reasons, gluten free, great for coeliacs or those with IBS, dairy free, great for lactose intolerant people like my friend Kate, and made with beans, great if you love beans.
So here, with great pleasure, because these bean brownies are really lush indeed, is the recipe!
The only piece of kit that you need is a blender, or a chopper, a masher, or something, anything that will blitz your black beans into a smooth, speckledy paste…oh and a bowl, a spoon, some scales…agh you get it…Bee.xx
Bee’s vegan black bean nutribullet brownies
Ingredients:
400g tinned ready to cook black beans (or pre-soaked and cooked black beans, which take forever to prepare but are much cheaper)
2 tbsp ground flax seeds, mixed with 6 tbsp hot water to a thick gooey paste
70g brown sugar (or coconut sugar)
80g cocoa powder (or about 70g raw cacao)
80g dark chocolate, chips or finely chopped (dairy free if needed, save some for the top!)
60g maple syrup / honey (obvs not vegan)
3 tbsp melted coconut / olive / vegetable oil
1 tsp good quality vanilla extract
1 tsp baking powder
1 large pinch of sea salt (optional, for the top)
2-3 tbsp warm peanut butter (optional, for beautiful drizzling)
Recipe:
Throw the beans, oil, flax mush and vanilla extract into your blender / nutribullet (I used the 900W version with the giant cup thing) / magi mix and blitz until you have a smooth speckled paste. You can do this by hand, but you’d need to very finely chop the beans up to ensure there are no bean skins in your teeth after eating - which takes forever.
Add the rest of the ingredients (barring the choc chips) into the mix, and blitz again until well combined. If the mixture is too thick to mix, add a splash of non-dairy milk and blitz again.
Pour / scrape / dollop your mix into a lined brownie pan, I used a 20cm x 30cm pan, and spread evenly. Pour on your peanut butter and sprinkle the salt and a few choc chips on top. Bake at 160 degrees celcius for around 30 - 40 mins, when a knife tip will still come out gooey, but that’s what you want, right?
Allow to cool, and enjoy.
