Guinness Brownies with Butterscotch Fudge

I’ve mentioned my to-try stack of recipes, but there’s actually more than one stack. There’s the physical stack of pages cut from magazines, there’s also a list of links I keep in Evernote, and there’s a board of recipes to try on Pinterest. It’s a little crazy to have to look in three places for ideas I know I put somewhere as a reminder to myself, but I usually eventually find what I’m looking for. A couple of weeks ago, I was searching for new-to-me brownie ideas. We were getting ready to attend an annual party, and more often than not, I take brownies to this party. This time, I wanted to change it up and take brownies with a twist of some kind. I wasn’t finding anything earth-shatteringly unique in my books. That’s when I remembered I had stored the link last year for this Guinness Brownies with Butterscotch Fudge recipe from The Little Epicurean. I admit, it’s the butterscotch fudge that grabbed my attention as butterscotch always does, and the pretzels on top just made me more intrigued. The recipe makes a lot of brownies in a nine- by thirteen-inch pan as opposed to the typical brownie recipe size of baking in an eight- or nine-inch square pan. So, this was perfect for a party. 

Making the brownies is an easy process that starts with melting chocolate with butter and then adding granulated and dark brown sugar. That mixture is then transferred to the bowl of a stand mixer, and eggs are added and mixed in one at a time. Flour, cocoa powder, and salt were sifted together and then added to the batter alternating with Guinness. Last, chocolate chips were folded in before pouring the batter into a parchment-lined baking pan. After the brownies baked for about 30 minutes and cooled, the butterscotch fudge frosting was made. Butter was melted with dark brown sugar in a saucepan. It was left to simmer for a couple of minutes, and then salt was added off the heat. With a stand mixer, confectioners’ sugar, cream, and vanilla were mixed, and then the butter and sugar mixture was incorporated and mixed until smooth. The fudge frosting was spread over the cooled brownies, and pretzels were added on top. 

Explaining that these brownies were Guinness brownies was all most people needed to hear before grabbing one or two. And, the addition of Guinness did bring about a lovely, tender, cakey brownie. The sweet butterscotch fudge frosting and the salty, crunchy pretzels on top were ideal embellishments. The tray of brownies was empty long before the party ended.