These brownies are so decadent and delicious. I had a hard time just naming them “Mama Rita’s Brownies” because they sort of need a name like Mama Rita’s Off-The-Charts Brownies, or Mama Rita’s Crack Brownies or Mama Rita’s Talk-to-Me Brownies… but you get the idea. Might be a bit hard to google down the road, so I just left it alone. ANYWAY, these are the brownies to make when you want something special, but have no more than 10 minutes to pull it together. Mama Rita, if you didn’t know, is my mama, and anything that comes out of her kitchen is worth a blog post, really. This is the only brownie recipe for me, and so after a solid 12 years of baking these, I realized this recipe had to be shared.

A dear old friend from the Lone Star State just spent the weekend with us, and he’s got a thing for chocolate too. Rather than slaving away in the kitchen, I prefer to cook food that still allows me time to hang out and catch up. So, this was an easy thing to mix together right after dinner, and fun to serve the guys as we all put our feet up and sat down to watch Sons of Liberty. An all American show and an all American dessert!

Mama Rita’s Brownies

recipe by Rita Salazar Dickerson

Note: the extra dark chocolate and the nuts sprinkled over the top are completely optional, and sometimes I even put the nuts on just one side to give everyone their favorite nut-free or nut-full brownie. So, do what you want! Makes 9 brownies, or feel free to do this in a 9″x13″ baking pan if you want to feed more mouths…they will just be half as thick (so a bit anti-climactic for me) and you’ll need to pull them from the oven after about 25 minutes.

Ingredients:

• 3/4 c butter, melted
• 1/4 c regular olive oil
• 3/4 c baking cocoa powder (I like to use an organic, fairly traded cocoa)
• 1 and 1/2 c sugar
• 3 eggs
• 1 tsp. vanilla
• 1 big pinch of salt (or 1/4 tsp if you want to be nit-picky or need a visual)
• 1 c flour
• 1/2 (or so) chopped dark chocolate or chocolate chips
• 1/2 c (or so) chopped pecans

Preparation:

1. Preheat oven to 350ºF.
2. Butter an 8″x8″ baking pan.
3. In a mixing bowl, combine melted butter with oil and cocoa.
4. Whisk in eggs, sugar, vanilla, and a pinch of salt.
5. Stir in flour with a wooden spoon and mix well.
6. Pour into baking pan, using a rubber spatula to spread evenly.
7. Sprinkle the chocolate and nuts over the top.
8. Bake for about 35 minutes or so, until a toothpick comes out clean (but it may have a couple moist bits on it, which is a good thing).
9. Allow to cool and cut into squares before serving (or just throw that thought out the window and eat them piping hot with a fork…they won’t be firm brownies until cooled, but sometimes, a hot brownie is the way to go!).