Fudgy Flourless Hazelnut Brownies with a Hot Chocolate Fudge Sauce

Week 503, and the apples arriving, the squash at the farm stand, the light turning golden, the kitchen shifting to soups and stews. I am 68 years old and the days have a rhythm now — the morning writing, the afternoon visits to Cedarhurst, the evening cooking, the weekly blog post — and the rhythm is the structure, and the structure is the sanity, and the sanity is required because the rest of it, the losing and the loving and the carrying, requires a sane woman at the helm, and I am sane, mostly, except when I cry in the car in the Cedarhurst parking lot, which is not insanity but its opposite: the specific, targeted release of emotion in a contained space, which is the most rational thing I do all week.

Seder complete; Marvin eats slowly; the story told again. These are the facts of the week, the data points, the things I would put in a report if I were writing a report, which I am not — I am writing a life, and the life includes the facts but is not limited to them, because the life also includes the way the kitchen smells at six in the morning when the coffee is brewing and the challah is rising and the house is quiet and the quiet is both the grief and the peace, simultaneously, and the simultaneous is the condition, the permanent condition of a woman who is 68 and alone and not alone, who is a grandmother and a wife and a writer and a cook and a caregiver and all of these things at once, always at once, braided together like the challah.

I made Passover brisket this week — because it was what the week needed, because the week always needs something and the something is always food, and the food is always the answer, and the answer is always the kitchen, and the kitchen is always mine, and the mine-ness of the kitchen is the one thing that has not changed in sixty-seven years of living, from Sylvia's kitchen on the Grand Concourse to this kitchen in Oceanside where I stand every morning and every evening and many of the hours in between, making the food that is the chain, that is the love, that is the thing I do when I don't know what else to do, which is always, and especially now.

I brought food to Marvin at the usual time. The visit was what visits are now — quiet, steady, the feeding by hand when necessary, the reading aloud always, the holding of the hand that may or may not know it is being held but that is warm and alive and present, which is the definition of love in this particular year: warm and alive and present. He ate what I brought. He received what I gave. The receiving is the relationship. The receiving is the vow. In sickness and in health, in recognition and in forgetting, in the recliner and in the kitchen, the receiving is the marriage, and the marriage continues, one container at a time, one visit at a time, one day at a time, at two o'clock, every day, because the chain does not break.

The brisket was the anchor of the Seder, but the brownies were the close — and a Seder needs a close, needs the thing that tells you the story is told and the meal is complete and you may now sit back in your chair and breathe. I made these flourless hazelnut brownies because Passover asks for flourless and because Marvin has always loved chocolate and because I needed, after the feeding and the reading aloud and the holding of the hand, to make something that felt like celebration, even a quiet one. The fudge sauce I poured warm, the way my mother would have, because warmth is the point, warmth is always the point.

Prep Time: 20 minutes | Cook Time: 30 minutes | Total Time: 50 minutes | Servings: 12

Ingredients

For the brownies:
1 cup hazelnuts, toasted and skins removed
3/4 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup unsalted butter (or dairy-free substitute), melted
3 large eggs
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder, sifted
1/4 teaspoon fine sea salt
4 oz dark chocolate (70% or higher), melted and slightly cooled
For the hot chocolate fudge sauce:
1/2 cup heavy cream (or coconut cream for pareve)
4 oz dark chocolate, finely chopped
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 tablespoon light corn syrup or honey
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
Pinch of sea salt

Instructions

Prepare the pan and oven. Preheat your oven to 350°F. Grease an 8x8-inch baking pan and line it with parchment paper, leaving an overhang on two sides for easy lifting.
Process the hazelnuts. Place the toasted, skinned hazelnuts and 2 tablespoons of the sugar into a food processor. Pulse until the nuts are finely ground but not yet a paste — about 20 short pulses. Set aside.
Mix the batter. In a large bowl, whisk together the melted butter and remaining sugar until combined. Add the eggs one at a time, whisking well after each. Stir in the vanilla extract and the melted dark chocolate.
Fold in dry ingredients. Add the sifted cocoa powder and salt to the chocolate mixture and fold gently until just combined. Fold in the ground hazelnut mixture. The batter will be thick and glossy.
Bake. Pour the batter into the prepared pan and smooth the top with a spatula. Bake for 28 to 32 minutes, until the top is set and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out with moist crumbs (not wet batter). Do not overbake — fudgy is the goal.
Cool the brownies. Let the brownies cool in the pan for at least 15 minutes before lifting out using the parchment overhang. Allow to cool further on a wire rack before cutting into 12 squares.
Make the hot fudge sauce. In a small saucepan over low heat, warm the cream until it just begins to simmer at the edges. Remove from heat and add the chopped chocolate, butter, corn syrup, vanilla, and salt. Let sit for 2 minutes, then stir gently from the center outward until the sauce is smooth, shiny, and fully combined.
Serve. Arrange brownie squares on a platter or individual plates and spoon the warm chocolate fudge sauce generously over the top. Serve immediately while the sauce is hot.

Nutrition (per serving)

Fudgy Flourless Hazelnut Brownies with a Hot Chocolate Fudge Sauce — The Passover Dessert That Carried the Seder Home