Black Bean Brownies

ANGELA VASISHTA // THE FLAT HAT

When I was 13, I visited my maternal grandma in Brazil and my sister had the idea of making brownies. We had been visiting Brazil every summer break since I could remember, and it never occurred to me that brownies weren’t the regular dessert item there that they are in the US. Without a premade mix, young Becca and her sister had to scour the grocery store for ingredients to make them from scratch, and still didn’t find everything we needed. Flash forward to last semester when a friend, who knew I had my own kitchen and an affinity for making weird recipes in it, sent me a recipe for brownies made of black beans. I was excited because it reminded me of my Brazilian brownie failure of 2013, in a country where I eat black beans (and rice) nearly every day but have never successfully made a brownie. Since I haven’t been able to travel to see half of my family in over a year now, I have been hit with major emotion; saudade is what they would call it. I miss Brazil, so I made black bean brownies.

Ingredients (makes approximately 32 brownies):

• ⅛ cup honey

• ⅛ cup stevia

• ¼ cup sugar

• ¼ cup cocoa powder

• 2 eggs

• 1 tsp vanilla

• ⅓ stick melted butter

• ¼ tsp salt

• ½ tsp baking powder

• 1 15 oz can drained rinsed black beans

• Chocolate chips

Instructions: 

1. Mash/blend beans into paste. I did this using a potato masher but any method should work.

2. Mix all the ingredients into a bowl.

3. Pour batter into a sheet and bake at 350°F for 25 minutes, add time until you can insert a toothpick and pull it out with a couple crumbles on it.
   

   I wasn’t sure what to expect with this recipe — making a dessert out of beans sounds like something I would do to follow up the Botetourt Squat’s Mountain Dew and Nacho Cheese Doritos cupcakes recipe. This was not that, I made good, gooey brownies. My housemate even gave them a thumbs up of approval. Would I make these again? Yes. I love brownies and it was honestly quite a simple recipe. I probably am going to make them again because I bought an extra can of beans so now I can perfect the recipe to my personal taste.