One of the first recipes I ever posted here was a brownie recipe. It is still a good recipe, but later I made a few tweeks and posted a better brownie recipe. Since going dairy free I have played with that recipe and ended up with one that everyone in my family thinks is the best brownie recipe.
Let me warn you. These brownies are not healthy. They contain worthless flours, lots of sugar, and plenty of calories. I consider them a treat.
But they sure do taste good. My husband recently requested them for his birthday instead of birthday cake. If you are looking for a special treat, you are bound to love these. Just don’t make them every day.
The adjustments I made for this version are quite simple. First, I used Earth Balance buttery sticks in place of butter. Second, I used a starchier flour mix which yields a brownie that is more fudgy and less cakey.
Feel free to play with the starches you use. I had to come up with measurements that work for a recipe, but I have successfully made it with part corn starch as well as more potato starch and only a little tapioca starch. If you like using arrowroot, that would probably work well too.
The Best Gluten-Free Brownies
- 3/4 c. Earth Balance Buttery Sticks (or butter)
- 1/2 c. cocoa powder
- 3/4 c. white sugar
- 1 c. brown sugar
- 3-4 eggs (4 makes them a little more cake like)
- 2 tsp. vanilla
- 1/2 c. rice flour
- 1/2 c. potato starch
- 1/3 c. tapioca starch
- 1/2 tsp. baking powder
- 1/4 tsp. baking soda
- 1/4 tsp. salt
- 1 tsp. xanthan gum
- 1 c. chocolate chips (I used a dairy free brand)
Preheat the oven to 350°. Grease and rice flour a 9 x 13 inch baking pan.
In a large sauce pan, stir the butter and cocoa over low heat until melted. Remove from heat and, using a wooden spoon or stiff spatula, add the sugars. Stir in the vanilla. Add the eggs one at a time, beating after each addition.
In a separate bowl, combine the rice flour, potato starch, tapioca starch, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and xanthan gum. Add this to the sauce pan and stir until all the flour is moistened. Stir in half the chocolate chips.
Spread the batter into the pan. Sprinkle the rest of the chocolate chips on top. Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes. Cool. These brownies cut best with a plastic knife.
Fantastic looking brownies, Linda! Nothing wrong with a recipe for brownies not being healthy, especially when they are birthday brownies. Birthday brownies are always calorie free.
I love the addition of chocolate chips! Can’t wait to try them out!
I bet all the eggs and brown sugar add to the fudgy goodness, too. The best brownies are always worth a splurge!
Shirley
Yum those look delicious. Would they work with a cream cheese swirl? I love creamcheese swirls
Earth Balance is soooo pricey especially when you need alot for a recipe. Although not as healthy, I think Nucoa margarine might work as a lower cost substitute for butter.
I use Fleishmens Salt Free it’s dariy free and only about $2.50 for a pound. (4 sticks)
Moe
Nucoa is about half that price
I had never heard of Nucoa so I had to look it up. Apparently it’s only available regionally–California, Arizona, and Nevada mostly. Thanks for the information.
Yum! Personally, I throw all “healthy” rules for baking out the window when it comes to birthdays!
Can you make these without the chocolate chips?
Sure. They will still be good without the chocolate chips.
Mmm…my goodness, Linda, they do look awesome. Eat one for me!
Yum!! My family would love these. Fantastic that they are gluten and dairy free. The only tweaking I will have to do is substitute the eggs.
Yeah a recipe to give me a break from using GF Pantry Brownies @ almost $5.00 a box! Here is a suggestion that I am going to try with this mixture. On accident when I made my last pan of GF Pantry Brownies I forgot the stick of butter they called for. I melted it as told to do but…got lost in the smell of eggs & 3 medium bananas mixing in my kitchenaid and just put in the mix. The bananas made the batter a bit thinner than normal but obviously I didn’t notice – plus they wanted it to go into a 9×9 pan and all I have is 8×8. They came out wonderfully (I want to say they took about 5min. longer to cook), bit different than my non-gf banana brownies but never the less they were gone in a few days. I’m wondering how organic apple sauce would work in place of the butter? Only 5wks into the gf cooking but I wonder how some of the non-gf cooking tricks work with gf-cooking.