Coconut Spice Harvest Brownies

[11/15/09 Update: This picture was featured on Healthy Yum's Cinnamon Challenge.  Cool.]

You know how it is.  First you’re hanging out on Twitter and getting huffy because of the people maligning those who add pumpkin to everything.

And then you check your voicemail and one of your neighbors requests that you bring brownies to a celebration of Diwali that night.  Before you know it you’re in the kitchen muttering about why on earth wouldn’t you add pumpkin to everything you bake since your crazy children invent new vegetables daily just so they can declare that they don’t like them and what are you supposed to do – let them get the vitamin A version of scurvy or something?

All the while you throw together something that you hope will be appropriate and vindicatingly delicious.  Which they in fact were.

Coconut Harvest Spice Brownies
16 – 24 brownies, depending on how you cut them

Preheat oven to 350.  Grease an 8 x 8 pan well.  The Joy of Cooking has some mishegas about lining with foil, but why line with foil?

In a saucepan over medium-low heat, melt:

• 4 oz. dark chocolate, coarsely chopped
• 3 T. butter
• 3 T. olive oil

Set aside to cool completely, then stir in:

• 1 1/2 c. sugar
• 2 t. vanilla

Add one at a time:

• 4 large eggs,

then:

• 1/2 c. pumpkin puree
• 1/2 c. apple butter or applesauce

Combine in a small bowl, then add to egg-sugar mixture and stir until just combined:

• 1 c. whole wheat pastry flour
• 1/2 t. ground cardamom
• 1/4 t. ground cinnamon
• 1/4 t. ground dried orange peel
• 1 cup shredded coconut

Scrape batter into prepared pan and spread to the edges.  Bake until center is firm, but batter is still a bit moist, about 25 minutes.  Remove to a rack and let cool before cutting into bars.

Tags: coconut brownies, diwali